Home Office still perpetuating dangerous anti-immigration rhetoric

Home Office still perpetuating dangerous anti-immigration rhetoric

Nov 4, 2022 | Bylines, News

The Home Office does not speak for desperate migrants. It does not speak for businesses crying out for staff. And it certainly does not speak for me, writes Bremain Chair Sue Wilson MBE for Yorkshire Bylines.

Ever since the Brexit referendum in 2016, the UK has become disturbingly familiar with anti-immigration rhetoric. Before the toxic language of UKIP/Brexit Party changed the nature of the conversation, the majority of the British public had no issue with European citizens doing jobs that they didn’t want. Six years on and staff shortages are a major issue, especially in industries such as hospitability or food. Thanks to Brexit.

 

Home Office – all talk and no action

Not only did Brexit change public attitudes towards migration, it shifted the Conservative Party ever further to the right. With that shift came increasingly alarming language from one home secretary after another.

First, we had Theresa May with her ‘go-home’ vans. Then we had Priti Patel with her disgusting policy – never yet implemented, thankfully – of sending desperate asylum seekers to Rwanda. Finally, just when we thought it couldn’t get any worse, along comes Suella Braverman, not once, but twice. With her far-right language of “stopping the invasion” and “the scourge of illegal immigration” it’s no wonder she earned the nickname Cruella.

If the rhetoric itself – from a government department responsible for the welfare of vulnerable asylum seekers – wasn’t bad enough, the lack of action is unconscionable. And deliberate, very deliberate.

 

Numbers can lie

Not only is Braverman’s cruel and toxic language offensive, but it is not supported by the facts. While it’s true that the number of desperate migrants crossing the British Channel has increased considerably – to over 40,000 this year alone – the numbers don’t tell the whole story. What they don’t explain is why.

They also fail to evaluate UK immigration against that of other European countries. That comparison shows the UK well down the European league table – in 19th place – when reviewing immigrant numbers as a percentage of the population. A fact that even the reticent BBC News programme is now sharing on prime-time TV.

 

Immigration: no solutions, only obstacles

Although migration from the EU has reduced, immigration from the rest of the world has not. In fact, it has increased. Desperate asylum seekers willing to risk life and limb for a chance of a better life have been left with no other options. Safe routes no longer exist – thanks to the Home Office – and earlier arrangements with the EU are now unavailable.

Aspects of the Common European Asylum System no longer apply to the UK, and the loss of the Dublin III Regulation in particular has removed the UK’s ability to return asylum seekers to other European countries. Leaving the EU has also meant that EU funding is no longer available for assistance with asylum and immigration initiatives.

Despite all the promises that Brexit would reduce immigration, it hasn’t. We have, it seems, failed to take back control of our borders. Immigration was, for the purposes of Brexit, a suitable topic to hang a culture war battle on, and still is.

 

Anti-immigration rhetoric: words matter

The terms ‘refugee’ and ‘asylum seeker’ are rarely used by the government. Instead, they prefer labels that stir up hatred and division. They prefer pejorative terms such as ‘illegal immigrant’, when what they mean is ‘undocumented’ or ‘irregular’. But those terms wouldn’t rile up the far-right, or satisfy those far-right members of the government, such as the European Research Group (ERG), the home secretary included.

 

The Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM) believes that labelling human being as ‘illegals’ is an example of bias. Not only does it affect public perception, but it also impacts on policy. The term ‘illegal’ implies criminality, is discriminatory, and quite frankly, offensive.

A person cannot be illegal. Migration is not a crime.

 

Government misreading the room

Regardless of their own personal views on immigration, the Tories have used migrants for their own ends. They successfully persuaded enough of the nation that poor, desperate immigrants were the cause of the UK’s ills (along with the evil EU, of course). They directed public anger at those looking for a better life in Britain, and away from themselves. What worked in 2016, however, is not working now. But the government is seemingly so blinded by its own hatred that is has failed to notice the change in public opinion.

Despite increased levels of immigration over the intervening period, the British public are now far more tolerant of immigrants. Before the referendum, levels of anxiety were rising in line with overseas arrivals. Those concerns seem now to have evaporated. Except in government circles.

