MPs WEREN’T ASKED TO THINK
They were told what to do by the people
9 out of 10 MPs owe their jobs to Brexit manifestos
(See below for the full graphs)
Here’s some ‘arithmetic’ for Remain-voting MPs
The following is a summary for all MPs of the democratic fundamentals underlying all votes they have to make on Brexit in the House of Commons.
Most newspapers and TV news programmes are obsessed with personality politics. Sometimes the basics of democracy can get lost. Below we try to bring things back to what ordinary people think is ‘normal’.
There are three things preventing Brexit:-
Brexit Facts4EU.Org Summary
The 3 main parties preventing Brexit
- Theresa May – a Remainer Prime Minister & her Remainer civil servants
- The Remainer MPs in the House of Commons
- The EU
The first item needs to be dealt with by Conservative MPs. The last item cannot be dealt with – we said from the beginning that the EU was always going to make it impossible for the UK to negotiate a normal, sensible departure.
It’s the second item which we address in this article.
The ‘parliamentary arithmetic’
Scarcely a day has gone by recently without hearing a Remain-supporting MP telling the TV or the newspapers that the government’s Brexit policy will not succeed because of ‘parliamentary arithmetic’.
“They just don’t have the votes,” they say, smugly.
So let’s just stop and think about this for a moment.
The arithmetic exists in the country at large. What Remainer MPs are saying is that they don’t like Brexit, they think it’s bad for jobs etc, and so will vote against it in the House of Commons, that supposed cradle of democracy.
These MPs are so caught up in the political machinations and intrigues of the Commons, they have forgotten several things.
BREXIT FACTS4EU.ORG SUMMARY OF DEMOCRACY & BREXIT
- In June 2015 MPs voted by 544-53 (by 6 to 1) to hold an In/Out EU Referendum
- The Referendum question was not “Do you want your MP to exercise his or her personal judgement?”
- It was a binary choice of staying in or leaving the EU
- The official government leaflet sent to everyone made it clear the result would be implemented
- The country voted by a majority to leave the EU
- The country then voted in the general election by 85% for parties favouring leaving the Single Market & Customs Union
So this is the democratic background to the decision to leave the EU. There’s nothing difficult about it. No objections were raised before the Referendum about its binding nature (albeit non-technically) on Parliament. No objections were raised about the need to specify whether the people wanted to stay in some parts of the EU’s structures.
It was a clear binary choice to leave the EU or not, and the British people made it in June 2016.
The ‘second referendum’
Almost a year after the EU Referendum the people had another chance to express an opinion in the general election of 2017. They voted by over 85% for parties whose manifestos committed to exiting the Single Market and Customs Union.
The chart above shows how the British public overwhelmingly backed parties which said they would enact the Referendum result and take the UK out of the EU, including out of the Single Market and Customs Union.
Within the 85% are the Conservatives, Labour, UKIP and the DUP. Within the 13% are the LibDems the SNP, the Greens, Sinn Fein and Plaid Cymru. The balance not shown are for very minor parties or individuals.
The basic fact to remember is that public voted by 85% for parties whose manifestos said they would fundamentally honour Brexit.
Current composition of the Commons
The chart below shows how the votes were translated into seats, for the MPs now sitting in Parliament.
Over 90% of MPs owe their seats to being a member of a party which fundamentally backed the Referendum decision.
- In June 2015 MPs voted by 544-53 (by 6 to 1) to hold an In/Out EU Referendum
- No question of a second Referendum on the terms of a deal
- No question of delaying the end of Article 50
- No question of a fudge keeping the UK in the Single Market or Customs Union in all but name
- No question of MPs taking over the decision of the British people and exercising ‘individual judgement’
Observations
This decision by the British people was not part of our normal ‘representative democracy’, where MPs are supposed to exercise their judgement on behalf of their constituents. In reality of course the vast bulk of them do no such thing and simply vote along party lines.
The consequences
It matters not whether MPs agree or disagree with it, they are honour bound to implement it. If they do not, as we have written many times, they will have to face the consequences.
On a personal level for them, this will mean some MPs being deselected by their constituency associations. It will also result in entire careers being ruined – tainted forever by their failure to comprehend that this was the most important decision in most people’s lifetimes.
If you’re going to do sums, do the right ones
We urge all MPs who continue to think they know best, and those who think they are being clever in coming up with some ridiculous form of words to justify their anti-democratic behaviour, to think again.
The next time you are about to say “the parliamentary arithmetic means it will never pass”, reflect for a moment. What you are actually saying is that you think you’re safe because you have many colleagues who will vote the same way, regardless of the views of the people. Sorry, but this time safety in numbers won’t work.
Please think carefully
These are YOUR decisions. YOU were elected on a manifesto. YOU know in your heart that the majority of the people want to leave the EU fully. YOU know in your heart that in fact you know little about the EU and that you trot out what you’ve heard, or what is the party line.
Well maybe, just maybe, sometimes the people know best.
On this occasion they overcame the biggest wall of propaganda in British political history and STILL they decided that the United Kingdom’s best long-term interests lie outside the European Union.
We urge you to think very carefully about what is right and wrong, and do the right thing. If you do – even if it’s now late in the day - you will have our support, and we think you will be looked upon more favourably by the majority of our readers and followers.
Since before the EU Referendum, Brexit Facts4EU.Org
has been the most prolific researcher and publisher of Brexit facts in the world.
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