Defining the Brexit vision

We have spoken this week of the need for a new vision and a better alternative to what David Cameron can offer us. It must be grounded in political reality and it must be convincing.

We've heard critics saying that we must simplify our message, but that does not mean we should dumb it down. To peddle a simplistic mantra is to undermine our own credibility. That means we will have to outline in detail what we want, and where we want to be. Only then can we sell it. The task is to creatively sell the product we have, not the product we wish we were selling.

Before we can sell the product we must define it. Our vision is for the United Kingdom as a self-governing, self-confident, free trading nation state, releasing the potential of its citizens through direct democratic control of both national and local government and providing maximum freedom and responsibility for its people.

The history of Britain for a thousand years has been as a merchant and maritime power playing its full role in European and world affairs while living under its own laws. It is our view that the UK can flourish again as an independent state trading both with our friends in the EU and the rest of Europe, while developing other relationships throughout the world as trading patterns evolve.

For an age the United Kingdom has freely engaged as an independent country in alliances and treaties with other countries. It has a long history of entering into commercial agreements and conventions at an inter-governmental level. We wish to uphold that tradition.

The ability of the people of the United Kingdom to determine their own independent future and use their wealth of executive, legislative and judicial experience to help, inspire and shape political developments through international bodies, and to improve world trade and the wellbeing of all peoples will only be possible when they are free of the undemocratic and moribund European Union.

The prosperity of the people depends on being able to exercise the fundamental right and necessity of self-determination, thus taking control of their opportunities and destiny in an inter-governmental global future with the ability to swiftly correct and improve when errors occur.

Within the United Kingdom, our vision is for a government respectful of its people who will take on greater participation and control of their affairs at local and national level. Our vision fosters the responsibility of a sovereign people as the core of true democracy.

With that in mind, we suggest that leaving the EU alone does not accomplish this, but it is the first step on a long road. For us to embark on this journey we must set out in detail what it looks like and why it's worth the risk.

A simplistic slogan works well on Twitter, but it is for us to provide substance to it in order to convince opinion formers. Primarily we must convince both the public and business that Brexit does not interrupt trade or threaten jobs. In this, guesswork and blind optimism is insufficient. Detail, realism and pragmatism are our watch words. Unless we define what Brexit looks like, the inherent credibility deficit will be our undoing. Winging it did not work for Ukip and it won't work for us.

We are asking for a a big change involving a massive diplomatic effort with a period of some uncertainty, so as much as we must reassure, we must also answer the question of "why bother?".
Where is the value in such an undertaking and what is the incentive?

We can present incentives but they have to be genuine motivators. Saying that families will be £933 better off if they vote out is a wet lettuce of an incentive. We've seen the same stunt pulled in elections and it no more works in a referendum than it does in an election. Also, simply saying we can "trade with the rest of the world" sounds like empty rhetoric because it is empty rhetoric.

Leaving the EU in reality means only marginal immediate benefits and while there are beneficial freedoms it will take time to fully realise them and put them to work. The Yes campaign will succeed in making that case. What have we got that makes it worth the hassle?

While we are in the EU, we are not (as eurosceptics have it) run by the EU. We're just told what to and on what terms. There is no flexibility and there is no redress. Change takes a long time time, and reform proves impossible. This diminishes us and our standing in the world. There is an alternative and it's better than anything Mr Cameron can offer.

Outside the EU, the UK would also be able to craft its own external trade policy. In this, it could act independently, it could act with other blocs such as EFTA, or we could take collective action through ad hoc alliances. This gives us the agility we presently lack.

There are sometimes gains to be made from negotiating as part of a formal bloc, not least for the protection afforded in times of financial crisis, and on matters of common interest. It is a means of spreading the administrative burden. Sometimes the added strength and resource of the UK, to help further spread the load is advantageous. At other times we need to be doing what's best for our unique emerging industries. While the EU negotiates on our behalf we cannot do this. We cannot get what's best for Britain and we cannot prioritise to our advantage. Nothing David Cameron will propose can speak to that.

There are many disadvantages to formal collective action as we have seen in attempts to reform the CAP. We need the flexibility to make arrangements which give us the benefits of EU membership while minimising the disadvantages. We also need to avoid the disadvantages we might suffer as an independent actor, while making the most of opportunities presented by changes in global trading patterns.

We must offer a solution that allows us to be full participants in the single market but also the freedom to be the architect of a global single market. Mr Cameron can only offer us more of the same. We must offer the best of both worlds. We've been sold the notion that we can't have our cake and eat it. We need to show that we can not only eat our cake, we can have seconds too.

