THE Brexit shock is causing a fundamental realignment in British politics. The Scottish National Party leader, Nicola Sturgeon, is trying to achieve both Scottish independence and continued membership of the European Union. And it’s a sign of the times that the Scottish dimension of the current political crisis is something of a sideshow to what’s happening in London.

Events are still highly fluid but it’s becoming increasingly clear that the Brexit voters fell into two broad camps: those who wanted to reduce immigration and those who dislike the UK having to accept laws made in Brussels. Those worried about immigration are effectively represented by Nigel Farage, the leader of the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP). Those who want to resist the power of Brussels are led by the Conservative Party’s Boris Johnson.

Boris Johnson — and one of his most articulate supporters Daniel Hannan — have both said they do not interpret the result as a vote against immigration. But with countless TV interviews showing Brexit voters saying that for them it was about immigration, it’s a difficult line to sustain.

But Johnson has little choice. Many in his Conservative Party, which has close links with big business and the city of London, are fearful of the damage Brexit could do to the economy. For the bulk of the business community it’s now a case of damage limitation: while the UK will have to leave the European Union they hope it may still be possible to retain access to the single European market. The difficulty is that the European Union is insisting that continued single market access depends on continued free movement of labour. Having said that, Europe is great at pragmatic compromises and it may be possible to find a formula whereby everyone can pretend that free movement has been limited but in which, for the most part, it continues.

For Nigel Farage and his UKIP supporters, who see immigration — especially from Eastern Europe — pushing down wage levels, such a fudge would be unacceptable backsliding on the sovereign will of the people.

These fissures could smash up Britain’s party political arrangements. First let’s deal with the right of British politics. The Conservative Party is going to have to choose a new leader who will automatically become prime minister. The contest will probably be between Home Secretary Theresa May who supported remain and the leavers’ leader Boris Johnson. It may not make much difference who wins.

To keep the party united the new leader will in all likelihood end up negating single market access on the best possible terms. Pro-European Union Conservatives will find it a highly unsatisfactory outcome but, given the referendum result, they have little choice but to accept it.

For Nigel Farage such an outcome would be an opportunity and put him in a strong position to build on his last election result of 13 per cent of the national vote share. Just how much better he does matters.

Under Britain’s highly disproportionate electoral system UKIP’s 13pc of the votes at the last election translated into just one of the parliament’s 650 MPs. If he broke through to over 20pc of the national vote that would result in a significant number of extra parliamentary seats.

The situation on the left is more complicated. Leaving aside the Scottish National Party, three parties can be expected to stick with unambiguously pro-remain positions: the Liberal Democrats, the Greens and Plaid Cymru. But between them they currently have just 12 MPs.

Labour is caught between the contradictory demands of its working class supporters in the north of England, some of whom oppose immigration, and its metropolitan support base in London, most of whom support it. Faced with the additional loss of its once reliable vote bank in Scotland, some are now wondering if Labour is in terminal decline.

The Labour leader, radical leftist Jeremy Corbyn has strong support among the party activists. But has little support in parliament because most Labour MPs believe he is too leftwing to ever win a general election. A vote of no confidence in him in the parliamentary party resulted in a remarkable 172 of his MPs voting against him and just 40 backing him. There will now be a leadership contest which, because of his support among party members, he might well win. That opens up the possibility of Labour MPs in parliament refusing to recognise his leadership and potentially the disintegration of the party.

These permutations could produce an utterly remarkable and highly unrepresentative outcome. The remain in the EU side had the backing of two thirds of the members of the current parliament and won 48pc of the national vote. If the many stories of people regretting their leave votes are accurate that support may have now risen to over 50pc. But at the next general election, which could be held as soon as the autumn, the remain votes could be split between the Conservatives, Labour, the Scottish Nationalists, the Liberal Democrats, the Greens and, if Labour does split, a possible new centre-left party of some kind.

In those circumstances, because the British system punishes small vote shares, the remainers might be barely represented in parliament. Conservative remainers would remain quiet in the interest of party unity and the Scottish ones will be focused on securing independence. If the left disintegrates it is even possible to imagine that UKIP could emerge as the main opposition to the Conservatives. British politics has not seen anything like it since the Second World War.

Published in Dawn, June 30th, 2016

Opinion

Editorial

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