Trump’s election reinforces the need for Britain to turn against Brexit

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/nov/13/trump-election-means-britain-turn-against-brexit

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All right: the egregious Donald Trump’s victory is, in his words, “Brexit plus, plus, plus”, and it is far more significantly ominous for the rest of the world than Brexit.

But what Trump’s triumph also does is to strengthen the case for re-examining the Brexit decision. Europe is now faced with huge geopolitical concerns. It should be pulling together, and resisting the centrifugal forces which the result of the British referendum can only aggravate.

Put bluntly, the rest of the European Union needs Britain, and, as it faces up to the implications of Trump’s love affair with Putin and manifest isolationist tendencies, the last thing either we or the other 27 need is for Brexit to dominate the next few years.

I still meet people who are surprised to learn that, on referendum day, Nigel Farage stated that, if the result were to be 52%-48% in favour of Remain, then it should be followed by another referendum.

The very idea that “the British people have spoken”, and that therefore the vote is irrevocable, does not quite stand the test of history. The British people spoke in 1975, but the likes of Nigel Farage did not like what they said, so in due course we saw the rise of Ukip and the emergence of Farage, conveniently financed personally by a salary from the European parliament – a salary which, I understand, he continues to draw. Talk about having it both ways.

Time after time, people change their minds in a parliamentary democracy – there was a time in Italy in the 1950s and 1960s when they seemed to have elections every year. The hysteria fomented by the Brexit press, with attacks on the legitimacy of judges, is reminiscent of Germany in the 1930s and the rise of Hitler. We have a prime minister who seems to be obsessed by what the Daily Mail advises; younger readers may care to study the record of that newspaper with regard to fascism in the 1930s.

It is worth repeating that only 37% of the adult population voted for Brexit and many of them were misled by a nasty propaganda campaign from the Leavers, which crossed the boundary from selective use of the facts to outright lies. It is therefore good to see that Professor Bob Watt, an expert in electoral law at the University of Buckingham, has complained to the director of public prosecutions that the lies propagated by the Vote Leave and Leave.EU campaigns – the EU costing £350m a week which could go to the NHS, “Turkey joining the EU”, etc – contravened electoral law.

There is already a bottomless pit of articles and emails on the question of the timing of invoking article 50 of the Lisbon treaty – to begin the process, not of negotiation, but of withdrawal from the EU. We now await the judgment of the supreme court early next year on the high court’s ruling that parliament should be involved.

I thought it was pretty shocking in the first place that our prime minister should have tried to bypass the sovereignty of parliament, and she continued to shock when refusing to criticise the vicious,1930s-style attacks on the judges – merely saying that she believed in a free press. Don’t we all – but, surely, a free and responsible one.

As Private Eye reminds us, the Mail’s picture of the three high court judges used a headline – “Enemies of the people” – that echoed the vile slogans of Robespierre, Lenin, Chairman Mao and the Nazi propagandist Julius Streicher.

It is not as if, according to recent reports, she needs to worry. We are told that, although the vast majority of MPs are against Brexit, most of them are intending to “respect” the result of the referendum.

This country is heading for a train crash. As one political historian said last week: “I don’t think there is any previous example in British history where policymakers were so determined to vote against their true beliefs.”

The problem for those of us who remain unrepentant Remainers is that the economic consequences of 23 June constitute a “slow burner”. This is the biggest British economic crisis of my long experience, and I have little doubt that when the full extent of the damage to investment becomes apparent, it will become increasingly obvious that the vast majority of the people will regret their decision.

As to the crucial point of whether the referendum result can legally be reversed, in a paper presented last week to the European parliament, Andrew Duff – a great expert on all matters European – wrote: “Contrary to the claims made in the English high court, article 50 is indeed revocable. Article 50(2) involves a notification of an intention to withdraw from the union. Intentions can change, especially after a general election and the installation of a new government.”

Meanwhile, our new chancellor faces the daunting prospect when preparing his much-hyped autumn statement (due 23 November) of dire economic forecasts from the Institute of Fiscal Studies – and doubtless, in due course, from the Office for Budget Responsibility.

These will reflect the expected impact on the nation’s finances of the exodus of financial and other institutions that want to ensure their place in the single market. They have to take serious long-term decisions, and are not impressed by the chaotic non-strategy of the Brexiters.