What Happened?
The Tories, Liberal Democrats, and SNP are all on board for elections.
Rather than attempt to press through the Withdrawal Bill that would be loaded with amendments, Johnson instead has decided to press for elections.
Saying vs. Doing
Making Sense of the Contradictions
- Johnson is so far ahead in the polls that he would rather gamble on elections.
- The Liberal Democrats desperately need elections to pick up seats from Labour. That is their second agenda. Their first agenda, outright staying in the EU is dead.
- A Johnson win would strengthen the case for another Scottish Referendum
- Labour does not want an election now but has to pretend that it does
Eurointelligence Take
President Emmanuel Macron has finally agreed a three-month Brexit extension, with some provisions for an earlier exit. But the really important part of the story is that he did so after a phone call with Boris Johnson.
If the government loses today’s scheduled vote under the fixed-term parliament act, it will edge towards the position of the LibDems and the SNP. Both parties are bringing legislation this week for a one-line bill that overrides the FTPA and sets an election day for Monday, December 9. Unlike Labour, these two parties are desperate for elections. The LibDems are the only full-on Remainer party in England, and would stand to gain many seats. The big prize for the SNP is a second independence referendum, which has a much better chance to succeed with Boris Johnson in Number 10 than with the UK continuing to languish in the EU.
The latest opinion polls are telling us why the Tories are so keen on an election. Opinium has the Tories at 40%, up 3% from last time. Labour is unchanged at 24%. It is our expectation that Johnson would win an election with a sufficient majority to deliver on his Brexit deal by end-January.
If parliament were to vote in favour of an election bill in whatever form, there would be two weeks until parliament is dissolved. This would open up a short window for the Brexit legislation to pass. We think it is more likely that it will pass afterwards.
The most likely scenario we are seeing now is for elections to be agreed this week, followed by an election at some point and a re-emerging Tory majority.
Desperate Needs
I have been talking about the desperate need of the Liberal Democrats and SNP to have elections for weeks.
It appears they finally realized that. They have also given up hope Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn would ever work with them.
As I have pointed out, Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson cannot stand Corbyn. She may as well get something out of this mess and that would be to trash him in an election.
Poll Results
The Liberal Democrats are headed nowhere if Johnson’s withdrawal agreement passes. Instead, they seek all the hard-core Remainers.
Those sick of referendums will surely not like Labour’s platform of negotiating a Brexit with the EU then campaigning against it.
Most Likely Scenario
Eurointelligence’s most likely scenario is the same as mine.
I have been posting polls for weeks.
Not getting it done by October 31 has strengthened Johnson’s hand, as I suggested.
Did Johnson Cave In?
It may seem like it was Johnson, not Macron who caved in, but we have not seen the final extension wording yet.
Alternatively, and more likely, Johnson has simply decided to gamble on elections, running on a Get Brexit Done platform, vs Corbyn’s majorly inept proposition of seeking a deal and campaigning against it.
Phone Call Explanation
Regardless of what Corbyn has stated, Labour wanted the WA passed before an election so it could attack Johnson on other issues. To achieve that, all Corbyn had to do was support Johnson’s Withdrawal Agreement.
Read those last two sentences a couple of times. They explain the phone call.
If France pressed Labour to pass the WA or approve elections, Labour would likely have chosen the former, while blaming France.
Johnson would rather run against a splintered Remain group and a splintered Labour party than getting his Withdrawal Agreement passed now.
Corbyn has made some serious miscalculations. Macron brought this to a head.
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
Sorry, Mish, but just can’t understand your closing statements, and have read more than the two recommended times.
In any case, Corbyn is correct that No Deal is not yet off the table, not just by end of 2020 but by Thursday 11pm. Maybe I’m being way too simplistic and naive, but I wonder if the Macron gambit is entirely over. The EU have announced they will offer the flextension, but haven’t yet finalised the written agreement. Perhaps Macron is holding off until the next two days in Parliament reveal whether or not a clear path forward is forthcoming or if they are going to remain in endless Mexican stand-off in which case, perhaps 11pm becomes significant again.
