Protesters want another Brexit vote
LONDON >> Tens of thousands of people marched on the British Parliament on Saturday, demanding another vote on Britain’s decision to leave the European Union. They wore T-shirts reading “This is what a European looks like” and waved signs urging “Bollocks to Brexit!”
The crowds were sizable and committed - organizers claimed 100,000 walked down Pall Mall - but the demonstrations were not seismic.
Though a couple of British politicians spoke at Parliament Square to the demonstrators, the leader of the opposition Labour party, Jeremy Corbyn, did not. The Labour leadership vaguely supports Brexit, as long as it is good for British workers.
So in keeping with all things about Brexit since the vote in June 2016 to leave the European bloc, the march seemed to do little to bring clarity to Britain’s messy exit from the European bloc. Some demonstrators Saturday explained they were not necessarily against Brexit but wanted citizens to have another vote on any final deal that Prime Minister Theresa May negotiates in coming months.
“If it’s a no-deal or a bad deal, we should get a chance to look at it — because it is the decision of a lifetime,” said Peter Davis, 45, an office manager from London, standing at Parliament Square.
When asked whether Brits didn’t already settle the matter two years ago in their historic decision to leave the European Union, Davies answered, “I don’t know if people really knew what we were voting on.”
Others in the crowd said they supported Brexit, but a soft, gentle, friendly Brexit in which London would have more say over budgets or migration, but might stay in Europe’s customs union or single market — allegedly two red lines for May.
Victoria Lewis, 55, a math teacher from Brighton who wore a blue T-shirt that read “Citizen of Europe,” came out to rally “because I have three children and they need to be part of Europe. Humanity is about us cooperating, not putting up false barriers.”
There are growing fears that Britain will “crash out” of the European Union.