Jeremy's Den: Westminster Projection and then some

Hallowexit Doomsday-72 and 51st Anniversary of the invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Warsaw Pact armies
Also Nigel Dodds' 61st birthday and Robert Plant's 71st

General election polling remains quite confusing. Pollsters agree there has been a 'Boris Bounce' coupled with a 'Nigel Slump'. But there is also circumstantial evidence of a 'Jeremy Bounce' with Labour skyrocketing to 25% or more in some polls, coupled with a 'Jo Slump' with LibDems plummeting below 20%. But the Boris Bounce is not as high and strong as Tories expected when they morphed into the Cumminist Party of Little England to promote a Crash Out Brexit. Then everybody is currently focusing on something else as Jo Swinson, Dominic Grieve and the mainstream media have successfully diverted the public's attention from the ends to the means, the variously implausible incarnations of a National Unity Government that nobody even considered a serious option before Commons' Summer Break. But two things have become clear because of this: LibDems and rebel Tories dislike Jeremy Corbyn more than they despise Boris Johnson; both would rather let Johnson have his way with a hard Brexit than put country first and unite behind Labour's leadership. Only the SNP, Plaid Cymru and the Greens have been consistent and responsible during all the stages of the Summer Recess Circus. Don't be surprised then when polls again send mixed messages though certainly not predicting a Borisunami at the Poppy Season Snap GE.

The twelve polls fielded since Johnson's Accession to the Despatch Box (aye, that's the correct spelling in Commons' Auld Englishe) show the Tory voting intentions flatlining and even slightly down from Peak Boris three weeks ago. This is certainly not the sign of a convincing and sustainable bounce, especially as the extra Tory voters come from the Brexit Party and Labour remain in relatively good shape despite all the Europhile votes lost to the LibDems. Of course polls might very well take yet another turn now that the First Minister of England is busy preparing to set the country on a wartime footing in peacetime while getting ready for an immediate snap GE. I think Jeremy Corbyn should be happy about the latter as Johnson bringing back Lynton Crosby is in fact good news if you remember he was the brains behind Theresa May's 2017 GE campaign and Labour should definitely welcome the help. It will all be about Brexit anyway and YouGov conducted an interesting poll just days ago.

YouGov polled four different outcomes, regardless of their likelihood to happen: UK leaves EU without a deal, which looks like Johnson's official policy now; UK leaves EU on the terms of the negotiated deal, which would have to be Thresa May's thrice woodchipped Withdrawal Agreement Bill; UK leaves with a freshly negotiated deal including remaining in the Single Market and Customs Union; UK holds a second EU referendum and Remain wins. Respondents were asked to rank the four options from 'very bad outcome' to 'very good outcome' with 'acceptable compromise' thrown in the middle for the faint of heart. The results (as usual after undecideds removed) are quite enlightening and basically not good news for Johnson and only moderately good for Corbyn.

Unsurprisingly May's Deal is still less popular than No Deal, though a third of the electorate have resigned themselves to describe it as acceptable for lack of a better option currently on the table. It is a clear warning to Johnson and probably Corbyn too that a second referendum delivering a Remain victory is the strong first choice of all opponents to a crash-out, with the renegotiated deal a second choice but also the preferred option for two thirds of the electorate when 'acceptable compromise' is added. Johnson is thus made painfully aware that he no longer has any mandate as people have an unalienable right to reconsider in the light of new information, and his gesturing and posturing is of little effect. Clearly his trips to Paris and Berlin ahead of his first G7 Summit now look more like a walk to Canossa than a victory lap, as Macron and Merkel must surely be aware of the shifts in British public opinion and that Johnson is in no position to demand anything from anyone. Unfortunately for Jeremy Corbyn YouGov also tested two hypotheticals: UK leaves EU with no deal and Jezza never becomes PM; Jezza becomes PM and holds a second referendum with Remain on the ballot. And the results are quite devastating for Corbyn.