What we cannot afford is a message into which the subtext suggests we're going to take our bat home and shut ourselves off from the EU. We're not looking to make the EU an enemy, we're just looking to redefine our relationship, not only for our own sake but for theirs as well.

That said, this alone is insufficient. As someone who writes on matters of trade and foreign policy it is immensely frustrating getting people engaged. The fact is that most people couldn't give a tinkers damn about trade or foreign affairs. We have delegated such to our politicians and in turn they have delegated it to the EU. Consequently, while important to win the trade argument in order to influence the influential, there needs to be an incentive for ordinary people too.

The EU promotes every day concerns such as roaming charges, visa-free travel and every day practicalities - along with rights and protections that we would otherwise perhaps not enjoy. They are marginal benefits but that is the level on which many will make their choice. People will be worried about their employment protections and basic rights. They worry that Brexit gives the Tories leeway to be as ruthless as legend has it. Again we need not only to reassure but to incentivise.

Consequently we have to build a movement that carries momentum beyond the referendum so that we can make demands once we are out. If we are taking some of the power back for the people, then why not all of it?

That is where we can make the case for a British bill of rights, direct democracy, real localism and constitutional rights. If we're just going to quit the EU and leave it there then we've left the job half done, putting the power back in the hands of the people who did all this to us in the first place. I don't know about you but the prospect of that excites me more than Matthew Elliot telling me I'll have an extra £933 a year.

As much as anything it sidesteps the necessity to take a divisive position on climate change, tax, health, education or the environment. The selling point is that it puts us in control and we get to decide what's best for us - and we own our decisions.

In that regard, we cannot make this referendum EU centric. This is a question about the future, who we are and where we want to be. The final battle in the last three months of the campaign will not be about whether the EU started the conflict in Ukraine, or whether we should take back our fishing grounds or even bent bananas. It won't be us vs. the EU. It will be us vs. David Cameron. The respective merits of the EU will take a back seat. It will be a poll on whether the public believe Cameron has scored a good deal and whether our vision holds water.

We must run a positive and a negative campaign. In so doing we must ignore the Yes campaign. That's a decoy and a fight we don't need to have. We should instead attack Cameron's credibility and trustworthiness, but on the positive side, we show the public that rather than griping about the EU, we have something bigger, bolder, lasting and achievable on offer. We must make Brexit the high watermark for the existing establishment orthodoxy and show that we will go the rest of the way.

If the campaign is instead an all singing, all dancing whinge about the EU, then I need to know now so I can engage in something more profitable and productive. It's boring and it's a losing argument made by losers. Life is too short.

It's NOT the EU, stupid

I found an interesting quote from Lord Hailsham in 1971 in respect to the EEC.

"It is true that the Communities have gone beyond the consortial pattern. There are these common institutions; the Commission, the Assembly, the Ministers, the court. There are fields of common law, very restricted because they are limited to the fields necessary to give effect to the nature of the economic community, but effective because they are enforced either by the legislative power of the individual member States or by the courts of the member States giving direct effect to rules of community law as interpreted by the Community courts. At first sight, this looks like a derogation from sovereignty. But I submit that, on close inspection, one can see that it is nothing of the kind. There is no physical power behind these institutions except the will of the members to keep their bargain, and no legislative or coercive power except the organs of the members to give effect to that will."

And this is the actual truth of the matter. The EU does not dictate in any real sense. Nothing the UK does in respect of EU compliance is not entirely voluntary. We comply because parliament wishes it to be so. In practice that means never saying no - because unlike the French, we hold true to our word.

The great dishonesty in this is that when the state does comply with the EU, for instance recent benefit cuts, it's dressed up as a domestic issue (ie evil Tory cuts). As it happens, I happen to agree with the measures put in place, but there is no democracy at work here. This is a classic instance of conforming to the EU non-discrimination ideal rather than putting our own interests first. Labour have the luxury of whining about it in opposition but they cannot pretend for a moment that they would do a single thing differently.

Thus the dictatorship is not from Brussels. It is from Westminster. Not only will they not confront the EU under any circumstances, they go to extended lengths to downplay or conceal its influence in some bizarre display of collective denial. The EU does nothing to us. We do it to ourselves - and we do it in "partnership" with the French who have absolutely zero intention of following the rules.

As undemocratic as the EU is, it is Westminster who continues to ignore the will of the public and they do in the certain knowledge that the media will not call them out on it because they lack the intellectual equipment to do so.

