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Mrs May has a 14 point lead in the polls and justification to call an election were Parliament to block Article 50. Given the current state of the opposition, t

by cmdkeen 10y ago

Mrs May has a 14 point lead in the polls and justification to call an election were Parliament to block Article 50. Given the current state of the opposition, their leader, and the fact that many Labour seats voted Leave it is a pretty safe bet that the Conservatives could end up with a 100+ majority. The key thing comes down to what "block Article 50" means. If the Government decide to not give ground during the Parliamentary process and refuse to be bound on their negotiating strategy an election is pretty likely as I doubt they would get that through Parliament at the moment. That election would potentially enable May to purge some of the wetter Tories as well. If you think this ruling is going to stop Brexit or is a victory against the Government I suspect you're going to be disappointed.

usgroup 10y ago
Brexit before March, what do you think?
- joosters 10y ago
  Current betting suggests 60% chance of article 50 triggered Jan - July 2017, 39% not triggered before July 2017, and 1% during 2016. Although the betting wasn't a great guide to the original brexit outcome, so you have to wonder about trusting it...
lmm 10y ago
Plenty of Conservative MPs and Conservative voters opposed Brexit. A general election would force the Conservatives to adopt a manifesto position on Brexit and be held accountable for the consequences of that position. It may not be a victory against Brexit, but it's a victory for democracy.
- joosters 10y ago
  Since when have party manifestos been used to hold political parties to account?
  - arethuza 10y ago
    As far as I recall the only time manifestos come in play in the political process is during the passage of a bill through the House of Lords - they "will not oppose the second or third reading of any government legislation promised in its election manifesto": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salisbury_Convention https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salisbury_Convention Note that this appears to be a "constitutional convention" rather than a hard and fast bit of law.
    - joosters 10y ago
      That's interesting, I had never heard of the convention before, thanks for mentioning it. However, it is specifically about the house of lords not blocking government manifesto promises. I was more thinking about the opposite, i.e. a government not going ahead with their manifesto promises.
      - arethuza 10y ago
        Do you really think any politician would introduce legislation requiring manifesto promises to be implemented? :-)
        gpderetta 10y ago
        For what is worth, at least in Italy, MPs are constitutionally not bound by electoral manifesto.
  - lmm 10y ago
    It's up to voters to do that. I've certainly had conversations with other voters on the extent to which a party delivered on its previous manifesto.
- tehwalrus 10y ago
  A pro-eu party may do very well in any such election, possibly unseating many Tories. I don't think May will be foolish enough though: she has a parliamentary majority to force brexit through regardless of the new requirement. (If she does, I'll be standing in it by the way, because my party has already allocated candidates to seats for any snap election).
aembleton 10y ago
But she can't just call an election without agreement from 67% of MPs due to the fixed term parliament act.
- cmdkeen 10y ago
  That's the thing about Parliament being Sovereign it could pass an Act saying "notwithstanding the Fixed Term Parliament Act the next election is on X" and call an election. It could also just repeal the Fixed Term Act.
  - pmyteh 10y ago
    Parliament can indeed do that, but it would require either the consent of the House of Lords or the application of the Parliament Acts (which is a multi-year process). My suspicion is that the Lords (where the government has no in-built majority) would vote down the new Act on the basis that it was an abuse of process. The backup option is a German-style 'technical' declaration of no-confidence, where the Prime Minister whips their MPs to vote no-confidence in the government for the express purpose of triggering the Fixed Term Parliament Act's clause. This would be effective, but would have a (relatively small) political cost in public perception.
Khol 10y ago
The issue here is that Theresa May cannot call a general election. The Fixed-term Parliament Act means that the only ways to call an early general election are if parliament passes a motion of no confidence in her majesty's government or a two thirds majority of MPs passes a motion to bring an early general election. (A third alternative would be to repeal the act.)
- onion2k 10y ago
  Even if May could get past the Fixed-term Parliament Act, a general election could turn in to a rerun of the EU referendum if the Labour party were to campaign on the grounds of not wanting to invoke Article 50, so the Tories would seen as the Leave party and Labour as the Remain party. Given the events of the past few months, I doubt that the Tories would risk that.
  - notahacker 10y ago
    I think they'd be reasonably happy with that, given that (i) Remain voters are highly concentrated in specific urban constituencies which tend not to vote Conservative anyway (ii) The Remain vote is more split between different political parties than the Leave vote in a FPTP electoral system (iii) Labour doesn't even have a consistent policy against Brexit and (iv) There's no way that conservative-minded Remainers are going to see a maybe anti-Brexit Jeremy Corbyn government as a more attractive option than a definitely-going-to-Brexit-but-not-lead-by-Jeremy-Corbyn Conservative government.
- notahacker 10y ago
  This is a purely theoretical obstacle. In practice, she could call a vote of no confidence in her government and order her MPs to abstain at very short notice.
  - gsnedders 10y ago
    Why abstain? You risk the motion not passing if they abstain: you simply whip the party to vote in favour of the motion, therefore defeating yourself.
KaiserPro 10y ago
So a few things: 1) an early election would require 75% majority vote in the commons. Unlikely as labour would be wiped out (they'd have to vote for it). 2) The Tories are utterly scared of UKIP, an early vote if the economy is in less than great health, or the effects of post brexit globalisation become clear, then UKIP will hold the balance of power. 3) The real power in the tory party it's self is not with May and the government its with the 1922 comittee, who are an odd mix of libertarians and ultra nationalistic types. It would be them driving the purge not May. That scares May.

