Second vote is only way out of chaos

DEAR Editor, Our Prime Minister Boris Johnson has staggered into a crisis even faster than the last three Tory Prime Ministers did, and on the same topic...Brexit.

Ted Heath lost the 1974 election on it, John Major was destroyed by his ministers and Labour won in 1997.

David Cameron managed five years with the Liberal Democrat coalition keeping him off the topic, but ran the referendum when he won in 2015 and was gone in twelve months.

Theresa May then called the 2017 election and lost the 17 majority that she had got from David Cameron when she had to implement Brexit.

Boris Johnson had a majority of two from May when he took over, with ten Ulster Unionists supporting him. He took less than a week to lose his majority, and now he is purging his MPs with a couple of dozen now being told that they cannot stand in a General Election. He then tried to call a General Election, though as he has yet to get candidates in the election he cannot get a majority.

Is there a way out of this chaos? Yes, a national referendum like 1975 and 2016. A best of three. And to stop the cries of betrayal from the Leavers, let’s remember who the first person to call for a second vote was.

It was Dominic Cummings in the Economist of January 2016 when he told the Bagehot column “there is a strong democratic case for a second referendum on the final terms of Brexit, if the first vote is for out”.

Cummings is now Johnson’s chief adviser. OK, the line is now no deal, but the vote is still legal and constitutional. And it is the only way out of the chaos consuming the Tories and British politics.

Trevor Fisher, Stafford