Why the return of Farage is the last thing the UK needs

Nigel Farage has been taking a sabbatical from main stage politics after the giddy excitement of last summer. Hoping for a post in his new buddy Donny’s government, he was also mysteriously overlooked for the post of UK’s ambassador to the USA. So, since the UK’s joyous Independence Day TM, Farage has spent his time wandering in the wilderness, occasionally popping up on his LBC radio slot, and searching for a righteous cause to throw his distinguished campaigning know-how behind.

Until recently, when Farage found himself, a little dishevelled and dusty, in front of a group of youths at the Young American Foundation, lecturing them on the necessity of following through on all badly made political decisions, no matter how disastrous they turn out to be. And it seems that there must have been 4G out in the wild, as Farage soon turned to his favourite topic, Brexit.

Much like UKIP positioning itself as the ‘guard dog of Brexit’, Farage inevitably sees himself as Brexit’s shining knight, whose duty it is to kill the EU dragon. With the withdrawal process in the untrustworthy hands of a party obsessively committed to the Hard Brexit he himself supports, Farage admitted that he would have ‘”no choice but to throw myself back into full time campaigning”.

For Farage, the slow progress on our withdrawal is not due to its complexity, but due to the lack of commitment on the part of UK ministers to the ideal of Brexit. Interpreting the Conservative government’s impressive inability to come to a coherent stance on even the most simple aspects of what will be a deeply complex withdrawal process as a pre-meditated ‘betrayal’ of the 2016 referendum result, Farage let on that he could rise again to ensure the ‘will of the people’ prevailed.

It is precisely this inability to distinguish the complicated details of the real world that makes the return of Farage such a dispiriting prospect. Farage does not deal in detail nor in nuance. His extremely limited strengths lie in painting the world in two distinct shades of black and white, creating battles of with us or against us. He does best when he can campaign on the ‘big issues’ rather than those of political realities. He is on the front foot when he can appeal to emotions, passions and pride, without concerning himself with practicalities.

The referendum campaign was, therefore, Farage’s ideal battleground, where he could deal in abstract concepts of ‘sovereignty’ and ‘independence’, pitching the vote as a fight of the plucky British against an undemocratic European Union superstate to “take our country back”. He kicked off the referendum campaign with a poster depicting escalators on the cliffs of Dover, and continued to play to fears over immigration, standing in front of posters reminiscent of Nazi propaganda. And last year, the ‘Out’ vote won, due in no small part to Farage’s efforts.

But we are now not in the suspended reality of the Brexit campaign. We exist in the real, post-vote world of hugely complicated and difficult exit negotiations, of legions of civil servants and experts, facing the daunting prospect of having to sift through thousands of laws, renegotiate hugely significant trade deals and restructure our economy. A world, in other words, of intricate and extremely important detail.

The EU has been lining up its negotiating team since the result, preparing their carefully considered positions, while our government has spent the past year losing high court cases, fighting amongst themselves, and holding a disastrous general election.

Preparations on the UK side have been going so badly that the EU is starting to think it is part of a ‘cunning plan’ to lull them into a false sense of security. The lack of preparation for almost every aspect of the withdrawal process and its impact on the UK has been astounding. The Department for Exiting the EU has not prepared a position on the financial settlement, there is no proposal for what border will exist between Northern Ireland and the Rep. of Ireland, and there is still no consensus on the relationship the UK wishes to have with the EU. In short, our current crop of politicians seem similarly allergic to detail too.

Seeing this, Farage has contributed to the most complicated negotiations the UK has ever undertaken by making a series of false and misleading claims on the divorce bill owed by the UK on his LBC show (LBC was forced to offer a retraction). He has offered very little constructive insight into what a post-Brexit UK might look like, famously quitting as leader of UKIP after the result. He returned during the Art 50 court case, which revolved around reasserting Parliament’s sovereignty on issues of constitutional importance (an issue Farage campaigned on), threatening to march 100,000 Brexiteers to the Supreme Court to intimidate the judges into curtailing Parliament’s sovereignty.

The return of Farage to the front line welcomes back a disruptive and deeply distracting form of politics, in a time when considered, mature and effective politics is desperately needed. Much like Trump’s fascination with his electoral victory, it focuses on the past referendum result, ‘we won, get over it’, rather than the careful implementation of the decision. It refuses to acknowledge the difficulties and complexities that come with executing that decision, and instead searches for traitors, “gutless” politicians whose chaotic approach is interpreted as a secret plot to undermine the ‘will of the people’. It is the poisonous politics of ‘betrayal’ and partisanship.

The elected ministers in charge of Brexit are far more competent politicians than Farage and, so far, they are botching Brexit. He offers no improvement. The return of Farage is the last thing the UK needs.

Edited by Maryam Elahi

Pynx Media (Archive)

Pynx was a media publication (an offshoot of Affairs Today) where writers of all walks of life could share their opinions without being edited. All opinions are those of the authors.

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Pynx Media is an online publication where passionate writers can share their ideas without being edited. All opinions are those of the authors.

Pynx Media (Archive)

Pynx was a media publication (an offshoot of Affairs Today) where writers of all walks of life could share their opinions without being edited. All opinions are those of the authors.

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