Lefties who want to Leave! I hear you.
The EU is deeply undemocratic. It is driven and corrupted by the profit motives of big business. It showed its true colours in its callous treatment of Greece last year. All true.
But if we leave on June 23rd I worry that you will regret your vote very deeply.
A Leave vote would first of all have to be interpreted. There are a multitude of reasons why people vote on either side, many of which contradict each other. Which ones will be acted upon? The desire to boost wages by restricting freedom of movement, or the desire to reduce costs by getting rid of health and safety regulations and human rights? The ambition to subsidise new industries, or the vision of the ever greater dominance of the financial sector in our national economy? Getting out of TTIP’s binds, or inviting big pharma, big biotech and big energy to design even worse replacement bilateral trade deals?
The Tories in power will – correctly – interpret a Leave vote as overwhelmingly a desire by businesses to get rid of regulations that protect people and our habitats, and a victory for the worst nationalistic sentiments stoked for years by the immensely popular right wing press. Leave will not be followed by a people’s movement to reclaim the power (at least if it is it will not have much to do with the referendum, except perhaps in Scotland) it will be followed by at least 4 years, maybe 9 or more, of Tories ripping up what is left of the post-war consensus with the gay abandon that will come with a fresh, mid-term mandate and a far right Prime Minister. That’s why Left Unity, the TUC and Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party – despite his longstanding opposition to the EU – are all pushing to Stay. We should not take lightly Corbyn’s warning that the NHS would “end” if we leave now, not least because his integrity is such that even under massive pressure he’s refusing to make arguments for staying that he doesn’t himself believe.
There are various imaginable exits from the EU – stage left, stage right, a green exit… For those on the left who long for an exit, it is tragic that the only opportunity on offer for a generation can only result in harsher austerity, deeper inequality and further suffering for the most vulnerable groups in the short and medium term, and rampant asset raids by the rich and powerful. But that is the situation. The Leavers I’ve tried to engage on this topic do one of two things when I ask what improvements they think will actually be made in the event of exit. They either go very quiet, or they revert to talking about what we could do, what we would be able to do and what we might do in future. None of which is actually going to happen. All the freedoms an exit would grant to improve the lot of workers, the unemployed, the elderly, the disabled, refugees, the sick and young – they are dreams that will not be acted upon in the foreseeable future. What is the use of the freedom to make things better if those in power are going to take us as far and as fast as possible in the opposite direction?
If the right have been able to force a ballot there’s no reason why the left could not do the same in future, and if we can’t foresee a movement strong enough to achieve such a goal, what makes us think we could get a truly left wing government into power in 2020, or stand up to the onslaught of a right wing liberated from Europe? The time to leave will be when government is under great pressure from the left and green directions to break EU regulations and agreements by introducing banned protections and rights for workers, the unemployed, nascent industries, fisheries, water and landscapes. Unless I’ve missed something very big, that moment is not now.
Matt Carmichael is a Tidal director and co-author with Alastair McIntosh of Spiritual Activism