Brexit blockers: Go back to your constituencies and prepare for electoral annihilation

Historically, contempt of Parliament was an imprisonable offence; today it is the national consensus. The public’s perception of politicians has always been, to put it mildly, unfavourable. Since the parliamentary expenses scandal a decade ago it has been positively toxic. Over the past month, however, that public hostility has hardened into something new: the conviction that the Westminster circus is no longer fit to govern us and must be replaced.

Nobody viewing the scenes last Monday night in the House of Commons could reasonably have concluded that the hooligan rabble on display could lay any serious claim to govern a developed democracy. What was once acknowledged worldwide as the Mother of Parliaments has become a global laughing stock. It is a toxic combination of usurped arbitrary power and infantile disorder.

The hypocrisy that has long infused MPs’ personal conduct and self-interest has now begun to dominate the anarchic Remainer cult’s deluded propaganda. “Stop the coup!” is a cry that comes unpersuasively from a coterie of politicians that has demolished the independence of the Executive and bound a government hand-and-foot in its negotiations with a foreign power. The crucial constitutional principle of separation of powers has been trashed and the Legislature has usurped the key powers of the Executive.

This has been accomplished through the machinations of a partisan Speaker. When John Bercow returned from the prorogation ceremony in the Lords to the House of Commons in the early hours of Tuesday morning it was as a victorious general being acclaimed by his troops on the Remainer benches. The standing ovation, the applause and the handshakes from those whose interests he had served quite unabashedly demonstrated the abandonment of any pretence of neutrality.

It is no exaggeration, but sober fact, to record that this is a revolution. Beyond that, it is a revolution only incidentally subverting the monarchy whose prerogative power has been usurped and the Executive which has been neutered: its real target is the overthrow of the democratic verdict of 17.4 million voters in the biggest electoral exercise in British history. Parliament has publicly and shamelessly proclaimed that the prejudices of 329 self-entitled MPs take precedence over the instructions of a majority of the electorate.

It is 1832 in reverse, which makes it a most unusual revolution. In revolutions, there is usually at least a propagandist attempt to pretend the upheaval is being conducted in the interests of the majority of the population – that weasel entity of leftist mythology, The People. In this instance, however, a tiny minority is attempting to deploy the mechanisms of existing power to relieve itself of the tyranny of the majority. Viewed objectively, therefore, it more realistically assumes the aspect of a counter-revolution.

For that is what it is. The old order, wedded to the toxic post-War notion that to govern Britain is to manage decline, clings to the European Union as the supra-national institution that distracts Britons from the dangerous aspiration of sovereignty. It regards the liberal globalist settlement, increasingly Marxist in culture but still financially rewarding for elites, as the guarantor of its comforts, status and privilege. It enjoys over-representation in all the commanding heights of society: government, civil service, media, large corporations, the public sector, higher education, NGOs and every other forum of influence.

Now that cosy settlement is threatened with overthrow by an unexpected uprising of the electorate in the 2016 EU referendum. The elites know they must suppress that rebellion at any cost, or see their power gradually dissipate in the hostile climate of a sovereign Britain vigorously asserting its identity and exercising its talents.

If you want a recent snapshot of the poisonous political culture that has for too long crippled Britain you need look no further than Theresa May’s resignation honours list, in which the worst prime minister in British history conferred 19 peerages following less than three years of failure.

Parliament must be drastically remodelled. And that remodelling must address the real issues, not the superficial ones. There is nothing wrong with authentic traditions; on the contrary, they reflect our ancient constitutional heritage. Keep the lace jabots and black rods and ermined robes: these are a reinforcement rather than a threat to our democracy.

When John Bercow divested himself of the Speaker’s wig, knee breeches and gold-trimmed gown he did so in preparation for the worst usurpation of power since 1642. Dictators have traditionally favoured drab apparel: remember Bonaparte’s grey coat. Nigel Farage wants to abolish the House of Lords: he is wrong. Fill it instead with peers who cherish British identity and the constitution, rather than engaging in the distraction of a constitutional reform more prolonged than Brexit.

Many House of Commons traditions, on the other hand, are harmful. The endless self-regarding bombast about “the privileges of this House” reflects an arrogant sense of entitlement. The hot-house atmosphere of the chamber is further aggravated by the narcissistic use of the term “stranger” for anyone who is not a member.

Above all, the much-abused term “representative democracy”, itself derived from a misrepresentation of the principles of Edmund Burke, must end. Sir Bufton’s pompous alibi for betrayal of his constituents “I am a representative, not a delegate” must give place to MPs who are delegates and behave as such. The “representative” card has been played to destruction; after the experience of the current disgraceful parliamentary session the country has no more time for it.

Despite all the parliamentary contrivances and misleading uproar, much of the country remains focused on the one salient fact: the public voted to leave the EU and a few hundred MPs, after three and a quarter years, are still preventing it. Parliamentary democracy has become an oxymoron. It will fare ill with these village Hampdens when the electorate finally revisits the ballot box.

Those who have broken our democracy must be expelled from parliament. We need people in power who are prepared to reform root and branch the corrupt system that has kept us hostages to a foreign power. In that respect, the Brexit Party’s slogan “Change politics for good” is likely to be as potent a pledge at the next election as the commitment to a no-deal Brexit.

The government’s churlish rejection of Nigel Farage’s offer of an electoral pact, a rejection which is suicidal for the Conservatives, will set commentators’ minds calculating. What could prompt such cavalier disregard of a much-needed lifeline? Is it delusory confidence on the part of Dominic Cummings that the Tories can win a majority unaided?

Or does it reflect the realization that the Farage offer could never be an option because it is conditional on a clean Brexit and the government intends to “deliver” a reheated Theresa May treaty, possibly at the cost of nudging Northern Ireland closer to integration with the Republic? In that context, was the government privately pleased to see no-deal Brexit legislatively eliminated?

Such a betrayal would destroy the Conservative Party at the subsequent election, as Nigel Farage and enraged Brexiteers would wreak a terrible vengeance. If, on the other hand, Boris delivers WTO Brexit by 31 October he will win. In all eventualities, the message to Brexit saboteurs of whatever complexion, when the election is called, is: “Go back to your constituencies and prepare for annihilation.”