Sir Simon Fraser
I think we are ready to go. Thank you very much, David. So, welcome everybody, and my name’s Simon Fraser. I’m the Deputy Chairman of Chatham House. It’s my pleasure to be Chairing this event tonight, the talk by Andrew Adonis on Can and Should Brexit Be Stopped? I hope you can hear at the back. Thank you all for coming. It’s a full house, standing-room only, that’s great. A couple of procedural announcements, before we get going. First of all, just to say, this event is on the record, both the statement and the Q&A session. So, that is all on the record. You can comment by Twitter using #CHEvents, which I think is on the panel there. Can I please ask you to make sure your phones are on silent, so that you don’t disrupt the events?
Andrew is going to talk for about 20 minutes and then I will moderate the Q&A session. We’ll come back to the arrangements for that later on. I think those are all the announcements that I need to make, so let’s move forward. It’s my great pleasure to introduce Andrew Adonis, Lord Adonis. He doesn’t need a lot of introduction, I imagine, to this audience. Andrew was, of course, Minister for Education and also Secretary of State for Transport and then, more recently, Chair of the National Infrastructure Commission, which he – which role he performed until 2017, when he stood down, citing his opposition to the Government’s policy on Brexit. And since then, as I think we all know, he has been extremely active around the country campaigning against Brexit and in favour of a second vote, a people’s vote, in constituencies around the country. A very high-profile, champion of that cause.
We’ve all been talking about Brexit endlessly for two years. We are now getting to the business end of this. The really hard times are coming, in terms of the reality of Brexit. There’s an awful lot to be sorted out. The politics is hugely polarised, and it’s in that context that Andrew is running his campaign. We need open and honest debate on Brexit and Andrew is one of those people, who’s certainly giving us that, so I think we all owe him a great debt of gratitude for that.
Andrew, without further ado, I’ll invite you to take the podium and address us on the subject, Can and Should Brexit Be Stopped [applause]?
Lord Adonis
Thank you. Thank you very much, Simon. Can I – and can I thank you for hosting this? I’m told that the one place in the country where the Chatham House Rules don’t actually apply is Chatham House itself. Apparently, everything is on the record. I’m speaking on the record and now, just to warn you, I think the Q&A is on the record, too.
Now this is England so, we do banter, you know, we don’t do serious confrontation, which is just as well, ‘cause I spend many hours of my life in studios with Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg and Mr Nigel Farage and I have to survive somehow, and I have the banter down to a fine art. Particularly now with Jacob, my banter with Jacob goes roughly as follows, that when the President of France came two months ago to England, he very generously offered us the loan of the Bayeux Tapestry. I’m not quite sure why we wanted the Bayeux Tapestry, given what it celebrates, but nonetheless, we’re very grateful for it and it’s going to go on display in the British Museum next year and the President of France asked for a return gift and Her Majesty the Queen has offered the President of France, as a return gift, Jacob Rees-Mogg, and he will go on display in the Louvre, as celebrating all that is best and worst about English history, in recent centuries.
However, ‘cause you know, we meet almost weekly, at the moment. However, I have latest intelligence from the Élysée that the President has had to decline Jacob, on the grounds that the Bayeux Tapestry’s considerably more recent. So – and I could do you – I can do you Nigel Farage. I will swap my seat, in the House of Lords, for his German passport. So it goes on and on. But the issues underlying the current situation are extremely serious. We’re in a deep Brexit crisis and we need, now at this moment, a plan both to get out of it and to get beyond it, with confident national purpose submission, and I want this evening to set out a plan with three points.
First, the goal can and must be to stop Brexit entirely. Brexit is a cliff, it is not a gradient. The category mistake we’re in danger of making is to believe that some Brexits are better than others when the fundamental problem is Brexit itself.
Being on the edge of a cliff, the necessary course for us, as a country, is to step back from the edge, not to delude ourselves with ever more absurd and bizarre schemes for jumping over the edge, while clinging to a branch and hoping to find a ledge, a third or halfway down. It is now crystal clear that the fatal flaw of Brexit is the act of putting the United Kingdom outside of the European Union, its markets, its customs union, it’s institutions, it’s law, it’s leadership, it’s future. Working out what we might do, having left, is the politics of least/worst options, which is unworthy and dangerous for this nation and this people, with its European geography and it’s European destiny.
After two years now of ceaseless Brexiteering by Government and Parliament, it is a statement of fact that there is no viable Brexit plan on offer, none in sight, and that all of those mooted involve massive dislocation and ongoing uncertainty for our trade, our security, Ireland, and our whole international position as a country. Even if we could get something like a Norwegian or a Swiss option, and don’t get me going on the complexities even of those, and of course they aren’t remotely Government policy, but even if we could safely reach some Norwegian fjord or Swiss chalet, the difference between that and our present position in the EU is measured in miles and not in inches, and anything short of this is, frankly, ludicrous, as the last few weeks of Keep Calm and Carry On Battle of Britain planning for food stockpiling and transport chaos has demonstrated. So, that’s point one. We can and we must stop Brexit.
Point two, the path away from the cliff edge is for Theresa May to announce that the Government’s Brexit deal will be put to a Referendum, after it comes to Parliament at the end of the year, giving the British people the choice not to proceed and instead, to stay in the European Union. If the Prime Minister will not do this, the House of Commons should direct her, or her successor, to hold this Referendum as it has directed Monarchs and Governments, in moments of national crisis, over centuries, since Magna Carta.
There’s a lot being said at the moment about democracy and Referendum results, which must be honoured, irrespective of circumstances, but democracy is not a single event. It is a process of constant public engagement, what Clement Attlee called, “Government by discussion,” it’s why we have regular elections for multiple tiers of Government. Why Parliament has two debating chambers and dozens of committee rooms and is not simply a registry office, and why the process of enacting even most minor legislation involves numerous stages, over many months, in both Houses of Parliament, not just one vote.
So, my second point is to state clearly, that a people’s vote, to stop a Government potentially harming the people, not only accords with our constitution and traditions, but in my view, is necessitated by them. Parliament has what Gladstone said, in respect of self-government for Ireland when he proposed this in 1886, “A golden moment to resolve an imminent national calamity.” It’s true, this moment does not feel particularly golden, but nor was it when Gladstone spoke amid continuing Irish terrorism and civil insurrection, in parts of Ireland in the 1880s. His point was that “Parliament had a rare moment of autonomy in its power to act,” which is precisely where the United Kingdom is at the moment with Brexit. We have the autonomy to act now before the timetable actually to leave the EU on the 29th of March next year overwhelms us, and we lose control of events, as we surely will. Which brings me to point three. Brexit will only be stopped if Members of Parliament show courage and leadership at this moment.