Whether it is the toxicity of the rhetoric, the cruelty of government policies, or the distressing sight of asylum seekers being treated like animals, public opinion does not match government language or actions. The world is watching and the behaviour of the UK – especially towards citizens of other nations – is under a microscope. The view is not a pretty one.

 

Failing to fulfil commitments

When withdrawing from the Dublin III Regulation, the government made a commitment to the 1951 Refugee Convention, of which the UK is a signatory. It pledged that leaving the EU would “not change the UK’s obligation to offer protection to refugees”. The government also claimed that “the UK’s status as a ‘world leader’ in the field of asylum will not change once it is no longer subject to EU laws”.

No doubt, if asked, the Home Office would say it has fulfilled those obligations, but their treatment of asylum seekers at Manston Asylum Centre in Kent would suggest otherwise. A note from a young detainee was recently thrown over the fence in a desperate plea for help. In it the young girl complained about bad food and said it was “like we’re in prison”. She said there were a lot of children on site who “shouldn’t be here …. they should be in school”.

Following recent bad press about overcrowding at Manston, the Home Office took action to rapidly remove hundreds of detainees. However, their ill-judged action included the shocking abandonment of 11 Afghan, Syrian and Iraqi asylum seekers at Victoria train station at 11pm on Tuesday evening. The asylum seekers were left without warm clothes, money, accommodation or food, some in flip-flops. Another 50 were abandoned at Victoria coach station. Thankfully charity volunteers stepped in to do the government’s job for them – offering the protection the government claimed to be committed to offering refugees.

Asylum seekers are desperate people escaping desperate circumstances. They would have to be, just to put themselves through the expense, horror and danger of the journey that brings them to our shores. They deserve to be treated with dignity and compassion. To have their applications dealt with in a timely and sensitive fashion and to be housed in decent living conditions in the meantime. They deserve to be offered to opportunity to contribute to British society, as they so desperately wish. They do not deserve the treatment they receive at the hands of a government that is not acting on behalf of anyone but themselves.

The Home Office does not speak for desperate migrants. It does not speak for businesses crying out for staff. And it certainly does not speak for me.

UK economy is “frankly doomed”

UK economy is “frankly doomed”

Oct 24, 2022 | Bylines, News

Billionaire investor and Tory supporter Guy Hands says the UK economy is “frankly doomed” and has been this way since the failed Brexit deal writes Bremain Chair Sue Wilson MBE for Yorkshire Bylines.

The UK economy is “frankly doomed”. So says billionaire investor and former president of the Oxford University Conservative Association, Guy Hands. Speaking to the BBC’s flagship radio news programme on BBC Radio 4 on Monday, Hands said the reason for the UK’s dire economic state was the “completely hopeless” Brexit deal.

The situation is so serious, claims Hands, that the UK could need a financial bailout from the International Monetary Fund. That’s unless the new prime minister can renegotiate the deal with the European Union. Without a new deal, Hands says, the UK is on a path to being “the sick man of Europe” – a characterisation of Britain from the 70s, at a time of industrial upheaval and poor economic performance.

Conservative Party should own their mistake

Hands, chair of private equity firm Terra Firma, made his comments following a tumultuous period of financial instability, brought on by the recent ‘mini-budget’. However, he believes the causes of the UK’s economic problems go back much further.

Hands holds the Conservative government completely responsible and said they must “own up to the mistake they made in how they negotiated Brexit”. He added, the government must move on from their “own internal wars”. Failure to do so would result in “steadily increasing taxes, steadily reducing benefits and social services, higher interest rates” and “increasing levels of poverty in the UK”.

Based on the last 12 years of Tory rule, the chances of the government accepting any responsibility for the state of the nation, or apologising for the harm done, seem extremely remote. More likely, even with a new PM, we’re in for more denial and delusion, especially when it comes to their failed Brexit project. The Tories don’t do sorry. Or reality, it would appear.

Another costly failed experiment

Short-lived former PM Liz Truss was an avid advocate of a low-tax, high-growth economy, despite no evidence that a ‘trickledown’ policy works. Professor Nicholas Barr of the London School of Economics said recently “there is a wealth of evidence against tax cuts alone producing growth”.

