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Iain Duncan Smith and Owen Paterson have conspired to thwart Parliament


During the tumultuous events within Westminster two weeks ago, the Guardian broke the news that Iain Duncan Smith, Owen Patterson, and an unnamed non-cabinet MP have been engaged in talks with right-wing EU governments with the intention of lobbying them to veto the UK’s request for an extension to article 50 should Parliament vote in favour of such an action, as indeed it did.

We should be clear about what these elected representatives, who are meant to serve the interests of their constituents, and the people of the United Kingdom, were doing. They have decided to ally themselves with the likes of Victor Orban, who has treated asylum seekers as animals , and the Polish government, which has all but forced the resignation of their country’s top judges in a bidt  to eliminate the rule of law. Of course, Government’s present and past have done the same,  due to both geopolitical matters and a long history of alliance.our shared history . Relationships with other states are nuanced, and it is easy to take cheap shots at Governments for not being able to have an international presence that is conducted only with countries that pursue policies that we consider compatible. Such is the difficult and dirty compromise of governance.

But these MPs are not the representatives of our country on the international stage. Decisions regarding our diplomatic relations with other countries are not within their competence in any aspect beyond their role as MPs voting in the House. That is the competence of Government and of Parliament.

In fact, these MPs are acting in order to undermine the UK, and to defy the will of our Parliament and our Government. In a monomaniacal pursuit of the Brexit that they have decided is the best for the UK, they have courted foreign governments in a brazen attempt to impose what they - as private individuals - have determined to be desirable upon the sixty-five million citizens of our country . One can debate whether the people desire crashing out of the EU without a deal – though it seems unlikely that the 48% want this or that there aren’t at least 4% of those who voted leave who want to leave with a deal – but this is not the issue of concern. Iain Duncan Smith and Owen Patterson have demonstrated that they are driven by an ideology which holds sacred not our democracy or the sovereignty of our country. Rather, for them, these concerns are merely a smokescreen to be exploited as they try to force the hand of history to bend to their will.

The view of Anna Marie Anders, the Polish minister for international dialogue, is that “sometimes you just have to make a decision, and if someone disagrees, that is the price. You cannot please everyone.” This may be the case, but the extent to which these MPs make decisions is with action in Parliament, and actions within their competence as ministers. The “someone” that disagrees is the state of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Perhaps these MPs have felt emboldened by the vast amounts spent by the UK Government on legal proceedings in the EU to deprive the UK of the power to unilaterally terminate article 50. Perhaps they are emboldened by the UK’s refusal to denounce violations of human rights committed by the Hungarian government. Regardless of the context in which they are acting, it is the case that  they believe themselves to be above the constitutional operations of the UK, and in doing so,  have placed themselves above our country and they have placed themselves above our citizens. They have displayed blatant contempt for the sovereignty they claim to defend.

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