If, in the historic Brexit votes to come, MPs hand their consciences to Party Whips and leave it to others to do their duty, we will most likely end up with a blind Brexit, a Wile Coyote Brexit, where we leave Europe next March, running off the edge of the cliff, without a credible plan for our national future, whatever the immediate provisions may be for stability. For this, we and our children will pay a steadily greater price in economic, diplomatic and possibly, security vulnerability until, as we surely will in the next generation either by our own initiative or through a European crisis, we once again, take our place in the European Union.
So, this is the strategy. Along with many other Parliamentarians and others, who I’ve been wrestling with this with, over many months now, it has three key components. First, Brexit can and must be stopped democratically. Second, this can and should be done by means of a people’s vote and, third, it’s the duty of all MPs, who realise that Brexit is basically wrong, to support the people’s vote and to give their frank advice to their constituents on the right course, which is to stay in the European Union.
Let me address two, crucial, follow-on points. It’s suggested by people in the shadows of our embattled Prime Minister, that the choice in any Referendum would be between her deal and something called no-deal. Something, which I should stress does not exist and has not been defined by Jacob Rees-Mogg and others, who glibly mouth the words, no-deal, because it isn’t remotely viable to exit the EU next March, with no Treaty governing the hundreds of issues, from aviation to food safety, vital to the life of this country.
The fact is, it’s Parliament, which, if it calls a Referendum, will also decide the question, and the only viable question, assuming that the Prime Minister succeeds in negotiating a draft Treaty, is to put that draft to the people. I suggest it’s sent to every household, as was done with the Good Friday Agreement in the 1998 Referendum in Northern Ireland, and for the people to judge, on a case made factually and fairly by both sides, whether they think the Prime Minister’s Treaty is preferable to the benefits we currently gain, from membership of the European Union.
The second follow-on point is about timing. The same people, in the Number 10 shadows, say we have run out of time to hold a Referendum, but this, too, is incorrect. It’s true that it may now be difficult to legislate for and to hold a Referendum before next March, but Lord Kerr, very much of this parish, who drafted and negotiated Article 50, and other European leaders privately, have made it clear that any requests by the United Kingdom to extend the Article 50 timeframe for the bona fide purpose of holding a Referendum as opposed to an extension of further adventures in Wonderland, would almost certainly be granted because the European Union is, above all, an association of democracies. That, of course, is one of the reasons why it is so strong and so successful.
It has always respected the democratic processes of member states, reaching decisions on treaties and policies, and no-one seriously believes it’s going to do otherwise, on the most momentous decision, by a member state, since its creation, 61 years ago. So, I see the correct path ahead very clearly, as a people’s vote. I also believe that we would win such a vote, if it was held. I think we’d win it by a large margin, not least because younger voters will very likely vote heavily against Brexit, and I wold expect younger voters, whose future is literally at stake, to turn out to vote in record numbers. I suspect they might vote in numbers as large as the over 60s, and that’ll be the first time that’s happened, in a recent election.
But that of course, presupposes that there is such a vote, and it’s touch and go whether that will happen. Now, we are a great democracy, but it is impossible to warn too strongly that it is not foreordained that we will get through the next six months to next March, without committing an act of massive, national self-harm. Democracies, when badly led, and we have been very badly led, can and do make grievous mistakes and sometimes, people have to pay grievously in their livelihoods and even their lives, and yes, that does include England, this throne of kings, this sceptre dial, this Earth of Majesty, the seat of Mars, this other Eden, demi-paradise set in a silver sea, the passage of Shakespeare’s Richard II, which of course, is a play about the destruction of a throne of Kings. Part of the reason I’m so concerned that we might get it badly wrong is that we have – and this is, I know, a bit countercultural to our national story, but it needs to be said, that we have got it so badly wrong, so often in the past.
There have been six deep and prolonged crises of the British State, in the last 150 years, since we became something approaching a democracy. We failed, as Britain democratised in the late 19th Century, to put the Government of Ireland on a liberal footing, within the United Kingdom. We failed to halt the drift into the cataclysmic events of the First World War, without any viable plan or policy. In the 1930s, we failed, through appeasement, to stop a second even more bloody war with Germany in just 20 years. Then, the 1960s, the state failed to manage industrial relations effectively, which led to nearly 20 years of chronic industrial unrest, involving the fall of three successive Governments: Wilson’s, Heath’s and Callaghan’s and vast human misery, across Britain, up to and beyond the end of the Miners’ Strike in 1985. That is four prolonged crises and the fifth is now, the rupturing of our membership of the European Union, which has been progressive, since Margaret Thatcher’s Bruges speech delivered almost 30 years ago to the day, in which she essentially declared war on the European Union, bringing us by highways and byways, to the brink of Brexit today.
My critical and very sombre reflection on all this is that in three of the four crisis I have just mentioned, until the present one, Government and Parliament failed to take the right decisions in time to prevent the crisis spiralling out of control. Thus, it was that in 1886 the House of Commons narrowly rejected Gladstone’s Home Rule Bill because the Liberal Party split on the principle of a devolved Parliament for Ireland, with terrible consequences, throughout the 20th Century for Ireland and the entire British Isles. Thus, it was that in 1914, the drift into cataclysmic European War went unchecked in Parliament, partly in a double-tragedy, because Prime Minister Asquith was pre-occupied in the key month of July 1914, with a civil emergency in Ulster, created by the Conservative Party, fighting Irish Home Rule, not only in Parliament, but through military mutiny in Ulster and doing so, in opposition to the fifth Irish Home Rule Bill in 30 years or, to be more precise, in 28 years, because the 30th Anniversary of the Commons’ rejection of the Home Rule Bill in 1886 was in 1916, the year of the Easter Rising in Dublin and the start of a full Civil War in Ireland, right in the middle of the First World War.
As for the crisis in industrial relations in the 1960s and beyond, in 1969, Harold Wilson’s Cabinet split fatefully on Barbara Castle’s In place of Strife plan for bringing industrial relations within a democratic legal framework and the upshot, for nearly two decades, was year-after-year of widespread national strikes and bitter industrial strife and intimidation. Many of us here, who grew up in the 1960s and 70s, incredibly accepted as normal an intermittently functioning economy, beleaguered by strikes, just as we got used to IRA bombs going off, not only in Northern Ireland, but in Oxford Street and in Regent’s Park. So let no-one doubt Parliament’s capacity to get big decisions very wrong, with dire, long-term consequences. Moreover, when fatefully wrong decisions are taken, the results are often worse, far worse than even the pessimists predicted at the time, as they were in Ireland, on the Somme, under Hitler’s tyranny and in the successive Miners’ Strikes of the 1970s and the 1980s.