This should give some pause for thought to those who believe Jeremy Corbyn is a straight talking, principled individual. He speaks with forked tongue on the EU, believing it capable of reform - but given the constraints upon our democracy he has but two options - no domestic policy changes and the status quo, or further EU compliance. In practice that means either firehosing welfare at any hapless biped with an EU passport, or removing benefits altogether. As a populist he will duck the difficult and unpopular road and do precisely nothing. Or we can have David Cameron who will go right ahead and do everything the EU requires of him.

The short of it is, the options available to us are not ones we would ourselves choose, the way we would have it is closed off to us by way of keeping our word, our politicians have little say in it and continue to pretend they are in charge. This is a sham democracy and will remain so as long as we are members of the EU. But like I say, if we want democracy, Brexit is only the very beginning.

Red Goddess is far from divine

Red Goddess: Inner World is an ambitious game for a little-known developer consisting of half a dozen people. There's no doubt the odds are stacked against it, and despite all sorts of potential, Red Goddess ultimately falls flat.

Brexit is the key to reforming Europe

The more you look at Brexit, the more inherent complications you find. The EU has been steaming ahead with various trade deals in recent years that we would have to work hard to replicate, tus any Brexit talks would require we negotiate the use of these deals by proxy until such a time as we can negotiate our own. That will necessarily require membership of the single market and consequently, we cannot make any promises about ending freedom of movement, assuming that were even desirable.

The fact is that the EU does have clout. It's no use arguing the toss over whether it is in decline or not. It is still a large market we cannot afford to lose, nor can be cut ourselves off from the extended benefits of single market membership.

Thus, as we look to the referendum, it becomes more a question of defining what kind of relationship we want with it. Even with our independence we would have to work pretty hard and pretty fast to open up new trading avenues just to compensate for the mid term losses should we completely reject European co-operation. In fact, we will have to work hard and fast in any eventuality.

With that in mind, when a new treaty offering us something close to associate membership is announced, it will look superficially attractive. It saves us the hassle and expense of having to replace trade deals and to an extent excludes us from ever closer union. What it probably won't offer is an independent vote at the top tables or trade exclusivity, which in most respects merely formalises the stagnation we're presently stuck in while the eurozone group does what it needs to do.

Since we are not in the Euro and never will be we are never going to be in the mainstream EU, which is a good thing, but we will be relegated to a formalised slow lane where we find ourselves following the rules but having no say at the top international tables where trade rules, including those of the single market, are made. As we continue to point out, the EU merely rubber stamps regulation. It is a redundant middleman.

With that in mind, independence will always be the best option for Britain, and by defining the terms of our relationship with the EU, using an interim stage such as the Norway Option, we can set about creating a benchmark for interfacing with the single market so that anyone may join it, thus reducing the EU to an actor within it rather than the master of it.

Anyone who knows anything about the intricacies of the EU knows that it has overreached in so many ways and while there is notionally a single standard throughout it does not manifest in reality. The hypocrisies are there for to see for anyone who looks for them. By leaving and regaining trade autonomy can we set a baseline for what a genuine single market looks like, recognising that it is the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe that has the greater influence in regulatory convergence. In that regard, UNECE is the single market, not the EU. Regulatory convergence is more pertinent to modern trade diplomacy than border tariffs.

The problem with the EU is that it seeks deep and comprehensive trade agreements that require unrealisable social changes, which the EU is not equipped to ram through, and so in many respects we have a European Union in name only. In terms of trade we have multiple tiers of treaties making up various zones within, with members in various stages of economic and social development. In that regard the EU is overextended having made demands of members that it can never bring to fruition - not least it's overambitious cultural reforms to the East and in the Balkans. As we have discussed previously, these have the capacity to do more harm than good.

The EU is as much about cultural hegemony as it is trade, and in its hubris creates as many problems as it notionally solves. The reality is that Western European social values cannot be imposed on a society and such changes have to come from below through popular struggle. It is only through becoming wealthier do societies become more liberal and progressive - so we are better off aiming for a single market of mutual trading standards that create wealth. Prioritising that means the social reforms will take care of themselves. They will then be lasting and genuine rather than at the barrel of a gun.

That is how we reform both the EU and Europe while at the same time breaking out of the euro-centric mentality toward a global single market, where all voices matter. Put simply, the EU as an entity cannot be reformed in this way. Supposing we could change treaties, we cannot change the essence of what it is built upon.

The reason for opposing the EU is that it is inward-looking, anti-trade (or at least open trade), protectionist, unaccountable and at times ineffectual. The 'sovereignty' question is misplaced for the reasons most often stated - global markets mean global rules. The message is that we can do better, but to do this we have to break the EU and remould it as something different from the post-war/cold war 'hug your enemy close' viewpoint. Britain leaving allows all this to happen. Without that existential threat to the EU nothing changes and we carry on limping along - with nobody ever satisfied and the EU continuing to stamp out brushfires with diminishing resources and a shrinking mandate.