Today, for example, they got into lengthy squabbles about who gets to set the date, how BJ cannot be trusted to do so but because they distrust him so much they won’t have an election to kick him out, the Father of House suggests they go forward to 3rd reading of the Deal and forget about elections, others insist that the Bill (Brexit) is anathema and these are the ones Boris needs to help get a vote for an election over the line without wrecking amendments and on and on and on.
Mish has framed this partly as BJ’s main motive being to get re-elected. Not saying it ain’t so, but I think along with that is the desire to be a PM with a working majority to deal with Brexit (i.e. not a Brino majority). Boris wants to be successful and get things done.
But if in the next 48 hours Parliament demonstrates the determination to stop him getting anything he wants done including an election or anything else, then I suspect Thursday 11pm might still be in play, and maybe Macron is still involved, albeit BJ himself could throw a spanner in the works as PM.
I also think that his letting Oct 31st go without some sort of fight is going to cost him a strong majority, and quite possibly the election altogether. A whole slew of ‘hard’ Brexiteers are going to swing to TBP.
I think 31 Oct. is over, and I don’t think BJ called it either – it was in the hands of eu and france all along (barring some deeper eu uk total management). France could not handle effect of no deal on it in EU, they chose to extend with clauses and leave UK to elections. BJ likely arranged with them mutually acceptable terms for extension. You can be sure EU and british establishment had everything in order to sideline BJ if he rebelled at what would have been an EU choice. None of them wanted that outcome though, looks bad and trouble would accompany it.
I am not sure if elections will be held, it would be a complete stalemate if not though, would play into EU hands as majority would beg another extension, maybe vote caretaker etc.
What is DUP doing, they are not going to get a better deal, so they want no deal ? They way they leave it is in the hands of remainers though, maybe they prefer in eu than existing agreement ? Previous pm gave them the ability to block, she was and probably still is a remainer.
Anyway, it is chaos now, I don’t know if I picture a Christmas election on top of that, and if not BJ is not just going to look bad for accepting extension, but will be judged as a failure for not securing a following direction, and probably bow out handing power to parliament. Don’t think there are not various sides would want it that way.
The Queen called it right: she said something to the effect that she couldn’t figure out why anyone would want the PM job given the current situation (and that she is very disappointed generally with the political class). The lady doesn’t chatter, plays her few cards close to the chest, but often her brief remarks are quite telling.
(That’s why I think Thursday might still be in play: because it will actually break the endless gridlock wherein everything else is a godd**n nightmare!)
With you there.
Johnson said in Parliament yesterday after the election vote that No Deal was now off the table, and Operation Yellowhammer has now been stood down – so there is no way that 31Oct is still in play. I think its over. There is a pattern here. May – ’No deal is better than a bad deal’. Corbyn total U turn. Johnson ‘No ifs or buts’. All capitulated in the end. Who’s pulling the strings?
Watch Brexit Party rise in the polls to above 20% and Conservatives fall below Brexit Party in the actual election. This is merely a repeat of May/June/July MEP Election outcome where Brexit Party made huge gains at the expense of the Conservative Party.
Oct 25 2019 Poll Avg. vs Actual December Election
36% Conservative fall to 20-23%
24% Labor fall to 15-20%
18% Lib Dems rise to 20-25% Most of Remainers will be here
11% Brexit rise to 23-27% BJ may be begging Farage to do a deal.
It is the seats that count, not the %. If tbp and con don’t have majority enough to hold con and other remainers or spoilers at bay they are just talking to themselves as far as making policy is concerned. I.e. parliament could vote another extension bill with referendum attached.