In his interview today, Hands also commented on the government’s “dream of a low-tax, low-benefit economy” – the whole ethos behind Brexit. In regard to Truss, he said the trickledown policy had been tried but was something that was clearly “not acceptable to the British people”.

In the midst of a cost-of-living crisis, Hands said it was not just those at the bottom that are suffering the consequences of “a disastrous economic state” caused by a “completely hopeless” Brexit deal. Poverty was now “moving up the economic level” and affecting “middle class people who will not be able to pay their mortgages” and are “finding it difficult to make ends meet”

 

The truth about Brexit cannot be hidden any longer

According to Hands, there is a “possibility of turning around the economy”. It would, however, require leadership from someone with the “intellectual capability to renegotiate Brexit”. Whether or not he believes our new PM fits the bill, or can pay it, is not clear.

What is clear is that, new PM or not, the Brexiters are still in charge. Based on earlier evidence, they do want a new deal, though not necessarily one that Hands would approve of, that the EU would accept, or that would benefit the UK economy.

Until the government – whether this one or the next – starts being honest about Brexit and our relationship with Europe, it is difficult to see how the situation can improve. Brexit has proven to be as damaging and disastrous as pro-Europeans said it would be.

The government will no doubt claim they have a plan, that everything will be fine given time, and that they know what they are doing. They will continue to blame anyone but themselves for the state of the country.

But, the damage wreaked by Brexit cannot be hidden any longer. The rest of the world can see it, and increasingly, so can the British public. It’s high time the government, the opposition and the mainstream media, opened their eyes too.

There is a better deal to be had. As members of the European Union.

 

Triple lock pensions at risk

Triple lock pensions at risk

Oct 20, 2022 | Bylines, News

The triple lock on pensions has been a long-held Conservative Party commitment and manifesto promise. But not any more it seems.Bremain Chair Sue Wilson MBE writes for Yorkshire Bylines.

Whilst financial markets may have felt some relief at the arrival of Jeremy Hunt, the new chancellor, British pensioners are fearing the worst. It seems that, for the second year running, the triple lock on pensions could be at risk. The chancellor refused on Tuesday, in front of both the media and parliament, to “commit to anything” or to make any promises. His comments were being backed up, at least on the day, by Prime Minister (for now) Liz Truss.

 

Triple lock pensions at risk: another broken manifesto promise?

The triple lock on pensions has been a long-held Conservative Party commitment and manifesto promise. The lock commits the government to upgrading state pensions annually by 2.5%, average earnings, or inflation, whichever is the highest. However, the last annual review – effective from April this year – saw the triple lock downgraded to a double lock.

Boris Johnson’s government claimed that the cost-of-living crisis was to blame – all down to Covid and no mention of Brexit, of course. Despite considerable outrage at having the inflationary element of the lock removed, Johnson rode out the storm with a promise of a return of the triple lock next year. It would now appear that both Truss and Hunt may have other ideas.

 

On Tuesday, Labour’s Emma Hardy asked the chancellor for confirmation that the state pension would rise with inflation next April. Hunt said he was “very aware of how many vulnerable pensioners there are and the importance of the triple lock” but would not be making “any commitments on any individual policy areas”.

 

The cost of inflation

When the inflationary element of the triple lock was abandoned this year, state pensioners saw their income rise by just 3.1%. At that time, the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) was recording inflation at 9%. With anticipated rises in fuel and energy costs this winter, inflation is expected to continue to climb. Just this week, the CPI rose to 10.1%, according to the Office for National Statistics. The Bank of England expects inflation to reach 11% by the end of the month.

US financial services firm Citi is predicting that the CPI will reach 18% in the first quarter of 2023, while the retail prices index could climb to 21%. Meanwhile, the International Monetary Fund believes the UK will have “the most persistent high inflation in the G7”

 

British pensions fall short

Over 12 million pensioners receive a British state pension, and the population is ageing. Like other vulnerable groups, whether working or not, any failure to increase income in line with inflation is going to hurt. With the energy and cost-of-living crises, many are already having to make difficult decisions about where to cut back, such as choosing between heating or eating. Without inflationary increases to wages, benefits and pensions, many more will fall into poverty.

