1 July 2019 | OPINION

Brexit. Gets boring, doesn’t it? We could be talking about healthcare, schools, infrastructure, the climate, homelessness or just about any other subject we expect our political class to be fixing while the working people who dig our roads, maintain our railways, staff our hospitals and enrich our country’s economy carry on. But no, for the last 3 years they’ve had to endure watching our political establishment argue amongst themselves, fight, throw milkshake and jab at their colleagues with their harsh comments on social media, because since 2016 a large group of politicians and their lobbyists have been throwing tantrums over Brexit.

Meanwhile, in Sadiq Khan’s Labour London we have a knife crime epidemic, acid being thrown over people and an ineffective Metropolitan Police Service under Cressida Dick, unable to control the streets at night. Instead of cracking on and getting the job done, Khan is far too busy worrying about the President of the United States and trying to stop Brexit.

The latest target for the Remain establishment is Boris Johnson: the biggest threat to their gravy train since Farage announced he was back. It was all going well until Theresa May couldn’t pass her Appeasement Bill and hand her (and our) £39 billion over for upsetting Brussels with our outspoken British democracy. It’s now ‘all weapons fire’ on Boris.

But does that not tell you something? He’s a threat. A threat to their control and a threat to their power. Underneath the mumbling, bumbling Boris is a finely-tuned machine who saw two terms as Mayor of London, bringing the city to much of the success it has seen this century.

The Remain establishment is furious with Boris and his commitment to remove Britain from the failing EU. If the Remain MPs try to thwart Boris’ Brexit plans, they will inevitably welcome the Brexit Party into the Houses of Parliament, which is likely why they’re less worried about Jeremy Hunt. Jeremy is Theresa May 2.0 and will happily sign Britain into being a Vassal State under the authority of the EU. If you support becoming part of a federal Europe, you should vote for him.

For Brexiteers across the nation, Boris is a crucial part of the broader Brexit process. This is not a General Election and it’s essential to get a Brexiteer into Number 10. Along with Farage and Widdecombe, two prominent characters expected to take the stage in the European Parliament soon, getting Boris Johnson from Vote Leave into Number 10 puts Britain in a secure and capable Brexit position.

The choice is clear: we either have Jeremy Hunt continue the work of Theresa May and Olly Robbins to derail the Brexit process and drag it on into 2020, or we take a Boris bus on the route to free trade with the whole world, investment in our infrastructure and positioning Britain to become a world leader in the Digital Age.

25 June 2019 | OPINION

They say you can never make the same mistake twice because the second time it’s not a mistake, it’s a choice. In this regard, Theresa May’s negotiations for a Brexit deal with the European Union were always likely to fail.

Following in the footsteps of Harold Wilson forty years previously, as part of his pledge to hold an in/out referendum, David Cameron promised to renegotiate Britain’s relationship with the EU. Nonetheless, what worked in 1975 did not work in 2016. Cameron claimed in 2014 that “the EU is not working and we will change it”. He claimed the EU was open to reform and he could gain significant changes to freedom of movement, something that has heavily contributed to British Euroscepticism. The fact is, as members of the EU, we cannot have full control over our borders. However, the changes he did come away from Brussels with were completely different. They included minor changes, such as an emergency brake on immigration and an opt out from ever-closer union.

Now, in this situation, Cameron had two choices. He could walk away and campaign to leave the EU or he could try and pull the wool over voters’ eyes and campaign to remain. He chose the latter, but rather than take a less prolific stance in the referendum campaign as Wilson had done in 1975, he decided to put himself front and centre, doing his best to make the sack of proverbial coal given to him by Brussels look like diamonds. His gamble backfired spectacularly and this was a classic case of a politician overpromising and underdelivering.

Which brings us to Theresa May. Having just seen her predecessor’s gamble of trying to sell a lemon to the British people and losing, she should have realised that a tougher line with the EU was required and preparations should have been made to make walking away without an agreement a viable option. Ironically, the more you prepare to walk away the less likely it is to happen. In reality Brussels saw straight through her unwillingness to contemplate it and knew that whatever they proposed, the Prime Minister would eventually accept.