In a major contradiction to their choices on the four earlier options, a significant majority would accept the crash-out if it also keeps Corbyn out of Downing Street. Even more than a quarter of Labour voters and Remainers would take No Deal over a Corbyn Premiership. This is surely the result of Labour's sticking to 'constructive ambiguity' for far too long and lacking credibility as Born Again Remainers, but also the expected outcome of lingering doubts on Corbyn's fitness for the job and ability to deliver any positive outcome to the current shambles. More on this and even worse somewhere below. Corbyn is obviously right to hit hard at Johnson as it may convince doubters to back him after all, but should be careful what he wishes for as a snap GE might no longer be Johnson's to win but could still be Labour's to lose.

The current weighted average of voting intentions shows only minimal and statistically insignificant change from what we had ten days ago. Current Poll'O'Polls includes the six most recent ones, conducted between 29 July and 15 August. Super-sample size is 11,278 with a theoretical 0.89% margin of error. Bear in mind though that the spread of voting intentions from poll to poll is much higher than this, at 4% for the Conservatives, 6% for Labour and a massive 8% for the LibDems. Only the SNP's voting intentions remain relatively steady around 40% of the Scottish electorate.

No party should feel secure on such results. The electorate has taken wild turns one way or the other repeatedly in the past so nothing is set in stone. The trends of voting intentions since the 2017 GE show an almost stably normal situation for about 18 months with the two traditionally main parties still strongly in the lead despite a slow rise of the LibDem vote, then all hell broke loose and froze over in the run-up to the European Parliament election. The one that was and should never have been but sent pollsters and voters alike spinning into disarray. What happened since the beginning of this year is the most remarkable part with the foreplay and aftershock of the European election moving the goalposts again and again. Then Brexit PTSD (pre-traumatic in this case rather than post-traumatic) reshuffled the deck again and made any definitive prediction quite risky.

Even with Labour and the Conservatives gaining back a fair share of previously lost votes, they are both in a rather precarious position. Voters have already sent the message that even the best laid schemes of Lab and Con can go askew, and might feel empowered to do so again in the near future. Traditional party loyalties have been ripped apart by the European election and the countdown to Brexitocalypse is still unlikely to fully restore them. The predicted breakdown of voting intentions by nation and region, as per the latest Comres poll, again supports this.

The British political landscape as we knew it in 2017 after UKIP's terminal meltdown has vanished out of sight and what we have is now more reminiscent of something 2015ish when the New Model Blackshirts still scored in the double digits, only made worse by lingering doubts about the two main parties' actual abilities to govern properly, exacerbated by a feeling of insecurity fuelled by the realization that self-destruct is incoming and major shortages of basic goods are no longer a fantasy. None of the historic Red and Blue heartlands have been restored to their former glory and both parties will certainly soon find the next campaign to be more of an ordeal than anticipated.

Current polling would again deliver a hung Parliament as the alleged Boris Bounce would fail to deliver a Conservative majority. In this awkward outcome where both Labour and the Conservatives would lose seats, again only the SNP and the LibDems would have reasons to celebrate. Though the LibDems might choose to go easy on the pink champagne as 40-50ish seats is far from a spectacular success for a party who only recently bragged about bagging 100 or so. Then dancing days would be here again though you have to wonder who would lead the dance. Boris Johnson fighting the election on a Pure Brexit manifesto and flunking it would inevitably lead to his demise, and a similar fate would certainly befall Jeremy Corbyn for delivering the worst Labour result since 1983, coincidentally or not the very year Jezza was first elected for Islington North. So all political business would come to a grinding halt unless some interim leaders emerge overnight from the Red and Blue ruins. Philip Hammond and Keir Starmer anyone?

Whoever leads the two prospective government parties, getting a strong and stable majority would be more of a challenge than ever before. No stairway to heaven for anyone here as the Con-DUP alliance would fall ten seats shy of a majority, or four if they managed to get the Brexit Party MPs on board too, provided no still sane Tory MPs defect to kill such a hard-Brexit pact. At the other end a Labour-led Rainbow Min coalition would fall fifty seats short with the LibDems sitting on the fence, which is the likely outcome at least for the first few days after the election. That's where an hypothetical PM Starmer would come in handy as he would deprive the LibDems of their main talking point: no deal with Marxist Corbyn. Of course PM Hammond would also fit the profile as he would deprive the LibDems of their second talking point: no deal with Buffoon Johnson. But both parties might also opt out of the emergency leader option and go on with Bozo and Jezza, and then all bets are off and Oor Lass Jo ends up the kingmaker, a once-in-a-generation opportunity she would relish.

