Reversing Hard Brexit
Reversing Hard Brexit:
A priority for the next government
Geoffrey M. Hodgson
Updated and enlarged version, responding to new poll data
Hopefully, in 2024 or earlier, the UK will have a much more progressive government than it has now.[1] It will then face an agenda of currently neglected but pressing issues, including dealing with climate change, reform of our broken political system, saving the NHS, and reducing burgeoning poverty and inequality.
Led by populists and nationalists, the decision to leave the EU Single Market has imposed large costs on businesses, reduced exports, fuelled inflation, created the problem with the Northern Ireland Protocol, and led to massive lorry queues in Kent. Although the UK integrated less than others into the Single Market when it was an EU member, leaving the Single Market has still inflicted huge damage on the UK economy.
The Labour Party have ruled out rejoining the EU Single Market as well as rejecting any re-application for EU membership. Labour’s plan is to push for amendments to the current withdrawal agreement. If the next government is a coalition of Labour with the Liberal Democrats and Greens, then it may seek closer and more extensive arrangements with the EU than those currently proposed by Labour.
Should the UK try immediately to rejoin the EU?
Let us consider the EU options for that coalition. One would be to apply to rejoin as an EU member, as quickly as possible. But crucially, despite the fact that the 2016 Brexit referendum was flawed and corrupt, it would be extremely provocative and divisive to press ahead to rejoin the EU without promising another referendum on the terms for re-admission. A referendum would be needed. And it would have to be won.
From September 2022, several polls show a majority for rejoin above 10 per cent. But, for reasons explored below, we need to be cautious about these results.
There are larger majorities for the claim that leaving the EU was a mistake. For example, a poll in late July 2022 reported that 52 percent thought that Brexit was a mistake against 36 per cent who thought it was right to leave the EU. If don’t-knows are excluded, then that is a split of 59 per cent against 41 per cent. But that does not necessarily imply support for rejoining. The evidence suggests that a significant number of people currently regret the decision to leave, but lack enthusiasm for rejoining. Despite these regrets, and the visible damage from a hard Brexit, a future referendum majority to rejoin is far from assured.
This is confirmed by looking at the polls leading up to the June 2016 referendum. The figure below (taken from Wikipedia) shows the data from late 2012 to June 2016, with indications of the average poll percentages. Looking at these averages, note that Remain was in a clear lead for much of this period, from about May 2014 to just before referendum itself.
Note also the dramatic reduction in the number of ‘don’t knows’ from about May 2014 onwards. The crucial point here is that Leave won the referendum largely because it was able to persuade a large number of ‘don’t knows’ to vote for Brexit.
In June 2015 Remain experienced its biggest poll lead – about 8 per cent on average. From June 2015 to the referendum, there was a big decrease of the undecided vote, from about 18 to 11 per cent. Leave won because virtually all of these ‘don’t knows’ decided to vote for Brexit. The Leave strategy implemented by Dominic Cummings was designed to convert the undecided to vote to Leave. It succeeded.
For illustrative purposes, let us examine the recent polls and assume that slightly less dramatic transfers of allegiance occur in the lead-up to a new referendum to rejoin the EU. Assume that the undecided split: one fifth of them decide to vote for Rejoin and four fifths decide to vote for Stay Out. This is a more favourable split for Rejoin that for Remain in 2016, because in 2016 virtually all the undecided shifted to vote Leave.
The outcome of these assumed shifts of allegiance would be highly disappointing for Rejoin. Only one poll so far, thus transformed by allocation of the undecided in the way proposed, would give Rejoin a clear margin of 10 per cent.
Three new problems for Rejoin
For moral and practical reasons, the 2024 coalition government should not hold a referendum on the same criteria. If a second referendum were held and the proposition to rejoin was carried by a vote of (say) 52 per cent in favour and 48 against, then the EU would be sceptical of an application endorsed by such a narrow majority, which again could be overturned in the future. They might reasonably ask for stronger evidence of the UK’s commitment to the EU.
Morally and practically, the proposal to reverse Brexit should be carried with a 55 per cent majority or more, and with majorities in all four nations within the UK. This is far from guaranteed on the basis of current poll evidence. Only three polls out of 37 since Brexit have indicated a 55 per cent majority or more to rejoin.
The second problem is that the UK’s previous EU membership came with a number of special exemptions. One of these was to allow the UK to keep its own currency. The only other EU member that has been allowed indefinitely to keep its own currency is Denmark. Otherwise, EU rules entail a commitment to join the Eurozone. Apart from Denmark, all other countries in the EU have made this promise, even if they still have their own currency. It is highly likely that the EU will require the UK, on it applying to rejoin, to commit to ditching the Pound and adopting the Euro at some time in the future.
Pollsters should ask if people would favour rejoining the EU if it meant a UK commitment to ditch the Pound in favour of the Euro. It is possible that the small majorities in favour of rejoining would disappear.
Third, these difficulties will be further exacerbated if and when the EU extends majority voting by member states on key issues. The UK previously had a veto: it would lose that. This too would be unpopular.
Consequently, a coalition strategy to immediately press ahead to rejoin the EU would have a strong possibility of rebuttal in a referendum. Such a failure would be catastrophic for the coalition that adopted this policy. The government could fall, and all its progressive policies would fall with it.
Could a rejoin referendum be evaded? Quickly going ahead with a rejoin application, but without another referendum, would be extremely divisive and could lead to nationalist rioting in the streets. The risk to a progressive coalition government would be even greater.
Rejoining the EU Single Market
A second and much less risky and less divisive strategy would be for the UK to apply to rejoin the EU Single Market. This would involve the re-introduction of freedom of movement with and within the EU. There is the further possibility of a customs union with the EU. But sadly and undoubtedly, such first steps in a strategy of reconciliation will be deemed by many to be a violation of the decision in the 2016 referendum. We need to deal with this falsehood first.
