Twelve days on from the day we were supposed to – and thankfully didn’t – leave the EU, Brexiters are fuming that the UK is being “humiliated” by the ongoing Brexit process. They’ve only got themselves to blame.
Theresa May is heading to Brussels today to see if she and the other 27 EU leaders can agree on a second extension to the Article 50 process. In a letter last week, May requested another short extension until June 30. But Donald Tusk wrote to EU leaders last night urging a longer extension of up to a year, giving the UK the opportunity to cut it short if a deal is reached.
Tusk’s proposal is not set in stone. The new exit date remains blank on official documents circulated yesterday between European leaders, who will need to unanimously agree to the terms tonight. An extension would also be conditional on the UK holding European Parliament elections on May 23, or we would face leaving with no deal on June 1.
Tusk warns that a short extension risks creating a “rolling series of short extensions and emergency summits, creating new cliff-edge dates” and would be “bad for [the EU’s] businesses and citizens”.
But however disruptive a return to no-deal panic every couple of months would be for the EU, it would be far worse for people and businesses in the UK. Nevertheless, good sense and the best interests of the country haven’t stopped Brexiters decrying this extension as a “humiliation”.
The Daily Mail blames “inept MPs” for the UK being stuck in “limbo”; the Express wonders when the UK will “escape EU clutches”. DUP leader Arlene Foster said it is “humiliating that we are having to go and beg so that we can leave”, with several pro-Brexit MPs echoing those sentiments in the Commons yesterday.
Let’s be clear. If the Brexiters feel humiliated, it is they who brought the country to this point. It was the promises they made in 2016 which couldn’t be kept. It was the pressure they put on the prime minister to draw impossible red lines before we even started negotiating – followed by more pressure which led to endless can-kicking and delay. It was their hostile comments comparing the EU to Nazi prison guards and the Soviet Union.
Tusk’s letter is a welcome tonic to such vitriol, when he urges that: “Neither side should be allowed to feel humiliated at any stage in this difficult process.” It is time our country escaped the clutches of the Brexiters’ hate and rage. We must take a long extension and make sure that, for the first time, the public can choose between leaving on specific terms or sticking with the current deal inside the EU. There is a sensible majority in both Parliament and the country ready to support this as a new way forward.
Edited by Jenny Sterne
So, people that voted to leave, only have themselves to blame for the EU and Remainers doing everything in their power to prevent us leaving?
Blamed for creating uncertainty through daring to vote leave, then blamed again for further uncertainty and humiliation through having their wish to leave actively overthrown.
Yeah, it’s all OUR fault.
We need to escape the clutches of the hate-mongering Mail, Express and Telegraph. When will people stop buying these rags? Somehow we need a counterbalance, a pro-EU version of the Sun. The new European is a good start but it’s only a weekly paper with nowhere near the reach of the mass market tabloids.
1. The Mail under Geordie Greig is improving fast.
2. It is not just humiliation, it is trashing the worldwide reputation of the UK. How can it be that Rees Mogg (“we should be as difficult as possible”) and Francois ( “perfidious Albion on speed”) have the nerve to call themselves British (or more likely in their parlance English} patriots? And how do they hang on to their dogged followers? Especially since they were in the forefront of those wrecking any chance of May achieving a deal? Whatever happens now it will be a long time before we regain any degree of international respect .
Denis, don’t criticise Rees Mogg! My friend’s wife’s friend’s daughter met RM at uni and she said he was clever. So there.
That’s at least as telling an argument as any we’ve read in the gutter press for the last three years. And another thing, our leave voting handy man says after we leave we won’t have to pay VAT anymore. So there.
Sorry to be stupid, but when I’m not laughing I’m crying into my non-Weatherspoons beer.
We really ought not to become embroiled in any form of tit for tat blaming or shaming Brexiteers.. it achieves nothing but giving them ammunition in calling us Remoaners and pedalling project fear… similarly wearing “Bollocks to Brexit” T shirts, badges etc. will not, I fear open their minds to reason.
If we get a second referendum, we will need to win it decisively and with a huge margin.
The time to build the numbers for a crushing defeat is now. Today. This minute.
And I would suggest that we change tactics to embrace the undecided and Brexiteers with a positively pro U.K./pro Britain, policy that demonstrates that we are for, jobs, careers, good pay, good food at cheap prices, great education, a great NHS, housing, pensions, more police on the streets, looking after our armed forces, better public transport etc. all of which are funded by taxes (and they MUST be fair and there must be transparency as to how our money is spent) that come from a (strong) economy.
