The Independent Group shows how all three main parties are narrowing their appeal

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Like many Lib Dems, I was underwhelmed by the formation of The Independent Group (TIG) of 11 defectors last week from both the Labour and Conservative parties. It had been a long time coming, and its members are undistinguished, except for the Conservative Sarah Wollaston and perhaps Labour’s Chuka Umunna. But now I am less sure.

This group isn’t the answer to British politics’ need for fresh ideas. But on reflection it poses challenging questions, and it already seems to have had some effect on the leaderships of both parties. For Labour, from which eight of the 11 come (plus a further defector, not part of the grouping), it challenges the party’s attitude to Brexit, and the way the party is now run.

Labour has been doing some determined fence-sitting on the issue that troubles Britons most. The leadership hopes that opportunities will arise out of the crisis, rather than doing anything to shape it. To their mind the acquisition of political power matters more, and the battle against “austerity”. And yet during the 2017 election, and especially in the part of London where I live, they courted votes on the basis that they would resist Brexit. Until these defections, and the threat of more, the leadership appeared not to care. Now they have been persuaded that a referendum of some sort should be held, if, as will surely be the case, the leadership’s favoured soft version of Brexit does not come about. This looks like too little, too late, but it is progress.

Admittedly this is a politically tricky area. Many of the party’s working class voters outside London support Brexit and would view a referendum as a betrayal. Still, if the party aspires to govern, it has to show more clarity on the issues people care about. And for most people that isn’t “austerity”.

The questions about how the party is run go deeper. It has been taken over by an ideological hardcore who speak only for a minority of voters. They are preparing to de-select MPs they feel are disloyal, and hounding them in the meantime. There has been a disturbing antisemitic edge to this. The antisemitism is by no means universal (I don’t think there’s much sign of it here in Wandsworth), and it is being played up by those not sympathetic to the party leadership – and yet many in the party say that the leadership doesn’t understand it, and is happy to let it go on. The attitudes of many Labour activists to the defections remind me of the sort of extremism that caused me to become involved with politic in the 1970s and 1980s. It is typical that such activists will say anything to voters in an election to shift them to their candidate (such as that it is the best way to stop Brexit – which is what they were saying here), and then to claim that all those votes were an endorsement of a manifesto that very few people actually read.

For Conservatives TIG also raises questions about Brexit and what the party is becoming. The party leadership has decided to own Brexit, and sees it mission to implement it regardless of what the public think. At least that isn’t sitting on the fence. But it means that the party is ceasing to be be the broad church of business-friendly middle classes that it used to be. What is left is a diminishing band of socially conservative older people, and an ideological fringe of libertarians, led by a Prime Minister with a deep bunker mentality.

And so a huge gap is opening up in the centre ground of British politics. A two party system, such as Britain’s in most of the country, works best when the principal parties are broad churches competing for overlapping spectra of the the public at large. The more ideological fringes provide edge and challenge, while the centre ground injects common sense and pragmatism. When the parties turn in on themselves, as both are now, and become ideological, most voters are left stranded.

But the establishment of TIG poses a huge question for the third of the main established parties: the Liberal Democrats. In spite of being liberal and broadly centrist, the TIGers haven’t given the Lib Dems more than a moment’s thought. The Lib Dem brand is weak and the party has been unable to exploit the gap at the centre of British politics. The party has seen its poll share creep up to 10%, but when offered the alternative of TIG, that share drops sharply.

Why are the Lib Dems so weak? The contradictions in the Lib Dem brand were exposed cruelly by its coalition with the Conservatives in 2010 to 2015. Before then its leaders thought that the party’s main weakness stemmed from the fact that the media paid the party little attention, and that it had little practical influence. The coalition solved both of these problems, but Labour inclined supporters saw it as betrayal, and then Conservative inclined ones saw the party as too weak to stop Labour.

It is now popular amongst Lib Dem activists to suggest that the real problem was a failure to sustain a “core vote” of cosmopolitan, liberal supporters, and that the party should rectify this by developing a more ideologically coherent programme. The party has been following that advice, with a clear focus on opposing Brexit, which unites such liberal types (whether the EU is in fact such a liberal institution is a topic for another day). This seems to have left the party fishing for voters in too small a pool. Perhaps it is making the same mistake as the other parties in being too ideological. Indeed many activists dislike the idea that the party should be chasing the centre ground, and look down on the TIGers.

Still, the Lib Dems have a lot of things that TIG do not: a party machine, councillors, activists, a history, and even a sense of mission. There is an opportunity for the party here, but it needs to ask how it can broaden its appeal beyond a small band of middle class cosmopolitans.

