The Sun goes out in the Empire where it shone with splendor – Opinion

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As we know, the United Kingdom is governed by a Prime Minister from a Parliament elected under the one-person system (i.e. there are no lists in electoral districts, as in Portugal), which requires elected officials to answer to their electorate and not to their party. Other particularities of the system include the fact that members of the Government must be deputies and that the elected party can change the Prime Minister without being obliged to go to elections.

Whether this type of parliamentary democracy is better than others is a subject of endless discussion, but outside Britain; the English believe that their system is the most perfect for representing the will of the people and, above all, the most effective for defending the national interest. It is always worth remembering the words of Lord Palmerston, Prime Minister in the mid-19th century: “We (we, the United Kingdom) have neither eternal allies nor perpetual enemies. Our interests are that they be eternal and perpetual and our duty is to follow them. »

In the 19th century, the jewel in the crown was India, because of the business it represented and the influence it gave to the English in the East. (It should be remembered that it was in India that the Portuguese had some trading posts, without conquering any territory. The Portuguese position was part of Catherine de Bragança’s dowry when she married Charles II, and it was from there that Britain expanded to dominate India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.)

Pragmatic, the British governments knew how to manage the two world wars and began, from 1947, to give independence to the colonies. The Labor government of Clement Attlee (1945) marked the transition from imperial prime ministers to pragmatists and the adaptation of the Empire to a simple island, governed with varying degrees of efficiency, but still in decline. However, the English people never lost their imperial position, even after losing much of Ireland, which became independent in 1921.

The decline was not limited to territorial losses; the quality of ministries has also deteriorated. In 1973, the country reluctantly entered the European Union (still just the European Community), still demanding countless exceptions (maintenance of the pound sterling, for example) and different treatment, in line with the English mentality according to which islanders are not the same and cannot be confused with mainlanders…

This mentality, cleverly exploited by dishonest politicians such as Nigel Farrage and Boris Johnson, who claimed that the money the country was giving to the EU could be better spent on domestic purposes, led Labor Prime Minister David Cameron to call a referendum – the famous Brexit, the stupidest and most ill-informed decision imaginable. What follows is a sad period to watch: the English want to leave the EU, but cannot decide on what conditions. The vacillations destroyed three Conservative ministers (Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Liz Truss) until finally things calmed down with Rishi Sunak – a Prime Minister of Indian origin, where have you seen him? While the Conservatives stumbled over their own proposals, Labor had a candidate from the class struggle, Jeremy Corbyn, who saw the European problem as a threat to workers and not as a problem affecting both employers and employees.

Even today, Brexit is a kind of evil bird flying over the once green charred lands of bucolic Britain. Once the Tories were burned once and for all, the new Labor candidate, Keir Sturmer, was introduced, who won the 2024 election. Sturmer may not be a dangerous leftist, but he is especially not, in the sense that he has strong ideas and defends them with determination. With him, he is the sixth mediocre Prime Minister from whom the country suffers. There is already talk of his replacement, and the most likely candidate appears to be Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham. There is one small hurdle: he is not an MP, but it appears there is a legal possibility that a Labor MP could voluntarily give up their seat to him. The fact is that Sturmer, if a dead fish in all, is a shark that defends the place.

As The Guardian puts it, “The spectacle of a prime minister clinging to power while his party becomes increasingly desperate to find a replacement is painfully familiar from the last Conservative government. English politics seems to be caught in an endless spiral. Starmer’s approach to relations with Europe is limited to touching the margins of the problem.”

In the middle of these troubled waters, surprise of surprises, what is rising is the far right of Nigel Farrage. How is this possible? Christopher Achen and Larry Bartels argue in their book “Democracy for Realists” that the theory of “backward voting” — the idea that we judge candidates based on their resumes — is a fairy tale. We vote for those who promise us a better life in the future, even if they haven’t delivered on it in the past. What will it be? The fact is that the more crises we go through, the less we demand satisfaction from politicians. This was the case with Boris Johnson, who created new crises to distract from old ones.

We must not forget that immigration – an important component of Brexit – continues to be the main battleground, and here the right has the arguments that voters like to hear. The failures of the Labor Party have made the nightmare that follows possible. After infuriating their voters with broken promises, Labor now wants to pin its hopes on Andy Burnham. His policy of “controlled immigration” (where have I heard that before?) is perhaps the only hope against the avalanche of “Reform UK” (Farrage’s party).

A YOUGOV poll published on Wednesday indicates that more than half of Labor want more restrictive immigration policies. Only 26% want a more liberal approach and 18% want more restrictions. On the other hand, 15% of Labor think they will lose votes to the Greens and 27% think the Greens and Reform UK pose the same danger.

What to conclude from all this? It is clear that the level of English politicians has fallen. The most interesting thing is that the next election may mark the beginning of a multi-party system in the United Kingdom. Regarding the end of Brexit, total silence. In short, a house where there is no bread, everyone shouts and no one is right…