13 December 2018 | OPINION
It didn’t have to come to this. The Brexit vote was a wake up call to the political establishment that they weren’t listening to peoples’ concerns about a range of issues from uncontrolled immigration to regional economic imbalances. They are still not listening.
Over two years after the referendum and politicians are still squabbling. The reality is Parliament is now trying to hijack Brexit. Brexiteer MPs generally believe the public voted to leave to regain national sovereignty. Theresa May’s deal makes it clear that she thought the public voted leave to control immigration and nothing else. Labour appears to want to protect the economy at all costs while ardent Europhiles such as Liberal Democrat and SNP MPs believe the people were at best lied to and at worst too stupid or too racist to rationally comprehend what they were voting for. Parliament wants to take no-deal off the table and with it any chance of a clean Brexit which many voted for.
The obvious answer when Parliament is in deadlock is to hand power back to the people in a referendum. But how can we avoid the discord, vitriol and anger that resulted from the last one, returning a second time on such a passionate political issue which Jeremy Hunt warned this week, could result in civil unrest and riots on our streets? Here’s an idea. Take remain off the ballot paper. A second referendum is favoured predominantly by remain voters who see it as a mechanism to reverse Brexit. However, we had a referendum two years ago where we were told the result would be implemented. Having a second vote with the losing option of remain on the ballot paper before we have even implemented the result of the first vote would be deeply damaging for democracy. It would not be so much a ‘people’s vote’ as a ‘losers vote’. Having a vote now on how to leave, not on whether to leave, would preserve the publics faith in our political system while also achieving a consensus for the way forward.
Vernon Bogdanor, intriguingly came up with the notion last month that a further two referendums are required to break the deadlock. Firstly, remain or leave and then if leave wins, how we leave. Well, we had the first one in 2016 and leave won. This brings us to the second, how we leave. The will of the people was to leave the EU but how to leave and what people voted for the first time is what is causing so much uncertainty and division. If politicians really accept the result of the referendum as so many of them often claim, they should stop trying to second guess why people voted to leave and actually give them a final say.
Theresa May’s deal has united both leavers and remainers against it, and with time running out on the Brexit clock, the government must look to an alternative off the shelf model offered to the UK by Brussels. Many leave voters want to have a Canada style free trade arrangement or a managed no deal Brexit whereas those remainers who say they have accepted the result of a referendum are pushing for a Norway style model with membership of the single market and the customs union. It therefore makes sense for these to be the two options in a referendum. As long as citizens rights and some minor deals are agreed such as an Aviation treaty to keep planes in the skies, there is no reason why a managed no-deal should not be an option on the ballot paper. Only those who have not accepted the result two years are still pushing for a remain option. We must not let them win.