Whatever the configuration and her close circle's best advice, there is still the distinct possibility that Jo Swinson would be clegging (Wiktionary: gaslighting your own bandmates and negotiating in bad faith by putting impossible demands on the table that will ensure the negotiation fails and you still can shift the blame on the other party's intransigeance while getting what you always aimed for in the first place but dared not tell out loud for fear even the most gullible would see through your stunts, also recently known as johnsoning in European Union circles). Then PM Jo might also want to think it through thrice and wonder how voters would react to her putting personal dislike over country and crutching an ERG War Cabinet, and they might even regret kicking Jared O'Mara the fuck out of Sheffield and Oliver Letwin out of Dorset, as current polling predicts. Unlike felines, LibDems are not entitled to nine lives and making the wrong choice here might be their one and final Day of Reckoning. Not that many would shed but a crocodile tear about the LibDems becoming an extinct species by their own shenanigans.

Now a quick aside on what other projection methods make of current polling, for completeness' sake. Pure PNS (Proportional National Swing) is a theoretical construct as no general election has ever matched the results it predicts. But there is always an outlier, think Scotland 2015 when the SNP multiplied their vote share by 2.5 nationally and this was pretty much duplicated across all constituencies with double-digit swings. UNS (Uniform National Swing) is generally accepted as the less unreliable method but there are also some outliers. For example in 1997 UNS from the 1992 GE would have delivered 401 Labour, 212 Conservatives and 11 LibDems instead of the actual 418-165-46. Remember you should never underestimate the LibDems. Finally Electoral Calculus' Advanced Regression Model has an in-built 15-seat bonus for the Conservatives but still remains quite close to UNS and is probably just as technically good when you bear in mind that the polls' usual margin of error can easily displace two or three dozen seats one way or the other.

Current projection says 105 seats would change hands, which is close to what happened in 2015 with 111 changes and 1880 with 113. But while 1880 and 2015 qualify as realigning or at least readjusting elections, this one would only muddy the waters a smitch further. The summary and cartography of gains and losses illustrate the ambiguity of the projected results. Labour's seven gains would in fact be only retaking seats they won in 2017 and whose MPs later defected and they would even lose John Woodcock's and Angela Smith's seats. Likewise LibDems would lose only Streatham and Totnes who would come back home to Labour and Conservatives respectively, who won them in 2017. Then I guess LibDem HQ would have moved Chuka Umunna and Sarah Wollaston to friendlier neighbouring constituencies. Just think Richmond Park or Twickenham for him and Torbay for her.

Here only ten members of the English Government would lose their seats. No genuine Portillo Moments as the Muckle Dugs like Rudd, Raab, Buckland or Sharma, who were once not so long ago seriously threatened, would now survive. Only a Mini-Portillo with Alister Union Jack going down and having all the time he wants to spend on his 486-hectare (that's 1,200 acres in ERG Measurement Units) farm near Lockerbie, though I doubt Fiona Bruce would grant him a special mention in the middle of the massive SNP gains on Election Night. Unfortunately the full updated list of the 45ish Private Parliamentary Secretaries is still covered by the Official Secrets Act so a few names are missing from the fatality list, and would surely have included a couple more Scottish Tories as the bag-carrier-cum-rat slot is the only trinket left for Wee Andy Bowie, Absentee Referee Dougie Ross and Boaby Snatcher Ross Thomson, the three Scottish Boristas who did not make it to the frontbench. Then Johnson might possibly discourage his Cabinet Ministers from putting Fanboy Thomson in such a position as he might misunderstand the true meaning of 'feel the mood of your fellow Members'. Better safe than sorry.