The fact that the UK state pension is pitifully low by comparison to other industrialised nations only adds to the problem. The basic state pension in the UK, for those who have made full national insurance contributions, is just £141.85 per week. As a percentage of average wages, the difference between our state pension and that of other countries is stark. According to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), a typical British worker’s pension equates to just 29% of average wages. Compare that to Japan (40%), USA (49.1%), Germany (50.5%), France (74.5%), Spain (81.8%) or the Netherlands (100.6%) and you begin to understand how far Britain lags behind.

 

Meanwhile, as British state pensions shrink in real terms, MPs are quite happily awarding themselves annual pay rises and, according to the Telegraph, are enjoying pensions “five times more generous than those of private sector workers”. In effect, the average worker would need to contribute 43 years longer than a British politician for the same pay out.

 

Risking core support

Of course, not all pensioners rely on a state pension alone, and not all pensioners vote Conservative. But many do. If this government’s policies have not already driven away many of their core supporters, the triple lock threat could finish the job.

If all goes to plan – which cannot be taken for granted – the right to vote will be restored to hundreds of thousands of pensioners living abroad, in time for the next scheduled general election. As the vast majority of them were anti-Brexit – even if unable to vote against it – they already hold a major gripe against the Conservative government.

The devaluation of the pound since the referendum in 2016 has already caused the pensions of British emigrants to shrink. Any further reduction of pension values in real terms would go down like a lead balloon. Or the Brexit pound. Despite that, the government seems intent on further undermining its core over-60s support at home and abroad.

 

Another U-turn or another lie?

When the topic of the triple lock was raised at Prime Minister’s Questions on Wednesday, the response from Truss was rather different from the day before. Another U-turn perhaps or just another attempt to mislead?

The SNP’s Ian Blackford asked Truss a direct question about the government’s commitment to the triple lock. Blackford said that the latest broken promise would “put pensioners in the front line of Tory cuts” and asked the PM to commit to “raising the state pension at the rate of inflation?” In response, Truss said the government had “been clear in our manifesto that we will maintain the triple lock” and that she was “completely committed to it”. She added, “so is the chancellor”.

Sadly, most pensioners across the country, or abroad, won’t believe a word of it. We know from past, bitter experience what government platitudes and promises are worth, and who pays the price for their mistakes.

Come the next election, it will be Tories paying the price for those mistakes. Unfortunately, it’s the country that will be saddled with the bill.

We get it, and we have listened: government U-turn on uncosted tax cuts

We get it, and we have listened: government U-turn on uncosted tax cuts

Oct 3, 2022 | Bylines, News

The country gets it. We have listened. Can we now bring on the general election and rid the country of Trussonomics and KamiKwasi thinking? Bremain Chair,Sue Wilson MBE, writes for Yorkshire Bylines.

One of the most unpopular decisions made by the Liz Truss government has resulted in a screeching U-turn in the middle of the Conservatory Party conference. The decision to abolish the 45% tax rate for the highest paid 1% of the country has been reversed. While Truss, Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng and Treasury Secretary Chris Philp argue about whose daft idea it was in the first place, the spin machine is going into overdrive.

One of the most unpopular decisions made by the Liz Truss government has resulted in a screeching U-turn in the middle of the Conservatory Party conference. The decision to abolish the 45% tax rate for the highest paid 1% of the country has been reversed. While Truss, Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng and Treasury Secretary Chris Philp argue about whose daft idea it was in the first place, the spin machine is going into overdrive.

Humility and contrition but no apology

An official statement from the chancellor described the 45p tax rate as a “distraction” from the government’s “overriding mission to tackle the challenges we face”. In a quote re-iterated by Truss herself, Kwarteng said “we get it, and we have listened”. However, who they had listened to wasn’t made clear. It’s unlikely that they listened to the public if, indeed, they ever engage with them on anything. Their recent mad-cap ideas would suggest otherwise.