I was travelling around Ireland by train, three weeks ago. I go everywhere by train, and I could deliver a whole lecture much more passionate on Ireland’s trains than on the politics and Government of Ireland, but I watched on the television, in an Irish pub, as Leo Varadkar received the Pope in a very moving ceremony in Dublin Castle.
Dublin Castle is where the Court Marshals and summary executions took place in 1916, after the Irish Republic was proclaimed in Dublin’s General Post Office. I visited the Post Office, when I got to Dublin. On the wall, are these words of Seamus Heaney, “History says, don’t hope on this side of the grave, but then, once in a lifetime, the longed for tidal wave of justice can rise up and hope and history rhyme.” That is the desperate situation into which our Parliament allowed Ireland to descend by decisions taken and not taken over a generation.
Now, the observant amongst you may have noticed, I said there were six prolonged crises of the British State in the past 150 years. I’ve, so far discussed, four and mentioned a fifth, appeasement in the 1930s, to which I’ll return. What’s the sixth? The sixth is a case of prolonged crisis where seriously wrong decisions were taken at the outset, but where, by good fortune and wise leadership, they were put right, two years’ later, and the upshot was, long-run benefits far greater than those predicted by optimists, such as the dynamics of getting big decisions right and wrong.
I refer, of course, to the saga of British non-Membership and then Membership of what became the European Union in the 1950s, 1960s and the 1970s. You know the story, Atlee and Bevan’s decision not to join the European Coal and Steel Community in 1951, because the Durham Miners won’t wear it. The equally fateful decision not to sign the Treaty of Rome six years’ later. Macmillan’s desperate bid to reverse this error in 1961, vetoed by de Gaulle. Wilson’s repeat in 1967, also vetoed by de Gaulle. Success by Heath at the third attempt in 1971, upheld in the 1975 Referendum.
The lessons crucial for our national debate, I suggest, are first, that out of the EU it will be a nightmare to get back in. Last time, it took us a decade of feverish diplomacy by Simon’s predecessors, even with Prime Ministers and Parliaments overwhelmingly committed to the cause, and that was negotiating with the European Union of six. Think what it’s going to be like, in the fractured politics of post-Brexit, where even when and if there’s a Government intent on re-joining the EU, we have to negotiate with an EU of perhaps 30, with the memory of our traumatic departure etched in red.
However, the bigger point to make, and let me make it because it’s so rarely made, it was never made two years ago and we’ve got to carry on making it now, if we’re going towards a people’s vote, is that after the initial missteps, our membership of the EU has been an overwhelming success. Because of the long shadow of Margaret Thatcher and a culture of constant belittling of and lying about Brussels, we constantly lose sight of the fact that our 45 years’ membership of the EU and the 70 years’ of the European Union’s rise in operation, have been arguably, the most successful decades, both in the history of this country and in the history of Europe.
70 years of peace, in all of the states belonging to the EU, the only 70 years of peace, in the history of Europe, 70 years of near universal growth and growing general prosperity across Europe, the only 70 years in the history, of this continent, when that’s happened, too. It’s very telling, to my mind, that the four catastrophes I set out earlier, all predate, or in the case of industrial strife started, before our joining of the European Union in 1973. Our international security, our trade and economic dynamism, our relations with Ireland and the position of Ireland, itself, North and South, have been vastly improved by the success of the EU, a success to which Britain has so largely contributed, not least through forging of the single market by none other than Margaret Thatcher before Jacques Delors came along, as President of the European Commission, and led her to fantasise that he was going to impose Marxism from Brussels.
Now, you know the statistics. 45% of our trade is with the EU, 15% is with more than 70 countries with which the EU has free trade agreements, including most recently, Japan and Canada. No-one understood the potential of all this better than Margaret Thatcher herself. This is Margaret Thatcher in 1988, very shortly before her Bruges Speech, “How we meet the challenge of the single market will be a major factor, possibly the major factor in our competitive position in Europe and world markets into the 21st Century. Getting it right needs a partnership between Government and business.”
That was Margaret Thatcher, 1988. Boris Johnson, 2018, “Fuck business,” I mean, that’s where we’ve moved to, as a country, over the course of those 30 years. And to stress, all of the treaties and laws involved in Membership of the European Union, were freely enacted by our Sovereign Parliament as a free democratic member of a free democratic European Union, much of it under the single market programme, but far beyond the economic realm. I never cease to be amazed at the further instances of what Brexit might cost us. The low point of the 150 hours spent with Bob and others in the House of Lords debating the EU Withdrawal Act, almost as long as Liam Fox’s circumnavigations of the Globe, in his quest for the easiest trade deal in history, was when it became apparent that leaving the European Union, wait for it, means losing the intricate legal basis for stopping cross-border child abductions, which are surprisingly common, after marriage breakdowns, and have been sharply reduced in number, thanks to European Law, and the automatic and immediate enforcement in all jurisdictions of one member state court’s, instructions on child return.
When this came up in the Lords, and no-on has an answer to how it’s going to be sorted out in any short period of time. A pro-Brexit peer said, in so many words, “That more child abductions was a price worth paying for liberation from Brussels.” I have never seen the House of Lords so angry. Whatever the instruction, from the British of people was, on the 23rd of June 2016, it was not that nor the 100s of other things now happening from the collapse of our space programme to the wholesale relocation of jobs, agencies and companies, from Britain to the Continent.
There are three other immense dimensions to the success of Brexit and conversely, to the dangers it may soon – we may soon be facing, which I just want to set out to get the arguments clear. The first is, Britain’s security and international influence, the Mission of Chatham House. Because Brexit is economically damaging in whatever form, the line being pedalled by many wavering Conservative MPs, in persuading themselves to go along with whatever Mrs May proposes, is that you can separate out economy and security and say, “Don’t worry, we’ll be safe with NATO.”
Now, crucially, NATO itself doesn’t take this view. Jan Stoltenberg, the former Norwegian Prime Minister who’s Secretary of General of NATO, constantly points out that if the EU – if the UK leaves the EU, 80% of the military resources of NATO will be outside the EU, yet, the EU’s security and foreign policy institutions are vital instruments of the Atlantic Alliance and of course, almost all the Members of NATO, vulnerable to attack from Russia, are small European states.
