Tag Archive for: European Union

It is up to us

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Last week I talked about the need to be realistic and not to chase our own Remain/Rejoin version of sunlit uplands complete with the attendant rainbow coloured unicorns. This week I thought I would address one of the two keys tasks that we have to achieve in order to fulfil our goal of reclaiming our rightful place in the European Union.

That task is to persuade the political establishment in Westminster that we need another referendum, something which is very topical given Kier Starmer’s comments earlier this week about not revisiting the past.

Starmer’s comments show that we cannot just assume that such a referendum will be forthcoming if Labour were to gain the keys to Number 10 in 2024 despite the fact that we repeatedly hear that Starmer himself is pro-European and that the Labour Party membership is overwhelmingly in favour of our EU membership.

The situation within the Liberal Democrats may well be better, but it is still concerning from our point of view. Motions have been passed at both the recent Spring conference and at last year’s Autumn conference that confirm a policy of seeking EU membership. But for some reason the party leadership seems most reluctant to say anything that is even close to being unambiguously in favour of that EU membership. They seem to skirt around the subject without giving any form of clear commitment.

I am sure that I don’t need to say this, but even though until very recently the majority of Tory MP’s supported EU membership, the situation within the Tory party currently appears to be beyond hope from our perspective.  It is difficult to see how any support for our cause would be forthcoming from within the ranks of the Tory party at present given that many of the most prominent pro-Europeans such as Michael Heseltine,  Dominic Grieve and Ken Clarke were thrown out of the party for standing up to the likes of the ERG over Brexit.

Furthermore, I strongly suspect that many, if not most pro-Europeans have subsequently left the Tory party, especially as Aaron banks and Leave.EU have been openly boasting for some time about how they have infiltrated the Tory party and orchestrated the deselection of pro-European Tory MPs. The Tory party is presently firmly in the grip of the far right.

Given these circumstances within the Tory party there therefore seems to be just two possible viable scenarios where we might be able to secure a further EU membership referendum following the next general election, but both scenarios require action from us.

The first scenario is for the Labour Party to win the next election with a commitment in its manifesto for another referendum. That would require us to put forward a motion to a Labour Party conference placing that commitment onto their agenda, something that would no doubt be opposed by many  in the Labour Party.     

The second scenario would be for a hung parliament where the party or parties holding the balance of power insist on a further EU membership referendum as part of some form of deal to govern the country.  Whilst that insistence could come from the SNP, they would understandably be more interested in a further referendum on Scottish independence. That insistence would therefore need to come from the Liberal Democrats if we wanted to be reasonably certain that a further referendum would come about. However, given the current ambiguity and apparent reluctance to openly commit to Rejoining, that insistence would need to be formalised as party policy via a motion put forward by us to a Liberal Democrat party conference. Again, that would no doubt be opposed by many.

In either scenario we therefore need to do two things. Firstly, we need to build up the pro-European community within both the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats, and secondly, we need to persuade both parties to pass our motions.  

We have made a start on both these issues. Our Labour and Liberal Democrat political sub-groups are active and growing. But we need them to be far bigger and far more active within both parties.  

Earlier today I ran a poll in our main Facebook group. Of the 1250 individuals who took part in the poll only 400 indicated that they were members of political parties, and of those, only 100 were active within those parties.     

We need to improve both ratios if we are to succeed. I would therefore urge everyone reading this to consider joining a political party and becoming active in that party to help us achieve that second referendum.

We also need to start presenting arguments for why we think there should be another referendum.

Those arguments need to convince both the politicians of the need for another referendum and also the wider electorate.  We also need to carefully consider what those arguments should be. Any arguments we put forward must avoid the charge that we just want another ‘go’ because we ‘lost’ the argument the first-time round. Such arguments are easy for our opposition to counter and for wider electorate to ignore.

We therefore need to put forward a substantial reason for insisting upon a further referendum, and that reason needs to focus around the legitimacy of the events of 2016 as our opponents will struggle to counter them, and the wider electorate will find it increasingly difficult to ignore them, as long as were are consistent and persistent.

Whilst we have started building these arguments, the survey that we started earlier this week has already demonstrated how much work we still have to do. For example, the preliminary results show that around a third of our own politically active Remain/Rejoin community are unaware of the fact that the Leave Campaign broke data protection law in 2016 and around 15% are unaware that they broke electoral law.

If so many members of our own politically active community are unaware of such issues, the lack of awareness amongst the wider electorate will be considerable.

We have to change that and we have to change the policy of both the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats. Starmer’s remarks earlier this week showed beyond doubt that there is no cavalry coming over the hill to rescue us.

It is up to us.  

Remain and Rejoin Unicorns

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Remainers and now Rejoiners often talk about Leavers wanting their sunlit uplands filled with rainbow coloured Brexit unicorns. Often this colourful narrative appears to have its roots in the lack of knowledge demonstrated by Leavers when they discuss the EU and how it works which rarely bears any resemblance to reality.

