Comment

Theresa May has announced that she will resign on Friday 7 June, breaking down as she concluded her speech in front of Downing Street with that she has been serving “the country I love”. Her speech attempted to focus on her ‘achievements’ rather than her failures.

TV commentators immediately started talking about her dignity and empathising with her pain, but May’s tears cut no ice.

Here are just a few of May’s ‘achievements’:

She has been a PM who debased our democracy by making the abuse of democratic process for her own ends a routine thing and ran and hid rather than face votes in the Commons – yet who lost none of the arrogance she showed as Home Secretary when she became PM.

May was responsible for the awful Windrush scandal, yet let – and probably made– Amber Rudd fall on her sword so May could hold onto the keys to Downing Street, then slapped Windrush people in the face by bringing her back into her Cabinet.

She had known that Windrush folk were citizens, yet deported them anyway, denying compensation to many. And when a parliamentary vote threatened to expose the full extent of her involvement in the abuse of their rights, she whipped her MPs to defeat it and keep her shame hidden.

May promised the survivors of the Grenfell Tower horror they would be rehoused within weeks. Almost two years later, many are still waiting.

May was responsible for the horrific statement that asylum seekers should be deported first and appeal later – and covered up the rendition scandal that she personally oversaw.

May lied about the AIQ/Cambridge Analytica scandal – and still dodged answering even when exposed.

May knew about sexual harassment by Tory MPs long before it was exposed – and was responsible for a huge ‘loss’ of evidence against parliamentary child abusers.

May personally vetoed visas for NHS doctors from overseas, prolonging the suffering of NHS patients.

She binned the second part of the Leveson enquiry to protect her allies in the abominable right-wing press from the consequences of their involvement in spying on vulnerable people.

Worst of all, she has:

• overseen the ongoing, inflicted collapse of our NHS
• terrorised disabled and vulnerable people with cuts, sanctions and constant tests to remove their support
• cut councils’ budgets so hard that they can no longer support many of the most vulnerable in our communities
• pushed the number of children in poverty to well over four million
• pushed fourteen million of our citizens in such desperate poverty that the UN’s special envoy for extreme poverty has just condemned it again and has said it could easily be solved if she had wanted to
• continued and intensified policies that have seen the deaths – the ‘social murder‘ of at least 120,000 people
• forced rape victims and domestic abuse survivors to prove their abuse or face loss of benefits and even homes

This is by no means an exhaustive list – it would be a huge undertaking to list all of her ‘achievements’.

No, Theresa May deserves no sympathy. Her tears cut no ice compared to the anguish of millions and deaths of tens of thousands in which she played a full and enthusiastic part.

And now she will be replaced by no less a horror, whichever Tory wins their leadership race – and the UK will be forced to suffer two unelected Prime Ministers in a row and the depredations they will continue to inflict.

Cry for the people, not for Theresa May.