Mystic Mag checks his crystal ball to predict 2020’s big events.
Will Boris Johnson be found out? What does the future hold for Labour?
Should we brace ourselves for four more years of Trump? Will the FBI feel Prince Andrew’s collar? And what about Brexit?
The stakes are high with the only certainty being an alarming uncertainty for the next 12 months.
Brexit
Cynical liar Boris Johnson wants Brexit talk banned because he knows it won’t be done by the end of January.
The UK is leaving Brussels’ political institutions but little changes immediately as we remain in the customs union and single market until at least the end of 2020.
My hunch is the Tory charlatan fails to negotiate a £600billion free trade deal by December 2020 and instead of Brexitgeddon he begs for an economic lifeline.
The £350million a week NHS Brexit dividend never existed.
Boris Johnson
(Image: Getty Images)
The Con-servative will be found out in the next 12 months, his celebrity gloss fading quickly as scales fall from the public’s eyes.
Lies eventually catch up with fibbers and that 80-seat Parliamentary majority gives him nobody else to blame when he fails to deliver.
Broken promises are Johnson’s trademark. Just ask his ex-wives and girlfriends.
Labour
I firmly believe Wigan warrior Lisa Nandy would be Labour’s wisest choice in March.
But I’m beginning to wonder if toolmaker’s son Keir Starmer might pip continuity Corbynista candidate Rebecca Long-Bailey.
(Image: Julian Hamilton/Daily Mirror)
The former DPP chief prosecutor is gaining momentum while Momentum’s failing to get Salford solicitor Long-Bailey going.
One-time teenage mum Angela Rayner is a shoe-in for deputy.
Economy
Wages are tipped by the Resolution Foundation to return finally to 2008’s value, after the worst squeeze for two centuries. Yet economic growth will struggle to match this year’s weak 1.3%.
It’s a myth Tory leech doctors are better for the nation’s prosperity, with average annual GDP growth per head in Conservative years below 1.2%, a third less than the 1.7% in a Labour era that included a global banking collapse.
Donald Trump
(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
Most recent US Presidents won second terms and I fear the gross ignoramus may in November again lose the popular vote but be gifted the White House by an electoral college favouring Republicans.
Fact checkers counted nearly 8,000 Trump lies and untrue statements in 2019 and his 41% approval rating is historically low.
But this contest is decided by tiny margins in Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Florida.
Obama’s old deputy, Joe Biden, is the likely, uninspiring rival unless Democrats gamble on Elizabeth Warren, Pete Buttigieg or Bernie Sanders.
NHS
Tories are applying a sticking plaster to gaping wounds they inflicted when Johnson’s “record” £34billion extra by 2024 is £20billion in real terms – or 3.4%. That’s below the historical average 3.7% rise, never mind the 6% under Blair and Brown.
Record waiting lists and times will fall a little but the NHS will be stuck on a trolley in the corridor with social care ignored.
Schools
Video Unavailable
Begging letters will continue to come to parents and classroom staff will be sacked as most schools in England suffer more austerity.
Labour’s £6,193 spending per pupil in 2010 is down to £5,723 under the Cons and children’s education will suffer when a Tory £6,150 target in four years doesn’t even repair the damage.
Dismantled red wall
Disillusionment will grow in former Labour seats where folk loaned their votes to Johnson, as life worsens instead of improving.
Those who didn’t like Corbyn will regret falling for Johnson.
Monarchy
(Image: BBC)
The constitutional crisis won’t be Harry and Meghan wanting money and titles without duties, but the FBI deciding to interview paedophile’s pal Prince Andrew.
The British monarchy’s fate rests on whatever Andrew and Jeffrey Epstein’s friend Ghislaine Maxwell might tell US law enforcement.
From Russia with love
We’ll learn how Russian roubles bought the Tories, with the release of an intelligence report that Johnson suppressed before the election.
Some £160,000 of £3million donated was in return for a game of tennis with him.
Corbyn was unfairly accused of being soft on the Kremlin over the Salisbury poisoning but follow the money and its from Russia with love to the Tories.
Environment
(Image: Getty Images)
Bans in April will see 5billion plastic straws, 2billion plastic cotton buds and 300million stirrers no longer consumed each year.
The Government is more hot air than action, which means Extinction Rebellion will be back on the streets and our planet’s fate is in the hands of a 16-year-old Swedish schoolgirl, Greta Thunberg.
Local elections
May 7’s local elections will test Tory popularity with London Mayor Sadiq Khan and Andy Burnham in Greater Manchester two Labour names defending seats.
Pick smart Brummie MP Liam Byrne and I’d fancy Labour’s chances of rescuing the West Midlands from Tory Andy Street.
Disunited Kingdom
(Image: Getty Images)
SNP chief Nicola Sturgeon will demand the referendum she doesn’t want and won’t get, while in Northern Ireland a DUP betrayed by the Tories is keener to revive the Stormont assembly to avoid February elections.
Creaking seriously, the UK will edge closer to collapsing in 2020 without falling apart.
Liberal Democrats
Poor Lib Dumbs.
In power only four years ago, they must choose a third leader in two years after a hara-kiri election for Jo Swinson.
Oxford polyglot Layla Moran, once arrested for slapping a boyfriend in a row over a lost computer cable, Edinburgh’s impressive Christine Jardine and ex-minister Ed Davey might stand.