On other occasions, this narrative stems from a failure by Leavers to appreciate the realities of a world where Britain is no longer a superpower that can get its own way with the use of gunboat diplomacy. For example,  in a world where the EU has arguably the largest economy in the world, the EU does not ‘need us more than we need them’ and we do not ‘hold all the cards’ in any particular set of trade negotiations, especially those with the EU.

Whilst Remainers/Rejoiners have a much more realistic concept of the UK’s position in the world post Brexit and indeed are often far more knowledgeable about the EU, this does not necessarily mean that there are no Remain or Rejoin unicorns running around in our version of those same sunlit uplands.

Possibly the best example of this to date has been the idea floating around for most of last year that Starmer was just biding his time and had some sort of cunning Baldrick style plan up his sleeve to get us back into the EU. I lost count of the number of times I heard people say give Starmer a chance, or he has to win round his own people or once he has won the election he will take us back in to the EU.

With hindsight most of the Remain/Rejoin community now recognise just how wrong those hopes were with the reality of the situation really hitting home when he instructed his MP’s to vote in favour of Johnson’s deal over Christmas.  

But for many months this was our very own unicorn running happily around our own version of those same sunlit uplands. Consequently, the issue of Labours position on EU membership is only now becoming apparent and for many months we as a movement did nothing to advance our cause within the Labour party. Worse, during that time we also allowed our opponents free reign within the party and we are now faced with the very difficult task of bringing the Labour Party back over to our way of thinking on the issue of EU membership.   

Given the difficulty we will face with that task as our opponents now appear to be very well entrenched in positions of power within the Labour party,  it is important that we do not make similar mistakes in the future. Sadly, however there are one or two other Remain/Rejoin unicorns running around.

Perhaps the foremost of these is the notion that somehow an alliance of progressive parties will be formed to sweep away all opposition before us, including the current Tory Government. For our movement, this notion is concerning in two ways.

Firstly, it ignores the important issue of the cross-party nature of our movement. 35% of Remain voters in 2016 voted Tory the previous year, and although that figure had fallen dramatically by December 2019, nearly one in five Remainers voted Tory in the December 2019 General Election. Put bluntly, a significant proportion of our own support base does not want to see a progressive alliance.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, this notion assumes that Starmer will wish to become involved in a progressive alliance of some sort. Why would he? For Starmer and his advisors to be interested in such a proposition they would need to be of the opinion that the only way they could win an election was as part of such an alliance. Why would they think that?  

The Labour party is a major political force in this country with considerable resources, a developed infrastructure and an entrenched political support base. They will think they can win on their own right up until the moment the result of the next General Election is announced.       

Similarly, another Remain/Rejoin unicorn is that all we need to do is persuade the Labour Party to embrace PR and change the electoral system and all will be well, as in the General Election after next, pro-European parties will sweep into power.

Again, I would ask the same question. Why would Starmer and the Labour Party change an electoral system that gives them an advantage? Yes, PR may be a fairer way of electing a Government, but there are valid arguments against PR and very strong reasons why both our main parties would wish to keep the current system unchanged.

It may well prove possible to persuade the Labour party that they should commit to changing our electoral system however we need to be realistic. There will be significant opposition. Furthermore,  given the cross-party nature of the Remain/Rejoin movement, many of our own supporters will be opposed to any such change meaning we would risk alienating large sections of our own support base by supporting such a change.    

Another example of a Remain/Rejoin unicorn is the popular idea within our movement that Leave voters will all of a sudden see sense because of the tremendous damage that Brexit is inflicting upon us.

That Brexit will inflict such damage is beyond doubt, indeed considerable damage has already been done. The issue however is linking that damage to Brexit in the minds of Leavers, particularly against the background of the pandemic. The pandemic will mask much of that damage and make its cause difficult to ascribe. After nearly three months elapsing since the end of the transition period there is no sign of a major shock to the economy that is directly and clearly attributable to Brexit.

Frankly I do not think we will see such a shock, rather, what we will witness is slow inexorable economic decline. That doesn’t mean to say that a shock will not happen, or that it has to be economic. The break-up of the Union via Scottish Independence could cause such a shock and we may shortly find out how likely that is with approaching Sottish elections.

But even if we see Scottish independence, I am far from convinced that will provide the required shock. Rather disparagingly we often refer to Leavers as ‘Little Englanders’. Whilst we should not be so disparaging there is possibly some truth in such remarks. Looking over data from the last census I noticed that the only areas in the UK where a majority of people declared themselves to be British were certain areas of Northern Ireland with the majority of people in England describing themselves as English.

That makes me wonder just how many Leavers really would be concerned about Scottish Independence to the extent that it changed their views on Brexit.  

The upshot of all of this is that we must be realistic.

We cannot count on the Labour Party suddenly coming over to our way of thinking on Europe, or riding to our rescue as part of a progressive alliance or by supporting PR. If we want the Labour Party to support EU membership, we must work to change their views inside the party and outside.  

Similarly, we cannot count on Leavers changing their views and coming round to our way of thinking because of any adverse effects of Brexit. If we want Leavers to change their views and support EU membership, we must work to change their views by promoting the benefits of EU Membership.

