Stopping the Brexit madness?

Yesterday (April 3) the British Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer, Philip Hammond, the leading figure in the British Cabinet after the Prime Minister, said a new referendum vote over Brexit would be
'A perfectly credible proposition.'
A leading figure from the Democratic Unionist Party, which provides key votes to the Tory Party government in Britain's hung Parliament, suggested a Customs Union with the EU could be
'a staging post' in getting to Brexit.

Both of these 'opinions' are direct reversals of the Tory Government's positions on Brexit 24 hours earlier. They demonstrate chaos.

The video of 'the Paras' shooting Corbyn's poster demonstrates at least one preparation to 'resolve' this chaos.

Meanwhile PM Teresa May has invited the leader of the Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn to another round of discussions to see if the Labour Party MP's can be persuaded to carry out her policy on Brexit - as her own party will not.

The fact is that there is no real government in Britain now. The PM has already announced her suicide (but has not spelt out the date yet.) Tory Cabinet ministers are providing their own manifestos as their party falls more deeply into its different Brexit factions. Paradoxically, while many Labour MPs and shadow Cabinet would-be ministers would get rid of Corbyn and McDonnell in a trice (if the vast Labour Party membership let them) Corbyn now 'leads' the British Parliament over Brexit.

How long this particular shake of the Brexit kaleidoscope will continue is not predictable but it is  unlikely to be long while. There is a social and political core here that will soon determine the shape of Britain's politics in the next years. Whether or not basic truths and their related opportunities are grasped by socialists inside and outside of Parliament is, however, yet to be seen.

What are these key messages?

(1) Brexit is not the most important issue in British politics. On the contrary, a huge part of working class people in Britain (and in Europe) are moving against their traditional rulers because their lives are getting worse and the political and economic systems don't work for them. Brexit will not answer that problem in Britain.

It is true that the main international obstacle (the US will come larger and second) to a radical Labour government is the EU rules against state reform of the economy. And stopping the EU's legal powers now would be sensible from a socialist perspective. But preventing a new right leadership in Britain, based on a Trump tax break and a Singapore tax haven, would be more critical. Brexit could become a route to popular misery. Brexit could still go either way as neither of the main social classes have the political momentum.

(2) Despite lots of studies that imply Brexit is a working class based revolt, and despite the fact that big Capital in the British and European ruling class promoted the EU, Brexit is not the critical determination in the evolving class struggle between the main social classes.

The Brexit vote in Britain took place after the immediate rise of a new, mass right wing party and movement. That meant the British working class were severely split. In Scotland, in most of the big cities, virtually universally among black, asian and other minority heritage working class people and among the youth, the vote was 'no' to Brexit. Why? Because of a reaction to Britain's right wing surge. The middle and upper classes were for the status quo and many working class leavers (including Corbyn) opposed the EU for anti-capitalist reasons, but it cannot be denied that the British working class was split.

Today, while a dangerous rise in fascism is emerging, the previous major right wing surge has been forced to retreat. It is wise therefore to use the opportunity today to deny the domination of the EU's legal, globalist menu and Labour's three-part policy, with a second referendum as a last resort, is sensible. But it is wiser still to unify all sections of the working class people on a platform that changes Britain. Brexit is not at all the centre of that program.

But, in reality, doesn't Brexit swallow everything before it? Surely everything depends on yes or no to Brexit? You can't change reality, can you?

You can. You must.

The decisive step to open out a radical dynamo to Britain's politics and economics, today, now, albeit in the maelstrom of Brexit, is to get a Corbyn led Labour government. It is that way round.

This is not at all a view that a Corbyn led government will be able or willing to solve the battles to come. Nor is it any pretension that such a government would be able to 'solve' the national issue in Scotland, or Ireland, or the City of London for that matter. But such a government will at least start from some of the key realities of Britain's society. From there, everything becomes possible. From there is the the potential of the mobilisation of the people behind the defence of the real issues which they need to change. And without that step society, including any Brexit, will make a serious shift to the right.