La señora May apostó por seguir el impulso del referéndum, y apostar por el llamado “Brexit duro”. Cabe establecer una comparación con la derecha española, que también ha jugado bajo Mariano Rajoy a alejarse de los planteamientos más liberales defendidos por el Partido Popular en el pasado. Hoy los del PP gustan de presentarse como centristas y simpáticos, tanto en cuestiones morales como económicas, defendiendo el Estado de bienestar, los subsidios y las consignas ecológicas más antiliberales. Se apuntan también a la llamada lucha contra las desigualdades, e intentan aprovechar la debilidad de la izquierda. Si los votantes de ambas naciones son comparables, Rajoy debería tener cuidado, porque en el Reino Unido parecen haber preferido el original a la copia.

Ahora bien, muchas propuestas de Jeremy Corbyn son tan disparatadas en su anticapitalismo que posiblemente estén más a la izquierda de lo que defiende la mayoría de su propio partido. En cambio, es posible que Corbyn haya atraído a esa masa de votantes urbanos, jóvenes y europeístas, que, aunque lejos del izquierdismo de Corbyn, rechazaban con tanta o más energía la posición de May en pro de un “Brexit duro”.

No sabemos qué puede pasar, y ni siquiera si la señora May tiene futuro político. Se está hablando de nuevas elecciones próximamente. Ahora bien, si lo que ha sucedido es que el electorado británico se opone cada vez más a la opción más agresiva del Brexit, entonces, como sugiere Clegg, aumentan las posibilidades de una negociación entre Gran Bretaña y Europa que no destruya los puentes y que apueste por el mercado único, con restricciones a la inmigración y algunos límites a la soberanía regulatoria. No sería una mala solución. Como escribió en Wall Street Journal la directora general de la patronal CBI, Carolyn Fairbairn, “todos queremos un acuerdo”.

Once again, Brexit

Nick Clegg, the prominent British politician, has written in the Financial Times that he has had experience of electoral success, such as in 2010, and also failure, such as in the last elections of 2017, “but he does not remember a fall as sharp as that of Theresa May”. Ignacio Camacho coincided with this view in ABC: Mrs May “took on a comfortable pre-Brexit majority and she has squandered it in less than a year”. The Economist summarised the situation in a single word: disaster.

Mrs. May committed to following the momentum of the referendum and backed the so-called “hard Brexit”. It is worth establishing a comparison with the Spanish right, which under Mariano Rajoy has also tried to distance itself from the more liberal approaches defended by the Partido Popular in the past. Presently, the PP politicians like to present themselves as centrists and nice people, in both moral and economic matters, defending the welfare state, subsidies and the most anti-liberal environmental directives. They also target the so-called fight against inequality and try to take advantage of the weakness of the left. If the voters of both nations are comparable, Rajoy should be careful, because in the United Kingdom they seem to have preferred the original to the copy.

However, many of Jeremy Corbyn´s proposals are so wildly anti-capitalist that they are possibly more to the left of what the majority of his own party supports. On the other hand, it is possible that Corbyn has attracted that mass of urban, young and Euro-enthusiast voters, who, while far from Corbyn´s leftism, were similarly or even more energetic in their rejection of May´s position in favour of “hard Brexit”.

We do not know what can happen, or even if Mrs May has a political future. There is talk of new elections soon. However, if what has happened is that the British electorate is increasingly opposed to the more aggressive version of Brexit, then, as Clegg suggests, there is an increased possibility of a negotiation between Great Britain and Europe that does not burn bridges and that commits to the single market, with restrictions on immigration and some limits on regulatory sovereignty. It would not be a bad solution. As Carolyn Fairbairn, the director general of the employer´s association CBI wrote in the Wall Street Journal, “we all want an agreement”.