The British Parliament descended into a state of near-farce this week.
It started with a U.K. Supreme Court ruling on Tuesday that Prime Minister Boris Johnson broke the law by ordering Parliament to be suspended for six weeks. Johnson, the court decided, had unjustly sought to prevent parliamentary action against his plans to withdraw Britain from the European Union by Oct. 31.
And when parliamentarians returned to their seats on Wednesday, the House of Commons’ atmosphere was one of fury. Johnson attacked those assembled for preventing him from withdrawing from the European Union. This, Johnson said, was tantamount to “surrender.”
Opposition parliamentarians were outraged. They began complaining about what they said was excessive rhetoric. Johnson doubled down. The notoriously self-absorbed speaker of the Commons tried to cool tempers and failed. The day’s session ended with calls on Johnson to resign — calls he promptly rejected.
Still, the emotional chaos only speaks to the broader political reality.
Utter dysfunction is now the rule in that domain. Johnson can’t get Britain out of the European Union because Parliament won’t let him. Johnson can’t get an election to get a new Parliament because Parliament won’t approve it. Johnson won’t work with Parliament to find a compromise deal because the majority of his party’s MPs (and probably of its voters) would view that as a betrayal. And the European Union won’t help Johnson because it fears that would encourage other countries across Europe to jump ship.
Chaos, then, is the predictable result.