There are no sunlit uplands in our journey back to EU membership, just hard work. Unicorns, rainbow coloured or not, have no place in the Rejoin movement.

Blue and Gold Photo Competition

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Sunday May 9th is Europe day.

Help us celebrate Europe day and our European culture by taking a picture of an EU Flag on Europe Day and entering it into our Blue and Gold Photo competition.

The picture could be of yourself, your family or your friends (please gain their consent) with an EU flag, or of an EU flag in a special or unusual place. It really is up to you as long as the picture is taken in May this year on or before Europe Day i.e. between 1st and 9th May, is not photoshopped and includes an EU flag

Prizes are available for the best picture, for the picture taken in the most special place and for the picture taken in the most unusal place. Runner up prizes will also be awarded.

Portrait of Steve Bray by Cathy Kingcome – an A2 sized print is the prize for the best photo

Prizes include a limited edition A2 sized print of Cathy Kingcome’s painting of Steve Bray, Amazon Vouchers, Pro EU Books, CD’s, Badges and Stickers which have been donated by the following sponsors. Please visit their websites and support them.

Ben Chambers of Sixteen Million Rising has kindly donated a copy of the SMR “You Write the Sings CD” – the track list is shown below

The Sixteen Million Rising “Write Your Own Song” CD – The prize for the strangest location

Please visit the Sixteen Million Rising Shop to see Ben’s full range of products

Mike Cashman of ViewDelta Press

Mike Cashamn explains the prize for the most original or interesting location – Sovereign Tea

Mike’s full product range can be found on Amazon – simply search for “Viewdelta”

Oliver Gray who has his own Website

All photographs submitted by midday on the 11th May will be entered into the competition.

3 finalists will be selected by a panel of judges including Adam Poole of Campaign to Rejoin the EU, Jenna Efkay of Remain Resources and Peter Corr of UK Rejoin the EU.

Winners for each category will then be selected by means of a vote amongst the members of the Campaign to Rejoin the EU Facebook Group and UK Rejoin the EU FaceBook Group. These votes will take place prior to the end of May 2021.

A link to the entry form will be placed here on May 1st – in the meantime click here to go to our Facebook event. If you click going or interested you will get a reminder to enter the competition

Endless Lockdown doesn’t have to mean Endless Frustration

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Over the last few weeks I have seen many people commenting on social media in a manner that indicates that they are quite frustrated about what they see as a lack of “campaign” action towards achieving our goal of Rejoining the EU.

This has made me wonder what people think of when someone mentions the word “campaign”?

For me, when I started the Facebook group “Campaign to Rejoin the EU” on that awful evening in December 2019, I’m not quite sure exactly what I had in mind, but I probably envisaged activities such as marches protests and other large outdoor events. Given the background of the Remain movement, I suspect many other Rejoiners had, or indeed still have, the same vision.

There are a number of reasons why this hasn’t happened, and indeed cannot currently happen. Funding is one, but the biggest by far is the worst pandemic for a century, which for all intents and purposes, has prevented any large-scale events from happening and probably will do for some time to come.

I suspect this is where much of the frustration originates.

Given this I thought I would look up the definition of the word “campaign”. The definition in my dictionary is “an organized course of action to achieve a goal.”

This definition very much reminds me of my time as a marketing communications manager where most of my work revolved around planned and highly organised promotional campaign projects that had one of three goals:

  1. Raising awareness of the company or Brand
  2. Promotion of our Brand Values
  3. Increasing sales either generally or of a particular product.

At the start of each campaign, we would hold what we termed a “launch team” meeting to identify and plan what needed to be done which included brainstorming promotional ideas as budgets would vary and would sometimes be very limited, meaning we couldn’t rely on having the money to advertise on TV or in the Press.

Some of the activities we came up with were really quite creative. We spent several very interesting mornings handing chocolates out with brochures to rush-hour commuters on Liverpool Street Station, we played Scalextrics with journalists for an evening, and we produced a short video based upon men behaving badly.

However, before we could do any of these more exciting activities, we often had to consider what mundane background work needed doing before we could start putting the actual ‘campaign’ into effect.

Indeed, I remember one occasion where the high value and very different nature of a new product meant that we could not actually start selling the product for several months as we had to put in a whole new infrastructure for handling customer enquiries. This included a new telephone enquiry handling team, a new section of our website and underlying IT infrastructure, the recruitment of a new administration team and extensive training for selected people in our sales team to be able effectively sell this new product. In other words, we had to prepare the ground before we could actually start promoting and selling the product.

This is very much where the Rejoin campaign is now. We have to prepare the ground for the forthcoming battles and we have to be creative and realistic about which campaign activities we can undertake given our lack of funding and the restrictions caused by the pandemic.

We also have to be realistic about timescales – the earliest opportunity for a new referendum is at least 4 years away, possibly longer, given who currently occupies number 10. However, whilst we may not be in a position to march on Parliament demanding an immediate referendum in our millions as we did just a short time ago, we can still ‘campaign’ – and there is much that needs to be done!

We have to recognise that whilst we are already ‘sold’ on the idea of Rejoining, many of the wider electorate need convincing that we should. This requires us to prepare the ground by putting into place the infrastructure such as websites and social media channels to enable us to communicate with the wider electorate rather than just ourselves in our closed social media bubbles.

In exactly the same way that it was necessary for myself and my colleagues to raise awareness of the company we worked for and promote our brand values before we could promote and sell our products, the first objective for Rejoin needs to be raising awareness of our ‘organisation’, our objectives and to communicate our values to the wider electorate. Effectively we need to explain the reasons why we want to rejoin the EU to the wider electorate before we can start promoting another referendum and actually campaigning for their votes.

Whilst we may not be able to run events that involve large public gatherings, we are only really limited in what we can do by our own imagination. There is nothing to stop us working towards our goals in other ways such as running online mini-campaigns that prepare the ground for mass public events and the actual campaign to Rejoin in a few years’ time.

• We can reinforce our European identify with campaigns such as our #IAmEuropean campaign linked to next months census.
• We can organise parliamentary petitions such as the successful recent petition calling for it to be made a criminal offence for MPs to mislead constituents which send a clear message to the leave campaign that their devious and dishonest activities will not be tolerated next time.
• We can start building online pro EU communities within all the major political parties with a view to placing Rejoin firmly onto their agenda.

We simply have to be creative about what we do until we are in a position to campaign in more traditional ways. We need to start coming up with ideas and there is no limit.

These ideas do not need to be complex but do need to be varied as we are all different and not everyone will be comfortable undertaking all activities. For example, I am not particularly comfortable being videoed or working street stalls. Others are. We each need to work to our strengths. One of my strengths is writing, and not just blogging. I regularly contribute to social media groups in my local area and write letters to the local paper. It may not sound much but people do take notice.

Recently on a local Facebook page I posted about a controversial EU linked issue. An acquaintance in the local area, who I am 90% sure voted leave, said to me shortly afterwards that whilst he had started to agree with much that I have been saying, he disagreed with me on that particular issue. I had no idea that he was even reading what I was saying, let alone that he was beginning to accept my arguments and change his mind!

Despite the pandemic, people are prepared to listen to what we have to say and it is possible to change minds. There are other ways of getting our message across than mass gatherings. So instead of getting frustrated that we cannot march en masse to Parliament, let’s all think about something that we can do as individuals that will move us towards our goals.

Sign a petition, sign up for the #IAmEuropean campaign, join a political party and promote EU membership in that party, write letters to the local press, contribute to local social media groups, run a social media group or channels. The list really is endless.

Yes the pandemic is frustrating, but there is so much we can do towards Rejoining.

Rejoin Needs to get its Act Together

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Sadly, hardly a day goes by without coming across some sort of argument between Rejoiners.

These arguments are almost always based upon some form of party political or ideological disagreement. Everyone seems to want to attack Tory Rejoiners, Starmer supporting Rejoiners want to attack Corbyn supporting Rejoiners and vice versa, Scottish Nationalist Rejoiners want to attack Scottish Unionist Rejoiners and vice versa. The list goes on and on and is pretty much endless. Furthermore, the mere mention of some staunchly Pro-European individuals such as Tony Blair can be enough to start an argument.

Given that support for Rejoin is spread right across the political spectrum this needs to stop otherwise our goal of Rejoining will become increasingly unlikely and our movement, which has been painstakingly built over the last 5 years, will fragment and die.

As a movement we must stop fighting between ourselves and focus on issues related directly to our membership of the EU. However, there is also a need for considerable improvement in that area as well.

Imagine yourself as an outsider listening in to what the Rejoin movement is saying. Many of the messages we effectively broadcast to the outside world are inconsistent and contradictory, and can even inadvertently legitimise what our opponents are saying and end up working against us. Furthermore, some of what we say is very complex and difficult to understand and often very negative.

There is still a tendency within Rejoin to focus on the negative aspects of Brexit. Apart from ironically the fishing industry, the dire predictions of mass bankruptcies and associated job losses are unlikely to materialise. Even if they do, they will either be masked by Covid, or are going to occur over a longer, slower period of time rather than the quick cataclysmic event that would be needed to shock average leave voters into the realisation that Brexit is a bad thing that they should not have supported in the first place. Even then, as has become apparent in recent weeks, many if not most staunch leave voters will either blame everybody and everything other than Brexit, or will claim Brexit is worth it to ‘get back our sovereignty’.

Other arguments presented by Rejoin, such as the cause of Brexit being the desire to avoid EU anti-tax avoidance rules have no resonance at all with large sections of the electorate such as Red Wall voters and never will. Some arguments, such as challenging the result of the 2016 referendum on the grounds that there should have been a super majority, whilst understandable, actually end up having the opposite of the desired effect and confirm the legitimacy of the 2016 result in the eyes of many ordinary voters.

This inconsistency and contradictory nature of what we are saying a movement is not helping our cause and needs addressing urgently.

When discussing our campaign over Christmas a fellow Rejoiner pointed me in the direction of Moscovici, a French social psychologist, and his work on minority influence. Whilst I am still exploring his work, the potential it has to aid our cause rapidly became apparent to me.

Amongst other things Moscovici theorises that consistent arguments that do not change over time and that are perceived by the majority as legitimate and unbiased will succeed in changing the views of that majority. Implicit in this theory is a need for the arguments presented by the minority to be simple and straightforward so that they are readily understood by that majority.

The implications for the Rejoin Movement are that instead of the multiple, complex and often contradictory and inconsistent arguments that we usually present to the outside world, we need to simplify what we are saying and present far fewer but more consistent messages that will not change over time.

Effectively, we need to forget issues such as super majorities, tax avoidance and what our opponents’ term ‘project fear’, and focus on messages that are easily understandable by the majority of the electorate and which will resonate with them. Fortunately for us many such messages are readily apparent, meaning it is simply a case of adopting them and using them consistently. Examples include:

  1. We reject Brexit as the Leave Campaign lied, broke Electoral Law and Data Protection Law
  2. Nationalism and false claims about immigration are the root cause of Brexit.
  3. Membership of the EU is beneficial and is a good thing for the UK

Adopting a smaller and simpler set of messages such as these for broadcast to the outside world does not mean that we cannot engage in deeper discussion amongst ourselves or indeed with the wider electorate. However, before the wider electorate will engage with us in these deeper, more complex arguments, they need to accept that we have something to say that is legitimate and worthwhile, which is where these simpler consistent messages come in.

These simpler consistent messages are the key to that deeper engagement and persuading a politically apathetic electorate that we have a valid argument and that the question of EU membership needs further consideration.

Why should the media get away with it?

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Despite this last weekend being far quieter on the political front than the previous one, I still had quite a sour taste in my mouth over the news media coverage of the Article 16 issue that previous weekend.

Even now, ten days later, I have yet to see any evidence that Article 16 was in fact triggered.

The is absolutely no doubt in my mind that the EU considered it, but that does not justify claims in the British News media that they had triggered article 16 or the one-sided frenzy that the media subsequently created with virtually no mention of Boris Johnson’s threat to trigger article 16 a few weeks earlier.

Since then, a Parliamentary Petition calling for Article 16 to be triggered has been created and is being heavily pushed by Arlene Foster. And yet the News Media has said next to nothing about that.

Sadly, neither this inaccuracy or bias is news to the Rejoin Community. I am sure I have no need to give names but several of the more popular daily newspapers are very based towards the Pro Leave argument and accuracy is not something that certain of those newspapers have a reputation for.

The inaccurate and biased reporting over article 16 however appears to have extended well beyond newspapers into other media, including the BBC.

Not only does this whole affair demonstrate the need for the system of press regulation to be overhauled as I suggested in my last blog post on this subject, but it also demonstrates that there is a need for the Rejoin community to be more proactive in this area and actually do something about it rather than just moan about it amongst ourselves.

To that end I have put together and submitted a new parliamentary petition on the issue which hopefully will be accepted and we can lush to highlight these issues.

But we do need to do far more as a movement, and one of the things we need to do is complain to the relevant organisations and regulatory bodies every time we see a story that is wrong or in the case of the BBC, biased.

IPSO, who look after complaints about newspapers and organisations, have put together the very useful graphic I am posting with this, but here are a few other useful links.
This is the article where I found the graphic which outlines the whole process of complaining about the news media

https://www.ipso.co.uk/complain/

This is IPSO’s complaint form

https://www.ipso.co.uk/complain/complaints-form/

This is where you start a complaint about the BBC’s news coverage

https://www.bbc.co.uk/contact/complaints/make-a-complaint/#/Complaint

This is OFCOM’s complaint form https://ofcomforms.secure.force.com/formentry/SitesFormCSLEStandardsComplaints

So next time there is something in the news media that is factually wrong or inaccurate rather than just moaning about it we must be proactive and formally complain. If enough of us do we might actually get something done!

Starmer, the Red Wall and Rejoining

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Starmer’s decision to chase the Red Wall vote and the expense of Rejoining the EU has caused considerable concern to many in the Rejoin movement. This vote chasing in the long term will do nobody any favours and will most likely backfire on Labour. His stance is probably strongly influenced by his new policy chief and committed Leaver, Claire Ainsley. However, what is really needed from Starmer is some leadership on the issue rather than simply chasing any particular group of voters – Red Wall or Rejoiners.

The nature of the Leave Campaign in 2016 was dishonest beyond anything ever seen previously in British politics. To paraphrase Professor Michael Dougan of Liverpool University, the Leave Campaign was dishonest on an industrial scale on just about every major issue.

