Years after the 2016 United Kingdom referendum which resulted in a slender 51.9-48.1 percentage majority in favour of leaving the European Union, the Prime Minister at the time, David Cameron, was asked why he did not insist on a ‘consensus majority’ of 55 or 60 per cent in favour on such a crucial issue.
Cameron replied that he had always considered the referendum to be advisory only, to be revisited when the terms of leaving became clearer.
In essence, his answer was hardly surprising. All referendums in the UK are advisory, Parliament is sovereign and nothing can be implemented until MPs have had their say.
Where the former Prime Minister failed – and failed miserably – was that he did not remain in office to manage the process he had created.
His claim that as a supporter of remaining in the EU, he should step away from the development of a plan he did not agree with, does not stack up.
It should have been clear to him that with a wafer-thin majority in favour of leaving, there needed to be continuing consultation on both sides of the argument for and against Brexit.
An agreement with the EU on the protocols of quitting the bloc should have been hammered out in order that a final deal, with all the consequences fully debated, could then have been put to the people in a ‘confirming’ referendum.
That’s what ought to have happened; that’s what Cameron should have overseen.
Instead he walked away within days of the 2016 result, leaving the Government at the mercy of Brexit fanatics who were determined that the people should never have a second chance to spoil their dream.
If Cameron is the main villain of this sorry saga, close behind him comes another – the former Labour Opposition Leader, Jeremy Corbyn.
At the 2019 General Election, with the EU withdrawal still incomplete after three tortuous years, Corbyn had a golden chance to go head-to-head with Prime Minister Boris Johnson over Brexit.
It would have been the time to rally the forces of Remain and offer the second referendum that Johnson and his fellow Brexiteers had repeatedly refused in their headlong flight to ‘Get Brexit Done’.
Instead Corbyn, the old lefty and never an EU enthusiast, waffled about re-opening negotiations for a better deal while trying to switch the debate to non-Brexit issues when at the time Brexit was the overwhelming issue on which the election was being fought.
As a result the Remain camp, more than 48 per cent of the population, and probably a lot more after the consequences of Brexit had been fully revealed, was cut adrift with no-one to vote for. The field was left open for Johnson’s crushing victory.
If the Conservative Government has been efficient in anything, it has been the suppression of opposition to Brexit.
Pro-Remain MPs have been weeded out and the economic and social disaster that is unfolding has been blamed on everything from the pandemic, to climate change to the Ukraine War — but the excuses are wearing thin.
The country has been terribly served, betrayed by its leaders. Now is the time to put that to rights.
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