Is The Plan To Lose A General Election?

Is no deal actually going to happen?   I have never thought it would and I still think it won't.   There are so many downsides even from a Brexiter point of view I can't see it happening.   The most significant development this week is that the German government have started making noises that they are ready for no deal.   I think that this is basically just a shot at the UK government to stop messing about.


So how does Boris get out of the no deal scenario he talked up?

Well despite all the bluster he has left himself plenty of wriggle room.  He can still say that he wants a deal so long as the EU play along with it.  He has not been forthcoming with what is wrong the current deal or what he would settle for.  And of course he did actually vote for May's deal when it was politically expedient at the time to do so.  So he would be able to portray a pretty wide range of scenarios as being getting what he wanted all along.

But I don't think that's the actual plan.

His best bet is to provoke a vote of no confidence and find himself forced into an election where he narrowly loses.  That way the problem is dropped on the Labour Party.   They negotiate a soft Brexit and we are out of the EU without too much in the way of disruption.

The Tories can then blame everything on Labour and campaign to deliver a 'proper' Brexit next time.

If you think how you would go about achieving this you see how the strategy he is currently pursuing makes sense.  They hava abandoned the normal Tory trope of portraying public spending as a vice in itself and have promised to open the public purse to dispense all the goodies we could ever want.  That's actually going to put off a lot of habitual Tories - but also means Labour have to make comparable promises.   Going on and on about no deal also alienates remainers.  The mainstream medium are happy to ignore them, but politicians know there are a lot of them about.   Annoying remainers is a great way of building up the Labour vote in seats where they don't normally do well.   Great for getting Labour in in a snap election.  But leaving them with a lot of supporters who might well drift away once the Brexit issue is sorted - especially if they don't like the way that Labour handles the matter.

So a Labour government with thin support, extravagent promises that they have failed to meet and who can be blamed for all the disruption surrounding leaving the EU, or for failing to leave the EU.  That would be the perfect Christmas present for the Tories.