Perhaps, instead, they had listened to the markets. Or perhaps to their donors, who journalist Robert Peston said had told the party “We don’t need the money, we don’t want the money and you are bringing us into disrepute”.

Or, heaven forbid, did the government listen to some genuine economic experts? Or was it just the cries from their own, baffled and worried backbenchers that caused the reversed ferret?

What we do know is that Kwarteng is “happy to own the humiliation” but not willing to say sorry for the worry or the damage. Presumably because, like Truss, he genuinely believes it was the right move in the first place and it’s just that the country doesn’t understand his genius.

The damage is done

Despite subsequent efforts to downplay the significance of the proposed tax cuts, Kwarteng had saved that particular announcement until last in his mini-budget speech last Friday. The tax cut proposals drew immediate and vehement criticism, not least from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The pound responded so badly that the Bank of England was forced to take the unprecedented step of a £65bn emergency intervention, in an effort to restore order.

Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves said the abandonment of the policy comes too late for families paying higher mortgages and prices. The Tories, she said, “have destroyed their economic credibility and damaged trust in the British economy”. The whole strategy of trickle-down economics had been “discredited”, she said, with the government “making it up as they go along”.

Labour MP Chris Elmore also expressed concerns about mortgage rates, after lenders withdrew hundreds of mortgage products as a direct result of the chancellor’s actions. Not only were many facing “massive hikes in their mortgages”, Elmore said, but first-time buyers were being “frozen out”. He added, “the damage is done”.

 

Pressing on regardless

Of course, the abandoned tax cut was not the only issue of concern over the government’s economic policies. If you can call them that. The whole idea that cutting taxes will stimulate growth would be laughable if it wasn’t so scary. Worse still is the prospect that any cuts in tax will be funded either by increasingly expensive borrowing or by public sector cuts. And let’s not forget, borrowing has now become more expensive thanks to rising inflation caused largely by [checks notes] government actions.

But, never fear. Truss and Kwarteng have everything under control. Their energy price guarantee “will support households and businesses with their energy bills”. Better yet, their policy of cutting taxes will “put money back in the pockets of 30 million hard-working people and grow the economy”. Not sure what will happen to all those who don’t ‘work hard’, but then you can’t win them all.

Finally, in his U-turn statement the chancellor said the government was “driving supply side reforms”, whatever that is supposed to mean. Apparently, that includes accelerating major infrastructure projects – “to get Britain moving”

 

Move along now

The government will be hoping, if not expecting, that this latest U-turn will draw a line under its recent, and catastrophic, misjudgements. Even if some are prepared to give Truss and Kwarteng the benefit of the doubt, for others this latest debacle will just be the straw that finally broke the camel’s back.

The public are waking up, Tory donors included. Multi-millionaire and former Conservative Party donor, Gareth Quarry, has just defected to Labour. He described Truss and Kwarteng as “two zealots” following a policy of “GCSE economics”. Quarry said their proposals were like “a game of roulette where they’re just betting everything on one number coming up in the next spin”.

 

While Truss and Kwarteng may hope for forgiveness, or at least for short memories, they are ignoring what, for most of the country, is the bleeding obvious. Even though the tax cut for the relatively few paying the highest rate of tax has been abandoned, it is what this government wanted. Truss’s government believed in it – and still does.

Truss and Kwarteng might now expect credit for doing the right thing, but they were forced into it and it was against their better judgement. The Conservative Party is now seen as the party that tried to cut taxes for the very richest people in our society in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis affecting millions. Not only would they have forced further hardships on those already facing poverty, but they expected us all to pay for it, not just now, for years to come.

So, please, can we just bring on the general election and let’s rid the country of Trussonomics and KamiKwasi thinking. The country gets it, and we have listened. And we don’t want to hear any more.

Just Biden our time

Just Biden our time

Sep 22, 2022 | Bylines, News

Waking up to the reality of Brexit – our biggest trading relationship is destroyed and we can’t conclude one with the world’s biggest economy writes Bremain Chair Sue Wilson MBE for Yorkshire Bylines.

Before Liz Truss had even got her feet under her desk at Number 10, she was already preparing her excuses. In advance of her meeting with the President Joe Biden, she was telling the country why a free trade deal with the US was not on the cards. Probably for years.

