two-party dominance<\/a>) \u2013 will do their level best to deny Mr Burnham in what would be a colossal by-election struggle. <\/p>\nAt the same time, Mr Burnham must resign from the mayoralty of Greater Manchester, which could see the city that likes to bill itself as Britain\u2019s \u201csecond\u201d after London fall to Reform. That would be a huge embarrassment for Labour, plunging a dagger right into its former heartland, the home of the Co-op movement, site of the Peterloo Massacre, once lived in by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. All lost to Nigel Farage\u2019s nascent right-wing party. <\/p>\n
The country has been on a roller coaster, going through prime ministers in rapid fashion and lurching from one side of the spectrum to the other<\/p>\n
Ms Cooper was making the comparison with Tony Blair, who did stand down, in favour of the chancellor, Gordon Brown. That was completely different. There was no other rival to Mr Brown, he was out on his own as the next leader. There was the thorny issue of whether Mr Blair had agreed originally at their famous dinner at the Granita restaurant in Islington after the then Labour leader John Smith\u2019s sudden death and discussion of the succession, that Mr Blair would run and would subsequently move aside for Mr Brown. The Brownites insisted there was a pact, the Blairites said if there was, their man took the view that in the interests of the country he should remain in charge. <\/p>\n
Whatever, Mr Blair did eventually quit, after delivering three general election victories. That was a period of certainty, of a prime minister in number 10 for a long innings. Relative stability was maintained with Brown and with the Tory-Liberal Democrat coalition of David Cameron. <\/p>\n
The very need for a coalition, though, was indicative of a deeply fracturing electorate. The once centrist majority, with a swing to the left or right, was no more. Britain was broken. <\/p>\n
It was a divide highlighted by Brexit, which split Britain in two. Since that ballot, the country has been on a roller coaster, going through prime ministers in rapid fashion and lurching from one side of the spectrum to the other. <\/p>\n
The Brexit result was a protest vote. It was as much about working class, disenfranchised, disillusioned constituencies giving Westminster a bloody nose as it was signalling a desire to abandon the free trade bloc. That\u2019s been the pattern in the intervening years. Boris Johnson persuaded the usual Labour \u201cred wall\u201d North and Midlands to elect him because he would bring \u201clevelling up\u201d. When he didn\u2019t and his Tory successors Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak also failed to pick up the baton, they stampeded in the other direction, back to Labour and to Mr Starmer. <\/p>\n
Wrapped up in this is frustration, a shortage of timespan. People have no patience. Social media has seen the creation of a populace that demands change immediately. <\/p>\n
Politicians, anxious to please, to get themselves elected, have gone along with that, promising they will deliver. Even in this current cauldron, those words \u201cdeliver\u201d and \u201cchange\u201d are repeatedly being bandied about. <\/p>\n
They shouldn\u2019t be. Britain is not set up to do things in a hurry. Its regulatory framework, the government system, the City institutions \u2013 none of them function at pace. Over the decades, there have been proclamations that the red tape would be torched on bonfires, to no avail. If Mr Johnson was serious about ending the North-South divide and securing parity, it would have taken him many years \u2013 two if not three terms. No one bothered either, to inquire as to the cost. One comparison was Germany, where reunification cost $3 trillion. That sort of money was simply unavailable. Still, Mr Johnson was believed, for a short while. <\/p>\n
What\u2019s also occurred is that the main parties housed organised factions within themselves. They always did, but latterly they became more structured, parties within parties. In the pursuit of peace and electoral success, this was tolerated but it was storing up trouble, so the Tories had the Europhobes, the Brexiteers and Labour had Momentum on the left. They had their own chiefs and agendas. They were complying with the central command some of the time but prepared to work against it as well. <\/p>\n
That too was more achievable with the rise of social media and WhatsApp. It was noticeable that the turmoil of the last few days took place while MPs were not at Westminster; they were away from Parliament but nevertheless they were able to mount a rebellion. Dissatisfaction is fomented also by a questing, headline-searching media, anxious to gain online clicks. The one feeds on the other. <\/p>\n
Here we are then, with a lame duck premier who maintains he is staying put. In the time I\u2019ve taken to write this another minister has resigned. We shall see. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"What a mess. There is no other word that sums up the current state of government in Britain.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35077,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[13,94,613,3040,3041],"class_list":{"0":"post-35076","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-britain","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-keir-starmer","10":"tag-opinion","11":"tag-story","12":"tag-uk-bureau"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/116565179366818373","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35076","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35076"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35076\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35077"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35076"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35076"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35076"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}