Moving the goalposts
Last week's comments by the President of the European Council, Donald Tusk continue to reverberate.
There are two aspects to what he said.
Had it been expressed in more reasonable and less inflammatory language, the point made would have had some merit and indeed, was saying nothing I did not myself write here during the referendum campaign.
However, consigning people to hell because you do not agree with their tactical decisions about how much detail to give of their vision and plans during a referendum campaign is divisive and unconstructive at best. Doing so at a critical stage of the Brexit negotiations and when there is a desperate need to find a deal which can both satisfy the EU and the House of Commons was counter- productive and unhelpful in the extreme.
I wasn't present at the CCC cabinet meeting when the leader of the County Council, councillor Stewart Young who is supposed to be a political representative of a county which voted overwhelmingly to leave, appears to have endorsed Donald Tusk's comments.
As I didn't hear Councillor Young's exact words and therefore can only judge by the report of his speech in the press I will limit my response to the observation that I doubt if his remarks will have gone down well with the majority of the electorate of Cumbria.
However, one interesting thing which comes out of the Tusk broadside is an illustration of just how far the goalposts have moved in terms of what people want from Brexit.
The leader of the "European Reform Group" of hardline pro-Brexit MPs, Jacob Rees Mogg, responded to Donald Tusk by saying that the supporters of Brexit did have a plan, and he pointed to a document written in 2015 called "Change or Go."
Anyone who actually looks at this document, as Robert Hutton calls out here, will find that it provides evidence of just how far the goalposts have moved when you compare what supporters of a no deal or "World Trade Organisation" Brexit now say the electorate voted for in 2016 with what they were saying before that referendum.
In answer to the question “What do we mean by ‘leaving the EU’?”
the book "Change or Go" suggested options including “becoming a European Economic Area member like Norway.”
That position is now anathema to Brexiteers, who today would describe such a situation as "Brexit in name only" and a betrayal of the 17.4 million people who voted leave.
The subject of EEA membership comes up again in a section of "Change or Go" on what should happen if Britain reaches the end of the two-year Brexit negotiations without a deal.
“One option is that negotiators may agree to extend the two-year deadline,” it reads. “Another is that the U.K. is ‘parked’ inside the EEA while outstanding issues are resolved.”
Both of these options have now be ruled out by the ERG as attempts to frustrate Brexit.
Of course, everyone is allowed to change their mind. What is not reasonable is to change your mind while insisting that your new position is what millions of people voted for at a time when you were saying something rather different.
There are two aspects to what he said.
Had it been expressed in more reasonable and less inflammatory language, the point made would have had some merit and indeed, was saying nothing I did not myself write here during the referendum campaign.
However, consigning people to hell because you do not agree with their tactical decisions about how much detail to give of their vision and plans during a referendum campaign is divisive and unconstructive at best. Doing so at a critical stage of the Brexit negotiations and when there is a desperate need to find a deal which can both satisfy the EU and the House of Commons was counter- productive and unhelpful in the extreme.
I wasn't present at the CCC cabinet meeting when the leader of the County Council, councillor Stewart Young who is supposed to be a political representative of a county which voted overwhelmingly to leave, appears to have endorsed Donald Tusk's comments.
As I didn't hear Councillor Young's exact words and therefore can only judge by the report of his speech in the press I will limit my response to the observation that I doubt if his remarks will have gone down well with the majority of the electorate of Cumbria.
However, one interesting thing which comes out of the Tusk broadside is an illustration of just how far the goalposts have moved in terms of what people want from Brexit.
The leader of the "European Reform Group" of hardline pro-Brexit MPs, Jacob Rees Mogg, responded to Donald Tusk by saying that the supporters of Brexit did have a plan, and he pointed to a document written in 2015 called "Change or Go."
Anyone who actually looks at this document, as Robert Hutton calls out here, will find that it provides evidence of just how far the goalposts have moved when you compare what supporters of a no deal or "World Trade Organisation" Brexit now say the electorate voted for in 2016 with what they were saying before that referendum.
In answer to the question “What do we mean by ‘leaving the EU’?”
the book "Change or Go" suggested options including “becoming a European Economic Area member like Norway.”
That position is now anathema to Brexiteers, who today would describe such a situation as "Brexit in name only" and a betrayal of the 17.4 million people who voted leave.
The subject of EEA membership comes up again in a section of "Change or Go" on what should happen if Britain reaches the end of the two-year Brexit negotiations without a deal.
“One option is that negotiators may agree to extend the two-year deadline,” it reads. “Another is that the U.K. is ‘parked’ inside the EEA while outstanding issues are resolved.”
Both of these options have now be ruled out by the ERG as attempts to frustrate Brexit.
Of course, everyone is allowed to change their mind. What is not reasonable is to change your mind while insisting that your new position is what millions of people voted for at a time when you were saying something rather different.
Comments
That position is now anathema to Brexiteers, who today would describe such a situation as "Brexit in name only" and a betrayal of the 17.4 million people who voted leave.
really, is it? or could it perhaps lets say, be the first step in a seris of different things that actually make Brexit a process not an event?
as I said at the time, we thought about it quite carefully.
I am not accusing you of changing your position.
It's not people like you who were referred to in Robert Hutton's article which I linked to and was quoting. But there are indeed people in parliament and elsewhere who have indeed greatly hardened their position and to whom the sort of position which many Brexit supporters would have regarded as acceptable in 2015 is now anathema.
My twitter feed and Facebook timeline are full of comments supporting a hard Brexit from people associated with Vote Leave or Leave.EU about whom the statement that they never specified their exact destination and plan during the referendum campaign is perfectly reasonable.
Their explanation at the time for not putting forward a plan was that the referendum was not the election of a government and it would be the duty of the government to implement Brexit in the event of a leave vote.
I don't have a problem with these people arguing for a hard Brexit.
I do find it a little bit frightening that the present government position - the May deal with a legally binding guarantee that we can't be kept in the backstop permanently - which would once have been seen as a fairly hard Brexit is now being accused of being a sellout by some.
Similarly I accept that those who want what they call a "WTO Brexit" and I call crashing out without a deal have a right to argue for that position.
I do have a problem with such people claiming - as quite a few of them do - that it would be betrayal of the 17.4 million leave voters were parliament to support options like a "Norway" Brexit or one based on the EEA which they certainly were not ruling out before the referendum.
The ballot paper asked whether Britain should remain a member of the EU or leave the EU. If we cease to be members of the EU we have honoured the result of the referendum.