Wootendw made the point “A big win will also make hard-line Brexit Tories more insistent on a ‘good’ deal, however they choose to define ‘good’. “
Agreed – In fact I wrote a whole post on that previously
“I have said for days that a long extension is good for Johnson, and he works to achieve it. Mish disagreed. Now it seems that we have a long extension. Suddenly it is good for Johnson. ;)”
For starters there likely wont be a long extension. There will be elections. The killer for Johnson was the possibility of delay after delay with no elections.
Hell of a lot of votes today for election
After the election, the first opportunity to leave is January 1. Is it not long? Never mind.
Well I have been reading around tonight, and from an anecdotal perspective let me tell you that support for Johnson in normally supportive places has absolutely fallen off a cliff edge. It is an overnight sea change. Even if he gets his election it will be something he bitterly regrets. His only option of survival, even short to medium-term is to team up with the Brexit party but I doubt whether his arrogance will let that happen.
Mish, you are my one stop shop for all my Brexit news. Arguably one of the defining political events of our time. The MSM is pathetic and corrupt in covering this complicated and politically charged issue. Keep up the good work.
Last time out May was an unknown electoral performer who started off from a very positive position, the rot started when she put fox hunting in the manifesto and it went downhill from there. Corbyn was largely untested and got massively supported by anyone who didn’t remember the 70s and 80s. Doorstep feedback was very positive.
This time, Johnson is a proven electoral performer in most target demographics, whereas Corbyn has now become even less welcome on the doorstep than the Jehovah’s Witnesses before 8am on a Sunday. The pollsters won’t be quite so embarrassed this time.
As for Farage, the less air time he gets the more votes he’ll score. However, TV coverage is determined by how many seats a party is standing in, not whether they got votes or even existed last time out. Any party standing in 1/6th of seats gets coverage, which is why we don’t have to suffer election broadcasts by the SNP in the kilt-free part of the country.
.
May also privately was a remainer. So it is no surprise that she wanted to work a deal that looked an awful lot like remaining. How hard could she bargain when the EU knew she was privately against Brexit? And that was one of the main reasons the Tories stood against her deal. But, now BJ has had a go at it and because May gave away the shop in her negotiations he could hardly be expected to do better. The EU would demand more concessions not less, so Johnson adopted the attitude that we need to get Brexit done first, then alter the more hideous aspects later.
That is why the NO DEAL people have held out, they don’t want all to be bound to the EU by all these strings attached, but Johnson is saying take the damned deal and worry about cutting those strings one by one down the road.
Quite. According to The Times today the evil May ‘cried’ when the Referendum result was declared. She didn’t believe in ‘Leave’, didn’t want it and saw the way to deal with it as damage limitation. The poison chalice she left Boris means that the only way to properly manage Brexit is via ‘No Deal’.
Well, What will happen to the Brexit party in this election? The rules for all broad casters in a UK election mean that each party will receive time in proportion to votes cast in the previous election.The Brexit party did not stand in the previous election and is therefore guaranteed no time whatsoever on TV and radio. One further point, Survation was the only pollster to accurately call the 2017 election. Every other pollster were calling a 50 seat Tory majority. Predicting the outcome of the next election is for the birds.
Perhaps this is the best possible outcome to this deadlock. The next 6 weeks will of course be insufferable, with an overflow of propaganda, virtue signalling and fingerpointing. Which I will gladly skip and pay absolutely zero attention to. Wake me up for the results please, and best of luck to you!
The most interesting question is this- what if elections can’t be scheduled by Thursday (or Wednesday)? What will Johson do then? I do think Mish is right- SNP and the LibDims want elections now, but what if they don’t actually deliver?
Someone had better have done their homework on how seats will be allocated for this poll layout. E.g.
2015 Con got 36% of vote 330 seats Ukip 12% of vote 1 seat
2017 Con got 42% of vote 317 seats
Now you have libdem vying and brexit party, maybe it follows the above, maybe the reverse, maybe libdem takes seats due to brexit party vote and not con.
