Everybody is entitled to change their mind

CONSERVATIVES win general elections and Labour never raises its hands in surrender by declaring the nation has spoken so policies it bitterly opposes must be embraced.

Instead, Jeremy Corbyn vows to save the NHS, improve wages, unshackle trade unions and renationalise privatised industries such as the railways and the Royal Mail.

When Labour was triumphing at the polls, it was the same reaction from Theresa May, who fought Tony Blair and Gordon Brown every inch of the way.

The Conservative Prime Minister opposed clause by clause, bill by bill, Labour’s programme.

Then, when the Tories stumbled back into power in 2010, they strolled through Parliament’s lobbies to turn off health spending taps, scrap new schools and swing an axe at the welfare state.

MPs standing up, win or lose, for what they believe – whether we agree with them or not – is how politics and democracy work. The defeated side in a ballot trying to switch public opinion in future is perfectly legitimate.

Corbyn is entitled to demand an early general election to change last year’s result, and May is within her rights to resist.

So the worst argument of them all against another Europe referendum is that it wouldn’t be democratic.

Oh yes it would, and I agree with David Davis, the Tory former Brexit Secretary who I acknowledge opposes a re-run, that people are entitled to change their mind in a democracy.

Boris Johnson’s brother Jo, a Tory with integrity unlike the lying ex-Foreign Secretary, exposed in his explosive resignation speech how May’s in-out Brexit hokey cokey would be significantly worse for Britain than remaining in Europe, while the hardline Leaver’s lies are fantasy. The dawn of the grim truth is why a Populus poll for pro-European group Best for Britain finds that 65% of voters support the British public having the final say on the reality of going or staying.

Our country’s best deal is in Europe yet campaigners tell me only 120 of 650 MPs would vote today for a saviour referendum.

Corbyn, who has told a German newspaper that he can’t stop Brexit, could if he wanted. And democracy would be on his side.