As world leaders assembled in New York on Wednesday for the United Nations summit, Biden and Truss were preparing to meet. It appeared as though both would come to the table with very different agendas. The president’s national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, had already made it clear that Biden would want to discuss the Northern Ireland protocol “in some detail”. Truss, meanwhile, was insisting that a UK/US trade deal was not on the agenda and there were no negotiations currently taking place. “I don’t have any expectation”, she said, “that those are going to start in the short to medium term”. That timescale looks certain to be after the next general election.

 

Waking up to reality

On becoming trade secretary in 2019, Truss regarded a trade deal with the US as her main priority. She was “confident that things were moving in the right direction”. Not any more, it seems.

It was also seen as a major priority for Boris Johnson when he became prime minister. Not only was it regarded as a seemingly straightforward task to do a “great deal” but we’d be “first in line”.

A former adviser, Ben Ramanauskas, said Truss “did try very hard” in earlier negotiations with Biden but was now forced to accept that “reality” had caught up with her. A trade deal with America was, according to the BBC, now “on the back burner because Truss knows it is unattainable”.

Not so special relationship

The most pressing issue affecting any potential trade deal, for Biden at least, is the Northern Ireland protocol and protecting the Belfast Good Friday agreement (GFA). While Truss insists that the government’s controversial Northern Ireland protocol bill itself provides protection for the GFA, it is not a position that many outside the government support. Least of all, the US president. While Truss will be seeking to distance any discussions of trade deals from those on the protocol, Biden will be keen to link them inextricably together.

However, not all issues surrounding trade negotiations, or the ‘special relationship’ between the two countries relate to the protocol. On the UK side there are issues – for the British public and farmers, at least – relating to food, health and animal welfare standards, such as hormone-treated beef and chlorinated chicken.

On the American side, there are issues over policy – currently British economic policy. As Truss admitted that her economic proposals would benefit the rich the most, Biden said he was “sick and tired of trickle-down economics”. The Americans, he said, were “building an economy from the bottom up and middle out”. The right-wing economic theory – suggesting that cutting taxes for the wealthy would “trickle down” to the less well off – “has never worked”, he added. Although not a specific condemnation of Truss and her policies, Biden’s comments ahead of their meeting will not have improved already strained relations.

 

Steadfast allies

If the mood music before the meeting was cool, Biden and Truss made an effort at the UN. Presumably keen to demonstrate their similarities of purpose rather than their differences, Truss described the US and UK as “steadfast allies”. The words ‘special relationship’ were never uttered.

Both sides reiterated their commitment to the GFA, even though they have very different ideas on how to provide the protection they both seek. Biden said he was looking forward to hearing what was on Truss’s mind and to further discussing how to make sure that the GFA was “upheld into the future”.

The president is planning a state visit to the UK in the first half of 2023 to mark the 25th anniversary of the GFA. In effect, the visit will provide a deadline for resolving the issues surrounding the protocol.

 

Rewriting history

With the prospect of a quick trade deal with America dissolving, Brexit supporters are attempting to change their stories. A US/UK trade deal was never promised, they say. It’s not important to the UK economy, they say. And the always familiar Brexiter refrain, they need us more than we need them.

Alternatively, they say that everything is going to plan/going well, or going exactly as they anticipated. Or that all will be well if we just wait long enough. In other words, the same tired excuses and lies we hear every time the truth about Brexit becomes blindingly obvious, even to those wearing rose-tinted goggles.

The pro-Brexit campaigns sold the prospect of doing free trade deals around the world – and especially with America – as one of the biggest wins of leaving the EU. Even as recently as August 2020, the Expresswas talking about a “Brexit trade breakthrough”, with a headline claiming that the Remainers had been “silenced” as a “brilliant US/UK future deal plan revealed”. Just this week, their own headline tells a very different story, as they admit that the deal “might take years”, and describe Biden as “uninterested”.

Having witnessed the kind of harmful compromises the British government have already made when making post-Brexit trade deals, many will see any delays to a US/UK deal as a relief. Not least British farmers, and the British public, concerned about the cost to our valued health and food standards.