But if these international perils weren’t clear enough two years ago, the 27 months since the 2016 Referendum, Trump, Putin, Salisbury, Orbán, Salvini, the far-right AfD becoming Germany’s main opposition party are flashing red lights. And for an exhibition, just in the past week alone of the corruption of our foreign policy by Brexit and how economy and security can’t be compartmentalised, look at last week’s vote by the Conservative Party in the European Parliament to back Viktor Orbán, alongside Latvian Fascists, the French National Front and the German AfD against every mainstream European party of left and right. Britain’s Prime Minister is no longer prepared to criticise rising fascism in a European state because its leader’s support may be needed for Brexit.
Now, Churchill had something to say about this. Remember the far away country, of whom we know nothing, in 1938? That was the one next door to Hungary, and this is not only shameful, it’s also deeply damaging to Britain’s true interests. Orbán today. What price, Salvini tomorrow and who knows, Putin the day after.
Next Ireland. Now, as I say, I’ve spent a good deal of time in Ireland, in recent months, and Ireland is a phenomenal European success story, North and South. The Ireland of today is socially and politically almost unrecognisable from de Valera and Northern Ireland too, is hugely transformed since the end of the troubles. As I toured Belfast, Derry and the border, people kept pointing out to me where the checkpoints were, where the border posts were, where the Army helicopters used to land ‘cause it was too dangerous for the Amy to move around by road. Where people were killed by bombs and boobytraps. Now, the border is detectable by only different colour road signs along the road. The Barracks have largely gone and in Derry City Centre, the Barracks have been converted into cafes and nightclubs.
Now, Ireland is, to my mind, the Achilles’ heel of Brexit because what the Irish North and South want to change is precisely nothing, in terms of membership of the European Union and that also, is the British Government’s formal, agreed position in respect of Northern Ireland because of the Good Friday Agreement, the fruit of stunning statesmanship by John Major and Tony Blair.
Crucially, in the European negotiations leading to the UK and the EU’s joint report last December, which began the process of formal negotiations, the Prime Minister accepted the necessity of a backstop, in respect of Northern Ireland, whereby if new border or customs controls affect Great Britain after Brexit, Northern Ireland will remain subject to European law and customs and trade provisions to ensure full regulatory alignment.
Now, Mrs May struggled hard to avoid a commitment to such alignments, and to the backstop, but she had no choice, for two reasons. The Good Friday Agreement and the reality that that the Republic of Ireland would simply have vetoed any European Union negotiating position that did not guarantee that there would be no new border. Now, as I said, Mrs May struggled hard against these provisions, so much so that when she was in Belfast last month, she rhetorically disowned the backstop, but I very much doubt that Mrs May will, in fact, fail to honour the Irish backstop, in any Brexit Treaty, not least because of the very vocal concerns raised by the Police Service of Northern Ireland, about what would happen without it.
The Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland said last week “That any different customs and tariff regimes between North and South in Ireland, would be a smugglers’ charter,” and smugglers and paramilitaries of course, have always gone hand-in-hand on the Irish border, but the call to ignore Ireland is disgracefully, now par for the course amongst Brexiters. Nigel Farage, when I debated with him last week, told me that concerns about the Irish Border were entirely got up by Barnier and that anyway, Ireland was a tiddly country.
Now, I don’t want to elaborate on this, except simply to say that I do regard Ireland as the Achilles’ heel of Brexit, which is going gangrenous, and I suspect it may be the thing that finally makes Brexit impossible, and there is nothing more important to the domestic and foreign policy of this country than doing nothing whatever that jeopardises the position of Ireland.
The third Brexit dimension is of course, Great Britain itself. Now, the truth is that, in the last 45 years, Britain would’ve been far worse off outside the EU, but in the last ten years, in particular, since the financial crash and living standards have stagnated or dropped, this has become layered upon a deep and growing sense of alienation, particularly in England outside London, where there is still no devolution worth the name and there is deep frustration and anger.
Now, from my extensive rail travels around Leave England, in recent months, it’s clear to me that if the question on the ballot paper, two years ago, had been, do you want a fundamental change in the Government of England or do you want an end to austerity? There would’ve been overwhelming yes votes to both of those propositions, but the only question on the ballot was, do you want to leave the European Union? An act, which if it happens, will in fact make it harder to do almost everything that people really want, in terms of devolution and improved services, including the NHS.
Now, Will Hutton and I discuss all this in our book, Saving Britain, available in all good bookshops for 8.99. It’s central message is Change Britain, Don’t Brexit. But we also face head-on the issue of immigration, which was a major factor in the Referendum, and we simply can’t get away from that fact. We argue the case for ID cards replacing National Insurance cards, so that we know who is legally in the country, who is legally working, and being paid legally, and who’s eligible for access to public services. We also argue for a new Migration Impact Fund, so that local communities are properly funded to meet the costs of new and larger migrant communities, and we also argue for our full participation in EU law, which for example, in Belgium, requires migrants to register immediately on arrival and leave within three months, if they don’t have the means to support themselves. All these things are doable, within the existing EU structure, and we should be putting in place the arrangements to do them, if we face a people’s vote.
Now, in all these ways, we need to make the case for the EU, with coherence and with passion, why it’s so strongly in the interests of Britain, of Ireland, of our security and our prosperity and our whole future. I want finally, though, to return to arguably, the greatest of the crisis, I mentioned at the outset of this lecture. The trauma of appeasement in the last 1930s, when the effects of a seriously mistaken policy were to be experienced sometime after the key mistakes had been made.
Now, May 1940 and the replacement of Chamberlain by Churchill is also the supreme instance of Parliament in fact getting it right in the nick of time, and in this, it’s perhaps the shining example for MPs, as they prepare for the Brexit votes to come. Now, on the events, hugely important events, for the whole history of this country of May 1940, I cannot recommend too highly, a recent book by Nicola Shakespeare, Six Minutes in May, an account of Chamberlain’s fall through the prism of the critical vote at the end of the House of Commons’ debate on the fall of Norway in May 1940, the six minutes being the time allowed for MPs to file through the division lobby. It was in this crucial division that 39 Government MPs voted with Labour, which together with as many abstentions, made Chamberlain’s position untenable and brought Churchill to power. Now, I draw two lessons from Nicola Shakespeare’s book, Six Minutes in May and reflecting on it.
First, it is possible, by action in Parliament, to reconstitute a Government, in a time of crisis and fundamentally, change its policy. But for the Norway debate and vote, Chamberlain would’ve survived and there would almost certainly have been an armistice with Germany, after the fall of France, a month later. But the second lesson is that it was an unbelievably close-run thing. Clement Atlee, as leader of the opposition, didn’t even decide to call a vote at the end of the Norway debate until the morning of the second day of the debate, because until then, he thought that any vote would simply consolidate Chamberlain’s position, since no Tory MP had rebelled in any previous Parliamentary vote on appeasement or the conduct of the war, even after the Munich Agreements when Churchill delivered what, in retrospect, was the most devastating indictment of appeasement. There were no Tory rebels and even Churchill himself abstained, partly from the very real fear of deselection in his Epping Constituency. What persuaded Atlee to vote against Chamberlain at the last minute was the brave action of a group of young Conservative MPs, many of whom had been fighting at the front and one of whom went to see him on the night of the first day of the debate and told him that “The war could not be won with Chamberlain and that a group of Tories were prepared to vote against the Government.”
This persuaded Atlee who, thereafter, led the opposition with his customary precision. Now, back to today. I hope that Jeremy Corbyn rises to the level of Clement Atlee and that Tory MPs will be in a similarly significant position and act accordingly, in the votes leading up Brexit. But I just want to make one final point. My political hero, Roy Jenkins, told me about the Norway debate first-hand because his father, Arthur Jenkins, was Atlee’s Parliamentary Private Secretary at the time and he, Roy, sat in the Gallery for the debate. He said that Churchill’s supreme qualities were confidence, optimism and leadership. He used to quote the famous lines of another Irish poet, W B Yeats, on the problem of politics in the 1930s, “Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold. The best lack all conviction, whilst the worst are full of passionate intensity.” Yeats was so right and so right today. We need the case for the European Union to be made with confidence, optimism and leadership. We need the best, not the worst to be full of passionate intensity, and it needs to happen now. Thank you very much [applause].
Sir Simon Fraser
Now, ladies and gentlemen, if you carry on applauding, we won’t have any time for questions. Andrew, thank you so much, that was a very powerful statement. You argued that we need coherence and passion and you gave us coherence and passion this evening. You set out very clearly your view that Brexit has to be stopped entirely, it’s not about damage limitation. You made a very strong case for the need for courage and political leadership. You gave us examples where that leadership has not been shown in the past and the consequences of that. You highlighted the economic and non-economic consequences of Brexit in your view, and you ended with a rousing call for conviction. Thank you very much for that. I’m sure that there are going to be many questions in the audience.
If I may, I’m going to start with one myself, before I go to the floor, if you’ll forgive me, audience, and that is this. You placed a very strong emphasis in your statement on the importance of Parliament and leadership in Parliament and Parliamentarians taking their responsibility, but the people’s vote is going to be the vote of the people and you said also, that you were convinced that if such a vote took place, there would be a very strong majority in favour of remaining in the European Union. And I wonder if you could say two things. First of all, could you say a bit more about your evidence for making that assertion and, secondly, could you answer the point that concerns me, and I’ve heard from other commentators that people may favour a second vote in principle, but they’re very worried about how divisive and, really, potentially, vicious a campaign could be and therefore, they’re nervous about that.
Lord Adonis
Well, I’m very nervous too, about the divisiveness and let’s be clear, I mean, this has been one of the most divisive things that’s happened to us, as a country. But the only thing worse than holding a people’s vote, in my view, is not holding one because the consequences of us crashing out, not least in the public and deep public bitterness there’ll be when people appreciate the consequences, over the immediate future, but certainly, over four, five, six years, I think will be very great and I think this could lead to really serious, further instability in our politics. So, I don’t in any way minimise the impact of a vote, in terms of what’s going to be a very, very difficult public debate. I just think the consequences of not doing it are greater.
On the interplay between Parliament and the people, we are – never forget, we are a Parliamentary democracy. The supreme political institution of this country is the House of Commons. What the House of Commons decides is what happens. The reason we had the Referendum is because the House of Commons voted for it. So, the crucial first stage to getting the people’s vote is for the House of Commons to vote for it. It cannot happen any other way. We do not have a Constitution, as in Switzerland and some other countries, what’s called a Power of Initiative, which is people themselves to require a Referendum to be held. So, the House of Commons has to vote it and as I say, I think that is going to be a very close-run thing, very close and public pressure is going to be hugely important in bringing that about.
Why am I so confident that we can win the Referendum itself, though? Because I’m absolutely confident, from my travels up and down the country, that the young are going to come out as never before in the electoral history of this country. They are – all the polls show, all my meetings show they are overwhelmingly opposed to Brexit and they have this classic combination, which is what’s so powerful in politics, of altruism. I mean, they believe in the internationalist and the European ideal, but also, massive self-interest. You know, as somebody, a student put it to me, in a recent meeting I was at, “I do not want to be shut up on a small island with Jacob Rees-Mogg, Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson,” that is where the young are. They do not want borders. They want to be able to live, love and work across Europe. They rightly understand that Brexit can only damage their capacity to do that. They have careers to forge, over the next 50, 60, 70, if they become Members of the House of Lords, which adds to your life expectancy, 80 or 90 years, and they absolutely don’t want this to happen.
Now I think the turnout, I mean, the registration, ‘cause a lot of young people aren’t registered because of complexities to do with the modern registration system, but we won’t go there, and I think registration will shoot-up, I think turn out will shoot-up. The young are organising amongst the young, indeed, there are many of them here this evening. I have no doubt at all, I have complete confidence that we will win this, people’s vote, if we get it. The problem is, to be blunt, is persuading marginal Conservative MPs, who it’s a hugely difficult thing for them to vote against the Whip and cause difficulties for the Prime Minister, to vote for the people’s vote in that crucial division.
Sir Simon Fraser
Thank you very much. Now, we have only just over a quarter of an hour, so I’m going to go straight to the audience, and if you don’t mind, I’m going to take questions two at a time, so that we can move forward. Can I remind you this is on the record? Also, of course, this is an issue on which people have very strong views. Could I please ask you for questions, not statements, and brief questions, so that we can get as many in as possible, and when you ask the question, the microphones will come round, could you please introduce yourself. So, I will go round the room to try to get a range of questions. I’m going to start right at the back and then I’m going to come here.
Member
Hi, I hope I’m allowed to ask this. What do you think is Jacob’s motivation for all of this, Jacob Rees-Mogg?
