A twilight view of the Houses of Parliament

This week sees the Boris Johnson speech at the Conservative Party Conference, potential co operation by anti-Brexit MPs in the Commons, the formation of a new Government in Austria and a key debate in the Canadian General Election.

Firstly, the PM speech. Party Conferences are designed to fulfill a range of roles. They are about enthusing party members, deciding policy (at some conferences), announcing policy, gaining positive media coverage and generally acting as a shop-window on the party. Usually Parliament takes a break so that the three main parties can have their events uninterrupted by Parliamentary process. This year however the recess has been refused for the Conservatives, who meet in Manchester.

Leaders speeches are generally the final act and crescendo of the conference. This year Johnson is scheduled as final speaker (2 Oct)and will be hoping for a good reception, both in the hall and elsewhere. Of course last time the Conservatives were in Manchester Theresa May had a coughing fit, a comedian attempted to hand her a p45 and various bits of the stage fell down. (I saw it all being in the hall with a group of Edge Hill students). Of course Johnson is more of a showman and you can imagine him working disasters into his act in a way that May couldn’t manage. However this time he will be focusing on delivering a message to people outside the event. It is a vitally important moment for him. Expect plenty of “surrender” and ” Get Brexit done”.

Back at the Palace of Westminster, while the cat’s away….. Pundits have been saying that these few days are a chance for anti-Brexit MPs to come up with more moves designed to make attack the Government and to reinforce the so-called Rebel Alliance. Some of this punditry is based on anonymous source briefings, and of course it’s worth remembering that some sources don’t actually have much in the way of information. However, with cross-party working very much to the fore these days, it makes sense to look out for signs of further moves. The tricky issue is yet again the Vote of No Confidence. Will it happen? Will there be enough in favour? Under the Fixed Term Parliaments Act (2011) a vote of no confidence doesn’t mean an immediate General Election. But it could lead to one in pretty short order. Parliament doesn’t officially resume until around 2pm today (30th) but that won’t stop the behind-the-scenes work.

In the UK we tend to have our elections on a Thursday, meaning a rush before or after work for some. On the continent they are a little more civilised and have polling on a Sunday. So there are often election results on a Sunday night. This time we’ve had results from Austria where it appears the Austrian People’s Party (in Government before) will be the biggest party but may need Coalition Partners. The Austrian People’s Party is the mainstream Right Wing Party (OVP). Previous Coalition partners have done badly so it remains to be seen who they can team up with. Incidentally, for election and opinion poll junkies I highly recommend the Europe Elects twitter feed. We cover European Politics as well as Elections and Voting on our Politics course at Edge Hill.

Finally, October sees the Federal Elections in Canada. Last time (2015) the Liberals left from third place to first, installing Justin Trudeau as Prime Minister. His brand was great then, young, fresh, open. Today however he struggles as first a row about alleged interference in a legal process and then revelations about previous “blackface” incidents have tarnished the brand. Both other main parties have changed their leaders since 2015 so it’ll be a case of seeing whether the newbies can overtake the Governing party. This week (2 Oct)sees one of the few Leaders debates – a French language one in Montreal. Trudeau is good in debates and the next few weeks will be crucial if the Liberals are to hang on.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *