Healing Divisions

[Camomila]

My latest Brexit worry...

If we Brexit, the country is going to be divided, angry, and poorer. But even if we don't, there'll be some angry people.

[DarlingNikita]

remain predictions turned out to be rather pessimistic !!

Pah hah hah. Come back and say that a bit further down the line.

[BubblesBuddy]

And what about the billions £ we are spending on this nonsense? Contingency funds. Already we don’t have HRT drugs. No shortage in the EU. Just here. Why? Because the drugs companies are selling elsewhere, that’s why. Just the start of things to come.

[LouiseCollins28]

For me that's a very good example of why this division is so serious. Bubbles deals in facts see, thereby implying others do not. Further, not only is "Leaving" not an acceptable outcome. Even wanting to leave, is now unacceptable too?!

If the divisions are going to be healed up, then as I see it:

Our leaders need to convince those who did and those who did not vote for whichever is the eventual outcome that their stake in our society is still as valuable as it ever was.

[twofingerstoEverything]

Louise ...but since the Pro-Remain folks will continue to have the lion's share of economic opportunities and power in any scenario, how badly will such people be affected.

Someone's bought into the remainer = elite/leavers = victims bullshit I see? I'm surprised this nonsense is still doing the rounds, given that 48% of the voting population can't be elite/economically powerful etc. I'm pro Remain. Brexit will very likely make me poorer and further restrict my already limited opportunities. Assertions like yours really annoy me. You just need to look at the BJs/Farage/JRM/Dyson/Michael Caine/CEO of Next to see privilege and power. Poor little them, eh?

[EllebellyBeeblebrox]

Another one here not currently interested in healing divisions. Too frustrated and angry and worried about what the future holds. Too pissed off with the Conservatives and many of the leave voters. I think while austerity still bites and the gap between the haves and the have nots is so wide divisions are inevitable, that's what government should be addressing. I am under no illusions that this government will do that.

[twofingerstoEverything]

Going back to the OP, I don't know how the divide can be healed because ever since June 2016, 48% of voters have been ignored. TM's red lines and shouts of 'Brexit Means Brexit' pandered to hardliners and ignored moderate voices. The closeness of the result in what was, after all, an advisory referendum has barely been acknowledged. I'm not suggesting Remain supporters should have been pandered to and Leavers ignored; I'm saying the closeness should have been conceded and attempts made to honour the referendum result in an orderly (softer) fashion that would minimise damage and disruption.

Divisions have been stoked by politicians, the media, etc., as half of voters have been dismissed as elite remoaners while the other half shout 'we won' without being able to agree on what the prize is.

[Peregrina]

Our leaders need to convince those who did and those who did not vote for whichever is the eventual outcome that their stake in our society is still as valuable as it ever was.

I agree with this, but I don't see the current crop of 'Leaders' being able to do this. Maybe in 10 or twenty years time the leadership will come forward. After all after the horrors of WW2, the leadership came forward to propose the founding of the EEC, realising that there had to be a better way.

I agree with twofingers too - if we had gone for a soft Brexit - Norway plus, most of us Remainers would have said, OK, it's not as good, but it will do. Now I just feel a slow hardening anger at Leavers.

[jasjas1973]

*Our leaders need to convince those who did and those who did not vote for whichever is the eventual outcome that their stake in our society is still as valuable as it ever was8

Lets say we Remain, the Govt could have a "Marshall Plan" for the regions... or similar, poll after poll shows that many who voted leave did so out of a sense of being ignored and economic decline, rather than being particularly anti EU.

But if we Leave, what exactly is going to appease Remainers? or make them feel valued?

[Cyclemad222]

The rift won't heal, it'll die off. It's more about young/old than anything else. Baby boomers are 70ish now. Give it a decade or two.

[jasjas1973]

Most of the people i know who voted leave are quite yond, 30 to 50 ish, a few boomers and elderly.

Just as Brexit isn't split down party lines, its not as simple as old vs young either.

Even if it was, we are still outside of the EU and unlikely to re join.

[bellinisurge]

Yup, most of the Leave voters I know are young. Between 20 and 40. I'm about a year too young to be a baby boomer. But most of the boomers I know voted Remain. As did I.

[Camomila]

But if we Leave, what exactly is going to appease Remainers? or make them feel valued?

Exactly!

