The absent opposition

Oppositions don’t win elections — governments lose them. This has long been the Westminster wisdom. But the truth is that oppositions can lose elections, too: they must pass a basic competency test to be considered for office. Today, however, no party resembles a credible opposition to the Tories, let alone a government in waiting.

What makes this absence so striking is that the government is in such a perilous position. It must somehow implement Brexit. Leaving the EU will crowd out Theresa May’s domestic priorities and reveal all the divisions in the Tory party over what kind of relationship with the EU the UK should seek. As one Tory with good links to No. 10 puts it, ‘People regard this as existential to the country and so they will behave in a principledmanner, and won’t be whipped as easily.’

The short-term economic fallout from Britain leaving the EU won’t be simple for the government to deal with, either.