The cross-party consensus is comforting but complacent
British voters go to the polls on July 4th, in an early election called by the beleaguered Conservative Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak. The Labour Party, led by Sir Keir Starmer, is the overwhelmingly likely winner.
Unlike in the previous election in 2019, allies are not watching nervously. The Labour Party then was led by Jeremy Corbyn, an avowed left-winger who mistrusts NATO and the United States as imperialist, but has a blind spot for Russian misdeeds. Brexit was still a big question then. Three years of debilitating rows in Parliament over how to (and whether) to implement the 2016 referendum result had shaken public and international confidence in Britain’s supposedly pragmatic, effective system of government. The centrist Liberal Democrats were even campaigning to revoke the referendum result and keep Britain in the European Union. (Disclosure: I am a Lib Dem candidate in the election).
All that is over now. Labour chucked out Corbyn for his response to an investigation into antisemitism. He is standing as an independent. Boris Johnson won the election for the Conservatives on a promise of “Get Brexit Done”. After a messy year, Britain’s relations with Europe have settled down. His successor Liz Truss, who joked that she was unsure if France was an ally, is almost forgotten, if not actually gone. Relations with decision-makers in Washington, Brussels, Paris and Berlin are cordial and pragmatic. Britain’s leading role in arming Ukraine wins plaudits.
None of that is likely to change in a Starmer government. His team includes some impressive advisers. But they have little room for manoeuvre. Amid a clamour for more spending on health-care, education, welfare and infrastructure, it is hard to see more money for defence soon. Eager to attract back the working-class pro-Brexit voters who abandoned them in 2019, Labour has ruled out a serious re-think of relations with the European Union. Minor parties present no challenge to this consensus.
That might seem cause for comfort. In fact, it should prompt alarm. Starmer’s government faces a packed calendar when it takes over on July 5th. Ministers will have barely mastered the office layout before they pack for the Nato summit just days later in Washington, DC on July 9th. Colleagues in London will busy preparing the European Political Community summit to be hosted in Britain on July 18th. Emmanuel Macron will doubtless shine at both events, other European leaders less so. And nobody will expect surprises from Starmer, the new kid on the block.
But fate may have plenty of them in store for him. The world is not waiting for Britain to sort itself out. Ukraine bought us time. We wasted it. European defence is still in a mess. The Middle East is on the verge of conflagration. Russia is making alarming headway in Africa. Mainland China is menacing Taiwan. North Korea is sounding madder than ever. Add to that protectionism, climate change, migration and the impending technological upheaval of artificial intelligence and the international agenda has not looked so daunting for decades.
Yet Britain is on many fronts off its game. An enfeebled army cannot field even one war-fighting division. A radical defence review is needed. Vulnerabilities to dirty money and dirty tricks are shocking. Brexit — still not fully implemented — hamstrings the economy. Public administration is shambolic and scandal-plagued. Infrastructure and environmental standards lag far behind the rest of Europe. The political system looks fossilised. Read the foreign media’s coverage of Britain and the adulation of “Cool Britannia” only a decade ago has given way to threnodies about malaise.
Allies previously fretted about Britain’s unpredictability. They should worry even more about continuity.
Photo Credit: This image is used courtesy of the UK Parliament’s Digital Service.