Fury over Remain peer’s Nazi slur
A LEADING figure in the campaign to force voters to think again about Brexit provoked fury yesterday by comparing the decision to quit the EU to the appeasement of Nazi Germany in the 1930s.
Lord Malloch-Brown, head of the pro-Brussels pressure group Best for Britain, claimed that leaving the bloc was an attempt to “pull away from Europe’s problems” that could backfire on the UK.
In an interview on BBC Radio, the peer said: “Britain’s history as an island nation adjacent to mainland Europe is when we try to, sort of, pull away from Europe’s problems and close ourselves off to them they have a habit of infecting us anyway.
“Appeasement in the 1930s, you name it – for centuries Britain has ignored events on continental Europe at its peril.”
Brexit supporters were enraged by the peer’s remarks. John Longworth, co-chairman of pressure group Leave Means Leave, said: “This really is a crass comparison.
“Leaving the EU is not about closing ourselves off. It is about taking back control and becoming a global, more outward looking Britain. The only appeasement that is going on right now is that being conducted by our government in the face of Brussels bullies.
Tory MP Peter Bone said: “What Lord MallochBrown doesn’t understand is that we are not turning away from Europe, we are turning away from the EU.
“To bring up appeasement shows his desire to discredit the democratic vote of the British people to leave the EU.”