The ballot wording in the 2016 referendum was simple: “Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union?” The ballot said nothing about leaving or staying in the EU Single Market or a customs union.
Up to the referendum, many people argued in favour of leaving the EU but remaining in the EU Single Market. They included leading Brexiters such as Daniel Hannan
in 2016. Nigel Farage
promoted the Norway option at the same time.
Against this, the then Prime Minister David Cameron stated just before the referendum that
“The British public would be voting if we leave would be to leave the EU and leave the single market.” As Cameron was a Remainer, this may have been a ruse to encourage moderate and sensible Leavers to back Remain. Cameron may have judged (quite rightly, in hindsight) that a Leave victory would signal a strong nationalist swing within the Tory Party that would have pushed for a hard Brexit. Alternatively, Cameron may have been ignorant of what ending EU membership implied. In any case, his assertion that ending EU membership meant exiting the EU Single Market is false.
The Leader of the Labour Opposition Jeremy Corbyn, a lifelong Brexiter (but briefly and only nominally in favour of Remain) said in a 2017 interview
that remaining in the Single Market was “dependent on membership of the EU”. This too is patently false, as the Norway example shows. It stems either from ignorance or from a desire to enforce his temporarily closeted hard Brexit views.
During the referendum campaign, Dominic Cummings advised the Leave campaign to be vague about what trading model the UK would be adopted after a successful vote for Brexit. When his advice was partly evaded, and Michael Gove, Boris Johnson and other leading Leavers proposed various post-Brexit trade arrangements, the different plans were all fuzzy and short of detail. As late as May 2016, a few weeks before the referendum, Gove shifted toward a clearer and more extreme position, to advocate leaving the Single Market as well as leaving the EU.[3]
But the wording of the referendum ballot does not imply leaving the EU Single Market. The Leave campaign itself was deliberately evasive on this issue. It is only after the event that many Leavers and some Remainers made the false claim that the referendum result obliges us to leave the Single Market.
Some Leavers describe being outside the EU but within the Single Market as BRINO – Brexit In Name Only. In response, the 2016 ballot specified neither the implications nor the options. And the Leave campaign failed to clarify these during the referendum campaign. The UK voted narrowly for Brexit in name and substance, but that did not necessarily imply leaving the EU Single Market.
The BRINO slur is used by those who fail to recognise that all international trade involves treaties. The UK cannot simply impose its will on other countries, as it did on its colonies when it had a global Empire.
Severing all ties with Europe means ending all trade with the EU.
A progressive government has no legal or moral obligation to put the option of rejoining the EU Single Market to a referendum. By contrast, on the question of re-applying for membership of the EU, the ethical and practical case for another referendum is much stronger.
What must be undone first?
To help reverse the decline of the British economy, rejoining the EU Single Market is an urgent matter.[4] A very large 2018 poll
found 56 per cent saying that the UK should be part of the EU Single Market, with only 28 per cent against. This margin is much greater than in polls on the question of re-acquiring EU membership.
The “arguments of the past” argument is easily dismissed. Enlightenment claims for freedom, human rights and equality were arguments of the distant past. That does not mean that we should forget them or treat them as anything less than uppermost priorities. The “arguments of the past” quip also minimises the massive economic damage of non-membership of the Single Market. If it continues to do harm, how can we ignore it?
Starmer is right to be concerned about internal division in Britain. But removing major impairments to our prosperity and wellbeing can reduce rather than increase that division. It is hard to see how Labour’s proposed refinements to the current trade deal between the UK and EU will greatly reduce internal division. The current (slim) majority that favours rejoining the EU will remain deeply divided from those that are opposed. People are divided on these key issues. Up to now, Labour’s response has been to proceed by ignoring them. A better strategy would be to admit the grave pitfalls of Brexit and to persuade people that major repairs are required.
Some Labour members are opposed to rejoining the EU Single Market because it would necessarily re-establish freedom of movement, which is one of its major features. In response, Britain has a chronic shortage of skilled labour, which could be alleviated by migration from Europe. The UK has higher levels of immigration than before Brexit, and more of it comes from outside the EU. Opposing rejoining the EU Single Market on these grounds is politically dubious and unconvincing.
On the other side of the division there are pro-Europeans that want to regain EU membership as soon as possible. But a rushed attempt to rejoin could genuinely create much more division and then backfire. In any case, for rejoiners and leavers alike, rejoining the EU Single Market should come first. Then, and only then, should even closer ties with the EU be attempted.
We should not curtail debate about Brexit and its consequences. On the contrary, it is vital for us to discuss them. Silence is neither a progressive nor an honest option. But, on the other hand, we are urgently in need of a much more sophisticated strategy than the slogan “Rejoin the EU Now”. We also need an approach that tries to heal division, not by ignoring the Brexit problem, but by tackling it in a realistic and effective manner.
First published, 17 September 2022
Updated poll data, 9 October 2022
More new data and revisions, 23 November 2022
Endnotes
1. The author thanks Jim Hodgson, Vinny Logan and Gerhard Schnyder for helpful comments on a previous draft of this blog.
3. Shipman (2017, pp. 243-6).
4. There is actually a spectrum of options here, from full membership of the Single Market through various intermediate positions, with Switzerland as one example. But I believe that there is enough public support for rejoining the Single Market for it to be pushed as a primary option. But it could be achieved in stages. This important issue is a matter for further debate.
Bibliography
Grey, Chris (2021) Brexit Unfolded: How No One Got What They Wanted (And Why They Were Never Going To)
(London: Biteback).
Oliver, Tim (2018) Understanding Brexit: A Concise Introduction
(Bristol: Policy Press).