This should have been a four horse race

It is now clear that absolutely nothing will have changed on Friday 24 June; irrespective of which way the referendum vote goes.  In law, the referendum is merely advisory – there is no requirement that our sovereign Parliament has to pay any attention to it.  Of course, if there was an overwhelming result for one side or the other, it would be politically difficult to ignore.  But with the polls showing Remain and Leave virtually neck and neck, there is huge scope for political horse trading.

If there is a vote to Leave, it will be so close to 50:50 that our overwhelmingly pro-remain Parliament will find some mechanism to ignore the result – most probably following the example of Ireland, where some frantic renegotiation was followed by a new referendum so that the electorate can vote the correct way.

If there is a vote to stay, nothing changes either.  The result will be so close that the Farages and Johnsons of this world will simply claim they were robbed or that Project Fear unfairly frightened people into voting to Remain.  The leave campaign will no doubt be emboldened in this by the sickening levels of British racism that the referendum has exposed.  As in Scotland following its referendum, far from putting the issue to bed for a generation, it will merely lead to ongoing speculation about the circumstances in which a new referendum will have to be called.  David Cameron – if he is still prime minister – will have achieved none of his aims.  His loony-right back benchers will go on dividing the Tory party and (hopefully) making them unelectable.

The obvious conclusion to draw from this is that the whole exercise from beginning to end has been a complete waste of time, money and energy.  But the deeper reason for this state of affairs is less obvious to most people…  It is the early consensus between the two wings of the British elite that the referendum should ask a simple “in v out” question.  This sounds obvious – keep it simple stupid!  However, it has resulted in considerable anger, division and animosity across the UK that is not going to go away any time soon.  The reason for this is that we have all been obliged to try to shoe-horn ourselves into one of two thoroughly unpleasant right-wing camps.

In fact there are four broad positions in this referendum:

1. Remain because we love the EU just as it is
2. Remain and reform
3. Leave and reform
4. Leave because we love Westminster just as it is.

That queasy sensation that so many of us felt when Tony Blair – hands still stained with the blood of a million Iraqis – was wheeled out to tell us we had to vote to Remain, is precisely because he, Cameron, Goldman Sachs, Jamie Dimon and all the other representatives of corporate power are in the first of these camps.  These are the people that want to remove democracy and introduce market forces into every aspect of our lives.

Most left Remainers, by contrast, are in the second group.  Best articulated by economist and former Greek minister Yanis Varoufakis, this group recognises the urgent need to save the EU from itself by ending its constitutional requirement to pursue the neoliberal free market capitalism that failed so spectacularly in 2008.  These are the people who want to save European capitalism from its own folly.

The Leave and reform (Lexit) group see the stay and reform position as hopeless.  Ordinary people have failed to bring about democratic reform in their own countries.  It will be impossible to build support for treaty change across the 28 countries of the EU.  This group is not – as opponents claim – saying that the current UK government (or one led by Boris Johnson) is fine.  Far from it.  This group also favours reforms such as a more proportional electoral system that will make Britain democratic again.

In this, the Lexit group are very different to the pro-Leave (Brexit) campaign led by UKIP and the Tory right.  The Brexit group clearly want to use the Parliamentary dictatorship that the First Past the Post system produces in order to tear apart the few remaining rights that ordinary people still enjoy. They see the flimsy EU Social Chapter as an impediment to full-blown market capitalism; and would support remain if they thought they could remove it.

While we cannot know for sure, I believe that had we been offered a four-horse referendum, the majority of the votes would go to Remain and reform and Leave and reform.  This being the case, I am also pretty sure that the campaign would have been significantly less divisive.  It would expose our hostility toward the corporations and their paid political henchmen who want to destroy democracy in order to make even more profits.  It would expose the right wing fanatics who blame all of our ills on immigrants.  Instead, it would open up a more urgent debate about how best to build democracy and create a society that works in everyone’s interests.

The failure of the left in this referendum stems largely from our inability to give voice to the similarities between the Leave and reform and the Remain and reform camps.  Both seek democracy and justice.  Both have valid arguments to make.  More importantly, both need to find common ground to mount a longer-term campaign after 24 June.  Failing to do so will merely play into the hands of the racist loony-right.