Here is a paradox. The Brexit Party, despite its name, cannot deliver Brexit, but might yet prevent it.
Nigel Farage established the Brexit Party in January after his previous party, the U.K. Independence Party, descended into infighting and extremism. The new party was a product of the widespread frustration at the failure of Parliament to implement the referendum result. Nearly three years had passed since Britain voted to leave, but MPs kept finding procedural devices to block Brexit. The then-prime minister, Theresa May, buffeted by events, repeatedly tried to sound tough by announcing new exit dates, only for each one to slip.
At the European Parliament elections in May, she led her (and my) party to its worst result in its 350-year history, plunging to 8.8% of the popular vote. The Brexit Party, by contrast, won comfortably with 30.5%, a spectacular victory given that it had been in existence less than five months.
May resigned two days later, and Boris Johnson became leader. Unlike his predecessor, he had backed Brexit in 2016 and was determined to make it happen. The Conservatives began to climb back up the polls. Last month, to general surprise, Johnson secured a new withdrawal agreement with the European Union, which unlike May’s, gave Britain control of its trade policy, opening the door to deals with Australia, the United States, and so on. The opposition parties continued to block that deal, forcing him to go to the country in an attempt to break the deadlock.
We will learn on Thursday night whether he has succeeded. The opinion polls, as I write, put the Conservatives ahead, but there are some qualifiers to bear in mind.
For one thing, the constituency boundaries are out of date. In an unprecedented vote in 2013, opposition MPs halted the work of the independent Boundary Commission, whose job is to keep the electoral map up to date with population movements. The consequence is that it now takes more votes to elect a Tory MP than a Labour MP. To win more seats than Labour, the Conservatives need to be several percentage points ahead.
For another, the Tories have no putative coalition partners. They need to win an absolute majority to form the next government. If they fall one seat short, the chances are that the losers will form a coalition to push through new referendums on EU membership and Scottish independence.
Then there is the fact that the polls badly understated Labour support last time. In particular, young voters, perhaps because they have no memory of socialism, voted for Jeremy Corbyn in record numbers. This time, too, there has been a surge in registration among voters under the age of 25.
Finally, there is the decision of the Brexit Party to contest around half of the seats. While the polls show that not one Brexit Party MP will be elected, there are several constituencies where they might take enough votes from the Conservatives to allow a pro-EU candidate in.
Why would something calling itself the Brexit Party risk derailing Brexit? Well, politics is a funny game. Most institutions are as concerned about their own survival as about whatever cause they were nominally established to pursue. Once Britain has left the EU, there will be no future for the Brexit Party.
That is not to say that all its supporters feel that way, of course. On the contrary, most Brexit Party members are motivated purely by the desire to leave the EU and will vote accordingly. On Thursday, four of the party’s members of the European Parliament put out a statement urging people to vote Conservative, on grounds that it was the only sure way to guarantee that Britain recovered its independence.
Farage himself seems conflicted. He stood down his candidates where there was an incumbent Tory MP, but then continued to rail at Johnson, sometimes in a strikingly petulant tone. Why stand down in only half the seats, and not the half where it would have the greatest effect? After all, if Brexit Party supporters are being urged to back the Conservatives in those seats, on the unimpeachable grounds that that is the best way of ensuring Brexit, why doesn’t that logic apply everywhere else?
There is, I think, only one explanation. Farage doesn’t like the idea of a successful Brexit being delivered by someone else. Standing down some of his candidates is a tactic that will allow him, in the event that Johnson wins, to claim that he was responsible. But that claim will be false. After 20 years spent campaigning to leave the EU, Farage’s final act will be to make Brexit less likely. A sad end to his career.
