The EU referendum wasn’t an argument in the end about cargo shipments, but about our constitution. Our nation’s direction of travel ought to now be, above all else, the complete restoration of national democratic self-government.
But Theresa May’s proposed “Withdrawal Agreement”, after all the “Brexit means Brexit” rhetoric, deliberately achieves no such thing and must not become law.
Soft unpatriotic politicians lacking the confidence to believe in our country’s independence, arranging our independence, was never going to end well.
What has been the result of the “negotiations” since the 2016 referendum? A deeply offensive elitist plan that artfully spells out an apparent reclaiming of sovereignty in big print, while spelling out continued subordination to the European Union in small print.
The most staggering example of the small print painting the truer picture is in relation to the “backstop”. This arrangement keeps the UK in a customs union with the EU, meaning free trade with the rest of the world is made difficult and the EU would set our trade tariffs without the UK having a say.
And this “backstop” arrangement, requiring both parties to agree to its termination, means it will not be able to be cancelled by us without the EU’s permission.
The Government’s “Withdrawal Agreement”, after the people voted to leave and “take back control” in the biggest democratic exercise in our nation’s history, is one of the greatest civilised insults from politicians to the people in any country in history.
Big print vs Small print – In response to the Conservatives’ misleading and outright untruthful graphic published on social media selling their negotiated “deal”, we decided to make our own.
The “Withdrawal Agreement” must be rejected
Whether our politicians like it or not, the moral objective given the result of the referendum, has always been to renew our nation’s constitution and solidify our independence and right to democratic self-government.
If the Government wanted to secure a new free trade agreement with the EU at the same time (which it should have done), it had the chance to do so.
Astonishingly, after all of this time, and after all of the elaborate fearmongering about the prospect of having a different trade policy, the Government has failed to make the slightest degree of real progress towards formalising post-Brexit free trade between the UK and the European Union. All we have thus far is a mere declaration of intent.
In fact the only concrete economic item of business the Government has secured with the EU, is the proposed transfer of £39 billion to the European Union for precisely nothing in return.
During these last few years since the referendum, we have witnessed one of the least principled and most incompetent governments our country has ever had – just when we’ve needed the very opposite.
With what little courage and competence our politicians can muster, we must now focus solely on the implementation of the single most important principle that was determined by the referendum: the restoration of our independence and right to self-government. We must leave the EU and all its institutions, completely, by the end of March 2019.
The European Union and its ever-increasing political and legal power, is a cancer that diminishes the health of a nation’s democracy and ability to determine its own future.
If we do not operate thoroughly and cleanly on our nation’s constitution now while it is on the operating table, and choose to leave behind any number of cancerous cells in the form of pseudo-membership of EU institutions, then these cells will grow again and sooner or later we will find that we never actually left.
The people have spoken. We need to leave, completely. Parliament must reject the Prime Minister’s “Withdrawal Agreement” and we must revert to trading with the European Union on World Trade Organisation (WTO) terms, just as the United States and other major countries do.
On the 4th July 1776, thirteen American colonies “crashed out” of their union with us without a deal. Since then, they’ve enjoyed their freedom and done rather well, and so will we.