Vanity Fair: The Death of the British Dream

On Tuesday, Theresa May made an unusual choice for the backdrop of her historic announcement regarding the terms of Britain’s departure from the European Union. The prime minister chose not Parliament but rather a lectern at Lancaster House, the setting, astonishingly enough, where Margaret Thatcher, the hero of every Tory right-winger, outlined the largely British notion for a single market back in 1988. Thatcher’s role in the European project ranks pretty high in the extensive annals of conservative amnesia, but it was May’s contempt for the elected representatives of the British people that was most significant. It apparently occurred to almost no one that she should be making her speech to Parliament, whose sovereignty and independence the Brexit supporters claimed to champion during the referendum campaign, rather than to the media and European ambassadors. [...]

The United Kingdom’s Supreme Court may, over the next few days, force the government to allow a debate before the triggering of Article 50, which will start the two-year procedure of leaving the E.U. But, even now, government ministers are drafting a one-line bill that is so microscopic that it will allow for no amendments and little debate. I hate to be an alarmist, but this adds up to something of an executive coup on Parliament. And the worst part of the whole story is that M.P.s are conniving in the rapid process of their own obsolescence. Apart from a few honorable exceptions, they sit gravely watching the ship of state head for the rocks with absolutely nothing to say for themselves—no ideas, not one thought about the huge, avoidable disaster of Brexit, and nothing to observe about the sheer, wasteful inconvenience of it all. [...]

This executive coup is all the more surprising given the numbers involved. May, who has never led her party to an election victory and therefore has no personal mandate, has a majority of just 14 seats in the House of Commons, which could easily be overturned by those M.P.s who are in favor of remaining in the E.U. There is something approximating a two-thirds pro-E.U. majority across all parties in the Commons. And in the House of Lords, where a geriatric majority is in favor of leaving the European Union, there are enough activist Europhiles to cause trouble.

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