Brexit: the same battle that must be fought again and again
More than two thirds of Labour supporters voted to remain in the European Union. That is unarguable, and that figure even holds up in the constituencies that voted to leave overall.
Had the party retained the five million voters lost by new Labour, the referendum may have had a different result. But those five million — some disenfranchised by a government that didn’t change anything for them in the long term, and some disillusioned by right-wing policies and international aggression — either stopped voting never to bother again, or have been converted by the next salesman to come along. Labour voters wanted to remain in the EU, but in 2016 there just weren’t enough Labour voters to tip the balance.
Successions of neoliberal politicians offered people a bright future and those that took the odds lost time and again. Bet on Thatcher get negative equity, bet on Blair get a call centre job if you’re lucky, bet on Clegg and get Thatcher again in cuddly posh fat suit and lose pretty much everything. Those who always lose may as well take a punt on the bigger bet, and leaving the EU was set up as being the greatest gamble of all.
Jeremy Corbyn campaigned harder than anyone else on the left, tens of appearances, millions reached on TV and by social media, much harder than the Labour In campaign. He had to work hard to be heard, as the media was only interested in the right-wing infighting, the monetarism adrift from real experience, and lies on a bus they could never bring themselves to look at for long enough to call out. In a world where the policies of monetarism have run adrift from real experience, it is much easier to paint democracy as an urbane parlour game, and ignore the fact that people die when benefits are cut, social care funding slashed, or bombs dropped.
Some have criticised the nuanced line Corbyn took, but it was needed to persuade parts of the electorate that could see the EU as a force for a status quo that wasn’t working, a financial hammer breaking Greece, Italy and Spain. That message was the right one to send out, it worked with the Labour voters, however it is rich for the media to blame a man that they had spent a year telling people not to listen to for not making himself heard.
Years of broken promises broke the link between voting and democracy, and the leave campaign drove their bloody lying bus through the gap. That they were the same lies that beat the AV campaign in 2011’s electoral reform referendum, the once-in-a-generation chance that we had to restore participatory democracy in the UK to something approaching fair, makes the taste even more bitter.
Remain lost the referendum but try as you might to look for one, there’s no-one with a mandate to stop the country exiting the EU.
Labour are vocal about fighting for a brexit for the 99% not the 48%, the 52% or the 1%: that’s the only position it’s possible for a democratic socialist party working for the whole of the UK to take.
There is no route to success by talking to only 48% of the country. Amongst that 48% are those, like Cameron, who may have happened to agree with you on this yes/no vote, but who would much rather a Conservative government pissing all over us — regardless of whether we are inside or outside of the EU tent.
There’s a large government majority on leaving in the commons: they have the DUP, UKIP and others on their side on top of their well drilled ranks. There is no way an article 50 triggering bill can be defeated, but the bill as it stands it only contains the permission to trigger article 50, nothing about the negotiations or the wider process.
Labour amendments to protect EU citizens rights were beaten in the commons because even those Tories that said they were for EU citizens rights — such as new liberal favourite ‘woke Anna Soubry’ — having rights voted against EU citizens rights. It’s clear that a Tory brexit is one that doesn’t care for anyone’s rights.
The government don’t have a Lords majority so it’s possible that that such an amendment will pass in a Lord committee, as may one to give a ‘meaningful’ parliamentary vote once the deal is known. At that point (after negotiations produce nothing that people want) parliament could actually stop us leaving, but that’s the only point at which it can. Even then it seems to be a long shot unless public opinion can be changed while the negotiations are in motion.
Jeremy Corbyn is right, “the real fight [for which read ‘the harder, dirtier, longer fight’] starts here”. Brexit is a long road, and the more Labour break the terms of EU exit and the new deal down into understandable chunks, the more they stand a chance of getting concessions that matter. The Tories have hardly raised an idea they haven’t had to back down on since Jeremy won the party leadership, Labour have won concession after concession (on forced academies, on further cuts to the disabled, the worst parts of the Trade Union Bill, child poverty indicators, freedom of information, Legal aid for domestic abuse victims), through leading widespread public support pressurising the Tories. These don’t get seen as losing votes — and the opposition don’t get the credit they deserve — because the Tories only put to votes the ones they can win.
To oppose leaving in any circumstances at this point is to give the Tories a free ride because those that do that lose their ability to talk about the issues. And it’s the issues, the things that affect the people of the UK of all nationalities — their rights, their safety, their jobs, ultimately their ability to take some control over their lives through democracy — that matter in the long run.
Concerted pressure on individual issues from a united Labour party, tapping into and building coalitions across the country, can defeat a shaky government, but in needs to make the victories seem inevitable. It needs to make the Tories understand that they can’t win.
To stand strong on the issues Labour needs a firm base, to win on those issues it needs wider public support. Throwing up hands and throwing in towels is a defeat. Fighting for what’s best all, for as long as it takes, is not a defeat: it is, however, complicated and difficult.
As Tony Benn said, “Every generation must fight the same battles again and again. There’s no final victory and there’s no final defeat.”
There aren’t any quick ways out of this, no legal loopholes, no chance of re-running the referendum, no refusal to engage that will succeed, there is only the same fight for the people and against neoliberal capitalism, over and over again. Fight from your own angles, in your own way, but anyone offering you simple solutions simply doesn’t have them. There aren’t any.