As regards the damage to our economy that a failure to secure a deal would bring, this perhaps is the least of our economic concerns. Damaging as the situation might be, it pales into insignificance when compared with what we have already lost.

 

If leaving the EU was about enabling our freedom to deal independently with countries around the world, it has failed. Either the Brexiters were lying or they were overly optimistic about their own talents. Or both. In the process, they have destroyed our biggest trading partnership with our closest and most important neighbours, and without accepting any responsibility whatsoever. That’s more than just a spectacular failure. It’s criminal negligence, and they seem to be getting away with it.

Biden is smart. He can see through this government’s nonsense. Thankfully, finally, it would appear that the British public can too.

Liz Truss – Brexit Britain’s anti-monarchist, Remainer PM

Liz Truss – Brexit Britain’s anti-monarchist, Remainer PM

Sep 22, 2022 | Bylines, News

‘These are my principles, if you don’t like them, I have others’ seems to be PM Liz Truss’s modus operandi. Lisa Burton, Bremain vice Chair takes a closer look for Yorkshire Bylines“

I’m against the idea that people can be born to rule – that people, because of the family they are born into, should be able to be the head of state of our country. I think that’s disgraceful.”– Liz Truss

 

Once, it was widely known and accepted that Britain had its fair share of republicans, but these are strange days in British society. Right-wing tabloids, commentators and a rise in nationalism mean that we must watch our language. Not showing enough reverence to royalty, the country, and even Brexit can land you in unpatriotic deep water. Indeed, criticism can even get you arrested.

Yet here we are. We have witnessed the new British prime minister get through an entire leadership contest, meet the Queen and subsequently King Charles with hardly a mention from mainstream media that she, a former Liberal Democrat, was a republican who campaigned for the abolition of the monarchy. When her previous views were reported, well before the death of the Queen, there was no criticism. Indeed the Daily Mail’s front page reporting was of her regret and mistake.

While social media responded to Truss’s bizarre attempt at a curtsy/bow, now dubbed ‘the burtsy’, with a mixture of cringe and humour, we should consider the abuse Jeremy Corbyn received on front page spreads when ‘he didn’t bow deeply enough’ at the Cenotaph.

 

The hypocrisy of the government-supporting media

Truss and her supporters would say it’s irrelevant because she was young, or she has changed her mind. So let’s pretend it was Keir Starmer or Nicola Sturgeon who campaigned for the abolition of the monarchy when young.

It is undeniable that the right-wing, Conservative-supporting media tabloids, like the Daily Mail, Sun and Express, would attempt to annihilate them over their stance. After all, the Mail ran 13 days of front-page coverage over ‘Beergate’ in line with the advice of their old pal Goebbels who said, “repeat a lie often enough it becomes truth”. Sorry, folks, it doesn’t change the law though.

Every time Corbyn interacted with the Queen, he was regularly attacked and criticised for his republican beliefs and perceived lack of respect, as these headlines show.

‘NATIONAL DISGRACE Jeremy Corbyn refuses to bow to Queen.’

‘Leftie who hates royals will kiss Queen’s hand to grab £6.2 million.’

‘Jeremy Corbyn snubbed Queen with ‘deeply insulting’ refusal: Don’t expect to kneel’

‘Jeremy Corbyn branded ‘disloyal’ after refusing to sing national anthem.’

‘”Scruffy and disrespectful” Corbyn is slammed for his appearance at Cenotaph service.’

The speech

In her previous incarnation – before she became a Conservative and a monarchist – Truss was president of the Oxford University Liberal Democrats and very much an anti-monarchist.

In 1994 she made a ‘monarchy-bashing’ speech at the Liberal Democrat conference in Brighton. If a ‘leftie’ spoke these words previously, the tabloids and so-called ‘patriotic’ commentators would likely be foaming at the mouth:

“This Party, unlike Labour, will not duck and weave about debating the issues people are interested in. When they examine what we stand for, unlike the figure at the centre of this debate (meaning the Queen), we will not be caught with no clothes on.”

