Some thoughts on a way forward for the Rejoin movement

Some thoughts about the way forward for Rejoin.
There is some disagreement amongst Rejoin supporters about the timing of a campaign with many arguing now is not the time to campaign as Brexit supporters need to see the damage Brexit does. I disagree this for a number of reasons:

  1. This is essentially a rehash of what leavers called project fear. They will blame anyone and everyone other than themselves for the adverse consequences of Brexit and if they are backed into a corner they will say it is all worth it
  2. Over the last 5 years together we have built an amazing pro EU movement, the largest in the EU. We must not let this die. Doing nothing will mean that this movement will wither and die.
  3. There is much we can do now in terms of building and organising, and also laying the ground for future battles on our terms, without actually overtly campaigning for Rejoin.
  4. If I were writing a Leave Strategy for the next few years, Pushing the idea that it is too early for the Rejoin Campaign to start would be a key part of my strategy. Waiting around is playing right into the Leave Campaign’s hands. In fact its quite noticeable that non of the party leaders have said anything like now is not the time.
    So what should we do? Broadly I believe we should follow four strands of action.
  5. Challenge the legitimacy of the decision by the current Government to take out of the EU. Remain activists know many of the reasons why, but do the rest of the Electorate? I would argue they do not and we need to raise awareness of this
  6. Promote the benefits of EU membership. Why? Because it’s never really been done in a planned systematic way. As remain we spent far too much time focussing on the risks of leaving and countering the lies told by the leave campaign
  7. Those of us who are members of political parties need to promote Rejoin within those parties and other issues that help us lay the ground for that such as proper regulation of the media
  8. Develop, grow and maintain our Rejoin Movement and our European identity. We had big plans in this area, but sadly we had to curtail much due to Covid, but there is still much we can do online.

I will cover each issue in more detail in future posts. I welcome your thoughts and constructive criticism on these broad outline of a strategy