Ironically former Tory Grandee Oliver Letwin, who could have been a credible substitute (oops, sorry, not Led Zep) Swinson-approved PM after a mediocre election result leading to Johnson's resignation, would also lose his West Dorset seat to the LibDems by a hair. Which would also be a parachuting opportunity for Sarah Wollaston if she agreed to cross county boundaries to hang on to a seat.

There would still be a modicum of hope left for the projected losers who might be able to sneak back in through the out door as 74 seats would qualify as marginals, including 27 of those predicted to change hands. Most of them would be the traditional Red-Orange-Blue battlegrounds with the Brexit Party now almost out of the picture. On current polling the Conservatives would be deeper in the danger zone than Labour with almost twice the number of marginals.

The alternate scenarios after reallocating the marginals to the runner up would not really deliver better outcomes than the direct projection. The basic result being something of a lose-lose situation for both Labour and Tories, reshuffling the marginals could do little to improve it significantly for either side, though some combinations could deliver a number of quality moments for the smaller parties during coalition negotiations.

The best case scenario for the Conservatives would deliver just a ten-seat majority. At first glance this might look safe enough, but John Major in 1992 started the 51st Parliament with a 21-seat majority and ended his term as a minority PM relying on UUP support to get legislation passed. What happened once can happen again and probably earlier in the term, and wreck Johnson's premiership. At the other end of the spectrum Labour's best case scenario would turn out to be quite nightmarish for everyone involved. Even a deal with the LibDems would leave the Tories one seat short of a majority, which is just the kind of tricky situation the LibDem leadership might want to avoid, especially if a mediocre Labour result led to Corbyn's resignation and a more Swinson-compatible leader being elected. A Labour-led Rainbow Max Pact could then rely on 350+ seats, depending on which smaller parties would join it. Not totally bulletproof as internal tensions might implode it sooner than later, but that's the best we could get.

This week Deltapoll polled Boris Johnson's and Jeremy Corbyn's leadership valence, which is the assessment of their attractiveness vs averseness (rocks vs sucks to make it simpler) on various criteria related to their perceived leadership abilities, and then some more personal stuff. This 'the people as character witnesses' exercise is definitely bad for both but arguably even worse for Corbyn. First both are perceived as untrustworthy and out of touch, definitely a bad start for an aspiring PM. Even the 'principles' item is not as good as it seems as the precise wording hints that the true meaning is 'opinionated' rather than actually 'principled' and both get roughly the same result anyway so this is a tie rather than giving either an advantage. I'd say the first half says BOZ 0-0 JEZ.

The next items on Deltapoll's laundry list are even worse for Corbyn. Of course you might question Johnson's judgment when his cherrypicked Foreign Secretary only recently learned about the English Channel, and even argue that the crises he handles best are the ones of his own making. But the respondents have spoken and Corbyn does not even do that well on 'fairness and equality', to quote the full wording of the item. So I say the second half is BOZ 2-0 JEZ. Bully for you, comrade.

Then Deltapoll treads on more personal ground with questions about kindness and baws. I fail to see how kindness can be even remotely considered an asset in the shark-infested Westminster swamp but then it's their questions, not mine, and anyway it's a draw with slim majorities concluding that both Bozo and Jezza are actually mean. Then the last two items are devastating blows for Corbyn. Though I again feel quite flabbergasted by Johnson's ratings. In my book Do-Or-Die is more akin to watching a dead dog floating down the Thames (hint: scroll down to the end of Chapter XIII) on a summer day than to actually making any kind of decision, tough or not. I also question the assessment of Johnson's ability to get the job done as he actually has got fuck all done so far and when he does it will be more like Timothy McVeigh getting the job done in Oklahoma City than Winston Churchill getting the job done in World War Two. But Deltapoll's respondents are merciless and the third half is definitely BOZ 2-0 JEZ. And we have game, set and match for Johnson on an overall BOZ 4-0 JEZ. Holy fuck.