I came across one such example yesterday when attempting to ‘discuss’ Brexit’s lack of legitimacy with a hard-core supporter of Farage. The individual concerned claimed that the EU had never had its accounts signed off, a claim on the part of the Leave Campaign that is actually very easy to disprove with a simple Google search. No matter what I said or what evidence I presented, this individual simply would not accept the reality of the situation. The EU’s accounts have been signed off every year it has been in existence.

This is typical of the false beliefs about the EU held by many Leave voters. People in the Rejoin movement talk about ignorance and dishonesty of Leave voters, and whilst this may ring true, one needs to remember that ultimately the problem is with those who lied.

Such deeply held entrenched beliefs did not just happen or come about in the relatively short space of time of the referendum campaign in 2016 itself. In many ways they remind me of the belief’s individuals hold about Brands which are the product of planned and sustained campaigns on the part of brand owners to implant a particular perception of their products in the minds of consumers.

Such deeply held false beliefs about the EU can only have come about as a product of a deliberately and sustained campaign to discredit the EU using falsehood over a substantial period of time.

Starmer’s decision to chase the Ref Wall vote and allow Brexit to stand therefore has serious consequences for the quality of our democracy, indeed the very future of democracy in the UK. It sends a message to individuals and organisations that deliberately misleading the electorate in this way is acceptable in the UK.

Starmer therefore needs to show leadership and challenge that dishonesty for the sake of democracy itself. And that is without even considering the issue of the serious breaches of both data protection and electoral laws committed by the Leave Campaign for which it was heavily fined.

There is however a further reason why Starmer should address this issue which is the subject of some of those lies, specifically immigrants and immigration from the EU, which is often cited as the main issue that caused Red Wall voters to vote leave.

The Leave campaign made all sorts of allegations about EU immigrants and immigration such as a reduction in income, stealing jobs from British people and overwhelming public services such as the NHS.

These claims are false.

Study after study has shown little if any impact on wage levels caused by EU immigration, in fact the only authoritative study I have seen on the issue showing a reduction in income concluded that there was a reduction of just a few pennies, and even then, only in some industries not all. The claims of the Leave Campaign were inconsistent on the issue of stealing jobs with the famous Schrődinger’s immigrant simultaneously stealing jobs and claiming benefits whilst also telling us we had record levels of employment. Various studies have also shown that rather than overwhelming public services, EU immigrants actually contribute more in taxes than they take out in the form of services and benefits to the tune of several thousands of pounds each year.

When challenged over these false and misleading claims, leavers prove to be just as stubborn and often claim that they are based on common sense – if an immigrant is in the UK, they must be stealing a British person’s job. Not only does this show a lack of knowledge of the manpower shortages faced by the UK economy, it is also difficult to understand why they hold such beliefs when many Red Wall areas such as the South Wales Valleys have very few immigrants, EU or otherwise.

These claims raise two further issues that need addressing by Starmer, and indeed in the case of the first issue, by the wider UK society as this is where many of the allegations of racism on the part of leave voters arise.

EU immigrants were and are still being blamed for issues, not because they are responsible but simply because they are immigrants. That is racist and needs to be addressed no matter how uncomfortable it is for Starmer and the Labour party.

Secondly, whilst the cause of the long-term structural problems linked to industrial decline faced in many Red Wall areas is debatable and could include issues such as Thatcher’s monetarism of the early 1980’s, privatisation, militant trade unionism, lack of investment, the nationalisation of much of our heavy industry, or in the case of the coal industry, the longer term need to protect the environment, such problems were not caused by immigration or immigrants. Stopping Freedom of Movement by leaving the EU will therefore not solve the problems.

Furthermore, the desire expressed to rebuild the UK industrial base now that we have left the EU expressed by many in the Labour Party who supported Brexit is flying in flying in the face of the reality of the 4th Industrial Revolution with its digitisation and automation. Mass employment in manufacturing will soon be a thing of the past and the financial realities of the huge sums needed for automation make investment in a small British economy disconnected from the EU unrealistic.

Furthermore, the captive markets of the British Empire that our industrial base once relied upon for customers will not be coming back, indeed many of the countries that made up the British Empire are now emerging as economic powers themselves eager to export the products of their own manufacturing industry. India for example is growing in economic strength and given its size and democratic nature will no doubt become a leading economic superpower, perhaps even the leading economic superpower.

Leaving the EU will therefore do nothing to address the structural issues faced by Red Wall voters which are the ultimate cause of their dissatisfaction.
Starmer’s vote chasing with its implicit failure to show leadership on this issue of our EU membership will therefore not only result in alienating remain voters but will almost certainly also alienate Red Wall voters further. And, of course, waiting in the wings to exploit that alienation is Farage with his hate filled right wing populism.

Starmer needs to show leadership and act. He needs to face up to the issue of the lies of the Leave Campaign and lead Red Wall voters rather than just chase their votes.

Bad PR or Dodgy Journalism? Time for Change

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This last weekend has been one of the most difficult weekends that the Remain/Rejoin movement has ever had to endure. What started as a simple contractual dispute concerning the failure of Astra Zeneca to meet its contractual obligations to deliver a certain number of vaccines to the EU very rapidly and very publicly spiralled out of control turning into a PR disaster which ended up with, amongst other things, the EU being accused of trying to steal British vaccines. Our opponents had a field day as a result.

