Author Archives: Paul Young

Yes, working hard and smart to change public opinion quickly is key to stopping Brexit. Many MP’s are running scared of being accused of going against the wishes of the people, so it must be obvious to them that public opinion has changed and we have to hurry to make it so. More Brexit negotiation shambles will help, but focusing on economic and pragmatic arguments did not win us the referendum and it won’t persuade many to change their opinion. People have become numb to the same old ping pong arguments. One side says this and the other the opposite ad infinitum. Even I have found my head spinning at times with some doubt. What was missing from the remain campaign was the emotional argument. The leavers won this hands down with “take back control” and sadly, xenophobia.

In Nick Clegg’s short book, “How to Stop Brexit” he rightly points out that the UK public have never had the same emotional attachment to EU institutions as continental Europeans. He suggests a key reason for this is that the UK escaped invasion, a very plausible suggestion. In my opinion there has always been a conservative islander mentality in the British psyche too. I am old enough to remember the complaints when we moved to metric measures – what’s wrong with pounds and ounces, and gallons,  and of course, a pint? We used to talk about people on “the continent” Even now we still have miles rather than kilometres and drive on a different side of the road. (The latter probably understandable for practical reasons, but Sweden did change sides in the 60s)

Whilst Nick’s book offers a good analysis of why the UK (only just) voted to leave, plus a list of very practical and pragmatic actions for those who want to #stopbrexit, such as writing letters to MPs  –  it does not offer much emotional inspiration. Of course it’s difficult to persuade people to stay with something that they know is hard work when their emotional committent is lukewarm or worse hateful. It is also very difficult to win an argument focused on realistic pragmatic necessity, when the opponents can offer a vague uncharted idealistic fantasy.  Whilst missing the emotive narrative, Nick’s book does however offer us lots of hope and inspiration. Young people are much more likely to support staying in the EU and everyday more of them are coming of voting age. At the same time the facts of mortality dictate that the older people, more likely to be Leavers, are dying away. He also reminds us that only a little more that 650,000 voting the other way would have reversed the referendum result and that recent polls are suggesting that sufficient numbers may have changed their mind in our direction already.