Paul Mason

Why won’t Remainers get behind Corbyn’s Brexit plan?

At the BBC early doors for the Today programme, to preview Corbyn’s speech advocating membership of a customs union. I suggest that ‘this is something Remainers can get behind’, but come off air to a torrent of denialism and abuse on Twitter. In a parallel universe, the people who feel existentially destroyed by being halfway out of the EU would have made this case passionately before the vote, instead of trying to rely on fear and platitudes now. In quick succession, the European Commission drops its bombshell, obliging Britain to impose customs controls across the Irish sea; then Theresa May delivers her speech applying for a kind of off-peak gym membership of the EU. It’s well delivered, diplomatically calibrated, and doomed to be rejected. Again, in a parallel universe, David Cameron would have stayed in office, gone for something close to a Norway-style deal, with a cross-party committee to oversee the negotiations.

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