You’ve hit the nub of the uncertainty in the process – it isn’t just the total number of voters, but where they vote. I know of a lot of Labour voters who will vote against Boris (he is regarded as a clown) but not for Corbyn (another clown). LibDems may do well with tactical voters. Brexit voters could well be suspicious of Johnson who has just thrown the DUP under the bus and hurt Johnsn more than he expects.
Anybody calling this election confidently is delusional.
Absolutely important. On a base analysis of the polls, though, I think the Conservatives are in a position more like 2015 than 2017- Labour was much stronger in 2017, but looks much weaker and closer to 2015 today. I guess the real question is this- who is going to vote for LibDim in an election in December? Is it normal Tory voters who are Remainers, or is it normal Labour voters who are Remainers? The polls suggest the LibDim support comes out of Labour’s hide, not Tory’s.
The other side, though, should worry Johnson- he will find it harder today to form an alliance with the Brexit Party than might have been possible a month ago before he came up with deal.
Thankfully I don’t involve myself in trying to figure this out, it is much more complicated as voters drift between all parties. So for example where ukip previously took a portion of votes from con, and con less from libdem, but still winning the seat, now you might have libdem taking votes from labour and ukip taking more from con, where libdem wins. You can imagine all the combinations of this, but even then you would need to go through accurate data seat by seat just to guess.
The other point not mentioned is that EU says new agreement is not negotiable. To me that means if no majority by con and DUP stays firm then it is a replay, where no deal or long delay and new referendum are maybe only alternatives.
I have said for days that a long extension is good for Johnson, and he works to achieve it. Mish disagreed. Now it seems that we have a long extension. Suddenly it is good for Johnson. 😉
Anyway, it seems that the EU is content with the destruction this deal will cause in the UK. Meanwhile, the English elite can be satisfied as they are about to kill the Corbyn project. And a lot of people will celebrate Johnson for it… I have no stake in the game but this seems to be a very sad outcome.
Soon we will see if it is really over.
‘The english elite can be satisfied as they are about to kill the Corbin project.’ – the English elite, plus I would venture a significant majority of the Parliamentary Labour Party.
Yes, of course.
An allusion to the movie?
Hmm. I think Johnson would have liked to have his “deal” to be passed last week. He must have known that as soon as people dug into the deal they’d find the things they don’t like in it. Thus, it is probably DOA like May’s deal. There is no way to deliver Brexit to a majority, because the different groups behind Brexit believe it is different things – many contradictory.
As usual, there was no plan in 2016. There is no plan now. It is like everybody was promised $1M each, and now we are discovering that we have to pay up front for it.
The plan should always have been for a hard Brexit. That is the only Brexit.
One thing I dont understand is the Labour party. They are more split on Brexit than anyone else. Not only that, they stood on a manifesto of seeing through Brexit, and then turned against the idea. As a result of all of that, no one can reasonably trust them. It doesnt matter what their policies are if you dont trust them.
Labour must know this. Why didnt they just see Brexit through, and hope that it went badly and then capitalise at the next election? No one would have criticised them for accepting a hard Brexit and letting it happen. It would have ended the divisions in their party, let them keep the trust of their electorate and given them a chance in the following election. Instead they seem to have betrayed everyone, especially themselves.
Corbyn built his case on the assumption that Johnson and the EU/Remainers will not join forces against him. They are doing exactly that.
The biggest remaining wildcard is Nigel Farage. Can he capitalize on the broken “do or die” posture?
IMHO, Nigel made a big mistake when he called for an extension instead of for passing Boris’s deal. Essentially, it made him appear to be making common cause with Corbyn, Swinson, et al.
It was controversial but he has no political agenda if he is just standing behind the Tories. He is going for a “no deal” exactly because the Tories cannot afford it.
By the way, MPs in the ERG are already making noise about reopening the Northern Ireland deal… Amazing.
