Vote remain so we don’t have to bother about Brexit again

If we quit the EU, our politicians will be obsessing about bloody Brexit for years. The only way to stop that is to stop Brexit.

The country is crying out for our politicians to move on from Brexit. It’s three years since the referendum and they are talking about nothing else. They are doing nothing else.

But it’s a mistake to think that we can fix the country’s real problems if only we get out of the EU. The agony will go on and on. That’s true whether we quit with a deal (as the prime minister wants) or crash out with no deal (what Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage want).

If we leave with a deal, all we will have done is signed our divorce papers. We won’t have agreed our future relationship with the EU. Even if our politicians could agree on what they wanted from that, it would take years to nail down the details of a comprehensive trade deal.

But the politicians won’t agree. Different factions of the Conservative party will fight like ferrets in a sack. So will the Labour party’s factions. There will be at least one more general election before we have a stable government that is in a position to negotiate with the EU.

If we crash out with no deal at all, things will be even more chaotic. Maybe the economy will take such a plunge that we will be forced to sue for terms with the EU. This really would be national humiliation. Or maybe we will soldier on with misplaced Dunkirk spirit, grimly determined to push through the suffering that our dishonest politicians have helped inflict upon us. Either way, we certainly won’t be able to stop bothering about Brexit.

On the other hand, if we stop Brexit, we can start fixing the country’s real problems. Our politicians will have the bandwidth to do so. They will also have more money – as our economy will be bigger than under any Brexit scenario.

We can fix our broken NHS – and social care for the elderly.

We can fix our housing crisis.

We can fix child poverty.

We can fix our towns that have been starved of investment for decades.

We will also have much more power to fix global issues – especially the climate change crisis.

We will be a powerful member of a powerful global bloc – not a mid-sized player in a world dominated by bullies such as Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.

We will only stop Brexit if our MPs decide to do so – or ask us whether we still want it in a People’s Vote.

So we need to take every opportunity to send them a powerful message that this is what we want. That’s why all pro-Europeans should vote on Thursday for a party that explicitly backs a People’s Vote – the Lib Dems, Greens or Change UK (or SNP in Scotland and Plaid Cymru in Wales).

Note: this list does not include Labour, which is sitting on the fence.

This article was amended shortly after publication to add a mention of Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, and add some hyperlinks .