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A prime minister who has never faced a general election, & who can no longer command the confidence of our elected MPs, plans to drive through a seismic policy change by suspending our democratic institutions. This is no longer about Brexit: it's about democracy itself. [THREAD]
2. By suspending Parliament, Boris Johnson is tacitly accepting that he can no longer command its support. To carry on regardless - and to push through a fundamental policy change that he knows it would vote down - breaks the most basic principles of our parliamentary democracy.
3. Johnson's democratic right to govern comes *solely* from Parliament: from the support of a majority of MPs. Take that away, & what's left is simply the votes of 90,000 Tory members. We cannot allow unelected party activists to override Parliament or usurp the functions of MPs.
4. We will doubless be told that the referendum trumps Parlt. But the referendum said nothing about the *form* of Brexit - & Johnson himself opposed May's deal. So how do we decide? We can do it democratically, through Parlt or a further referendum, or autocratically, like this.
5. What we cannot do is to pretend that suspending Parliament is democratic: that a single heroic leader can embody in his own person "the will of the people", and use that as a weapon to crush dissent from elected representatives. That leads down a much darker path.
6. Most MPs do not sign up for this job expecting to face a constitutional crisis, or a choice between their prime minister and the principles of a parliamentary democracy. But that is the decision that Conservatives face today. May they think carefully, and choose wisely. [ENDS]
