A plague on both their houses; vote tactically

Neither the Tories nor Labour deserve to win this General Election. They have dissembled and over-promised throughout their campaigns leaving a sorry choice for the electorate.

Let’s start with the Tories. The likely and even comfortable winners of this election. The campaign has gone according to plan, with one exception. Personally, Johnson is a weakened figure. His popularity as Mayor of London is long gone. In focus groups he is closely associated with the word ‘liar’. He has bumbled his way through the last few weeks; but his charm has evaporated. Whether it is avoiding Andrew Neil, ignoring a picture of a young boy on a hospital floor, inventing 50,000 new nurses when 19,000 are existing ones, claiming there will be no trade barrier between Northern Ireland and the mainland when leaked documents show otherwise, or promising to ‘Get Brexit Done’ when it simply isn’t that easy, he has faced incredulous hostility throughout. At the end of the campaign he still compares favourably with the dire Jeremy Corbyn; but is less popular than Theresa May.

Specifically, on Brexit, his claim is a shocking untruth. His Withdrawal Agreement hands the initiative to the EU, since he has promised (umm…) not to extend the deadline beyond the end of 2020. The EU will run negotiations down to the wire and we will be faced with a no-deal Brexit, huge compromises, or an extension by then. All this will be followed by years of further negotiations. If Johnson gets a huge majority he can, I guess, shaft the right-wing ERG and/or the DUP (twice over…). If it is a small majority who knows. And will Johnson, with a bruised ego and a (temporarily suspended) reputation for lack of focus, soldier on?

What is certain is that if there is no Tory majority, what little love there is among Tory MPs for Johnson, will disappear very quickly.

And then to Labour…Marxist, hopeless, anti-Semitic even. Their extremism has thrown this election away. Corbyn looks and sounds tired; but it is the sheer extravagance of their manifesto which destroys any semblance of consensus capitalism. This will do for them in the end. It should be their 1997; a tired Tory Party, riven by Europe, swept away by a rejuvenated Labour Party, 20% ahead in the polls. But it won’t be. With the LibDem collapse hardening Labour’s vote, and after a decade of austerity and a struggling NHS, they may do better than expected but not well enough. They should have walked it.

Finally, the LibDems. Mistakes have been made but they have also been unlucky. It is the old ‘standing in the middle of the road…run over from both directions’ analogy. The UK really does need to find a route back to centre-ground politics.

So how is this done? By voting tactically in every constituency since neither Labour or the Tories are fit to govern on their own. They have moved too far to the extremes. A hung parliament would force the Tories to move to the centre, assuming they can overcome UKIP infiltration. Labour will stay hard Left for a while since Momentum’s Corbynistas hold most internal levers of power. But this can’t last forever and Labour moderates will this time have to act. Which takes us to the LibDems. They will do badly in this election but a few more seats than expected and a rise to second place in many constituencies will set them up to help a centrist resurgence.

And the benefits? Johnson and Corbyn go. Brexit is re-visited fairly with a second referendum, which is couched in terms that will heal at least some of the country’s divisions. The Union has a better chance of holding together and parties advocating compassionate, centre ground politics can prove their worth.

‘Get Brexit Done’ is a Tory myth. Corbyn’s Labour Party are extremists. The LibDems deserve to strengthen their position, even if just a little. Tactical voting is everything to get British politics back to a position of commonsense. Go forth and multiply… as they say…those constituency results which will do just that.