Wednesday 7 June 2017

A Belgian stand-off?

David Hancox's letter to the FT refers.

We could have a hung parliament* after tomorrow. Tim Farron clearly regards both Jeremy Corbyn and Theresa May as bad prime ministers and will not take the parliamentary party into coalition with them, so there may well be no prime minister for some time to come, unless either May or Corbyn are ditched by their parties.

Not so long ago, Belgium went for 589 days without an elected government. The country ticked over quite well in the care of her civil servants, and only hit trouble when a prime minister was appointed. Perhaps we should not fear a "Belgian stand-off".

* My guess is that Conservative gains in Scotland plus the perennial support of the NI unionists will see Mrs May through. The irony of a Conservative administration being dependent on Scottish votes for survival will not be lost on the Labour Party.

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