IN these strange, dispiriting, discombobulating times, I find myself relying on simple pleasures to get me through. You know the sort of thing. Raking leaves. Making soup. Cat videos on You Tube. Running through fields of wheat.
I’ve also discovered more comfort than I ever thought possible in Sunday night telly, with the viewing figures suggesting many, if not most of us, have also come to rely on this weekly fix of what I’ve come to call tranquiliser television.
I’ve stuck with BBC One since Bodyguard and The Cry, happily settling over the last few weeks into a comfortable routine that comprises Doctor Who, the Strictly results show, David Attenborough’s Dynasties and The Big Drama, perhaps because aliens, a verbal pasting from Craig Revel Horwood and watching baby wild animals struggle to survive are all still much more pleasurable than contemplating Brexit.
And this is why I must object in the strongest terms to any plan that involves Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn interrupting my precious Sunday night viewing with a Brexit debate.
Of course, since the details are still being worked out/argued over behind the scenes by lackeys, it’s possible ITV will host proceedings, though I can’t imagine fans of I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here!, forced to forsake their usual slebs so the PM and the Leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition can publicly humiliate themselves in what will would surely be the dullest Bushtucker trial of all time, will be best pleased either.
Not even the addition of some Christmas tinsel can save this debate, which is fast becoming the ultimate turn-off. Apart from the obvious fact that the mention of the word Brexit sends most of us into a state of comatose/anger/delirium (delete as necessary), this would be event TV at its most pointless.
Unlike in the sort of debates we’ve become used to over the last few years, held before referendums and general elections - and indeed most of the shows it would replace in the schedules - no one other than the MPs watching would have a vote.
Adding to the futility surrounding this set-up are the Brexit stances of the only two politicians invited to take part: barring a major change of heart, the positions being argued by Mrs May and Mr Corbyn would not only be similar, but similarly bad.
The irony of all this is staggering. Here you have Mrs May, who voted Remain, trying to ram a terrible Brexit deal through Parliament that will, by her Government’s own admission, make the country poorer. This bleak halfway house leaves the UK worse off in every way, with no control or say over EU policy, having to align itself regardless, while losing all the benefits of the Single Market.
Mr Corbyn, meanwhile, a lifelong Eurosceptic who claims he voted Remain, has taken his party to a bizarre, opaque and convoluted position that also has us leaving the EU, despite knowing full well this will cause genuine and serious harm to the very people and public services he has spent his political life trying to protect from Tory policy. He agrees with Mrs May on ending free movement and leaving the Single Market, his only real divergence from her being the continual peddling of the fantasy that the EU would give him a far better deal than it gave her. Just because he’s Jezza, you understand.
In some ways, you can see why Mrs May, never a natural performer on this type of platform, would nevertheless want to take part in a debate. Don’t think for a minute it’s about persuading the public to support her deal – we have no say. No, as is usually the case with the Tories, this is all about selling it to a faction, in this case the grassroots party membership, who she wants to pressure their MPs to vote with, rather than against, her.
As for Mr Corbyn, who in another striking similarity with the PM is also a poor public communicator, I’m still trying to work out what he thinks he can get out of this exposure.
And that’s why if I was Nicola Sturgeon, I’d stay well out of it and let these two lame ducks go it alone. For now, at least.
The First Minister, who is not only an excellent debater but has a clear and cogent position on Brexit, says she wants in on the action, to put the case for staying in the Single Market and/or having a so-called People’s Vote.
Like many, I share her concerns around Scotland being deliberately left out of the process, as her lack of an invite to the debate only highlights. But I honestly don’t think she should waste her time with this one.
If and when the People’s Vote, or even another general election is called, both of which are possible scenarios, her voice will be needed to persuade not only Scots, but arguably more importantly voters around the UK, that Brexit can and must be stopped or at least significantly watered down. In that scenario she should not only debate Mrs May and Mr Corbyn but be ready to make her case against hard Brexiteers like Boris Johnson.
Until a meaningful opportunity arises, however, Ms Sturgeon should keep her powder clean and let Mrs May and Mr Corbyn keep fighting the phony war.
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