The biggest puzzle of Theresa May’s premiership so far is why someone who pioneered laws against modern slavery and was so tough on stop-and-search should take such an extreme and heartless position on EU migrants. Her declaration – that she’d use them as bargaining chips in Brexit talks – struck many who would otherwise support her as bizarre and repugnant. The Times reveals today that this idea was dummed up, as you’d expect, by the Whitehall machine.
Sir Ivan Rogers, Britain’s ambassador to the EU, advised all candidates for the Tory leadership to use Britain’s three million EU nationals as bargaining chips in Brexit talks because he thought it would be the only bargaining chip Britain had. Boris Johnson, Andrea Leadsom, Michael Gove and Sajid Javid all regarded the idea as disgusting, and said so. Even if destabilising Polish nurses and German mechanics in Britain would give the Foreign Office a nice chip to play, why would a humane government wish to do so?
Mrs May’s mistake – her worst so far – was to not think his advice through properly.
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