Sense and Senility

Sense and Senility

Why it is time to stop Brexit

Increasingly the disarray of the British Cabinet is getting in the way of Brexit. And that is before negotiations have started.

Less than half the people in Britain even have an opinion about Brexit now, let alone an intention to leave. How the negotiations should be handled is a mystery to all. You can’t blame Mrs May, she did her best. She must have said “Brexit is Brexit” a thousand times. We only repeat rubbish when we’re not understood.

Of course, most of the voters never understood what Brexit was about anyway. More understood what the purpose of Europe was when Britain joined the EEC. The aftermath of two world wars, increasing economic power accumulating in America – and, all too soon, in Asia – left Britain out of the big discussions. Britain is now being left out of not just the big discussions but all of them – and not only in Europe.

Can the situation be reversed? Of course it can. There will be loss of face, the PM will lose her job, but probably only a couple of weeks before she is going to anyway, some eagerly ambitions politicians will see their keys to Downing Street snatched back but who cares. The triumph of Sense over Senility will redeem all that. Now’s the time to start the process.

The Prime Minister should negotiate the return. She was not in favour of Brexit at the time of Cameron’s ill-conceived referendum, everyone knew that. It’s one of the reasons she had to keep repeating the mantra to herself and others. Now she has a chance to lead, first by seeking the EU’s agreement to ignore the letter she sent giving notice to quit. She should say that she wants time to convince the British voter that leaving the EU is a mistake, say, six months. During that time she will campaign to explain her reversal of the current plan.

Six months from now she will hold a General Election, not a referendum. The people don’t want any more General Elections or referenda but they had better have it properly explained to them why this is so important. And why the actual effort a voter has to put into a General Election is so infinitesimally small. There will be tears, possibly some demonstrations. At the end of this Britain will have better educated voters, a greater understanding of its modest place in the world and a future linked to the land-mass from which it originally sprang.

It will at last be able to practice the globalism it demonstrated so well when dealing with its former colonies. It will become part of the international scene once again.

And a thick fog in the Channel will isolate nobody, not even the Continent.