Lord Adonis
Goodness, where do I start?
Sir Simon Fraser
Sorry, we’re going to take two.
Lord Adonis
Yeah, okay.
Sir Simon Fraser
Roger.
Roger Liddle
Roger Liddle. How, Andrew, do you think we overcome the official Labour position that if the Treaty is defeated, there should be a General Election, which of course, is guaranteed to make sure the Conservative MPs will vote for Theresa May?
Lord Adonis
Well, I can ask Jacob. I’m trying to get to debate with Jacob on no-deal at the moment because he and I have been corresponding. He with quill pen, me in – by email. But we’ve been corresponding on what no-deal is because, as I said, no-deal itself doesn’t exist, so what does he actually mean by no-deal? What is it that he’s proposing? He has been reluctant to debate with me on it, but when he does debate with me, I’m going to him what his motivation is. I will tell him I’ve been asked, in Chatham House, what his mo – and I will then report back to you ‘cause I’m afraid I can’t – that’s beyond my paygrade, to answer that at the moment.
On Labour and the election, of course Jeremy Corbyn wants an election because of course, what he wants to do is replace the present Government. So what I’m assuming will happen, in the key votes, is that the first vote will be on a vote to dissolve Parliament, or some equivalent to that. It’s possible, of course, who knows what’s going to happen, that that could be carried, though, I think it’s unlikely, but all we need to see is that if that fails, then that the next vote, which is I think the more credible one, in terms of the Parliamentary arithmetic is on the people’s vote.
Now, as Roger knows better than anyone there’s a massive groundswell of opinion in the Labour Party, crucially including the Trade Unions, who really did move in a big way, over last weekend, because they understand the importance of this for living standards and jobs, in favour of the people’s vote, and I think that will weigh heavily with Jeremy Corbyn.
Sir Simon Fraser
Okay and thanks. Can we just go one back there and then the lady in the middle there?
Domenic Carratu
Domenic Carratu. You mentioned about the need for confidence, optimism and leadership and that the battle will be in the House of Commons, so would you be tempted, personally, to follow Lord Benn, or Anthony Benn, resign the Lordship and fight in the Commons?
Sir Simon Fraser
That’s the first one. You’ve got time to reflect on that.
Edith Greaves
Hi, my name’s Edith Greaves and I am a young person, but I also worked on driving young turnout for the Remain Campaign by encouraging voter registration amongst young people which, as they move around, is very difficult. And one of the things that we got wrong was assuming that turnout, amongst young people, was automatically going to – that they were going to vote remain, and I think my question is, how do you convince people, because obviously, you know, as you say, it wasn’t about actual EU membership, it was about so many other things, like immigration control and a changing economy, and all this stuff that then got boiled-up into this big mess that we’re in, and how do we unpick that mess and have a clear message that says, “Look, the EU was a byword for a lot of anger and frustration about a lot of things,” and how do we make that into a series of conversations about immigration, about the economy, and about young people?
Lord Adonis
Oh, well, there’s…
Sir Simon Fraser
Tony Benn and then…
Lord Adonis
Well, on that – the very, very amusing thing is that the latest, the successor to – when Tony died, the current Viscount Stansgate is, I’m told, very keen to come to the House of Lords. So, maybe we can do some kind of swap, but the – but of course, this is all going to be sorted out in the next two months and there aren’t going to be by-elections, and all that. So this is going to be the current group of Parliamentarians who’ll have to decide this and it’s very important that you engage with them, in your constituencies, because they’re going to be the crucial agents.
On the making of the argument, the difficulty with the argument is, of course, that those making the argument won’t have control of policy, we’re not the Government. I mean, we’ll be in opposition and I’m very wary about making promises that can’t be delivered. So I certainly don’t think we should make any promises contingent upon renegotiating of any European treaties because I think that that would be a real hostage to fortune. The big thing, we do need to show that we understand the wider-context and debate. I think that’s hugely important and in particular, we need to get out of London a lot. I mean, most of the meetings and engagement I do is out of London and frankly, that’s hugely important, but the big missing link, I think in the campaign two years ago, the huge missing link, was that we did not make the positive case for Europe itself.
There is a massive positive argument to be made for Europe. We never made it. On the contrary, so unfortunately overwhelmed, had the Conservative Party, including David Cameron himself been by 30 years of the drip-by-drip of UKIP, Thatcher and all of that, that they were almost embarrassed to admit we were members of this organisation, and I’ve just – the other book I’ve done, in the last few months, is edited a collection of essays on Prime Ministers in Europe, since Churchill, dedicated to the memory of Winston Churchill, who saved Europe and inspired the European Union. And Sir Ivan Rogers did the essay on David Cameron, which was a great revelation to me, because I hadn’t realised that David Cameron, properly understood, was as close as it was possible to be to a Brexiter, whilst actually still favouring us just about remaining in the European Union.
He spent his whole time – what happened with the Referendum was not an abhorrent act. He’d spent all of the previous three years trying renegotiate everything in sight, trying to trade-off the stability pact and the measures that was essential to take to stabilise the euro, with further opt-outs, that was everything to do with UK financial services, and all of that. So this was an accident waiting to happen. It was an accident waiting to happen, in terms of what had been happening in the Conservative Party and UKIP, all the way through. But it was also, I’m afraid, an accident waiting to happen, in terms of David Cameron himself.
Now, in the other book, Saving Britain that I’ve done, the chapter on the politics of this, after having researched it and reflected on it, I entitled how Mr Farage became Leader of the Conservative Party, because to all intents and purposes that is what had happened by 2014/15, particularly in 2014, when UKIP topped the poll, in the European Elections and David Cameron was running really scared that there might be a massive UKIP surge, in the 2015 Election, which is why he doubled-down on the Referendum commitment and felt he had to deliver it immediately after the election.
So, we cannot go there again. We cannot, as a country, continue to be half-in-half-out and depending on who’s making the argument, more out than in. We have got to make an unashamed, positive, principled, passionate argument for a Europe which has done this country no end of good, over the last 45 years, and we will bitterly regret, if we take this decision, to alienate ourselves from our leading international partners, our leading international markets, and our leading sources of international stability. We need to be making the argument in those terms and as I say, it can’t start soon enough.
Sir Simon Fraser
Very good. One here in the middle – two in the middle, actually, if I just take these two, and then I’ll just go to the back, and this gentleman here.
