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Theresa May ended last week with the indignity of being publicly berated by Donald Trump over her Brexit policy and told her much cherished trade deal with the US might never be.  At home, she finds herself hostage to Brexit hardliners after the unravelling of her Chequers agreement. EU negotiating partners can only wonder who has the final say in London as talks approach an autumn deadline and preparations are made on both sides to tackle the chaos of a disastrous no-deal exit.

Meanwhile, the EU moves on, concluding a long-awaited deal with Japan  that creates the largest area for free trade that the world has ever known. As long as the UK is an EU member, British companies benefit from this arrangement. After Brexit, it's not clear whether, as a smaller trading entity, Britain will be able to secure the same terms as the EU for such an arrangement.

EU braces for chaotic no-deal outcome after Theresa May’s concessions to hardliners - Evening Standard
European leaders scramble to prepare for a “chaotic” no-deal Brexit after Theresa May gives concessions to the Tory Right to survive a week of rebellions, savage infighting and open threats to her leadership.

Now is probably a good time to remind ourselves of the government’s own secret analysis, leaked to the Sunday Times last month, which predicted food, fuel and medicine shortages within days and the Port of Dover collapsing “on day one” if there was no deal.

EU trade deal with Japan shines light amid global protectionist trends - New York Times

The EU signs its largest trade deal ever, a pact with Japan that will cover a quarter of the global economy — by some measures the largest free-trade area in the world — and is the latest in a string of efforts either concluded or in the works. They point to a more assertive Europe looking past frosty ties with the United States, and even the coming withdrawal of the UK from the bloc.

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Quote of the Week

“I thought that the white paper was going in the right direction. Now we see that unravelling again, so all the more reason for us to take more serious decisions.”

Airbus chief Tom Enders speaking at the Farnborough International Airshow

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InFacts

EU-Japan trade deal shows what we will be missing out on - Milo Mallaby

Boris Johnson’s resignation speech lays bare Brexit breakdown - Luke Lythgoe

For the Tories, breaking up is not so hard to do - Nick Kent

Chaos reigns as Brextremists grab the wheel from May - Luke Lythgoe

What should be the question in a People’s Vote? - Hugo Dixon

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More Brexit News

How the BBC lost the plot on Brexit - New York Review of Books
The BBC’s reporting of the scandals around the Brexit referendum is not biased or unbalanced: it barely exists. It’s like if the US networks had decided the Mueller investigation was no concern of theirs.

Prominent Tory MP suggests national unity government to save the UK , but what’s the likelihood? - Guardian
The idea of a government of national unity has been mooted as a way of saving the country from a Brexit disaster. But, Jonathan Freedland argues, wounds still run deep in the Labour Party from previous such arrangement back in the 1930s. A second referendum would be more likely.

Labour opens up biggest lead over Tories since general election - Observer

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Video of the Week

Justine Greening on Sky News explaining why she's backing a People's Vote on the final Brexit deal

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Brexit Comment

Brussels is set to unpick May’s white paper - Quentin Peel, InFacts
When Theresa May finally published her long-delayed Brexit White Paper last week, there was an audible sigh of relief in Brussels. Don’t knock it too much, they said. At least we have something to negotiate. Already, that looks like wishful thinking.

Boris Johnson has ruined Britain - Jenni Russell, New York Times
Boris Johnson saw the Brexit campaign as a manoeuvre to  secure his future, writes British journalist Jenni Russell. “Instead, in damaging the country, he fears he has wrecked his own future, too. As one of his allies told me last month: ‘He knows that the verdict of history is about to come down on him — and bury him.’”

Michael Gove: I wanted 'different feel' to Vote Leave campaign - BBC
Michael Gove has distanced himself from some of the arguments he made during the Brexit referendum, including claims over levels of Turkish immigration.

Hardline Brexiteer says we should leave without a deal; then we don’t have to pay the money - Express
Jacob Rees-Mogg says the UK should simply leave the EU on WTO terms “and then we don’t have to pay them the £39 billion. “So there’s nothing to be fearful about.”

Vote Leave broke electoral law and British democracy is shaken (Guardian)
A democracy is only as strong as the elections that set its course. If they can be bought or subverted, then confidence in democracy and the legitimacy of the governments it instals, ebbs away.

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Final Word

OFOC's Will Dry slams Brextremists for blaming everyone else for this chaotic, botched Brexit that the government are pursuing

From London 4 Europe

We need to re-set our campaigning

London4Europe Committee Member Michael Romberg writes that getting the referendum on the terms will be the easy bit. Winning it requires a total rethink of our campaigning. Above all, we have to show that we have listened to Leave voters.

Everyone who was on the march last Saturday will have experienced the great energy, optimism and good nature that was shown by the Remain movement – visibly and nosily out in force. We need to turn that enthusiasm into victory.

The victory that matters of course is not just ensuring that Parliament sets up the referendum on the terms. It is not even winning that referendum. It is healing the country. And that requires us to run the referendum campaign in a particular way.

Need to recover from the mistakes of the past

We need an almost 180 degree turn from what some Remainers have been saying for the past two years.

Since the June 2016 shock many Remainers have been deeply opposed to any engagement with the electorate. So:

• People have followed siren voices like Professor Grayling calling on Parliament just to set aside the referendum result.
• We have focused on our hurt, what we would lose.
• We have highlighted the contradictions of Brexit and assumed that it would collapse under their weight.
• Where we have shown the impact on others we have concentrated on the economy – a re-run of the Stronger IN campaign.

