Democracy isn’t
a once-and-for-ever event.
There’s no rule
in democracy which says that people have one and only one chance to make a
choice and can never change their minds.
And contrary to what Jeremy Corbyn seems to think in trying to whip his
party’s MPs into voting for Brexit, there’s no rule in democracy which says
that a 52-48 vote amongst the public has to be followed by a 100-0 vote in
parliament. Despite what the Daily Mail
might say, the 48% are entitled to expect their views to be represented too,
and MPs who do so are neither traitors nor enemies of democracy.
Even in the UK,
there’s a history of allowing people to change their minds after a
referendum. The now-abolished seven yearly vote on whether pubs should open on a Sunday in Wales (the most frequent example of a referendum in the UK) is an example where the
right to re-take the vote periodically was enshrined in the legislation. The devolution vote in 1979 was re-run in
1997 (albeit on a slightly different set of proposals), and even the EU vote
itself was an opportunity to reverse the decision taken in 1975. Decisions taken in one referendum can be –
and regularly have been – reversed in subsequent referendums.
The devolution
referendums were held a second time because people who didn’t like the result
in 1979 continued to campaign for what they thought was right; and the second
EU referendum was held because some people never really accepted the idea that
the UK belonged in Europe. One thing of
which I’m certain is that had the vote on 23rd June been to remain, UKIP would
not have simply packed up and gone away – they would have continued to
campaign. And, in a democracy, they
would have had every right to do so.
Respecting the
result of a democratic vote does not require those opposed to that result to
accept the arguments of those who won and assist them to implement the
decision. If it did, opposition MPs
would consider themselves democratically mandated to assist the governing party
in implementing its programme.
Respecting the result of a democratic vote means nothing more than
accepting that a decision taken in one vote can only be reversed by another vote. The people always have the right to change
their minds, and those who would lead them always have the right to seek to
persuade them to do so.
In the context
of all of the above, why is it assumed that those who think a bad decision has
been taken should stop arguing their case, and start working to ensure that
what they fought against actually happens?
It’s a perverse suggestion. Even
worse, why are so many politicians throwing in the towel and doing exactly
that? Have they changed their
minds? Did they really not believe what
they were saying? Did they see it all as just some sort of political game?
Anyone seeking
to provide leadership to the nation should be telling us what they really
believe is the right future for the nation, and working to persuade the people
of that, not facilitating the implementation of what they claim to believe is a bad decision. And if they believe that
staying in the EU is the best future, they should say so, and argue for that
position. It’s not as if there’s no
support for that view – after all, 47.5% of the electorate voted for that, and
that’s not a bad position from which to start to build a majority. It’s certainly better than the starting point
for building a majority for independence, for example.
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