Sir Peter Westmacott
And thank you, Peter Westmacott. Andrew, thank you for that. If, in the meaningful vote, which the Government reluctantly conceded, and Members of Parliament do, do what you suggest and decide that they will vote for the people to consulted before we jump over the cliff, as you put it, what will be the question on the order paper? What will be the question on the Referendum? Is it a binary question or will there be two or three questions? How would you boil it all down to one simple question put to the people of this country?
Sir Simon Fraser
Can we just pass the mic to the one behind, thanks?
Member
Yes, in a similar kind of vein, it sounded to me that the central argument you made is that we needed to get the MPs to vote to stop Brexit, effectively. Do you think there are enough people that have an interest in what you have to say that would use all the social media platforms available to them, to address their MPs, their Constituency MPs to vote that way?
Lord Adonis
On Peter’s question first, Parliament will, of course, decide the question. My own view, but it’s only my view and MPs will have to decide this, is that it’s very hard to have anything other than a binary choice, in a Referendum. But I also think there are only two credible choices, which face the country anyway. I think there is, whatever Theresa May negotiates as against staying in, this theoretical option of no-deal hasn’t been defined and my challenge, to Jacob and Boris and Co ,would be, before you can even consider whether anything could go on the ballot paper, which is a third option, they have got to define it. I don’t believe it can be defined and I don’t believe they would and knowing Boris as I do, I think he would wriggle out of committing himself to anything anyway, at the end. And if he’s not prepared to do it, since he’s the guy who’s going to be going round with whatever he has on the side of the bus next time, then we certainly can’t agree to it. So, I think it will come down to a binary choice.
In terms of influencing MPs? Well, quite a few MPs are actually on Twitter now. I’m not sure how many do their own Twitter accounts, but some of them do. Quite a few of these Tories, who are quite keen to be in the running for this and that job in the succession to Theresa May, are on Twitter too, and well, actually, one of them, who I’ve been engaging with intensively, ‘cause I take the view that I don’t actually troll people on Twitter, unless they’re very important, on the grounds that if – I mean, it’s probably quite useful for me to troll people. So I had a jolly good go at the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee at the House of Common, who’s now dubbed me The Ermine-clad Troll, he’s called me, which is a huge badge of honour. That’s right up there, alongside Jacob saying I’m a caveman, and other prize insults, but he said to me, “But do you troll everyone?” And I said, “No, only Chairs of influential House of Commons Committees, who actually should know better than supporting Brexit.”
So, I think piling in on these people is very, very important and after all, they’re public figures. I mean, provided – I mean, it should be polite and all that, but they’re absolutely open and should be to being tackled by social media, and it does have an impact and, frankly, the more of it the better and the more organised it is the better, and the more young people who do it because they’ll see lots of potential voters and all of that, who do it the better too.
Sir Simon Fraser
I saw you on Twitter saying that you wanted to be – considered the most annoying person on Twitter yesterday. There’s some tough competition.
Lord Adonis
Hmmm, yeah, and then, apparently, I – well, amongst the Leavers, I’m only the fifth most annoying.
Sir Simon Fraser
Yeah, that’s right. Very disappointing.
Lord Adonis
So, I’ve got to try and get further up there.
Sir Simon Fraser
And I’ve got someone at the front, but I want to go back to be democratic and I will come back to the front. But the gentleman right at the back with the glasses.
John Krause
Thank you. My name’s John Krause. I’ve got two children nearing the end of education and they’re dismayed by Brexit and utterly appalled with the political leadership in this country to deal with it. So, my question is, do you think that the European leadership, the European Politicians can help in any way? Can they provide an olive branch and, if so, what might it be?
Sir Simon Fraser
Okay and one at the front here, please.
John Preston
My name is John Preston. I’m a student of European History in Chatham House. My concern is in two ways. Germany and Japan pulled out of the League of Nations and the consequences were very serious. The language of Brexiteers is in a similar direction, where is that direction taking us?
Sir Simon Fraser
Good question, and two good questions.
Lord Adonis
Well, I don’t think anyone else is going to go near Brexit. I think, actually, I think we have done a controlled laboratory experiment on why it’s a pretty bad idea. So – and as I say, I think what will happen if we do leave is that a political movement will begin very quickly. I think probably the day after we leave to take us back in again. This idea that somehow leaving next March is going to resolve this issue, I mean, it can’t change our geography, it can’t change our economics, it can’t change our security. All of these issues still continue. My view, at the moment, and it’s an issue I’ve discussed with Roger, who’s as passionate as I am on these issues, is if we go into a, whatever’s it’s called, an implementation period, or whatever title it’s given, which is basically the status quo, but without a seat around the table of the Council of Ministers, which is, of course, roughly the position of the Irish backstop as well. If we go into that position, the easiest thing to do, when it becomes clear that we can’t negotiate anything sensible afterwards, is simply to go back in again.
This actually has – Jacob and Co have realised this, which is part of the reason why they’re determined to create waste and destruction all around them. But it’s not actually possible to do it because all of the changes that’ll need to be made mean there have to be some implementation period. So, actually, the issue of re-entering is going to remain absolutely at the top of the agenda for quite some time to come, and my own view is, it won’t be finally resolved until we either go right back in again or until we do adopt a status, which is a very, very similar to a Norway or a Switzerland, which means that we’re in, but for political reasons, we can’t actually have a seat around the table, which I think would be a bad position, but it’s hugely far removed from where we are at the moment.
Sorry I’ve forgotten the…
Sir Simon Fraser
The question at the back, was about whether…
John Preston
An olive branch.
Sir Simon Fraser
…an olive branch would come from the other side to help us?
Lord Adonis
No, no. Well, they’re doing exactly the right thing. No European leader that I’ve seen, apart from Mr Salvini, has said that they think Brexit is a good idea, and every European leader has said that they want us to stay and they’ve gone out of their way to be accommodating. Frankly, that’s all that we can ask. We certainly don’t need Europe, other European leaders coming and trying to sell Europe to us. We have got to sort this out ourselves. This is a problem made in Britain, it needs to be sorted in Britain, and if we’re not capable, frankly, of sorting out our own big political crisis, we can’t really expect our European friends to come in and help us. Indeed, I can’t think what they could do. I mean, let’s be clear, everything it was possible to opt of, we have opted out of, in the last 30 years, apart from the actual central institutions of trade.
