English Labour leader Keir Starmer gets a lot of stick from his party’s neanderthal left, and I pity him for that. But still the rest of us have to talk about Keir, we really do.
Sir Keir hath a cunning plan, or at least with backup from Labour’s echo chamber focus groups he thinks he does. This ‘plan’ has to do with deflecting Tory attacks over Labour being soft on Brexit by insisting that the UK’s act of national suicide in 2016 is irreversible, and Brexit can be made to work. There will be no rejoining the EU, declares Starmer with all the gravitas he can muster, or even the European single market and customs union, with the obligations that brings around the free movement of goods, capital, services and labour. The gammonry must be placated.
Starmer’s problem is that his plan is in fact a vague wish bordering on desperate fantasy. The would-be, coalition-free prime minister over a whole and undivided UK says that the UK’s Brexit agreement with the EU can be renegotiated so as to remove all barriers to trade with Europe.
How does that work when Britain is not part of the single market? It may in theory be possible to remove some checks on goods crossing borders, restore mutual recognition of professional qualifications, and permit short-term, visa-free work travel between the UK and EU. But in the absence of a customs union, the principal barriers to free trade will remain. Small to medium-sized enterprises, for example, will still be hit by customs delays, VAT and tax brokerage charges. These are are currently sending Britain’s exporters to the wall, as well as reducing choice and increasing costs for British consumers.
Starmer hasn’t got it in him to do casuistry like Boris Johnson, so the hypothesis that yesterday’s speech is but a ruse to secure a single-party Labour government come the next general election is as fanciful as Starmer being an alchemist with an ample supply of the philosopher’s stone. Does Starmer seriously believe that he can secure a slightly squishier Brexit than Johnson, on the basis that unlike his morally degenerate opponent he’s a good guy? That sound you can hear is European Commissioners choking on their coffees.