A Will Hutton Observer column turns back the clock as if it were still ticking

Will Hutton in the Observer never lets go ...

Whisper it, but it was the folly of Brexit that paved the way for Truss’s crazy libertarian zeal

Instead of a stimulus to growth, Britain faces intense economic and social dislocation and ongoing stagflation. Austerity is back, this time on an epic scale....Whisper it – this is where Brexit has inexorably led. There is no Brexit that can work congruent with deeply held British values, beliefs and economic interests. [known only to the right sort of people, of course].  A democratic vote has transmuted into a rightwing coup, culminating in a destructive libertarian programme, an attempt to shrink a state the right considers bloated, to eliminate the last remnants of regulation, to try to drive taxes down, however vital to sustain public services. All in the name of “liberating enterprise” and forcing “self-reliance” on what the Brexit right consider a lazy, cushioned workforce. The line from Brexit to last week’s debacle is straight and obvious.

The old hatreds are still there even though Truss hardly represents the upper classes: 

the EU became a source of law that did not originate in the House of Commons, which exists in rightwing circles to confer prerogative power to the English upper class via the Tory party. 

The old elements can be stirred in again as well, slightly updated to include beastly striking unionists

This was a minority preoccupation – until immigration jumped in salience. Suddenly, the prospect emerged of an alliance between English libertarian toffs and an elderly, white working class. Add the malevolent genius of Nigel Farage, together with plausible Brexiters on the left, like the charismatic RMT boss Mick Lynch, and the rest is history.

No mention of Boris. One new input appears in the mix: 'American libertarians, so influential on the British right'

Hutton wants to remind us what we have missed, as if nothing has happened:

EU membership was an unacknowledged boon ...Our regions were propped up by generous EU funding [Still! That old myth!! The original Brexit lie!!]

So what can be done? Well, we must elect Labour next time but also:

The UK must join the customs union; and it must align with EU rules and regulations in sector after sector...Truss will attend the first meeting of the European Political Community in Prague this week, championed by President Macron, to discuss European defence and energy security...The long, slow march back to where Britain belongs now begins – into the heart of Europe.