All that has been counter-productive. Leave voters have been confirmed in their view that the elite does not care about them.

A referendum forces us to engage

The biggest single advantage of using a referendum to settle what happens is that it requires us to engage with Leave voters. We will only win the referendum on the terms if 2016 Leave voters vote Remain. They will only do so if it is in their own best interests to do so. We therefore need to come up with a programme to make it in their best interests.

For a lasting settlement, they need to vote positively for the EU; not because they wish for Brexit but fear that we cannot afford it. Remember the real aim: to heal the country.

Forget demographics or better advertising or higher turnout. At best, these factors could scrape us over 50%. We need a convincing win. To get to 67R:33L would require over six million Leave voters to vote Remain. So we have to address their concerns.

Step 1: stop losing

The first thing is to stop saying things that lose us credibility. Any dissing of the electorate or the 2016 result just takes us backwards.

Step 1a: lower the focus on the economy

Of course I believe the economy is important – I am a former HM Treasury official. But it is not the most important thing.

For those few Leave voters who really care about the economy, whether they want socialism in one state or a deregulated Global Britain, nothing we can say will make a difference.

The rest do not believe us – the lack of an immediate economic crisis proves to their satisfaction that Brexit will not be an economic problem. The honest statement of economic harm from Brexit is slightly slower growth. Though it would accumulate over time – HM Treasury’s £4,000 after 15 years – it would be imperceptible in any one year.

The economy is just not a point worth making a big deal of in our campaign. Project Fear failed last time. Why would it succeed this time?

Step 2: EU membership: a message of hope

We have to start with our counter-message to the emotional appeal of “Take back control”. We need to campaign in poetry. We need our “yes we can”.

Why actually do we believe in the EU? Is it really just about trade? For me it is because the EU is:

• an essential support for peace (that is why it was founded) – peace includes solving problems of disputed sovereignty like Northern Ireland;
• a promoter of harmony between nations;
• a supporter of democracy;
• bringing people together;
• giving us individual freedom, especially freedom of movement, both at the high level and at the practical level like reciprocal healthcare.

That is a message of hope. We can give it with our eyes on the horizon, facing the future bravely.

Sure, it will be met with blank looks and rejection. Unlike on the Continent, it is a relatively new idea in the UK. But we have to try it if we are to get away from asking people to vote for the benefit of their wallets.

Step 3: we heard you in 2016 - a change is going to come

Above all, 2016 was a protest. We therefore cannot campaign to Remain, for things to stay as they are. That is hard for us. We liked things as they were in May 2016. But 17 million of our fellow citizens didn’t. So we need to advocate change.

It is awkward because the protest came from two directions:

• the left-behind, who had nothing to lose and wanted someone to blame; and
• the leafy towns and suburbs of the South East who were doing well but felt the loss of an England of the imagination

It is also awkward because the Remain movement can no more deliver change than the Leave campaign could deliver Brexit. We must not follow their lead in making false and undeliverable promises.

So we need the political parties to come on board and show how they would respond. That will not work because the two main parties are pro-Brexit.

So we, the campaigners, need to take the promises that have been made by the various parties and show how they would work better if we Remained.

For example, there would be no government distraction – years spent tieing up loose ends after Brexit and managing a permanent negotiation with the EU could be better spent addressing real problems. The EU is a regulatory magnet, so we will end up as a rule-taker – better if we shape the rules.

Step 4: Sovereignty

Sovereignty matters more to Leave voters than we credit. So we have to address it head on and explain why it is better to pool sovereignty.

Blogs on this page give arguments for how EU membership enhances sovereignty, how the EU is more democratic than Leavers think, ensuring that the benefits of Brexit are worth the cost, the benefits of relying on shared EU agencies.

Step 5: Immigration

We must not pretend that EU changes are going to save us – no-one had heard of the posted workers directive before the referendum. Nor will an emergency brake work. We have to defend freedom of movement as it is.

Blogs on this page address: messages about immigration that calm Leave voters, what immigration control is worth to Leavers, the Government always misses its immigration target, the different roles of immigration and austerity in pressure on public services.

Conclusion

The question to ask about every campaigning action is: will this make a 2016 Leave voter vote Remain with enthusiasm and for positive reasons? One by one we will get to six million converts.

Blogs on this page reflect the views of the author and not necessarily of London4Europe.

It is never easy to follow the detail of parliamentary process, but the big picture at the end of this week is clear.

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People are changing their minds about Brexit. The latest polls since June 2016 now show a solid lead for those in favour of a Peoples Vote on the terms of a Brexit deal and for staying in the European Union (EU).

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One month ago, the major pro-Europe organisations came together to launch the single combined campaign, “People’s Vote”, i.e. for the British people to have a vote on the final Brexit deal to be proposed by the Government. 

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In less than a year, Britain goes over the cliff edge of departing from the EU – with a 'transition' to unknown arrangements. If regrets set in afterwards, it will be too late as we will have to re-apply under Article 49 - just as any other applicant. When those `unknown arrangements’ become somewhat clearer during negotiations this summer, “the people” may well look at the implications and decide for themselves whether they want to proceed over the cliff.

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It is becoming increasingly clear that while Theresa May’s Mansion House speech may have applied some sticking plaster on the gaping wounds within the Conservative government, it fails to address vital issues on which it simply offers more unrealistic fudge.

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Britain's pro-European voice was dramatically strengthened this week when six groups campaigning to keep Britain's ties with the European Union moved into offices together in Millbank Tower, a location already associated with some of the most impactful political campaigns of the last quarter century (watch the video above).

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