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How the right just lost Europe

Free-marketeers were all too happy win the EU referendum by exploiting a wave of nationalism, but in doing so they locked themselves out of any “deal” with the EU, ensuring catastrophe and sealing their own downfall.

There are many honest reasons that people voted to leave the EU, and “simple racism” or “a cry for help” don’t really capture it. For sure, people wanted change, and wanted to take back control of their own lives if not their own country. Most people vote whichever way their newspapers tell them to, and the gutter press is awash incessant drip-drip of anti-immigration anti-EU sentiment. If the newspapers tell them they’ll be more prosperous outside of the EU, then people will believe it. There are plausible arguments on both sides. I can’t do the maths either, and it boils down to who you trust.

We really need to look behind the headlines, to see who is pulling the strings. From James Dyson, Rupert Murdoch, Boris Johnson, Daniel Hannan and Nigel Farage, these were all motivated by different things, but had in common that the EU wasn’t working for them, perhaps they have a personal grudge, perhaps there is personal gain, or perhaps a philosophical dislike of market regulation, welfare and a federal Europe.

All of these forces banded together, and Vote Leave took shape. By exploiting people’s fears, perhaps about immigration, lack of control, Britishness, “us and them”, the NHS, they drove a very successful campaign which found a lot of resonance. One thing which resonated very clearly was taking control over our borders.

When Vote Leave won on June 24th, it really upset the applecart. Vote Leave scraped a victory, and would surely not have won if it were not for the anti-immigration sentiment to control the UK's borders. Free marketeers like Daniel Hannan claim that immigration was irrelevant in deciding the issue, but he is wrong or fudging.

But this presents a problem. Theresa May’s government does not have a lot to go on by the simple instruction from the electorate to “Leave the EU”, but they have decided to go hard and that includes that freedom of movement should be stopped. And thereby ends the UK’s membership of the common market for goods, services and banking.

Some people predict economic disaster from this, and this would be a PR catastrophe for the free market demagogues and UKIP. For sure, many in Vote Leave will fail to acknowledge their culpability in causing misery to millions, but really the lie at that point will be laid bare. Like Tony Blair, I predict that David Davis will be clinging to his delusion for years to come.

Economic disaster is not guaranteed. The transition out of the EU could be buffered by various temporary arrangements, and the UK may even delay imposing controls in order to smooth the journey. It may even be the case that the EU changes its position regarding freedom of moment, and we reach a permanent arrangement quite quickly. It may well be that a hit in trade to the EU will not actually make our economy suffer too badly, or that trade with the rest of the world will pick up the slack. Trade deals may not in fact take ten years to complete. It may also be that the UK economy suffers death by a thousand cuts, and whilst many suspect that the cause was Brexit, the link will not be proven. And even if the UK economy suffers, some Leavers could claim something like that we should wait a bit longer, the EU will collapse, or that sovereignty and anti-immigration are still more important. All of this is wishful thinking.

The right-wing marriage between free marketeers and racists will cause them headaches. Taking the UKIP nationalists on board was necessary because Vote Leave could never have won using economic arguments alone. After all, most economists were against them. Theresa May’s hands are now tied in terms of our future relationship with the EU. There can’t be a “deal” with Europe, and many even from the Flexcit camp are seriously alarmed by the prospect of trading with the rest of the world in WTO rules alone.

The truth is that nobody knows exactly what will happen. The most likely course is that the UK is heading for a “hard Brexit” which leave it without any trade arrangements at all after 2 years. Remember that Leave criticise the EU for being slow and intransigent in its negotiations? Well, the UK is about to be on the receiving end of this.

Vote Leave won the referendum, but they did not win the argument. The referendum will settle the issue, not on June 24th, but in the years to come when we will actually see what happens when the UK leaves the EU. If it goes well, Vote Leave will be heroes. But it won’t go well, and when the public mood sours and the UK realises that the world doesn’t owe it a favour, the witch hunt will begin.

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