what you get here

This is not a blog which opines on current events. It rather uses incidents, books (old and new), links and papers to muse about our social endeavours.
So old posts are as good as new! And lots of useful links!

The Bucegi mountains - the range I see from the front balcony of my mountain house - are almost 120 kms from Bucharest and cannot normally be seen from the capital but some extraordinary weather conditions allowed this pic to be taken from the top of the Intercontinental Hotel in late Feb 2020

Wednesday, March 13, 2019

Brexit - What Happens Now?

Any defeat of the central strategy of a British government would normally lead to a vote of confidence which, if lost, would mean a General Election. And the massive 149 vote defeat last night of the government’s latest Brexit wheeze was the second such defeat after its 230 vote massacre in January. These, clearly, are not normal times – with governments now having the protection of the Fixed Term Act of 2011 which allows a general election only when two thirds of MPs vote for it.
The principle of "Parliamentary sovereignty" may be a hallowed one in the UK constitutional law textbooks but has not actually been evident for more than a century......the power first of party discipline; then (since mid 20th century) of the Prime Minister; and finally of European Law...has seen to that. 
But the UK's Supreme Court ruled 2 years ago that the Executive required parliamentary agreement to start the withdrawal process from the European Union. And Theresa May's subsequent failure (in the June 2017 General Election) to achieve a parliamentary majority led to the return of parliamentary sovereignty.

So Parliament will vote today to get rid of one of the three options which are open to it – to crash out of the EU in 16 days without a deal. It will then be asked to vote on Thursday on the option of requesting the EU for an extension.
The EU will only agree to that if there seems good reason for it – one strong reason being the possibility of a second referendum being held.

The People’s Vote has long argued for a second referendum – facing initial anger that this seemed to deny the legitimacy of the original vote but it has now dawned on many people that the inability of the parliamentarians to develop a clear consensus means that there is no other option than returning to the citizen. 
As Chris Grey points out in his forensic Brexit blog, Brits now have a much clearer sense of what they would be voting for – or rather “against”. It was in July 2018 the government published its Chequers’ Strategy – resulting from an away-day held by the Cabinet at the Prime Minister’s country residence. And it is this strategy to which the government refers when it talks about “the deal”.

Most European leaders were (and remain) aghast at David Cameron’s recklessness in allowing the British public a vote in the 2016 Referendum on membership of the European Union. And few of them expected the British government to honour the result. But we all know how eccentric the Brits are!
The 2016 referendum turnout may have seemed healthy at 74% - compared to the 64% of the first referendum in 1975 (and to a 59% turnout in the 2001 General Election and low 60% in 2005 ) - but not compared to the 82% of the 1950 and 1951 General elections and to the high 70% which prevailed until the 90s.
Nor was the experience without its critics – for example for its exclusion from the vote of 16 year-olds; EU citizens; and expats who had been out of the country for more than 15 years;

The 1975 Referendum had broken new constitutional ground – it had never been used before….and was, in most people’s minds, associated with dodgy regimes…..Vernon Bogdanor is Emeritus Professor of Government and author, amongst much else, of The New British Constitution. The grounds he gives for the support of such constitutional referenda do, therefore, deserve our attention. He gave two arguments – namely
- all parties supported membership in the 1970s - but public opinion was divided. A significant section of society had therefore no voice…
- the issue was so fundamental that the legitimacy of government was being threatened
In the 1970 Election, the Labour Party was defeated. Heath was returned to office. At the end of 1970, Tony Benn raised the possibility of the Labour Party committing itself to a referendum on joining Europe at Labour’s National Executive, but he could not find a seconder for the motion.
From 1971 onwards, the very complicated European Communities Bill made its way through Parliament, and in March 1972, a Conservative backbencher who was opposed to Europe, called Neil Martin, proposed an amendment calling for a referendum, and this meant the Shadow Cabinet had to decide what to do about it, and they decided to oppose this motion.  
But the very day after this happened, President Pompidou in France said he was going to have a referendum in France on whether the French people approved of British entry into Europe…and he was doing this for internal party political reasons, to weaken his opponents on the left, who were split on the issue. …. But there were going to be four new members of the European Community: Britain, Denmark, Ireland and Norway. In the end, Norway did not join.
The other three countries were all having referendums. France was having a referendum on whether Britain should enter, but Britain was not. One cynic wrote to the newspapers that when Heath has spoken of full-hearted consent of Parliament and people, he meant full-hearted consent of the French Parliament and people… 
After this, Labour’s National Executive voted narrowly in favour of the Benn proposal. Then, a couple of days later, pure coincidence, the Heath Government announced there was going to be a plebiscite, in Northern Ireland, on the border, on whether people wished to remain in the United Kingdom or join the Irish Republic. At this point, the Labour Shadow Cabinet agreed to the referendum.

So, the referendum came about through a series of really unforeseen contingencies and vicissitudes, completely unplanned, this very fundamental change in the British system.
Some readers may wonder why a referendum was held a mere 2 years after the UK entry into the EU. The answer is quite simply that the 1974 Labour Party manifestos had made very its reservations about several aspects of the agreement which it pledged to revisit and revise. The General Election of February did not give it a working majority and another had to be held (in June) to give it that – after which very detailed negotiations with Europe took place to allow it to campaign successfully in the 1975 referendum  

Although the odds on a second referendum have just shortened, I haven;t actually seen any real discussion about the mechanics - ie the options and question which would be on the ballot paper; or the organisation and timing of the campaign. I hope to explore these questions in my next post

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