It should be clear to all that we need a new settlement for Europe and the superstate idea of the last century is a failed idea that will never reach completion. Brexit is the first step to designing that new Europe. For Europe to regain its vitality it must clear away the old and make way for the new. In this Britain can show leadership and once again be asserting its global values. What's not to like?

Riding London

As regular readers will be aware, last year I crashed out of the Prudential RideLondon-Surrey 100 cycling event in the middle of a tropical rain storm. Unsatisfied with that outcome, I attempted the event again in 2015. For the sake of completeness, here’s how I got on.

From the moment I knew enough about my injuries to know I would be fine to get back on a bike, I was resolute that I wanted to return and complete what I’d set out to achieve. As such, I filled out the ballot for a place, sent it off and waited. Being...

Moving to Perch Runway

Anyone who had read my previous post about crashing my bike, followed by about a year of silence, could reasonably conclude that I suffered some sort of underlying and undetected injury which crept up and took me from this world in the night shortly thereafter. The reality is far less dramatic, and is, as most things that trouble me are, entirely down to software. As gauche as it may be to blog about your blog, indulge me for a moment or two while I do just that.

When I launched this site in March 2003, it was on a

Are you with us?

Ukip like to cast themselves as "the people's army". If that analogy holds then they are cannon fodder. What we need in this coming referendum is special forces carrying out special operations. We have seen that numbers without co-ordination and strategy does not get results. For all Ukip's resources and exposure it still failed to get more than one MP - attributable to their own lacklustre campaign.

For a long time we have warned that the EU referendum campaign will follow a similar path with well funded operations springing up from nowhere, attracting much publicity, with plenty of casual support, but in the end lack the expertise to put it to work. 

Looking at The Know's Facebook page we see it has already attracted a large number of "likes", but if we look at the content we see them making all the classic mistakes, making promises that Brexit is unlikely to achieve - and complaining about bent bananas. If I was going to design a false flag operation, it would look a lot like The Know.

They're essentially sucking up the kipper support and relabelling it - and that's not going to win any new territory. Here follows a glorious example of the sort of people they're attracting:

And then there's this little gemstone...

You don't have to dig deep to find it. This is what contemporary euroscepticism looks like now. Obviously such people are no use to us in building a progressive and outward looking case for Brexit, and the best thing The Know could do is serve as a cesspit to keep that lot distracted. We can't tell you just how depressed that makes us feel - but we're not going to take it lying down.

It is our view that we can do more with less. The Know and Business for Britain will waste a lot of money and energy rushing around well before the referendum campaign kicks off, boring their audiences and making an irrelevance of themselves. It is our view that the referendum will be much later than anybody thus far anticipates, so the focus must now be on building a reserve unit who can pick up where they tail off and reach new audiences with new arguments.

We're sceptical about how useful big ticket websites can be - and these eurosceptic start-ups tend to just feed from the existing pond, each cannibalising each-others support. There is no value in this. Instead what we need is a core of bloggers each with a respectable Twitter following. Individuals, not organisations will turn the tide. By our reckoning we're going to need thirty such people, who we are happy to train and lend support to. Thinkers who influence other thinkers are worth ten thousand kippers.

We are old hands at social media and blogging and can advise anyone who wants to join such a team. This team will need to crosslink and retweet each-other - putting egos and minor differences aside. They don't necessarily need to work together, but co-operation helps growth. We need to start early on this because on the web, content is king, and for search engine optimisation, older blogs with more content leave a larger web footprint. The mission being to put clear blue water between us and the kipper grunters, to show that there is a liberal and progressive wing of euroscepticism that has larger concerns and a broader visions.

What we definitely don't want are immigration obsessives, climate change bores or people who will rant about bent bananas. We are looking for euro-sceptics. And by that we mean actual sceptics who express genuine scepticism over everything they see and hear - especially those who, like us, are sceptical of the nonsense the europhobes are presently belching out on an industrial scale.

If you have a forensic eye for detail and a shrewd eye we need to hear from you. This is going to require a lot of commitment, and running a blog is no small undertaking - but that's the challenge. We need an elite squad of mature, dedicated people who can take a brief, work to a strategy and think for themselves. If you think you are up to the job and this post resonates with you then get in touch. You know what's at stake and the time to act is now.

mrnorth303@gmail.com
raenorth@aol.com