Many of the candidates in the initial Tory leadership contest appeared not to have heeded these warnings. According to the great Albert Einstein, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. Yet Rory Stewart believed, as though he were in some sort of parallel universe, that Theresa May’s deal as it stands can still pass through Parliament. Jeremy Hunt, perhaps equally as delusional, believes he can persuade Europe to renegotiate the Withdrawal Agreement, despite his unwillingness to commit to Brexit by 31^st October.

Of course, Parliament could still block any future Tory leader from enacting a WTO Brexit, with the most likely procedure being a vote of no confidence in the government. It appears there are the required number of hard-line Tory Remainers for such a vote to succeed and there have even been reports of Theresa May being one such Remainer (all but proving Brexiteer assertions that her heart was never in it). But these potential defectors need only ask themselves which they value more: upholding democracy or potentially unleashing a left-wing Socialist government on Britain with Brexit still undelivered?

What this leadership contest has highlighted so starkly is how many Cabinet Members, Amber Rudd, David Gauke and Rory Stewart to name a few, have fundamentally disagreed with the key part of the manifesto they stood on in 2017. When push comes to shove, for them, ‘no Brexit is better than no deal’. If nothing else, this in a nutshell demonstrates why Theresa May’s government was doomed to failure.

Piers Morgan, when he appeared on a question time panel in 2016, summed up David Cameron’s failed renegotiation of our relationship with Europe before the referendum thus: Cameron is the kind of guy who goes into the first shop and says ”I love all your carpets. And, by the way, I’m not leaving until you’ve screwed me over”. The Conservative Party has now had two consecutive Prime Ministers who have been insincere and economical with the truth when it comes to their negotiations with Brussels (‘no deal is better than a bad deal’, anyone?). Whoever they elect as leader must make sure they do not make the same mistake a third time, or the party will face electoral annihilation. Nonetheless, they are one major Boris gaffe away from Theresa May Mark II becoming PM, so I wouldn’t bet my life on it.

24 June 2019 | OPINION

We hear a lot about ‘one-nation’. Whether it comes from Rory Stewart, Boris Johnson, or even Ed Miliband back in 2012. In these divisive times, creating one-nation may be a furlong hope when it comes to Brexit, as a culture war rages on a daily basis. However, when it comes to sport, there is no more powerful weapon that sweeps differences aside and brings people together.

Watching a Sky News report on Polo at the Royal Windsor Cup, wouldn’t usually grab my attention. But this year, two youth polo teams based in South London were invited to play during the event. These youth teams weren’t just your stereotypical upper class polo players, instead they were from council estates in Brixton. Some of them were former gang members whose friends had been murdered. Watching this report was truly inspirational as I witnessed people from completely different worlds play sport together and show that we all have common ground. This, to me, is what Benjamin Disraeli’s one-nation is all about. 

Looking back, I’ve seen a one-nation ethos in sport so many times throughout my life. I have been playing football since I was in primary school and every week, I see so much more camaraderie than I do ill-will. I remember when I was working in Sheffield back in 2013, my colleagues and I were in a park having a kickabout. Five or six students were playing next to us so we asked them if they wanted a match. They said yes, so we set up goals and started playing.

10 minutes later, three Chinese people (with Neymar haircuts!) were walking past and they asked us if they could play. We, of course, said yes. After another period of play, a couple of what turned out to be Ghanaian students were cycling past. They asked if they could join in and, amazingly, this melting pot of different people now meant it was 11-a-side. We mixed the teams and had a great time. That was the power of football to create one-nation.

What’s fantastic about football or even rugby, is all you really need to get going is a ball (and hopefully a few friends). Football in particular has inspired working classes for generations, but having worked with hundreds of children in care over the last few years, it is worrying how little interest there is in football – or any other sport. There are many plausible explanations for this. In many cases, parents haven’t encouraged their children to get involved in sport. If the child didn’t have to go to school when living at home, they wouldn’t have had the opportunity to get involved. And of course, we must not forget, with video games more popular than ever, there is a major issue of millions of children being isolated in their room all day.

