I want to try to keep this dispassionate. People should not be judged by their ethnicity or by their gender or by their sexual preferences but by what they say or, in this case, what they are not saying.
In this Brexit election, Brexit is hardly being discussed. The Prime Minister started this campaign with a lead of 22% and this has been frittered away to a lead of 3% and within the margin of error. The cause of this is the way the campaign has progressed right from the moment it started. The blame for this lies firmly at the feet or in the hands of Mrs May and is entirely her responsibility.
The reason for this, in my view, is the way that the Conservative Party has run its campaign. It has been very presidential. It has also been lamentable.
We have "Theresa's Team"; we have Mrs May calling the manifesto "My Manifesto"; we have her saying "a vote for me and my team" and in some circumstances the words 'Conservative Party' are very much an after thought. I am looking at a leaflet that says the name of my Conservative candidate 'standing with Theresa May', NOT 'standing with the Conservative Party'
We are 22 months from Brexit. The first negotiation will be in mid-June. We do not have any time to waste on pointless posturing. At the end of March 2019 the United Kingdom becomes a third country. President Tusk has said so in his reply to Mrs May:
"While an agreement on a future relationship between the Union and the United Kingdom as such can only be concluded once the United Kingdom has become a third country"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/31_03_17_eu_draft_guidelines.pdf
This means that between the United Kingdom's exit from the European Union and the negotiation of a new agreement some kind of interim deal will be required or there will be a 'hard Brexit'. The question is 'What does a hard Brexit look like' and the answer is 'not pretty'. I unhesitatingly recommend reading http://www.eureferendum.com for more comprehensive analysis but the idea that 'No Deal is better than a Bad Deal' is garbage.
The Conservative Party and 'President May' still pretends that 'No Deal is better than a bad deal"
The Conservative Party and 'President May' refuses to recognise that if there is a 'Hard Brexit' there will be massive consequences for Cross-border transportation at Dover, Holyhead and at other ports as well as no flights from UK airports; we will have problems and disruption to trade such as selling Pharmaceuticals, Meat and other products.
The Conservative Party and 'President May' refuses to acknowledge the problems for customs and other databases to which we will have no access from the end of March 2019 under a 'No Deal' scenario for which we have no substitutes as far as I am aware. Government IT projects have not historically had a reputation for getting it right first time success.
At least the Labour Party want to make every effort to stay in the single market and we could stay in the single market and have some controls over immigration if we joined EFTA/EEA and invoked Article 112 of the EEA treaty - read Dr Richard North on this. The problem is that Mrs May will not countenance it. This is NOT strong and stable leadership (whatever that means) and anyway 'Brexit means Brexit' and 'Strong and Stable Leadership' are NOT in any way plans or a templates - they are meaningless mantras.
Mrs May is showing the most remarkable lack of ANY leadership let alone the Strong and Stable type.
The Conservative party does not deserve to govern. It has abdicated its authority by pretending it can achieve something which it is is impossible to achieve.
The European Union will not negotiate a new deal in parallel with the exit agreement. The exit agreement must come first and THEN we can negotiate a deal. In between these two events which may take five years we need something else and Mrs May has 5 days to tell us what that looks like.
No deal is not it and will not do.
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