The conspiracy theorists would have it that Corbyn was told to back off. Not sure there is any merit in this, but it was a direct U turn.
It is difficult to think of another reason why an acolyte of the EU hating Tony Benn would want anything other than a quick hard Brexit.
I am sure Tony would be so proud of his son. Poor fella must be writhing in his grave.
You are right that the election would be unpredictable but the short-term tactical game seems to be lost for Labour. They need a game changer during the campaign.
As for Johnson’s deal, I agree that he will have problems with it later. A landslide election victory would be probably enough to push it through but the consequences will arrive.
Well, Mish’s logic tells me that Labour really need to vote for Johnson’s election then, and get the deal through to nullify at least in part the Swinson threat. We will know in a couple of hours.
“Not getting it done by October 31 has strengthened Johnson’s hand, as I suggested.”
It certainly strengthens his hand, but for what? He could pass May’s deal if he really wins big – and it wouldn’t matter politically for 5 years.
No deal certainly is not off the table.
As I explained before – Elections before WA signed make it more likely
Macron was not bluffing BJ called it off.
So, are you ready to concede that while “No Deal” is a possibility, it is nevertheless essentially off the table? The French were never going to wholeheartedly embrace losing yet another year of UK money flowing into EU coffers to subsidise their (French) profligate ways.
“So, are you ready to concede that while “No Deal” is a possibility, it is nevertheless essentially off the table?”
Won’t know that until after the election. Tories will be promising Brexit and we don’t know what Farage’s party is going to do.
What election? The Peoples Second Referendum in a series of Referendums until they vote correctly?
The EU is a roach hotel … you can check in, but you can’t check out.
There will likely be a general election even though it was voted ‘down’ yesterday (majority favored election, but 2/3 required). The rules requiring the super majority can be changed with a simple majority.
It’s in Mish’s latest analysis.
It is also possible that Macron was bluffing all along and didn’t want to be held personally responsible for what would happen on Brexit.
I hope the Brexit Party field 630 candidates and make large inroads into the Tory vote.
That would split the Brexit vote.
Only if you are sure that Johnson and the Tories are for Brexit. Based on current evidence, including the fact that Johnson could have delivered Brexit, that is not true.
At the moment the Brexit party are the only ones I trust. They might be way down in the polls, but so what, my vote will push them up a bit. Voting for the Tories wont help any more than it did at the last election.
I agree, No Deal needs support from Farage.
However, Farage’s party can help Brexit by playing a spoiler role without winning any seats. There are a few committed Brexiteers among the Tories and those guys need to win.
wootendw,
yes, you are right. Committed Brexiteer I may be, but my MP is Tory and voted for Hard Brexit.
The only thing Farage can do is make Corbyn PM
Not if he plans it right. But you do need some pro-Brexit, pro-Labour guys and there are a few.
No, there aren’t any committed Brexiteers in the Conservative Party. Even the Spartans voted for Boris’s Surrender Deal.
No, it wouldn’t split the Brexit vote. As the Conservative Party vote is not a Brexit vote. That party will always let you down.
Try this site, if Mish will let me post
“Try this site, if Mish will let me post”
The info fine but I don’t know if Farage is on to it.
After thinking about it, I agree that a deal is a more likely if BoJo wins big as I suppose he will because he is more likely to get what he wants, which is a deal. And it wouldn’t matter politically for 5 years, no matter what path he took.
However, the election will be about Brexit and the Tories will have to run with that. A big win will also make hard-line Brexit Tories more insistent on a ‘good’ deal, however they choose to define ‘good’. Hopefully, they will hold Boris’ feet to the fire and remind him of his promise to voters. I hate to say it, but his current deal does not do that. As he got the EU to agree to changes in May deal, they may have to agree to additional ones.
Farage has surely done all the math and knows what districts to challenge and whether to challenge with a pro-Labor or pro-Tory candidate, whether or not it’s too win or to spoil. Farage would prefer something closer to No Deal.