24 May 2019

EU-Rope: The EU election: Remain blew it

Indeed, this may be the only democratic opportunity that Remainers have on Brexit before we actually leave the EU.

Remain blew it.

If polling is correct (and it looks more than likely) a very low turnout yesterday will have given Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party a landslide victory.

It seems to me that too many Remain supporters regard the anti-Brexit campaign as a spectator sport.

Brexiters want Brexit to happen more than Remainers don’t want Brexit to happen.

That might seem harsh, but the reality speaks louder than words: not enough Remain supporters voted in the 2016 referendum, just as not enough Remain supporters voted yesterday. [...]

None of the main anti-Brexit groups and parties have been able to work together, let alone to properly embrace, encourage and use the many skills of grassroots Remain campaigners (including mine, as an investigative journalist, campaigner and film maker).

Everyone – People’s Vote, Best for Britain, the five anti-Brexit parties, even Gina Miller and Chuka Umunna, and many other prominent Remainers – all seem to want to go it alone, and not to unite the Remain movement as a powerful, cohesive, single force. [...]

There have been no effective or realistic efforts by the Remain side to raise awareness about the EU; all the efforts were put into getting another vote, rather than winning it.

Well, we had another vote. It was yesterday.

And if the polls were right, not enough Remainers bothered to take part.

[...]But there has been no educational campaign in the UK about how the EU functions as a democracy, democratically run by its members for the benefit of its members.

Worse, millions across Britain believe the exact opposite.

The general level of ignorance about the EU in our country is breathtaking.

Yes, “education” could have fixed it – but that would have taken years, not just the months we have left before we are scheduled to leave the EU. [...]

So, if the Brexit Party won the anticipated landslide in yesterday’s EU election, thereby sending a pack of unwanted, trouble-making, recalcitrant British MEPs to represent us in the European Parliament, the message from the UK to the rest of Europe and the world will be clear:

Britain wants Brexit; we deserve Brexit.

Of course, the reality isn’t true. Over 60 polls since the 2017 general election clearly demonstrate that Britain doesn’t want Brexit at all.

But unless Remainers are prepared to unequivocally show that in a democratic event – like the one we had yesterday – then it will make no difference.

Marches make no difference. Petitions make no difference. Only the ballot box makes a difference. [...]

Here’s the reality.

• Theresa May resigned today (good).

• Vince Cable resigned today (bad – he should have stayed on, just as his profile and likeability were on the rise across the country. There is no potential LibDem leader with the same gravitas and high profile).

• Boris Johnson is predicted to be the Tory’s new leader and our next Prime Minister. He will undoubtedly immediately call for a general election, because no party can effectively rule with no majority (as Theresa May discovered to her cost).

• There is a high chance that Johnson will win that general election, especially if he comes to an agreement with the Brexit Party.

• The EU has made clear that they will not make any changes to the Withdrawal Agreement. Johnson could not accept that deal, especially as May has just resigned because she couldn’t get that deal passed, and Johnson resigned last year as Foreign Secretary because he opposed that deal.

• Johnson has made clear that he is willing to take the country out of the EU without any deal. A new Parliament, with a different composition of MPs, might well agree with him.

This is an emergency. If this doesn’t now galvanise the country’s Remainers to put aside all egos and urgently re-organise, then our cause is lost.

If Remain cannot now unite in a way it’s never done before, then it may that (something I have never wanted to write), only a dose of Brexit will bring Britain back to its senses.

Full article on EU-ROPE blog

Related opinion piece on Nation Cymru: This EU Election was a big disappointment by Remain parties

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