There is no single answer to that question. New leadership will clearly help. But, if they are to become a success in the British political system the Lib Dems will have to become a broader church. This sits uneasily with the wish of many activists to focus on a core vote, and to be ideologically more coherent. But this isn’t either/or: politics is not an easy business. Has-beens and Blairites the TIGers may be, but until the the Lib Dems can absorb such as these, among others, they will not make progress.

Will Brexit be delayed?

Back in January I placed my first political bet: on Brexit happening on the due date of 29 March 2019. The odds had slipped to 5:1 against and I thought the combined chances of the government squeaking through a deal by then, or failing miserably and Britain crashing out on that date, were higher than that. Since then, the market has moved somewhat towards my view, and I have laid the bet at a modest profit. But what really are the chances?

I placed my bet just after the government’s first massive defeat on the “meaningful vote”, after which there have been two developments. First the government cobbled together an unstable majority for a deal without the Irish backstop. Second there have been moves towards a compromise with the Labour Party based on a customs union. It is hard to know what to make of either development. The Irish backstop is not going away, but winning the vote has allowed the government to press on based on Conservative and DUP votes, together with a few opposition MPs. It is hard to see this holding together, since anything the EU will offer will look like a climbdown for the hardliners, who don’t seem all that bothered by the thought of the UK crashing out without a deal. That was confirmed last week when the government lost on its fudged interim motion.

And Labour’s move? Well this does look like a bit of leadership at last from its leader, Jeremy Corbyn. It could be the first stages of a bold move to secure a soft-Brexit deal, based on Labour, Conservative and maybe even DUP and SNP votes. But if the Prime Minister, Theresa May, pressed ahead on this, it really would be a Robert Peel moment that would shatter the Conservative Party. Peel did so in the 1840s by opposing the Corn Laws, a particularly egregious piece of law, which was designed to keep landowners in the money at the expense of everybody else, including Irish peasants starving as a result of potato blight. That some Tories, like Jacob Rees-Mogg view the episode (i.e. Peel’s splitting of the Tories) as a national disaster makes my blood run cold. But I think if Mrs May had the character to do a Peel (as I suggested she might last year) we’d have seen more sign of it by now. Besides there is the question about how serious Mr Corbyn is in executing such a brave move. Cynics suggest he was making an offer he knew the government could not accept.

All of which suggests that we are hurtling towards 29th March and a crash out. Or at best massive confusion as the government will be unable to enact the necessary legislation for deal if it succeeds at the 11th hour.

It seems clear that the only way to avoid a no-deal Brexit on 29 March is to postpone the exit date. This comes in two flavours. One is a three month delay – just enough to avoid Britain having to take part in European parliamentary elections, though probably too late for the EU to redistribute the country’s seats. The other is a long one, of twelve months, which would mean Britain having to join those Euro elections.

Why go for the shorter delay? If the government actually has managed to get a deal through parliament, then it gives them time to enact it. It would also give the country a chance to have a general election, if the government wants. It does seem to be preparing for an election, but perhaps only to keep the option on the table: it is hard to see what the party would gain, though Labour’s growing disarray may tempt them. (This disarray was added to yesterday by the resignation of seven MPs – though this is a tremor rather than an earthquake and I’m not getting excited about it yet). And it would allow both sides a bit better prepared for a no-deal crash. One thing does seem clear though: it isn’t enough time to forge and enact a new deal. Why would the EU side agree? Only to be better prepared for the crash when it comes – which might be enough.

So why go for a longer delay? This gives Britain the chance to take a deep breath and have another go, under a new leader. If Mrs May conceded this, she would doubtless resign, so much has she staked on 29 March. We would have time to replace the Conservative leader, have an election, and perhaps even have a referendum. There would, of course, be an incandescent reaction from Brexit supporters. These comprise at least a third of the population, and views amongst this third seem to hardening – with no-deal a popular option. Perhaps they would channel their anger by trying to get an extremist as the new Tory leader.

It is possible that the EU side will offer the UK a 12 month postponement and nothing shorter. If so Mrs May would have to choose between no-deal and an admission of complete failure: caught by her own brinkmanship. And who knows what she would do then?

The Euro at 20. Why is it so popular?

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It is 20 years since the most ambitious European integration project came into effect: the common currency, known as the Euro. Europhiles (and I am one) would do well to understand the successes and failures of this project, as they pose important challenges to the future of European integration.