[BubblesBuddy]

If remainers feel they have to work longer and harder to put money into the economy that others have put a torch to, then their only value is their taxes but little for themselves. It would be the same in a Labour Party give-away. Oh, and many old Labour trots were fiercely anti SU. Tony Benn for a start. I am pleased through that more sensible modern Labour MPs have understood the damage likely to the economic lives of their constituents.

There does need to be more spending in the North. Not on shoring up business post Brexit or the vanity project of HS2. Real money going into Northern connectivity. This could have been done whilst being in the EU and increasing the number of well off people paying higher rate tax. This is a bigger sum than the lower rate tax take. The more people that get into high earner tax brackets, the more money the government has for projects. Everyone needs a bouyant London but it needs more than just London. Leaving the EU really doesn’t help if tax payments are less, jobs are lost and the economy is in recession.

[MaxNormal]

I don't feel remotely inclined to heal any division. I'm done with England, politically. I will focus on supporting the push for Scottish independence. Thankfully I don't know any Leavers here in Scotland.

[MeganBacon]

48% of voters have been ignored
I don't agree. There was a largely Remainer cabinet and a WA that really was a compromise, so it did recognise the 48%. Parliament couldn't get it approved due to the fact that it unified the non-compromisers from both Leave and Remain, who jointly outnumbered the middle ground compromisers.

[jasjas1973]

Megan Of course the 48% were ignored, we lost! there is no fucking compromise, just as if the result had gone the other way... we would have won and stayed IN, pissing off the xx% who voted Leave.

It was a binary question and a close result was bound to cause division across the nation... and why Cameron was an idiot to even consider an EU referendum.

Aside, if there was a remainer cabinet, they'd have revoked Art50, just as a remainer Parliament would have, as far as i can see, both are heavily Leave.

[Jocasta2018]

My parents, aunts & uncles were all born between 1930-1941. All had parents that didn't make it back, Some even had grandparents that had never been 'the same' after returning from the Great War. All voted to join the EEC in the 1970s & all voted to remain in 2016 - after the longest spell of peace in Europe for over a century.

The main leavers I know are in their early 60s. All bought their council houses on one salary & made an absolute killing. They entered the workforce with nothing more than CSEs and were able to work their way up. Whilst I'm pleasant to them, it's truly changed how I view them.

Leave/Remain divisions will never be healed. And yes, the EU and Remainers will be blamed when it all goes tits up.

[MeganBacon]

Neither side in a 48/52 result should consider themselves "ignored" just because they don't get everything they want. They should consider themselves heard if they get about half of what they want. Which was basically the WA.

[GhostofFrankGrimes]

Mays deal was hard brexit. Out the CU, out the SM. The goal posts got shifted post referendum. We’ve come along way from Norway style deal.

[MeganBacon]

OK some potential compromisers were alienated by the fact that TM and Robbins didn't consult enough - a cross party working group would have had more buy in and expectations about the backstop would have been managed far better. But both leavers and remainers can be equally annoyed about that. When MPs were asked to vote on the WA, it was the only compromise available and both sets of non-compromisers chose a double or quits approach, a gamble which at the moment seems likely to pay off for the non-compromising leavers.

[jasjas1973]

Megan i don't know where to start with that.

Are you being serious or just goady?

[bellinisurge]

@MeganBacon you know damn well that there hasn't been any compromise from the Leave side. Just flouncy waiting for Remain voters to agree with them.
No Deal is the ultimate No Compromise position and not a single Leaver has done anything to avoid it.

[MeganBacon]

I wouldn't know how to be goady. That is how I see it. No deal is what we are heading for now and it's nothing like the WA would have been - yes Bellini it is the ultimate no compromise position and it's tragic. The WA was the compromise and people like Grieve didn't vote for it when he had the chance. To be clear, I am not blaming him - I am just saying he gambled that something better would become available instead of compromising and it looks like he has lost that gamble. Johnson and JRM did vote for the WA (the second time only I think?) because although it didn't give them everything they wanted, it went part way.

[GhostofFrankGrimes]

Governments have a responsibility to the people they serve. No deal is utterly irresponsible and any decent government would admit that there is no consensus and admit Brexit was a big mistake and revoke. Nobody is forcing the UK to no deal there is no obligation to leave other than to honour a 3 year old glorified opinion poll.