It's unfortunate that the parties that are unequivocally opposed to Brexit (LibDems, Change UK/TIG, Greens, Plaid, SNP) haven't agreed a joint list for these elections. It's quite possible that their total votes will exceed those of the pro-Brexit parties, depending which camp Labour is in by then, but the headline will be about the number of MEPs and on their own these smaller groupings will fail to make the thresholds in many regions.
Labour will quite possibly still not be in either camp, as they have three fundamental pulls in different directions which are very hard to reconcile:
- a membership very pro remain
- a voter base very pro leave (apart from London)
- a leader apparently pro leave
One might well also add to that a complication that they need Scottish seats to form a majority, and it’s not really fully clear whether Scotland is actually as ardently pro-remain as Sturgeon likes to have us believe. Yes Scotland voted remain, but a substantial number did still vote leave, and the raw figures don’t tell us how much of that remain vote actually care strongly about the issue.
If I were Corbyn I’d possibly be tempted to go for a remain strategy and hope that the blue-collar seats vote Labour based on habit, but it’s a risky strategy and would appear to go against his own beliefs.