For your complete information 38% would enjoy spending buddy time with Johnson and 48% wouldn't, while 21% would enjoy it with Corbyn and 61% wouldn't. Guess the feisty buffoon image has some perks that the long-faced dogmatist image hasn't. On to more practical concerns, 32% would trust Johnson to drive them home after a party while 49% wouldn't, but only 31% would trust Corbyn while 53% wouldn't. Which sounds a bit odd as I would trust Johnson to have one too many at a party while teetotaller Corbyn would have stayed on Diet Malvern. But then Corbyn admitted he does not own a car so that may be a factor here. Also 25% would trust Johnson to look after their children while 56% wouldn't, and here Corbyn fares just as badly with 25% who would trust him and 55% who wouldn't. Remember one of them will have to be trusted with the future of our children, not just occasional daycare. Just sayin. The only major piece of information lacking here is which one people would trust most to safely walk their dog. Guess we can trust Deltapoll to ask about it next time.

The now world-famous Lord Ashcroft poll about Scottish Independence seems to have been the spark that broke the camel's back. It surely has lifted some inhibitions and opened the gate to a flood of good feelings towards Scottish Independence, or at the very least the Scottish people's inalienable right to have the final say on this. Of course the loudest outraged shrieks and howls came for the usual suspects right here in Scotland, who are delusional enough to think their opinion matters beyond their small circle of cronies. I give you Ian Murray and Jackie Baillie. Don't bother searching for Jackie's ulterior motives as she's too thick to have any and it's transparently clear the post-Blairite MSPs were not actually targeting John McDonnell but just wanted to undermine Richard Leonard. Crosstabs from the Ashcroft poll offer some interesting perspective on the three stages on the road to Independence. All results here with undecideds and non-voters removed, first on support for holding IndyRef2 in the first place, broken down by past votes.

There is only a slim majority in favour of holding IndyRef2, which is quite surprising when compared to previous polls and the other findings of this one. Oddly Ashcroft did not include LibDem voters in the crosstabs, probably because their 7% vote share in 2017 does not give them that much of an influence on the overall results. Of course there is also some ambiguity and margin for interpretation in these results. Though it makes sense for some Yes supporters to oppose IndyRef2 if they fear Yes might lose it, or for some No supporters to support it because they hope Yes would lose it and make it a one-in-many-generations event. The crosstabs of voting intentions add some information, beyond the 52% for Yes that made headlines.

The most surprising part is 12% of 2014 Yes voters now switching to No. Possibly this has to do with Brexit and unwillingness to add 'chaos to chaos', as the Unionists talking points describe it. It should be noted too that the combined Yes-to-No and No-to-Yes switches would deliver roughly a 50-50 split. Yes winning in the headline question comes from people who did not vote in 2014 and for the most part they must be younger voters as this category is massively pro-Independence (72% of the 18-24yr olds according to this poll). Surely Ashcroft will poll 16-17yr olds too next time to get a more accurate snapshot. Then the final stage is which outcome people see as the most likely: would the Union prevail? or would it be Independence? A massive majority think Independence would win, a significant result as it confirms momentum is on the side of Yes, with Yes voters showing much more confidence in their cause than No voters. Though one in six Yes voters doubt the outcome, probably the same ones who would not hold IndyRef2 in the first place.

Just a few days after the Ashcroft poll was published, Opinium added a question about IndyRef2 to their standard voting intentions poll. They polled respondents on whether the UK government should 'allow' or 'prevent' holding IndyRef2 (their wording, not mine) but this time UK-wide and not just in Scotland. Oddly they included a 'Neither' option to their prompts, an unlikely answer for what is basically a Yes-Or-No question (pun fully intended). Even so the results, with undecideds and neitherers removed, are quite impressive. Support in Scotland is a significant 6% higher than in the Ashcroft poll and majority support across all English regions is also quite an upset. Though of course I don't rule out some ulterior motives like BritNats supporting IndyRef2 to make sure the Sweaty Socks Subsidy Junkies are kicked out of Our Precious Union and the Barnett dosh is channelled to Surrey where it belongs. Though of course there would be no Barnett dosh of Scottish origin left after Independence, but we shouldn't let minor facts get in the way of a good fantasy scenario. Or should we?