There is so much going on in sport which is truly inspirational. From the Paralympians’ extraordinary achievements now gaining the recognition they deserve, to women’s football being more popular than ever. But if the Conservatives are to be the party of opportunity, we need to be leading a national campaign to support charities, schools and the private sector in engaging our young people in sport. This is surely one agenda where we can all come together, as one-nation.

Paul Maginnis is the author of The Return of Meritocracy: Conservative Ideas for Unlocking Social Mobility. You can follow him on Twitter @PaulMaginnis1.

19 June 2019 | OPINION

The view that has constrained free markets, and free societies, for so long

For any true supporter of freedom, choice must surely be the most sacred of doctrines.  It underpins every principle that holds free markets together, and we know that free markets and free societies create and support one another.  As Milton Friedman noted: “A society that puts equality before freedom will get neither. A society that puts freedom before equality will get a high degree of both.”

We know that when we give people both the means to succeed, and the hope to do so, they tend to grasp them with fervour.  We do this best by giving them true choices, encouraging them to be arbiters of their own destiny.  But while Adam Smith did remark upon the ‘self-interest’ of “the butcher, the brewer or the baker” – and not without some wisdom – to my mind this is in fact what also brings us together in unity.  Because we share a common purpose, we share a common understanding along with a common morality, and these things form part of the glue that binds a society together.

That morality is not, as critics might suggest, a form of greed; rather, we merely acknowledge our own self-interest and, in doing so, we tame and tailor it to help support our society by contributing to it in the best ways we can – because we choose to.  What we get back from that should mirror what we put in.

It is for this reason that I believe Brexit will rejuvenate that spirit once again within these islands.  The European Union, at least in its upper echelons, has a fundamental culture problem with both Unity and Choice, in that it understands neither.  The main trouble with the level of homogeneity behind the principle of ‘ever closer union’ is that it implies two things: –

1) ‘Unity by uniformity’ – how can we fail to be united if we are all the same?

2) ‘Unity by necessity’ – the EU is essential to all our economies, so how could anyone ever leave?

But neither of these principles can lead to true unity.  Unity means mutual collaboration, in the face of difference and diversity, through choice.  There must be a genuine choice as to whether to unite with others in a common purpose.  The only tool the EU seems able to wield to manage diversity, however, is to eliminate it.  The only way it feels it can hold its members together is to withhold from them a number of very real choices about their future as a nation – as the German Chancellor is rumoured to have all but confirmed at an event for the Konrad Adenauer Foundation in November 2018[1].

That is not Union – that is Dominion.  It is also the way in which very corrupt people have always come to power, and retained it, throughout the ages – at least when they could not do so by the sword.  Once, in Europe, it was said that “all roads lead to Rome”.  Now, it would seem, “all roads lead to Brussels”.  There has been a certain sense of inevitability about it, which fuelled the genuine culture shock felt by many people, both in this country and abroad, when Britain rejected that dogma – for a dogma it is.

During the 2016 referendum campaign, people up and down the country were asking themselves many important questions, stemming from the perceived key issues of choice and control over our own lives.  In the debate this became: “what will it mean for our lives if we stay?” and “what will it mean if we go?”  But for me, as the campaign wore on, it became clear that the real nub of the matter was in fact something far more fundamental, and inextricably connected to the nature of choice: “what does it mean if we can’t leave the European Union?”

We were certainly told by enough people that we couldn’t – from the government, to the banks, to the majority of economists and academics who came scurrying out of the woodwork.  True, the message was framed as ‘shouldn’t’, but in fact the meaning behind it all was quite clear.  Even the former President of the United States was wheeled out to warn us that free trade with a sovereign, independent Britain was of little interest to his country (a notion that his successor, whatever else you may think of him, has since emphatically denied).

There could be no viable alternative to remaining within this political and economic union that would not devastate our country, we were told.  What all these negative campaigners did not appear to comprehend was that they were attempting to deny the British public the very soul of choice: each option presented must be genuine, and all opinions in the debate must be respected.

