Power vacuum has been left in EU vote aftermath

I EXPECT by now you are ‘referendum-ed’ out, but I hope you will forgive me if I reinforce something I wrote last week. As it was published the day before the vote, it has nothing to do with hindsight, nor how people chose to vote.

I simply said we should never have been given this responsibility.

I wrote it was ‘a decision I don’t think should be made by us. We have MPs who are meant to do that for us. Faced with the playground scrapping that our leaders call debate, most people are no wiser than when the campaign began. Every argument for staying is squashed by the leavers – and vice versa.”

I stand by every word, but not to gloat. I would love to have been wrong, but it turns that many people voted for odd reasons, because of the way their leaders presented the arguments for leaving or remaining – eternal damnation on one side, a heaven-on-earth on the other.

Whichever way we voted on Thursday – and I am not criticising people’s democratic choice; that is for them – we can’t ignore the squabbling and power vacuum with which we are left.

Few of us were informed enough to make such a momentous decision which, with such a close call, is splitting families and communities.

Sadly this happened after the Scottish referendum too, and now they might face it all again.

After the election, the second highest question on Google was, ‘What is the EU?’. How on earth did these people decide whether to leave or remain, if they didn’t even know what the institution was?

I sensed that many wanted to vote Cameron out, but they should have bided their time for a General Election. It worked, he’s resigned, but can anyone feel satisfied with the manner of his going?

Nevertheless, we need to keep steady, even keep a sense of humour which is even more important in times of crisis. Previous generations used comedy and popular songs to mock a much worse situation in two world wars.

Last week, when I wished people luck in deciding which way to vote, I mischievously quoted Bucks Fizz’s, Making Your Mind Up.

I now offer their other 1980s titles to get us through the next weeks/months/years: Now those Days are Gone, New Beginning and If You Can’t Stand the Heat.

And remember they won the 1981 Eurovision Song Contest!