My view, but it’s a subject for another day, is that we opted out of far too much. It’s part of the reason why we’re in this position, unfortunately, after Thatcher, as part of the impact of Thatcher, instead of a, be at the heart of Europe strategy, which we had right up to, and including, Thatcher herself, we then developed an opt-out strategy, which I think was a fatal mistake, and I think my – the leader for whom I worked, Tony Blair didn’t, it wasn’t his finest hour, the degree to which we kept out of things European. So there’s not much more they can do. We have to sort this out ourselves. We’re perfectly capable of doing so, whether we do or not I don’t think is going to depend upon what our European friends do.
Sir Simon Fraser
Okay and we’re coming to the end. We’re a bit short of time. I’m going to, if I may, take three more questions, very quickly, if you’ll indulge me of five minutes overrun, and then I think we’ll have to draw it to a close. There’s a gentleman there. There’s a lady here, and there’s one at the back in the corner.
Eeraj Bagazardi
My name is Eeraj Bagazardi. You’ve made a very compelling case for your position and I think most people in this room would agree with it, as do I, but do you not feel that the Brexit case is capable of being made much more attractively than the Remainer case, and with phrases like regaining our sovereignty and making our own laws and keeping immigrants out and blah, blah, blah, and all that sort of stuff, all of that – all of those sorts of words have resonance, and I wonder whether the Remain case is being made aggressively enough and with enough passion in order to, in effect, counter those points? And have the remaining people adequately taken into the account the expertise of advertising, the advertising industry and the public relations industry, and so on and so forth, to get help from those people, in order to make this case much more compelling?
Sir Simon Fraser
Okay, let’s hold onto that one, are we making the case effectively?
Member
Well, in a sense, that’s a – this is a follow-on from that because…
Sir Simon Fraser
Would you mind introducing yourself?
Susan Schoenfeld Harrington
Oh sorry, Susan Schoenfeld Harrington. With all the money that Arron Banks put in that’s supposedly in – some say come from Russian sources, etc., do you think that’s something that can be prevented from happening in any future people’s vote?
Sir Simon Fraser
Fine, and one in the corner. There was somebody right at the back.
Anthony Dunn
Yeah, thanks, Anthony Dunn. I’m completely on the line to anybody. Okay, the People’s Vote, assuming that you can – that this does actually happen that Parliament can have its arms twisted to have it happen, Dominic Cummings and Matthew Elliott, the two most malevolent and odious miscreants in the body politic in this country, no, I don’t like them, my views, not Chatham House’s, these two…
Sir Simon Fraser
Questions and not statements.
Anthony Dunn
Yes, these two…
Sir Simon Fraser
No, I like your statement. Anyway, carry on.
Anthony Dunn
Yeah, these two pranksters, okay, are going to come back for round two, what are we going to do, on the Remain side, to face them off and counter their arguments more successfully next time?
Sir Simon Fraser
Okay, well, those are three rather linked questions around making the case, funding, being effective.
Lord Adonis
Can I link those last two questions? There’s one very important point I want to make. The Electoral Commission didn’t have – didn’t conduct itself with great glory in the last campaign. I mean, the fact that we’re now debating, two years’ later, decisions it’s taken in respect of funding and the legality and the legality of what happened, and all that, isn’t a great exhibition. But one of the things I think we got really seriously wrong last time was allowing two Leave campaigns.
Now there has to be, and the law is perfectly capable of doing this, Parliament just has to say it, there should be one official campaign on one side and one official campaign on the other side and there are two reasons for this. Firstly, because it means that then, when it comes to the fundraising, you can only fundraise for one campaign, but also, what you then cannot have, is you cannot have an official campaign, which claims to be respectable, and unofficial campaign that does the breaking point, and all of the stuff which is deliberately dark and all of that, but which is not and does not have any association with responsible Politicians who are going to have to implement it.
So, there’s some big and important lessons. There are clearly lessons about Russian influence and money and all that and we need something much, much, much more effective than the Electoral Commission next time. But I’m very strongly of the opinion there should just be one campaign on each side, they should be properly regulated and they should have responsible, political leaders. The people who are actually going to have to take responsibility for implementing these decisions, who lead them on each side, and that is just a straightforward matter of law and regulation and it needs to be done.
Now the question about making the case, of course you’re completely right. Let’s be clear, the Leave campaign had the best tunes last time, but let’s also be clear, a good part of the reason why they had the best tunes last time is because they were straightforward lies, you know, let’s be clear. Let’s call a spade a spade. The £350 million on the side of the bus was a lie. The breaking point was a lie. The seven million Turks, who are supposed to be invading this country the day after the Referendum, that was a lie. It is a fact that the 350 million is now the 50 billion exit deal. It is a fact that Turkey is not joining the European Union, any time soon. It is a fact that we’re not going to have cake and eat it on all these trade deals, and so it goes on.
Now, I’m much more confident because in the long run, in my view, in decent democracies like ours, the best arguments win. I think next time, we will have the best tunes, with one proviso, that we do not duck this fundamental issue ‘cause after all, this is a Referendum about belonging to the European Union, we do not duck this fundamental issue of it being a good thing and a necessary thing for this country to be a Member of the European Union. If we cannot answer unambiguously yes to that question, then we shouldn’t be going to a People’s Vote at all and that is one of the big messages I wanted to get across this afternoon, is we cannot continually do this half-in, half-out, trimming our sails, testing all the messages, so that they’re not too pro-European because we think people are having difficulty out there with these messages. Either we can sell a straightforwardly, robustly pro-European message, on the grounds that we do not want to make people poorer, their economy, their security, their jobs, their livelihoods are much better off in the European Union. If we cannot make that argument then we shouldn’t be doing this. I believe that we can. The fact that so many of you are here this evening and that when I go up and down the country, I see now a huge, a hugely – as the political – people engaged in this game call it a hugely energised base. That is a really encouraging sign, and I think if I can, sort of, coin one of those great lines, the only thing we need to fear is fear itself. We can win this, it’s the right cause, it’s the right arguments. It is the whole destiny of this country at stake, we’ve been here before. The debate we’re having on Europe is essentially, the debate that Chamberlain and Churchill had in 1938. Is Czechoslovakia a far-off land of which we know nothing or is it part of our own security, economy and prosperity?
I have no difficulty answering to that question whatsoever. I am happy to pray in a Churchill, all of those great generations of passionately pro-European Brits, and we just need to go out there and win it.
Sir Simon Fraser
Okay, very good. Thank you very much [applause]. Well, I’m supposed to thank you before the applause, but I’ll thank you after the applause, thank you very much, and thank you everybody for coming, it’s been a very interesting and impassioned meeting. Thank you.
Lord Adonis
Thank you. Thanks a lot.
Sir Simon Fraser
A pleasure.
