Denis MacShane is a former Minister of Europe and was a Labour MP for 18 years.
If ever a party and its leader needed to create new news, it is the case for Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour party, as the damaging divisions over dealing with anti-semitism go into a second month.
He needs a political coup ahead of the charged of autumn when a short parliamentary session in September is followed by three weeks of party conferences. The most obvious way to change completely the frozen political agenda in the UK is for Corbyn to align himself with the growing calls for a new consideration of Brexit by the people.
Parliament is blocked with no majority in sight for Theresa May’s Chequers proposals, nor for a no-deal crash out, nor for shelving Brexit.
There were majorities in the Commons in July against staying in the EU customs union, and against European Economic Area membership. There is no majority for a Canada-style free trade deal without some sort of customs arrangement to prevent a hard inner-Irish border. The only thing that won MPs’ support was to remain subject to EU regulation of medicines, and a full participant in the European Medicines Agency (although it is leaving London).
Demand a vote on the final Brexit deal
Click here to find out moreSo the Commons is completely blocked, with majorities against every proposal but no majority for any proposal. The government is not able to govern, or deliver Brexit, and the Opposition is bogged down in internal wrangling over anti-semitism.
Corbyn does not have to commit fully and in detail to the terms of a new referendum but he can make an offer, as Labour’s way of cutting the Gordian knot of total political blockage on Brexit. Of course, there would be grumblings from Labour MPs who are quite sympathetic to Brexit, and worries that a new popular vote would just confirm the first referendum of June 2016.
But all political leadership entails risk. Corbyn should put himself at the head of the clear nationwide sense that Brexit is robbing the country of good governance. He should state that since May, her Tory ministers and many MPs are not prepared to offer clear leadership, the people should take over and make a fresh decision in the light of an Everest of new evidence, facts, and the clear criminality and money buying votes that the police are investigating.
It won’t be easy. On Europe, as on Israel, Corbyn has fixed views that haven’t changed in decades. But he has a golden chance to move on from the anti-semitism row and tell the people they are back in charge of Brexit.
The latest YouGov poll showing the Tories four points ahead of Labour is a wake-up call. It coincides with polls showing a clear majority for a new consultation. Labour can change its mind and the nation’s agenda by arguing that so many facts have changed that a new consultation is now reasonable – as happened in Denmark and Ireland when voters changed their minds on Europe.
The calls for a People’s Vote have been often presented as if it were simply a moral imperative. But it is also very much a question of Realpolitik. Business leaders in particular should support a new consultation, as the economic damage of either a no-deal Brexit or the miserable mess of May’s White Paper become ever more clear.
Edited by Quentin Peel
It is hard to imagine the words “Leader” and “Corbyn” appearing together in a sentence unless it is like this one. He needs to understand leadership and that it involves taking advice from others. It is not demonstrated by dogmatically clinging to old ideas and concepts. Perhaps Corbyn will never be a leader but he has a chance of protecting the country from the excesses of the right-wing of the Tory party and perhaps he can see that as being a greater evil than the EU.