To put it in free market terms, the European Union has claimed a monopoly over the notions of unity and progress.  It dominates that ‘market’ within Europe, denying free choice to those who might seek it in different ways.  In an economic sense, it lauds the Single Market it has created as its crowning achievement, but alas this is indeed the ‘single’ market that its members are allowed to trade in freely, unless 27 other countries can collectively agree a deal with another.

In a political sense, it has established a supreme role for its legislature and its courts above those of whom it claims to unite, while convincing countless millions that only this approach can guarantee their ‘rights’.  And it has done these things for the same basic reason underpinning all monopolies: to protect itself from choices that might lead to competition, while simultaneously claiming to promote them.  As the protagonist in the Matrix film series finally realises about the system designed to constrain and control him: “the problem is choice”.

At its heart, this is a question of power, but not so much in the legislative or judicial sense: rather, it is the power over hearts and minds.  This is the power that has caused millions to believe the European Union is vital to their values and their way of life.  It is the power that led so many citizens of a highly developed, first-world society to believe they needed to be ‘saved’ from their own government by political structures set up beyond our borders.  It is the power that caused Gina Miller to feel ‘physically sick’ – or so she said – at the referendum result.  And it is the power that inspired Steve Bray to put his entire professional life on hold to campaign tirelessly against the legitimate result of the largest democratic exercise in British history.

Now that, dear reader, is true power.  It is also why the question of just how ‘democratic’ the EU’s political structures are is utterly irrelevant.  By all accounts, there is plenty to say about that too – an elected Parliament that can merely amend legislation proposed by an appointed Commission would arguably resemble our system of the Commons and the Lords turned on its head – but I must admit, when I am asked about how democratic the EU is, I tend to reply: “that hardly matters”.

I suggest that those who wrangle interminably about whether or not the EU’s decision-making processes are founded upon democratic principles are rather missing the point.  When you wield the kind of power that causes hundreds of millions to believe you are “the Way, the Truth and the Life” [John 14:6], then you have truly forged for yourself a Monopoly of the Spirit.  From a Christian perspective, this may well be appropriate for God, but nothing of mankind born should hold such great sway over hearts and minds, for this denies us alternatives.  Such a worldview can only invite hegemony, as indeed we have seen with the European Union.

All of this must surely run counter to the instincts and intuitions of anyone who supports free markets, but opposes sprawling monopolies.  Markets have been dominated before by great entities that were deemed ‘too big to fail’, although history shows us that did not always save them in the end.  But certainly during those periods of dominance, it was the consumers – perhaps, in this case, we might call them ‘citizens’ – who suffered the most.

With Brexit, we would seek to send a message, not just to our own country, nor even to the rest of Europe, but in fact to the entire world: “there is another way”.  We must not allow the core values that we say we all share – peace, freedom, democracy – to become monopolised by any single player in that ‘market’.  Nor should we allow ourselves to believe that the great abuses of the last century – hatred, warfare, empire-building – can only be prevented in the future through membership of a political union that seeks ever greater dominance in all affairs.

For that would make a caricature of the progress that all of humanity has made since the Second World War.  We must demonstrate instead that peace and prosperity arise from human choice; that mutual collaboration must be a genuine choice; and that a stronger whole is brought about through embracing and overcoming enduring differences, which the principle of ‘ever closer union’ does not really allow for.  Above all, we must show the world that these choices can be made without leading to ‘political suicide’ or ‘economic collapse’. Brexit will be the first – and by no means the last – step on that long journey.

To put it somewhat poetically, Britain has a long history of writing its own future.  It has shaped that narrative down the centuries through its own choices as a nation.  I would prefer to live in a world where the choices around free trade, migration and sovereignty in the ‘market’ of any given nation state are made democratically by its ‘consumers’ – its own citizens.  The combined decades of successful application of free market principles in countries around the globe have taught us that this is the best way to achieve peace and prosperity for all.  For that, there must be a unity of purpose that is freely entered into.  And for that, there must be choice.

[1] https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/1048913/brexit-news-angela-merkel-germany-eu-sovereignty-uk