British Europhiles, of course, have a wonderful way to distract themselves from such searching questions: Brexit. Most will admit that there are problems, and that changes need to be made, but then they swiftly move on to talk about the latest nonsense put about by supporters of Britain’s exit from the EU. But what happens when Britain eventually does leave? Or what happens if, against the odds, Brexit is stopped? The political initiative will swiftly move back to the Brexiteers, and they will pose hard questions about the way the EU works. Questions to which few Europhiles have convincing answers. We rightly accuse Eurosceptics (most of them) of harking back to a fictitious golden age. But Europhiles are becoming as bad: the years before the 2016 referendum are acquiring a rose-tinted glow. We should be able to do better than that.

Which is why we need to think about the Euro. It is central to the whole European project. Britain opted out: but that was an early sign the country’s fatally semi-detached status within the union. If Britain leaves and then wants to come back in, it is unlikely that the EU will let us opt out again. It will be a test of how serious we are.

And it is likely to still be there in the 20 or 30 years time when Britain might be ready to consider re-entry. One of the most important things we have learnt from the currency’s first 20 years is that it is a survivor. Anglo-Saxon economists have sneered at the Euro from when it was first mooted. First they said it would never happen, nearly up to the day that it did. Then they said it would fall apart: this reached a crescendo after the Greek crisis in 2010, when one after another fringe zone economy got into trouble. And yet not a single country has dropped out. We need to understand why it has proved so robust, especially when in almost every other way the currency has been a disappointment.

It is, of course, technically very difficult for a country to leave the common currency. You have to develop a brand new replacement currency. Difficult, but far from impossible; plenty of people have thought about it, and come up with various approaches. Countries could do it if there was the political will. But there isn’t, not even in Greece. The hard fact is that the common currency is popular amongst ordinary working people. Polls show that this popularity fluctuates (it is on a bit of a high right now), and it can be a bit of a political scapegoat. Populist politicians in both France and Italy have complained about it (with the full support of those Anglo-Saxon economists), but the closer they get to actual action the more their courage fails. Marine Le Pen in France has had to backtrack; those Italian leaders in the League and Five Star Movement are likely to make the same journey.

It’s not hard to see why. To ruling elites and economists a currency is a means to an end, rather than something in itself. They tend to have a “use it or lose it” attitude to it, and think a little bit of inflation is a jolly good thing. Nothing illustrates the patronising attitude of these elites towards the majority of those they serve better. To most people the currency is a sacred bond of trust between the state and the citizen. Since time immemorial, when kings used to put copper in gold coins to pay for wars and their own high living, this gap between the perceptions of the elite and working people has created resentment by the ruled of those than govern them. For most Europeans, especially those in weaker economies, the Euro is a much more secure store of value than any local currency that would replace it. Especially since the entire purpose of those populist politicians in ditching the currency is so that they can devalue it, and secure the supposed wider economic benefits that would flow from that. And for those that borrow money rather than save it, the interest rates for the Euro tend to be lower too, so even they win out. The relationship is more complex for northern economies, like Germany’s, that might see a currency of their own rise in value. Indeed in these countries the Euro is not so popular. But it helps drive an export-led economy and secure jobs. Interestingly, Britain is at the intersection of these two groups. It’s fair to say that most ordinary people would rather trust British institutions to run their currency than European ones. And neither do export industries play such a great role in providing stable jobs as they do in Germany or the Netherlands. Scepticism about the Euro is more understandable here.

We should be careful not to overstate the popularity of the Euro. Amongst younger workers, in Italy say, who are struggling to find stable employment and save money, the Euro is not popular. But savers form the political bedrock of most developed nations. And to them the stability of the currency is no small thing. The rise of Nazism in Germany is often attributed to the failure of democratic institutions to prevent hyperinflation; conservative monetary policies are still a given in that country. Perhaps after preventing foreign invasion and keeping the streets and homes safe from criminals, people see maintaining the currency is the most important duty of a government: even higher that producing a healthy economy, which, after all, is mostly down to individual work and enterprise, not governments.

The European institutions have fulfilled that duty with respect to the Euro, in many cases better than the national governments that preceded them. So the currency remains broadly popular, and ways will be found of ensuring its survival as long as it holds its value. But in many other ways those Anglo-Saxon economists have been proved right about the Euro. It has not delivered the other economic benefits promised on its creation. Indeed the robustness of the currency can be seen as a trap, or a prison, preventing political leaders from delivering prosperous economies. Why this should be, and what can be done about it, has become one of the top priorities for European leaders. That is a topic I will consider in a further article.