Friday 5 May 2017

The Need for a New British Political Party

Compelling people to do something that elites believe is good for them, such as compulsory voting, is a bad idea. It reflects Polly Toynbee's despair of those who 'ought' to vote Labour or for 'progressives' not doing so. Better would be a grassroots organisation agitating for a reform of the British Parliament from below and for a new voting system.

The rise of a new Reform Movement to make Parliament more accountable and give voters a real choice is long overdue. May's government is going to become more like an oligarchy entrenched in Parliament, protected by a pliant unfree media and a sinister surveillance and authoritarian national security state that spies on dissenters.

As always Britain would probably copy any move towards greater authoritarianism under President Trump. The free media, whistleblowers and organised opposition to the growing prevalence one party government-as-state is going to be quite possible in Britain as Brexit proceeds and opponents are branded as 'saboteurs' .

There is no reason why Brexit has to mean a diminishment of Britain's long standing democracy and rule of law beneath the claims of national expediency and protecting the national interest from enemies within and without. But the way in which it is proceeding could well provide the pretext for a sinister power putsch.

Eventually, "Remoaners" and 'progressives' are going to have to accept that even if Brexit is irreversible, there needs to be a way of ensuring withdrawal from the EU does not mean the creation of a new UK state that is far more authoritarian that both the one that existed under the EU period and even prior to entry in 1973.

The scale of the potential destruction of Corbyn's Labour could mean, should Momentum and other retain control over it, that it will fragment and split. The strange death of the Labour Party could be matched by a New Liberal Alliance as the main opposition party as the historical raison d'etre of Labour is rapidly vanishing.

May has repositioned the Tories as a new National British party, poised to snatch seats in South Wales and Scotland even. The idea of 'Brexit in peril' could be used to shore up the support for the Tories should political and economic volatility increase as the EU fragments and disintegrates and tensions and conflicts arise.

In such circumstances, the need would be for a new opposition party developed from below by grassroots activism and committed to preserving Britain's traditions of liberty and the rule of law and to agitate for a proper representative democracy and laws to reform corrupt media and the stranglehold of business cartels.

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