On Brexit. Again

A reminder that Brexit was, and still is a process.

It is something that will never end.

Every 5 years there is to be a recalibration between the EU and UK, the first being in 2026, though the EU views this aas a technical review, not the wholesale changes many of us remainers would like.

This week, Leader of the Opposition, Kier Starmer, was recorded in a conference in Canada saying he did not want divergance from the EU, when released by Sky yesterday, it caused the expected meltdowns in most of the right wing press, especially The Mail, which again talked of betrayal.

Brexit, even if this was its "final form", would be subject to reviews and adjustments as EU and UK regulations change, and so how these would be managed would have to be discussed, and what was agreed in 2019 might not be appropriate in the next five years.

Also, no Parliament can bind future Parliaments from taking certain actions, so if a Government decided it was in the UK's interest to have closer links to the EU, then that is what the Government should have as policy. That at a given point there was a referendum and people voted this way or that meaning that no one in the future can change, is plain silly.

There was another referendum, in 1975, whether the electorate wanted to stay in the Common Market, as it was called then, and they did. So, if a Government was elected on a mandate to forge closer links, or rejoin the SM and/or CU, then that would a contitutional thing to do.

There would be no betrayal of Brexit, which is the whinging we hear from Brexiteers about their fellow Brexiteers who defined and enacted the Brexit we have. There is no Betrayal, never was, its what happeens when dogma meets reality, the self-proclaimed free-marketeers meet the actual free markets. Reality wins out.

Divergance means more checks, delays and costs at borders, including the one between Britain and Northern Ireland, breaking the Union up further.

The next election will be the Conservatives, probably not under the leadership of Sunak on a ticket of more divergance and leaving the ECHR, while the Labour Party will be more pragmatic.

Labour might now say there is no plans to rejoin the SM and/or CU, but of course, that could change in the future, and will. Sunak wants to use Brexit as a wedge issue in the forthcoming election, but already most of the country sees Brexit as a failure, and an appetite for Brexit 2.0 might not be a strong as the Tories and PM might think it is.

The population is aging, more younger voters are coming through.

Brexit was never an event, it was always a process.