This is the second part of a diptych on the latest developments in the UK elections, if you did not read the first part (Sneak attack blog part 1), you might prefer to do that first.

Besides the fundamentals of British politics (fascinating in itself), the election call reveals a number of other considerations to be borne in mind:

3. First Past the Post will distort the result – once more: There is a legitimate and strong case to be made for a majoritarian electoral system placing its emphasis on the formation of a strong, stable and viable government – instead of perfectly reflecting every single vote cast in the seats distributed to each party group. However, following Donald Trump’s election as President of the United States with a decisive minority of the popular vote, the UK general election may very well provide the sequel in this saga. With the centre-left opposition parties – Labour, the Greens, the SNP and the Liberal Democrats – split down the middle and opposing one another in key constituencies, the Conservative Party (no longer facing the threat of a diminished UK Independence Party) is likely to end up the beneficiary of the First-Past-the-Post electoral system traditionally used in the United Kingdom. The same system that delivered decisive majorities to the Conservative Party and Labour in the past – and with major distortions: in 1997, Labour under Tony Blair won its first victory, securing 418/650 seats in the House of Commons (64.3%) with 43.2%. In 1979, Margaret Thatcher managed to win 339/650 (52.1%) seats with 43.9%. Meanwhile, in 2015, David Cameron won an absolute majority of 330/650 seats (50.8%) with 36.9% of the popular vote. If the current opinion poll numbers hold up, the Conservatives could win a heavily distorted majority.

4. The European Union is not impressed: Meanwhile, the Brexit clock ticks down mercilessly. According to Article 50 TEU, an agreement must be have been concluded within two years after the notification of withdrawal (which occurred on 29 March 2017). On 30 March 2019, the UK will leave the European Union. Consequently, every minute and hour is precious for the UK to make its case in the negotiations. But with the country now being engaged in an election campaign, the country loses an entire month in which little progress is likely to be made. This will likely be compounded by the transition in the French presidency (regardless of who actually wins) in a few days’ time and the German federal elections in September. Even so, the atmosphere surrounding the negotiations has already been rendered quite difficult: over the weekend, the remaining EU27 agreed on no-nonsense, no-compromise negotiation guidelines. The guidelines essentially clarify that prior to negotiating any future free trade deal, the EU and the UK need to deal with the concrete details of the country’s withdrawal. In contrast, May had wanted to have both sets of negotiations in parallel to one another. Further, Commission circles appear to be genuinely alarmed about the apparently unrealistic mindset with which May is approaching the negotiations – including a complete refusal to even countenance settling its remaining debts with the EU. In this context, the Commission now appears to deem a complete failure of the Brexit negotiations to be quite realistic. This also places warnings by German Chancellor Angela Merkel, namely about “illusions” held by certain quarters in the UK in a fresh light.

Of course, the Prime Minister immediately denied reports of a difficult meeting: But, in all seriousness, was she going to concede that the meeting had gone terribly? In the middle of an election campaign entirely premised on her ability to manage Brexit? How about “No”? It is quite evident, ever since the referendum campaign, that those stridently advocating the UK’s departure from the EU make a wildly diverging set of assumptions about withdrawal than the EU27. The following passage from a recent European Parliament report is symptomatic for the Continental bewilderment at Britain’s negotiating posture: “Because of the patchy expertise in London on EU matters, there is a real risk that the British will overplay their hand in the forthcoming negotiations”.

These will be tough negotiations at best, and at worst could result in a complete disaster for the United Kingdom in economic, commercial and diplomatic terms. In an atmosphere in which the hard right in the Conservative Party holds sway, High Court judges are defamed as “enemies of the people” by highly partisan media publications and pressure is brought to bear on civil servants to tailor their expertise to the requirements of the political leadership, it is doubtful whether Britain can adopt a negotiating posture capable of maintaining the goodwill of its EU27 partners – and fostering the strong foundation of trust needed to forge a wide-ranging free trade deal. Instead of following a strategy based on measured rationality and intelligent give-and-take, the UK Government appears to live in a self-reinforcing bubble in which Eurosceptics tell one another that Germany will never permit a “bad deal” for Britain because of its car industry – despite the fact that both the Chancellor and her challenger have said that they will remain tough on Brexit. Or that no deal is somehow better than a bad deal [1]. Once election season is over, the Prime Minister needs to get down to business – and chart a realistic course for the negotiations. Britain is just one nation negotiating with a bloc of 440 million citizens. Much of its economic prosperity has been facilitated by its access to the Single Market and lower trade barriers. At the current rate, however, the UK is about to give this advantage away.

5. Uncertainty remains: This general election is unlikely to resolve the uncertainty around Brexit. The best explanation for Mrs May’s call to the polling booth is the desire to inoculate herself against the effects of (failed/difficult) Brexit negotiations. Even an enhanced majority will find it difficult to change the ground conditions: Mrs May needs to make a strategic decision – and admittedly a difficult one: Does she want to continue on a “hard Brexit” course – especially now that the EU27 is seriously willing to let that possibility come to pass? Or does she stand up to the hard core of her party to opt for the “softer” option of a Norway/EEA model or the intermediate Swiss variant (a complex network of bilateral, sectoral agreements with the EU – but also with limited tradeoffs on immigration and cohesion funds)? By the way, even if Labour were to miraculously win the general election, its leader Jeremy Corbyn has been studiously silent on Brexit – also because he is committed to a Eurosceptic position himself and only lukewarmly campaigned for Remain in the national referendum.

Recently, Tony Blair announced his return to frontline politics – as he found out to his chagrin, winning an election isn’t the end of your problems as Prime Minister. Sometimes, it can be just the very beginning of them.

 Read Sneak attack (blog part 1)
 This blog is published on Law Blog Maastricht ^{Image: by Audrey Penven​}