Our economy is services oriented and we must preserve it but simultaneously help those industries that need help to grow and be competitive in an ever smaller and highly competitive world.
If as much time, money and effort went into putting a public face or faces that stood for leading Remain or a People’s vote and securing much needed press and TV coverage as is spent on remitting daily electronic missives to existing Remainers we would have a significantly higher following and level of support.
Enthusiasm and passion sells more than facts do.
Time is precious and until we accept that we lost the first referendum through complacency and poor campaigning and change what we are doing then I fear that even if we win a second referendum the victory will be insufficient to completely kill Brexit.
We’ve already lost 2 plus years already in not having any visible, Leader(s) leadership or strategy.. Now is the time for change. Time for a strategy that is so overwhelmingly simple and passionate that it will win those crucial votes we desperately need.
We can achieve all this but it’s going to need organising and even more effort than we’ve already put into it. We simply must drive on relentlessly and stop this madness.
While I go along with much of what John Scott says – especially the need to build a winning case for any new referendum – I think it is not enough to offer all sorts of good intentions as to how a future British government will behave. The case we most need to build is the case for Britain in Europe. This must include feelings of belonging – always an element in the argument for narrow nationalism. I would like to see us talking about “Our Europe” and demanding not to have this part of our identity and our future taken away from us. I know this is deeply felt by many young people.
Also we must undertake to improve the EU – step up action on climate change, bringing social media and international banking under control, abolishing the ridiculous ritual of transporting the entire parliamentary entourage between Brussels and Strasbourg every month etc. etc.
It is true that regarding the perception of Europe in the UK we have a mountain to climb. 40 years of right wing press disinformation has left an image of Europe which is totally false; but then again, amongst those people who should know better there is an ideological gene in their DNA which blinds them to the realities of the 21st century and at the same time prevents them from learning the lessons of the disasters of the 20th century.
Caould someone please explain how the EU are “preventing” us from leaving?
We served notice to leave on 29 March. That it hasn’t taken effect Is because the U.K. asked for an extension.
The EU can’t force us to ask for an extension and they can’t unilaterally extend our membership.
So how can they force a country that would “hold all the cards” following an out vote according to Michael Gove to stay in the EU?
We shouldn’t let Leave Liers get away with this 1984-quality “re-imagining” of the meaning of words.
I can only agree with John Scott above, we ought not to get involved in any form of shaming Brexiteers.
If Britain does remain in the EU it is important to respect their rights and values. They must not be stigmatised. They could be issued with blue passports minus the words European Union – which would still be valid. They could be given special places to live, I don’t mean reservations, I mean supportive communities.
There are nice towns like York which were walled at one time, these walls could be rebuilt, with checkpoints to screen incoming visitors – foreigners would be turned away or charged a fee. Within the walls the pubs would be exclusively Wetherspoons, the supermarkets would sell home grown food, and local radio stations would play Rule Britannia on a continuous loop.
This model of progressive thinking would quickly help to win back Britain’s reputation and standing in the world.
Lets us not forget the prediction of many Brexit politicians e.g. David Davis, that EU negotiators would at the eleventh hour back down and change their position on the Backstop, to name but one example. Because of their fears for German car sales etc.
But like so much else from the Brexiteers, it proved to be sheer bluff. But unfortunately the bluff took in alot of voters.
Tut tut tut what a mess we are in….and yes it is the brexiters fault totally…they lied and lied and lied even more….whatever s*** they co.e out with NO DEAL is going to be better than we have in the EU.. I mean leavers what are your reasons…please DONT quote the words from MPs I’m not prepared to listen to that… ok one bone of contention…NHS was it 350,000 they tried to say would go there instead of the EU…what tosh (I’m trying to be polite) what happens to ALL the money you pay in national insurance.. supposedly for our health benefits? Our NHS is crashing from lack of doctors and nurses that have left BECAUSE of Brexit….. it was ok in the war when we desperately pleaded AND paid for immigrants to come over and help us…oh but that was different was it…as long as we didn’t have the crap jobs….talk about two faced hypocracy…well I AM EUROPEAN AND PROUD…after God made the world FOR EVERYONE …its the greed of men that put up a barrier and says that’s mine!!!!!!!!