 

She is referring to the expression ‘the emperor has no clothes’, which describes a situation in which people are afraid to criticise something or someone because the perceived wisdom of the masses is that the thing or person is good or necessary. It is often used in political and social contexts for any obvious truth denied by the majority despite the evidence of their eyes, especially when proclaimed by the government

 

Truss, the ardent Remainer

In the six years since the Brexit referendum, Truss has gone from being a vocal and ardent supporter of remaining in the European Union to being a ‘born again Brexiter’.

In May 2016, Truss, then secretary of state for the environment, addressed the Food and Drink Federation to speak about the benefits of the European single market and encourage them to vote remain. It is a speech worth listening to because, for once, she was spot on.

 

“I do think that the decision on the 23rd of June probably will have a greater impact on the food and drink industry than it would have on any other parts of the economy. That’s because if we look at trade, the food and drink industry exports 60% of all its products to the EU.”

She was right to be concerned. The value of food exports to the EU dropped by £2.4bn in the first 15 months after Brexit, according to analysis of HMRC data.

She also said:

“If we are a country like Norway, we’d have to fill in 50 boxes on a form every time we went to export something. In products like agricultural products, there’s a regime of quotas and tariffs.”

 

Right again. This is becoming impressive. Maybe Truss is a clairvoyant?

It wasn’t just trade – Truss campaigned for remain for our children’s future benefits

Speaking in 2016, the Conservative MP then said she championed Britain staying inside the EU to protect her daughters’ future and the environment.

I don’t want my daughters to grow up in a world where they need a visa or permit to work in Europe; or where they are hampered from growing a business because of extortionate call costs and barriers to trade.

“Every parent wants their children to grow up in a healthy environment with clean water, fresh air and thriving natural wonders. Being part of the EU helps protect these precious resources and spaces.”

 

Truss called this one right too. Brexit is cited as a factor in the recent sewage scandal, allowing water companies to increase how much sewage they discharge into Britain’s waterways and oceans.

Is she now happy that her daughters are hampered from growing a business due to extortionate costs? Does it fill her with glee that her children are now unable to travel freely, with no limits, to work, marry and retire in 26 other countries?

 

In Brexit Britain – you can change your mind – but only if it’s in the ‘RIGHT’ direction

UK government members are no longer traditional Conservatives. The party’s lurch to the populist right has been ongoing since those same forces brought about Brexit.

It has become a country where all polling shows that the majority of the UK now thinks Brexit is a failure and mistake and evidence abounds of its damage. Yet, discussion in addressing issues around Brexit is shut down. People who express these opinions are called traitors, remoaners, and unpatriotic.

Liz Truss can turn from anti-monarchist to monarchist and Remainer to Brexiter without being crucified by the tabloids, because her words align with the people and forces pushing the hard-right political agenda in Britain. She is now their figurehead who will willingly do their bidding and be protected for as long as she toes their line.

The hard-right of the party now drives Conservative policy. The ERG, Taxpayers Alliance, and Net Zero Scrutiny groups are just some examples. I recommend reading this investigative report by Byline Times and this article by Ann Moody in Yorkshire Bylines, which expose that Truss’s Cabinet appears to be ideologically aligned with some of the most controversial themes of far-right activism in the USA, including women’s (abortion) rights.

Six of Truss’s Cabinet appointments and four of her advisors have funding ties to Conservative organisations connected to American billionaires, the Mercers. The Mercer lobby has been called “the chief financiers of the fascist movement”.

 

Will Truss stick or twist?

In an LBC interview with Eddie Mar in March 2019, the conversation with Truss went like this:

Eddie: “People can change their minds, can’t they?”

Truss: “But they were told in the referendum in 2016 that their vote would be implemented.”

Eddie: “What about people who have changed their minds between then and now?”

Truss: “I don’t think people have changed their minds.”

Eddie: “You have.”

Truss: “I have, that’s true. In the other way, though.”

Ah, that’s ok then, and who knows, maybe the winds of politics will change direction, and Truss will become an anti-monarchist, liberal Remainer again. She might even regain some of her previous convictions. However, we can be reasonably sure that the right-wing, Conservative-supporting tabloids wouldn’t let her off so lightly if she shifted in the other direction.