Friday 10 February 2023

The leave voters who would vote leave again

Paul Goodman is the editor of ConservativeHome. Before that, he was MP for Wycombe from 2001-2010, and before that, he was the Comment Editor of the Daily Telegraph. In other words, he is the archetypal Tory, and as you can perhaps guess, a Brexiteer. He has an article in The Times, I’d vote Leave again — but Brexit is back at square one (No £), reproduced from the original at ConservativeHome, I think.  I could have predicted the contents and with a bit of effort, even written it for him.  

Suzanne Evans, one of the many leaders of UKIP, tweeted a link:

The article is about how Brexit hasn’t turned out well (surprise, surprise). But that, he says, is because the Tory government hasn’t implemented it properly or taken advantage of the freedoms.  He blames "Britain’s entire pro-EU ascendancy — its foreign affairs elites, its civil service establishment, the unions, the big banks, most MPs, most academics, most bishops, the lobbyocracy."

The list of these so-called remoaners who are thwarting Brexit is getting longer by the week, and one begins to wonder who Brexit was supposed to be for?  Now, I realise I’m biased but honestly I found it hard to understand how intelligent people (I assume he’s intelligent, perhaps that’s a mistake) can’t see the disaster IS Brexit.

We have had four different prime ministers (five including Cameron) with different cabinets who have had a bash at making Brexit a success. All have failed. The only way Johnson ‘got Brexit done’ was at the risk of peace in Northern Ireland and at the expense of a big chunk of Britain’s £600 billion a year trade with Europe. We are still trying to resolve problems with both and this will probably go on for years if not decades. Even men like Goodman concede it hasn’t been a success.

We haven’t actually implemented checks on EU imports because of fears that supply chains will break, and we can’t actually change our regulations by any significant amount because the EU will retaliate and damage trade even more. All UK governments since 2016 have, in effect, been in a strait-jacket, but can't admit it.

Who does Goodman think is going to actually deliver something that might just, on a foggy November night and looked at from a distance by someone suffering from Hypermetropia appear in the vague shape of success? Nigel Farage? Tice? Don’t make me laugh.

I noted Amber Rudd, a former Home Secretary, who I have some respect for, has said when some Brexit-supporting Tories have a quiet moment of reflection after a drink or two and the shutters have slipped, will admit it’s all gone horribly wrong. 

Yet, like Goodman, they maintain they would vote to leave the EU again in any future referendum. I suppose that in itself is an admission that another vote is coming.

After six, going on seven years, and if you listen to some, with another ten years to go, he says we are now back to square one. You really have to wonder what goes through his head. How many prime ministers and governments and how many years is he willing to tolerate banging their heads against a brick wall?

His basic argument is not unlike a lot of others. Essentially, it's this. Leaving was the right decision because we’re sovereign now and free to make our own mistakes, no longer able to blame Brussels. And it was always obvious we would take an economic hit. The sheer chutzpah is breathtaking. They were seemingly quite happy to see millions made poorer because that’s the consequence of an economic hit. in order to obtain sovereignty which has turned out to be nothing more than fools' gold. 

Goodman seems to forget, the duped voters were all told they would be better off (prosper like never before). 

Anyway, The Times or Goodman tweeted the article out and what amazes me, even more, is just how many leave voters say not only would they vote for Brexit again ('the damage hasn’t been that bad') but that they don’t know of anyone who has changed their mind.

Even more than that, there are a few who claim they voted to remain but are now pro-Brexit! 

A tweet by Angela Hancock, a former Brexit Party candidate for Portsmouth garnered quite a few of these responses:

She apparently doesn't know anyone who has changed their mind.

There are plenty of replies from people who do admit to changing their minds but a lot are like this one:

Or this:

None of them seem to have seen the Unherd Poll from a few days ago which shows that virtually every UK constituency now thinks Brexit was a mistake or the WhatUKthinks tracker which has been showing the same trend since about 2018.

What all this tells us is that (a) we all tend to live inside our own social media bubble and (b) there is a loud if shrinking minority who will be ever-harder to reach and will never accept Brexit has failed. 

It also tells me how lucky we were NOT to get the second referendum we were demanding throughout 2018-19. It almost certainly would have all gone terribly wrong. Either remain would have won with a small majority (continued division) or leave would have increased their lead (catastrophe).

Leaving, in hindsight, was the best thing for the pro-EU side since it means we all get to experience the effects of Brexit and to see through the lies. It is going to come at a huge cost but it's the only way to ensure the next time we join the EU will be the last.

In March 2017 when I started this blog, in the 'About' section I wrote these words:

I believe Brexit is going to come. Indeed it must come. Nothing less will be able to convince those who voted to leave the EU that we were actually better off inside the largest, closest, and richest trading bloc on earth. The economy must take a bit of damage. But we do need to begin now the long hard road to obtain a new referendum as soon as politically possible to take us back in. The annual increase in younger people joining the electorate and being far more pro-EU than older voters will bring about a balance quicker than we might think.

We will get a second referendum but it's important that we don't get one before a big pro-EU majority is guaranteed.  But every day brings that day closer.

Turkey

The horrific events in Turkey are really awful. The people who have lost their loved ones and their homes are out in the open in freezing conditions. The death toll is bound to rise further still. 

It is being suggested that lax enforcement of building regulations related to earthquake-proofing high-rise apartment blocks is at least partly to blame. If this turns out to be the case, I hope that politicians in this country who are fighting tooth and nail to get rid of regulations, men like Rees-Mogg, might think twice about why we need regulations, regulators, and inspectors to make sure things are safe. 

Safety only looks expensive until there's a tragedy, and then it looks cheap.

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