Brexit: Four reasons to be cheerful as we go into 2018 – and what must happen next

Labour MP Heidi Alexander says the government's plans for a hard Brexit are looking weaker by the day - and says voters have the right to think again.

When we all return from our Christmas break in January, there will be less than fifteen months remaining before the UK’s scheduled date of departure from the European Union. So now seems like a good time to step back and look at where things stand in the Brexit process.

Clearly, the whole undertaking has been much more complex and difficult than anyone could have known during the referendum campaign, and every day seems to bring more news of further complications. From nuclear safety to maintaining an open border in Northern Ireland, from financial services to manufacturing supply chains, from aviation to the NHS: Brexit poses countless questions to which our government is yet to produce any convincing answers.

And yet for committed pro-Europeans like myself there are growing signs, here and there, of the green grass shoots of hope starting to appear:

1. Opinion polls show our arguments are starting to cut through, with increasing numbers of people agreeing that Brexit might not be the right choice for the country.

2. During the General Election, Theresa May ran on a clear pledge to deliver a hard, destructive Brexit and the result was the loss of her parliamentary majority – hardly a ringing endorsement, by anyone’s standards.

3. We saw the architect of Article 50, Lord Kerr, making it clear in a speech organised by Open Britain that Brexit is a reversible process if the British people decide that’s what they want.

4. Elected MPs across all the major political parties, including eleven brave Conservatives, delivered a stinging defeat to the government over Amendment 7 to the EU Withdrawal Bill.

While it was MPs who ultimately voted in favour of this amendment – ensuring that the final terms of withdrawal of the UK from the EU must be voted upon by MPs through a full Act of Parliament – the real success story was the work of the grassroots campaign co-ordinated by pro-European groups like Open Britain.

They helped raise awareness of the amendment, they lobbied fiercely in favour of its passage, and most importantly of all, they helped tens of thousands of people in every constituency of the UK to send letters and e-mails to their local MPs asking them to vote in favour of it.

The vote in Parliament was as important for what it signals as what it says – Theresa May won’t be allowed to have this all her own way.

So there is reason to be cheerful – but the fight is still very far from over.

The government is still refusing to acknowledge the basic fact that wrenching the UK out of the Single Market and the Customs Union will drive our economy off a cliff.

Ministers are still trying to pretend that they can have all the benefits of our current EU membership, with none of the responsibilities.

And the Cabinet is still full of chancers and charmers like David Davis, Boris Johnson and Liam Fox, who continue to try and ignore the facts even as they stare them in the face. The pro-European side of the argument has certainly gained momentum over the last few months, but it will all be for nothing if we fail to keep up the pressure.

A year and a half after the referendum result, the future is far from clear. Government may have limped over the first hurdle of ‘sufficient progress’ in its negotiations with the EU, but it now moves on to the much more difficult and complex question of our future relationship.

It is more important than ever to hold them to account over the promises that were made: remember it was David Davis himself who told us we could have the ‘exact same benefits’ as we have now.

As it becomes clearer and clearer that doing so is impossible, everyone has the right to keep an open mind about whether or not this is the right path for the country.

Heidi Alexander is Labour MP for Lewisham East and a leading supporter of Open Britain

4 Responses to “Brexit: Four reasons to be cheerful as we go into 2018 – and what must happen next”

  1. Steve Howard

    What is happening to this country (as encapsulated by the generic phrase ‘Brexit’) is an utter catastrophe

    It and the people forcing it upon us, must be stopped immediately.

  2. Alasdair Macdonald

    Ms Alexander’s party is in favour of leaving the Single Market and the Customs Union, which is how most people define a ‘hard Brexit’. Aside from people like Ms Kate Hoey and Mr Frank Field, who have been consistent in their line, there are ‘left-wingers’ like Dennis Skinner and John Mann, who see the EU as a ‘rich man’s club’, and, probably this is the Party Leader’s position, too. And then there are the ‘swinging in the wind’ Labour MPs in the Midlands and North of England, whose constituents voted for LEAVE, who are uncertain which way to swing.

    So, Ms Alexander is simply floating a piece of wishful thinking. A hard Brexit will be delivered and it will be delivered by a substantial tranche of Labour MPs.

    I voted REMAIN and wish to remain a citizen of the EU as 62% of my fellow residents in Scotland did. I saw the defeat for the Government last week as ‘a good sign’, but there is a long way to go and, unlike SNP, LibDems, PC, Greens, Labour has no clear position, and, by using the word ‘clear’ I am deploying the principle of charity.

  3. Dr. Stephen Hardcastle

    ~Please tell your leader as he has been conspicuous in his support for brexit, while he was limp in support for remain in the referendum campaign.

  4. Alasdair Macdonald

    Mr Ian Blackford MP, Leader of the SNP group at Westminster has called on Labour to join with SNP, LibDems, PC and the Green Party to devise a concerted strategy to oppose, or minimise the adverse effects of, Brexit. Will Ms Alexander urge her party members to do this? Sadly, I fear, too many of her party are engage in solipsistic practices for narrow gain, such as some within her own constituency party are doing with regard to Millwall FC.

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