Brexit’s Falstaff can’t bluff his way through this any longer
Way back in the mid-1960s, during a quiet summer, a former journalist turned public relations man persuaded the chairman of a public company to conduct a search for the Loch Ness monster.
Quiet summers used to be known in Fleet Street as the “silly season”. One day, the PR man responsible for what was essentially a publicity stunt was called into the chairman’s office. The chairman, a retired general, was in a state of panic. “What on earth are we going to do if we find the monster?” he said.
“It’s all right, sir, no need to worry. There is no monster.”
I am reminded of this episode by the way those Brexiters who have not already admitted their gross disservice to a once-admired nation have been arguing that the government should do more to promote the advantages of Brexit. They have a slight problem: just as there is no Loch Ness monster, there are no advantages to Brexit.
Brexit is an unmitigated disaster, and the damage is getting worse. I fear that Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, so impressive in his forensic demolition of prime minister (still!) Boris Johnson during PMQs, is living in cloud cuckoo land if he really believes that “there’s no case for rejoining [the EU], so we have to make it work”. There is every case for rejoining the EU: the only question is how much economic and social damage will have to accrue before reality dawns.
Reality takes time to dawn; but when it does, it does so in spades. Tories have been tying themselves in knots over when and how to give the prime minister his marching orders. But the voters have not. For far too long they gave Johnson the benefit of the doubt – I am still reeling from the shock of hearing a distinguished establishment figure saying before Christmas: “I am beginning to
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