The EU had every right to insist that Astra Zeneca fulfil its obligations under the contract, not least because they had paid a large sum of money up front, and whilst raising important questions about what has been termed ‘vaccine nationalism’ that deserve serious consideration, the EU also had every right to attempt to secure supplies of the vaccine for its citizens.

Indeed, it should be noted that the UK has restricted the export of around 170 drugs relating to the treatment of covid to ensure supplies for British people and the US has restricted the export of vaccine to ensure there is enough for Americans.

The EU was also within its rights to consider all available options to secure that supply, including triggering article 16, which is where the real trouble started.

The EU was slated in the British News Media for triggering article 16. Except, as I write this, I still have not been able to find any evidence that the EU actually triggered article 16. I’m certain it was discussed, but far from sure it was triggered.

What appears to have happened is that someone in the EU published a draft document that had not been agreed but which made reference to triggering article 16. The British News Media picked this up, and for some reason, reported that article 16 had actually been triggered.

Whilst it was a serious PR blunder for the EU to publish such a sensitive draft document in that way, it is equally concerning that the British News Media reported it as a done deed, with the BBC possibly being the first culprit. Accurate reporting is key to quality journalism.

In addition to this shortfall in accuracy, in the ensuing media frenzy, the British news did not mention that Johnson had threatened to trigger article 16 around two weeks ago and thereby failed to present a fair and unbiased portrayal of the issue and the headlines soon degenerated into nationalistic jingoism aimed at discrediting the EU.

As we in the Rejoin movement know only too well, this sort of thing is nothing new. Inaccurate, misleading and all too often, biased and false stories about the EU are commonplace in certain sections of the British news media. Furthermore, during the 2016 referendum some prominent UK news organisations, including the BBC, failed to challenge blatantly inaccurate claims made by the Leave Campaign such as the cost of our EU membership.

Such issues are not restricted to news stories relating to the EU, but run right through the reporting of some sections of the British news media, indeed, some news organisations often appear to be little more than mouthpieces for a particular political party or cause, something that is currently deemed to be acceptable.

What is perhaps more frustrating, is that very often it is difficult if not impossible to have inaccurate or misleading stories corrected as the British news media is self-regulated by an organisation that has limited powers of enforcement and where participation is voluntary.

There are also no requirements for journalists to be qualified or registered in any way. The risks of this omission are illustrated in my own area by an individual named Martin Costello, a former UKIP parliamentary candidate and now an activist in whatever Farage is calling his latest political reincarnation. A few years ago, Costello set himself up as ‘journalist’ with his own TV ‘news channel’ based on social media platforms. As far as I can establish Costello has no training or experience as a journalist whatsoever. In reality Costello is a far-right political commentator and activist and nothing more. Each week Costello pumps out hours of supposed journalism which in reality is nothing more than far-right political propaganda. No doubt he will be ‘reporting’ on the EUs attempt to ‘steal’ British vaccines soon.

This situation is not acceptable. A much stronger statutory regulation which requires accuracy and fairness along with formal qualification and registration of journalists is needed, which should be accompanied by a requirement for news media to be politically neutral.

Had such a system been in place this last weekend we would have seen a very different story presented to the public. One that was far closer to the truth and one that was much less biased.
I am sure we would still have seen reports that the EU was considering triggering article 16, but we would not have seen reports that it had been triggered along with the frenzy that followed. In presenting the story, facts such as Johnson’s threat to trigger article 16 may also have been included in the interest of political neutrality and balance, along with reporting the restrictions on exports by the UK and US mentioned earlier.

Such a system or regulation would not threaten the ability of the news media or journalists to investigate any issue they wish, but would stop the current bias towards a particular political party or cause currently evident in many sections of our media.

Such a system of regulation is not new. The broad outline is exactly what has been introduced for the financial advice industry which was out of control with poor quality commission driven sales. That new regulatory framework has transformed the industry over time and improved it. The same improvements are needed in the world of journalism and news reporting and the profession and industry would ultimately benefit with a better reputation.

The role of the news media is to report the news, not create it or to set the political agenda, it should be somewhere to find out the facts and hear both sides of the story in a balanced and fair manner. This is not the case at present. The events of this weekend demonstrate that there is much wrong with the news media in the UK and that change is needed.

The EU is not proposing to do anything that the UK and the US have not already done.

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This weekend I was planning to write about Starmer and his current refusal to contemplate placing Rejoining the EU onto the agenda of the Labour Party. Instead, I find myself in very much the same situation as last weekend, i.e. writing about the fact that our opposition is currently still very active and that we therefore also need to be active, but that does not necessarily mean we need to start campaigning directly and openly for Rejoin, but rather we need to start preparing the ground for that ultimate campaign.