Opinium's crosstabs with current voting intentions, not the 2017 vote this time, are equally impressive if not even more. Massive support from Labour and LibDem voters is obviously the most important and unexpected result and I'm ready to count it as genuine support for Scotland's unalienable right to decide our own fate. Some 40% overall of right-wing voters supporting IndyRef2 is more ambiguous as they are the ones most likely to entertain 'Kick Out The Jocks' ulterior motives. But you know what they say about a gift horse…. even when you have every reason to beware of Brits carrying gifts. Ultimately what matter most here is the solid majority UK-wide supporting holding IndyRef2 even it would be foolish to believe all do it genuinely out of the goodness of their hearts.

All these results show that Scottish Labour and Scottish LibDems are definitely and dramatically at odds with their fellow party members Sooth Of The Wall, which should convince Jo Swinson, Willie Rennie and Richard Leonard (or whoever sits as Branch Office Manager at 290 Bath Street G2 4RE come next week) to take a deep breath and think it through. But will they? Even if they don't they will have to face the harsh and simple reality someday soon. The United Kingdom is falling apart thanks to Boris Johnson and all the Queen's corgis couldn't put it together again.

Meanwhile the trends from recent polls point to really good times for the SNP and really bad times for the Unionist parties. Unfortunately we don't have a post-Boris full Scottish poll yet, but only subsamples from GB-wide polls that we know are volatile and possibly unreliable. With all the usual caveats, these look quite consistent over the last six weeks and have the SNP up to about 40% on average, Conservatives down below 20%, Labour and LibDems tied on about 15%. While it is always fun to see John Curtice once more stating the obvious for the benefit of an Edinburgh Fringe audience, he remains oddly noncommittal about the number of SNP seats to be expected, while predicting a number of LibDem MPs GB-wide that a ten-year old would have easily got from Electoral Calculus. Then I will say it: the last full Scottish poll, conducted in late June, predicted 50 SNP seats and the current trend is likely to deliver 51 to 53, with only the LibDems holding their ground while both Labour and the Conservatives are on a downward spiral.

Of course Scottish Labour very publicly imploding does help the SNP as it hammers home their utter irrelevancy in today's Scotland. John McDonnell's conversion to IndyRef2 was but one more nail in Scottish Labour's coffin as some soon started questioning his ulterior motives: sincere belief in Scotland's unalienable right to decide our own future, or just a stunt to get SNP support to a minority Labour government? Whatever the explanation it shows that Labour have not learned from their recent mistakes. After their shambolic twists and turns about Brexit, a self-engineered cats-in-bag brawl about Scottish Independence will do nothing to restore trust in their policies. Sad and lonely days indeed for Richard Leonard when El Lider Maximo himself hangs him out to dry out in the cold under the bus, a position most awkward, and endorses IndyRef2. An interesting side effect is that the Guardian have toned down their usual anti-SNP stance quite a few notches, with arch-Unionist Scottish correspondent Severin Carrell often giving way to more neutral commentariat lately. The Guardian publishing a piece acknowledging that Independence is inevitable is quite a sign of the times but don't read too much into it just yet. We've already seen the Guardian's conversion from LibDemism to Corbynism to English Macronism to whatever it is these days, so they still might change their stance on this depending on which way the wind blows next month.

The Scottish Twig Office of the English Conservative Party too is in complete disarray. Not that David Mundell saying the exact opposite of what he said before being sacked by the First Minister of England is anything of a surprise. And of course it has a lot more to do with pissing off Johnson than actually acknowledging Scotland's right to democratically decide our fate. It just strengthens my case that the SNP should fight every forthcoming election on a strongly worded pro-Independence manifesto and make it the core issue of their campaigns. Even threatening UDI sounds like a good idea these days, just to see what the Minister for the Union would come up with to call the SNP's bluff. I guess even the promise of SuperDevoMax, Federalism in a word, would not quite cut it as the dominant feeling these days is not just 'Yes to Indy', it's also 'Break away from England's post-Brexit self-destruct' whatever way it is achieved. Never mind what condescending arch-Unionist journos say, Johnson is indeed the gift that keeps on giving and the end is near. For the Union. And a new beginning for Scotland.