by cmdkeen 10y ago

usgroup 10y ago

Brexit before March, what do you think?

joosters 10y ago
Current betting suggests 60% chance of article 50 triggered Jan - July 2017, 39% not triggered before July 2017, and 1% during 2016. Although the betting wasn't a great guide to the original brexit outcome, so you have to wonder about trusting it...

lmm 10y ago

Plenty of Conservative MPs and Conservative voters opposed Brexit. A general election would force the Conservatives to adopt a manifesto position on Brexit and be held accountable for the consequences of that position. It may not be a victory against Brexit, but it's a victory for democracy.

joosters 10y ago
Since when have party manifestos been used to hold political parties to account?
- arethuza 10y ago
  As far as I recall the only time manifestos come in play in the political process is during the passage of a bill through the House of Lords - they "will not oppose the second or third reading of any government legislation promised in its election manifesto": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salisbury_Convention https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salisbury_Convention Note that this appears to be a "constitutional convention" rather than a hard and fast bit of law.
  - joosters 10y ago
    That's interesting, I had never heard of the convention before, thanks for mentioning it. However, it is specifically about the house of lords not blocking government manifesto promises. I was more thinking about the opposite, i.e. a government not going ahead with their manifesto promises.
    - arethuza 10y ago
      Do you really think any politician would introduce legislation requiring manifesto promises to be implemented? :-)
      - gpderetta 10y ago
        For what is worth, at least in Italy, MPs are constitutionally not bound by electoral manifesto.
- lmm 10y ago
  It's up to voters to do that. I've certainly had conversations with other voters on the extent to which a party delivered on its previous manifesto.
tehwalrus 10y ago
A pro-eu party may do very well in any such election, possibly unseating many Tories. I don't think May will be foolish enough though: she has a parliamentary majority to force brexit through regardless of the new requirement. (If she does, I'll be standing in it by the way, because my party has already allocated candidates to seats for any snap election).

aembleton 10y ago

But she can't just call an election without agreement from 67% of MPs due to the fixed term parliament act.

cmdkeen 10y ago
That's the thing about Parliament being Sovereign it could pass an Act saying "notwithstanding the Fixed Term Parliament Act the next election is on X" and call an election. It could also just repeal the Fixed Term Act.
- pmyteh 10y ago
  Parliament can indeed do that, but it would require either the consent of the House of Lords or the application of the Parliament Acts (which is a multi-year process). My suspicion is that the Lords (where the government has no in-built majority) would vote down the new Act on the basis that it was an abuse of process. The backup option is a German-style 'technical' declaration of no-confidence, where the Prime Minister whips their MPs to vote no-confidence in the government for the express purpose of triggering the Fixed Term Parliament Act's clause. This would be effective, but would have a (relatively small) political cost in public perception.

Khol 10y ago

The issue here is that Theresa May cannot call a general election. The Fixed-term Parliament Act means that the only ways to call an early general election are if parliament passes a motion of no confidence in her majesty's government or a two thirds majority of MPs passes a motion to bring an early general election. (A third alternative would be to repeal the act.)

onion2k 10y ago
Even if May could get past the Fixed-term Parliament Act, a general election could turn in to a rerun of the EU referendum if the Labour party were to campaign on the grounds of not wanting to invoke Article 50, so the Tories would seen as the Leave party and Labour as the Remain party. Given the events of the past few months, I doubt that the Tories would risk that.
- notahacker 10y ago
  I think they'd be reasonably happy with that, given that (i) Remain voters are highly concentrated in specific urban constituencies which tend not to vote Conservative anyway (ii) The Remain vote is more split between different political parties than the Leave vote in a FPTP electoral system (iii) Labour doesn't even have a consistent policy against Brexit and (iv) There's no way that conservative-minded Remainers are going to see a maybe anti-Brexit Jeremy Corbyn government as a more attractive option than a definitely-going-to-Brexit-but-not-lead-by-Jeremy-Corbyn Conservative government.
notahacker 10y ago
This is a purely theoretical obstacle. In practice, she could call a vote of no confidence in her government and order her MPs to abstain at very short notice.
- gsnedders 10y ago
  Why abstain? You risk the motion not passing if they abstain: you simply whip the party to vote in favour of the motion, therefore defeating yourself.

KaiserPro 10y ago

So a few things: 1) an early election would require 75% majority vote in the commons. Unlikely as labour would be wiped out (they'd have to vote for it). 2) The Tories are utterly scared of UKIP, an early vote if the economy is in less than great health, or the effects of post brexit globalisation become clear, then UKIP will hold the balance of power. 3) The real power in the tory party it's self is not with May and the government its with the 1922 comittee, who are an odd mix of libertarians and ultra nationalistic types. It would be them driving the purge not May. That scares May.