The issue that has brought this about is of course the situation with the EU, Astra Zeneca and the vaccine.
As the week has gone by, I have seen an increasingly concerning stream of news headlines about the situation saying that the EU has done this, or that the EU has taken the other action. On clicking the headline to find out more, in almost all cases, what I have actually found is that the headline has been an over exaggeration of what was really happening. The real situation was the EU was considering action, had given itself powers to act if the need arose, or considering a particular course of action – and nothing more.


This came to a head last night with very concerning news reports that the EU had triggered article 16. Digging a little deeper and a little time have revealed that the EU had not triggered article 16. Indeed, it is difficult to find out exactly what did happen. According to the press this morning it may or may not have been an ‘error’. It is simply not clear what has happened at this point in time.


Whilst there are clear issues with the EU’s vaccination program centring around a late start and a slow procurement process, what is also clear is that the real issue over the Astra Zeneca and the EU vaccine is a contractual one. Astra Zeneca agreed to supply a certain number of doses of the vaccine by a certain date and took money from the EU for that. Astra Zeneca subsequently informed the EU that it could not deliver and nothing more.


As a consequence, the EU has moved to secure a supply of the vaccine for their own citizens by insisting that Astra Zeneca meet its obligations under that contract, if necessary, including by supplying doses of the vaccine from production facilities in other countries including the UK. The contract between Astra Zeneca and the EU that has been published show that the EU is entitled under the terms of that contract to make such a request.


One could argue that the EU and Astra Zeneca should have sat round a table behind the scenes to address the problems and find acceptable solutions. Instead, we have witnessed a media debacle with the right-wing press in particular having a field day with, as already noted, over exaggerated headlines. In addition to those headlines, the media have portrayed the EU as being selfish and even trying to steal vaccines from other countries including the UK.
Not only I have seen no evidence to support those more serious claims, the media has also been very one sided. There has been almost no mention of the fact that before Christmas the UK banned the export of over 100 drugs that could be useful for treating Covid, or the fact that the US has totally banned the export of Covid 19 vaccines.


In other words, the EU is not proposing to do anything that the UK and the US have not already done.
This situation demonstrates something that most Rejoiners are already only too well aware of. There is a serious problem with the British Press – it is politically biased, often at the behest of wealthy owners, often misleading even dishonest, and also poorly and ineffective regulated, all of which are issues that need addressing.


These issues also circle back to the need for Rejoiners to be proactive and start preparing the ground for future battles. We should be calling for these issues to be addressed now. We should be campaigning for the current system of self-regulation to be replaced with a statutory system of regulation that is independent of the media to ensure accuracy now. We should be campaigning for a requirement for the media to be politically neutral to ensure fair reporting now.
In addition to the unfair, misleading and biased media coverage, our opponents have also been having a field day. A visit last night to the social media pages of Farage’s current political platform shows them exploiting the situation with rampant nationalism and xenophobia fuelled by misleading information, half-truths and outright lies about the EU and the situation.


This not only demonstrates the need for us to be proactive i.e. actually taking on the opposition rather than arguing amongst ourselves in our safe spaces, but also the need to hold politicians such as Farage to account for their actions, including their lies. Again, this is something that we could and should be doing now. But I have to ask how many of us are actually doing this?


At present one of my colleagues here at UKIN.EU, Joel Baccas, has a parliamentary petition active that calls for lying by politicians to be made a criminal offence. How many people reading this have actually signed it? How many people have spent longer that the 2 minutes it would take to sign it and send a clear message to the likes of Farage that what they are doing is unacceptable arguing that they can’t be bothered to sign petitions?


Which all comes back again to the need for Rejoiners to be proactive – nobody is going to do this for us. It is up to us. If you haven’t signed that petition find it and sign it now!


It is also worth noting that this whole media circus has also been very successful in diverting attention away from the effects of Brexit. The fishing industry is staring into the abyss, exports have slumped, and British firms are being advised by the British Government to set up shop in the EU meaning the loss of British jobs to the EU…It is easy to see why the right-wing media and our opponents are making such a fuss over this – they needed something to divert attention away from the mess they have created!

Contractual Dispute or Vaccine Wars?

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We are currently seeing much concern and indeed criticism of the EU over the issue of Astra Zeneca vaccines.

In such circumstances it is often a good idea to stand back and break the issue down into its component parts.

What we are seeing is essentially a dispute over a contract entered into between two organisations specifically the EU and Astra Zeneca for the supply of a certain product.

Astra Zeneca agreed to supply the EU with a certain amount of the product by a certain date and has now said they are unable to do so. The EU is saying that is not acceptable and is insisting that Astra Zeneca deliver what was promised in that contract.

If we were talking about an ordinary product such as pens or paper nobody would be making a fuss – but we are talking about a highly emotive subject – a vaccine in the middle of the worst pandemic in a century.

The press and our opponents are stirring things up for different reasons. The first to sell papers, the second to cynically and dishonesty advance their cause. What a surprise!

All the EU is actually attempting to do is secure supplies of a critical product for its citizens – and if it were the UK government in that situation the press and our opponents would be encouraging our government to do exactly what the EU is doing.

You can find more detail in this BBC article