The Brexit Proxy War

‘We’ve left the EU and therefore the Leave/Remain argument is over. The only argument now is what sort of deal we have with the EU’

Heartening words, indeed, from the Labour leader yesterday, in an interview for the Telegraph’s weekly political podcast. Perhaps this intervention, from a man who battled so hard for three years to reverse the Brexit vote, was a sign that the country was finally exiting the four years of bitterness and division that the 2016 referendum had unleashed.  Perhaps it indicated a brighter future that would see erstwhile political opponents come together to fight for a brighter future. Yes, well, not quite. Just as Starmer was declaring the Leave/Remain argument over, a story was breaking that demonstrated that far from being over, the argument was just as bitter as it had ever been before.

For the weekend was about to be dominated by one major story – that of a disgraced, lying, and hypocritical charlatan of a political advisor. But in addition to the ubiquitous Alastair Campbell’s round of unchallenged media interviews, another storm was brewing – one involving present day political advisor, Dominic Cummings. The Mirror revealed that he and his family had travelled 250 miles from London to Durham, breaching lockdown advice in order be closer to family as both Cummings and his wife battled the virus. The story changed often throughout the day – Cummings’ parents were replaced by his sister in one version, babysitting was replaced by food deliveries in another. It was all Alastair Campbell could do to keep up in advance of his next media appointment.

One of the most amusing aspects as the story unfolded was how the left were suddenly able to describe with absolute precision the government’s lockdown policy – a policy which for weeks they’d dismissed as ‘vague’, ‘difficult to understand’ and ‘confusing’. Not since the scales fell from the eyes of a stricken Saul of Taursus deep within the old walls of Damascus had clarity been so quickly restored. Suddenly, the rules couldn’t have been easier to understand, with everyone now an expert. And yet time and time again, they failed to pinpoint exactly how Cummings had broken the law.

The government, unsurprisingly, backed their man, with Cabinet Minister after Cabinet minister tweeting support. Shapps, sent out by captain Boris Johnson as the night-watchman, batted watchfully in the press briefing, ducking the inevitable bouncers that were sent down. He reached close of play – but only just. Next man in must surely be Johnson – he simply can’t afford to slip any further down the batting order if he wants to turn this around. Coming back from injury is hard – but more than ever, he needs a captain’s knock.

But inevitably, as the Cabinet rallied around Cummings, there was much talk in the media about the government’s loss of moral authority. That by refusing to bow to the pressure to dispose of PM’s advisor, the government was losing credibility. But here’s the thing. This government was elected with one of the highest shares of the vote since the heady days of the Blair government and enjoys one of the safest majorities of any in recent years. Yet despite this – and solely because of Brexit – it is a government that is both at once hugely popular and deeply loathed. And those that loathed it before this weekend, deeply loath it just as much today. Those who voted for it in December would vote for it again tomorrow. 

And just as Left-leaning Twitter was embarrassing itself, so too was the UK media. Andrew Marr, a man who Andrew Marr regards as one of the UK’s most formidable interviewers, was reduced to asking a bemused Grant Shapps how many toilet breaks Cummings Junior had taken on the way to Durham. He pretended that the fact that Shapps was unable to provide these details was ‘extraordinary’. But unlike Marr, surely most of the country must have been relieved that the Secretary of State for Transport was unfamiliar with the toilet habits of someone else’s 4 year old child. I know I certainly was.

But of course, aside from the despicable media pile-on – at a time when there is so much we should be talking about - there’s another, altogether more sinister angle to this story. This is a story that only has legs because someone in Durham decided that it was their job to regulate the lives of Dominic Cummings, Mary Wakefield and their 4 year old child. Surely it was never the intention of our lockdown to pit the public one against the other in some kind of macabre Maoist nightmare. Perhaps it’s for this reason more than any other that we should hope Johnson and Cummings don’t bow to the pressure. Instead, we need them to end this lockdown and allow us as quickly as possible to return not to a ‘new normal’ but to the old.

Anyone who is willing to be honest this weekend knows that Dominic Cummings’ real crime was not driving to Durham. It wasn’t stopping at the side of the road for a toilet break. It wasn’t even his dress sense – although that probably does require intervention at the very least from the fashion police if not necessarily their metropolitan counterparts. No, Dominic Cumming’s crime was to deliver an unlikely Brexit win and a stonking 80-seat Conservative majority that would allow the Withdrawal Bill finally to be passed. Everything else this weekend is simply noise.

Most people seem to agree that Dom Cummings is not a particularly nice bloke. I certainly hold no torch for him. But this weekend’s witch hunt says significantly more about those baying for his blood that it does about Cummings himself. Were they not so blinded by hatred, they might more quickly see what kind of people Britain has become. But while they continue to refuse to see this, nothing Keir Strarmer says will make any difference – the Brexit argument will run and run and run.