1,153 days on from the EU Membership Referendum that left the whole British political establishment dazed and confused, and six dozen before the Great Leap Backward, the song remains the same. The Conservatives have kept all options on the table, except seeking another Brextension, revoking Article 50 and passing a Withdrawal Agreement Bill, while still claiming it's everybody's fault but theirs and hoping enough gullible voters will fall for it and vote for them. Of course when the First Minister of England has nothing to offer but 'Drink The Kool-Aid, Oiks', it will work only with those daft enough to buy that high levels of expertise in procrastinating, obfuscating, blame-shifting, fabricating, fearmongering and grandstanding are also proof of fitness to govern. Like a third of the English electorate, give or take, and a disturbing fifth of the Scottish electorate. Saddest part is that the oppositions look like having quite run out of options too when 72 calendar days before Halloween actually mean only 22 Commons working days left to defuse the B-Bomb. Unless you count The Guardian's latest fantasy scenario of a Lucas-Swinson ticket excluding 'separatist' SNP and Plaid Cymru as a viable option.

At first it looked like Jeremy Corbyn (or rather Labour's legal advisers) might have hit the motherlode when he asked Cabinet Secretary Mark Sedwill, the Head of the Civil Service, to spell out the rules regarding purdah. By convention purdah starts six weeks before Election Day. But the Fixed-Term Parliaments Act (FTPA) stipulates that dissolution happens 25 working days before the scheduled Election Day, which is also six weeks, give or take a couple of Bank holidays. In the one example we have so far dissolution was effective on 19 April 2017 and purdah started on 22 April to achieve six full weeks as the election was scheduled for 8 June. So whatever the scheduled date for the election, purdah starts on the day of dissolution. Which means that, whichever date Johnson chooses for the snap election, all Government activity basically stops as soon as dissolution is announced. Unless if it does not as constitutional experts beg to differ and are not willing to offer a definite opinion. So it might be up to the courts to decide whether strict observance of purdah means that only passing new controversial policies through Commons is strengstens verboten, or if implementing ones that have already been passed is also off-limits. The tricky part here being of course that No Deal Brexit has technically never been passed by Commons and has become the default option only by default, as the name implies, because May's botched Deal failed thrice and revoking Article 50 was never on the table. Now Sedwill's refusal to clarify the rules and 'make it up as we go' attitude makes it likely this would have to be settled in court, with no indication whatsoever of how long it might take or which way it might go. Note to Comrade Corbyn: whatever you choose to do, act quickly if you want a ruling before Halloween as courts ruling in your favour retrospectively would not look that good. Just sayin.

Then it looks like Westminster is bracing itself for an all-out nuclear constitutional war, and Elizabeth Windsor could very well be the Mother Of All ICBMs in this conflagration. The irony here is that Remainer MPs' amendments to the Northern Ireland Bill, originally designed to make prorogation impossible, now backfire as no business other than the Northern Ireland Bill can be addressed until 9 September, almost a week after Commons reconvene. Silver lining is that it allows the Scottish Court of Session time to rule on the case against prorogation fast-tracked to them, though it would still have to go through the Supreme Court afterwards. Sad part of the news coverage is that media are all over the place with the cats-in-baggery between the National Unity People's Vote Front and the People's Vote Front of National Unity and that some of them have managed to make Jeremy Corbyn the problem while he is part of the solution, and quite possibly The Solution for the few weeks needed to properly organize a snap GE, whether Jo Swinson and Dominic Grieve like it or not. But now we have reached this irony-filled point in the storyline where Boris Johnson's Nemesis might very well not be Jeremy Corbyn but Philip Hammond, provided of course his nineteenish partners in crime agree to put their baws on the table and go all the way. Because a good coup is like a good fuck, half of it is worse than none at all.

The plot thickens so stay tuned for further broadcasts

There is great chaos under heaven, the situation is excellent
Mao Zedong

Jeremy's Den

20/08/2019

Westminster Projection and then some - 20 August 2019 Update

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