Labour resistance to Brexit is futile
Brexit is going to happen: claims to the contrary are time-wasting mischief. Britain voted to the leave the EU; in June more than 80 per cent of voters backed pro-brexit parties. Negotiations are under way. If there is any serious domestic debate to be had it is over transitional arrangements. Militant Remainers prefer to engage in pointless grandstanding.
Take the Repeal Bill, which next week begins its journey through Parliament. The Bill is purely procedural. It repeals the 1972 European Communities Act while, for the sake of ease and meeting the trading standards of Europe, all existing EU legislation is translated into domestic UK law. This is not ideal: the purpose of leaving the EU is to cut red tape rather than protect it. But Parliament will then have an opportunity to “amend, repeal and improve” as necessary.
This is the practical beginning of Brexit, a repatriation of sovereignty that we saw advance this week with Britain’s withdrawal from the 1964 London Fisheries Convention. This will be extended, hopefully, to the writing of laws, free trade and justice. And as these steps are taken, the true destination of the Brexit project should become clear. Britain is regaining control and using that control to become a freer, more competitive country.
What must not happen is what Labour hopes to achieve by tying up the Repeal Bill in the Commons: Britain leaves the EU in name only, retaining every vestige of legislation that kills free enterprise. Nor must the country become stuck permanently in a no-man’s land of transitional arrangements. The CBI has suggested that Britain stay inside the Single Market and Customs Union until a Brexit deal is enforced, which would be a bad mistake and risks becoming an indefinite state of limbo. Moreover, there are those who want to use the debate over transitional arrangements not just to delay Brexit but overturn the referendum result – to kick start another Project Fear, hamstring UK negotiators and build the case for Britain to think again.
The Government has to press ahead with its negotiations with clear resolve, explaining exactly what it is doing and why – taking the public with it. Opponents have to be reminded that to delay or undermine Brexit is to resist the stated will of the people. The country is either in the EU or out of it. There is no third way.