Reaction from Remainers seems to have lapsed into quiet despair, with bits of barely-controlled revenge fantasies, apart from a tantrum from a Remainer on BBC Newsnight last night. As a further contribution to the mystery of the cultural significance of the EU for luvvies, A. Soubry MP was very angry and almost tearful with rage, but she seemed to have a series of symbolic targets -- worry at economic prospects, certainly, but more the demand that Leavers admit they were wrong, and the need to make personal attacks on her Leave debater (mostly for..er..organising politically).
The debate was chaired rather timidly (by Naga Munchetty) but at least it wasn't E. Davis who would have joined in with tantrums of his own. After complaints from 70 MPs about 'BBC bias', (the Guardian led with the denials from the BBC) the Corporation manages now to crowbar the term 'opportunities' into any sentence about Brexit
There was even an almost reasonable article about the intransigence displayed by both sides in the lead up to the referendum. F Herbert MP in the Guardian began with classic luvviedom about his shame when the Union Flag was displayed on the Brandenberg Gate as a sympathetic response to the terrorist attack in London.
The article then went on to say Brussels had also been too dismissive of British concerns in failing to exempt Britrain from the free movement of labour proviso, both when Cameron was negotiating the new deal and when the referendum vote was announced. We could have been exempted easily enough -- we are already exempt from the Euro, he argued -- and this would have taken much of the sting out of Brexit support. Instead there was hurt and truculence:
But the failure was Europe’s too. At first reacting in disbelief, Europe then behaved as a partner scorned. Well, then – go, it said. But you can’t expect to keep the house and the car, and there’ll be a price for this selfish separation.
Sooner or later, free movement in Europe will have to be fixed. Already the Schengen agreement is fragile, suspended in some member states. The EU could not contemplate Turkey joining at some point in the future with free movement in its current form. Yet still the policy is regarded as inviolate, a fundamental but in fact latterly invented freedom of Europe...The catechism of ever closer union is just one sign of the near-religious zealotry that has bedevilled both sides of the debate. The ideology of deeper European integration has created its nemesis in Britain: the doctrine of hard Brexit
After that, normal service was resumed:
The government is now relying on a one-way bet that the electorate won’t change its mind, and that the economic warnings about a hard Brexit are wrong. Few dare question the new orthodoxy, and the retired leaders who speak out are the least persuasive. Yet it wasn’t a mere minority who declined to support the event we are all expected to celebrate on Wednesday: it was nearly half of the country.
I know it might be tiresome to keep saying this, but economic policy always involves risk: we risk another financial crash, for example. There is always a risk the electorate will change its mind but if politicians worried too much about that they would do nothing long term at all (it's bad enough now). The hostile atmosphere towards dissent was nothing compared to the contemptuous and arrogant dismissal of the Brexit case during the referendum campaign -- and if a large minority has rights, even more so must be the case for a larger majority.
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