Peter Mandelson’s New Labour is back! So you might have thought from the Commons when, on the first day back after the summer recess, the Opposition completely changed the position it held on Brexit just a few weeks ago.
Back then it accepted the result of the EU referendum. Now it wants us effectively to stay in the EU.
The transformation is miraculous, a quick-change to rival anything you will see in a West End farce. Opticians could use Labour in eye tests: what can you see now, the circle or the square? Tory MPs said Labour Remainers had turned into ‘Reversers’.
Brexit Secretary David Davis was giving an update on EU withdrawal negotiations. This being the first day of term, lots of members wore suntans
Brexit Secretary David Davis was giving an update on EU withdrawal negotiations. This being the first day of term, lots of members wore suntans. James Gray (Con, Wilts N) had grown a grizzly beard. The Speaker had been at the Ambre Solaire.
Anna Soubry (Con, Broxtowe) had had a gamine haircut and Tom Tugendhat, newly elected chairman of the foreign affairs select committee, had grown in avoirdupois.
Mr Davis began with a trick, pausing theatrically after he said there had been ‘important progress’ in his negotiations with his Brussels counterpart, wannabe matinee idol Michel Barnier. Blairite MPs laughed long and arduously at Mr Davis’s claim, anxious to signal their derision.
Mr Davis, far from being taken aback by their scorn, retorted: ‘I rather wondered if they would fall for that.’
He went on to give a list of agreements reached on pensions and healthcare (the European Health card arrangement for British tourists visiting the Continent will continue, he said). ‘I wonder how Labour will explain to the public that they don’t care about those,’ mumbled Mr Davis. That boy could do with elocution lessons.
When Tory MPs mentioned the electorate (arguing that Labour had stiffed the voters in so quickly reneging on their election manifesto promises to be pro-Brexit), the claque of Centrists sitting near Hilary Benn (Lab, Leeds C) groaned.
Prominent among these blowhards was Stephen Doughty (Lab, Cardiff S and Penarth), who seems to have attended assiduously to his summer nosebag. ‘Shameful!’ roared this Doughty when Tory MPs attacked the EU’s negotiating position.
Sir Keir Starmer, Labour’s Brexit spokesman, kept his remarks mercifully brief. He is not a natural Commons performer
Ben Bradshaw (Lab, Exeter) wore a little moue of sardonic contempt throughout Mr Davis’s remarks.
The dreadful moment arrived, as invariably it does, when Speaker Bercow felt we should hear from Yvette Cooper (Lab, Pontefract & Castleford). Quick, lads, earplugs. Too late! That voice came shooting through the air like a vinegar-dipped javelin – aieee – and pierced us in the lugholes.
The noise was so terrible that I failed to take a note of what she said (I was fumbling for cover) but her face said it all: the most exaggerated expressions, all bulgy-eyed and stretched mouth, as she conveyed her disbelief at the Government’s failure to surrender to Brussels control. With that ability to emote with her chops, Yvette should be a Jackanory presenter. She’d be brilliant at Little Red Riding Hood and the big, bad wolf.
Kate Hoey (Lab, Vauxhall) braved heckles and mutterings from her party colleagues to say that any attempt to block a proper Brexit would be ‘betraying the will of the British people’. Kelvin Hopkins (Lab, Luton N) said it was perfectly possible to be pro-Europe but to oppose the EU on economic and democratic grounds.
If those two pro-Brexit Labour MPs signalled dissent from their party Whips, Ken Clarke (Rushcliffe) did the same on the Tory benches. Miss Soubry was more restrained. Tory Europhiles Dominic Grieve and Nicky Morgan said nothing.
Sir Keir Starmer, Labour’s Brexit spokesman, kept his remarks mercifully brief. He is not a natural Commons performer. Labour’s Chief Whip, Nick Brown (a friend of Mandelson and a member of the first Blair Cabinet) smirked but it was noticeable how few core Corbynites (save Diane Abbott) were present.
Ian Paisley (DUP, Antrim N) noted that for all this talk of Labour pursuing ‘open-trench warfare’ on Brexit, the real hand-to-hand fighting was probably inside the Shadow Cabinet.