A second Brexit referendum is a dangerous fallacy

Picture the scene – at a series of press events and amidst a flurry of tweeted delight from Labour’s right wing MP’s – Jeremy Corbyn backs a 2nd Brexit referendum. Oh how DE-LIGH-TED will be The Guardian and all of Corbyn’s other opponents. 

How does Labour’s Remain majority imagine that Labour’s Leave minority (about 35% of Labour’s vote at the last election) will respond to this? I will tell you – a very significant number will curse the name of Labour on every digital forum in the rantosphere and vow never to vote Labour again.

Just how does a horribly divisive second referendum on Brexit ever takes place in the real world anyway? While the tories remain in power it will never happen, many conveniently forget that the tories have a mandate until May 2022 – one way or another, Brexit will be decided long before then. 

If there is another general election before 2022 then a Labour embrace of a second referendum would be a disaster. Had a look at the polls for the European elections lately? Brexit parties are polling 34% – more than the Tories and Labour combined! If Corbyn campaigns for a second referendum, these people will see not him as the anti-establishment candidate anymore – they will see him as the enemy and will abandon Labour in droves.

In a General Election where Nigel Farage is handed the political open goal of a looming second referendum his new Brexit Party will do very well. Fancy another hung parliament with the balance of power being held by Nigel Farage? 

I hate to remind Labour supporters of this – but Labour lost the last election, to win they will need all the Leave voters who supported Corbyn last time and many more. To win, Labour simply cannot afford to tweak the noses of Brexiteers – however popular it may be with its Remain membership. 

The truth is – Labour are doing very well with their current Brexit stance, which walks a pragmatic political tightrope between two chasms of disaster.  There was always going to be a Brexit penalty for the major parties at the local elections – the tories lost over 1,300 seats while Labour lost 79, that reads like a triumphant vindication of Labour’s balancing act to me. The Guardian and the Blairites desperately tried to spin the results as a bad night for Labour when in fact it was a sensational night.

If by some bizarre turn of events a second referendum were to take place, the tories assisted by the full volume of the corporate media will pin the responsibility for it happening on Labour. There is a very cosy fantasy doing the rounds that a second referendum will somehow wash away all the Brexit bitterness of the last three years – it won’t. Brexit won’t go away even if Remain wins a 2nd vote. Brexiteers will be more embittered than ever, having had their Brexit mandate overturned by Labour do you think they’ll bury the hatchet and vote Labour at the next election? They will bury the hatchet all right – in Labour’s head.

Whether it happens or not – a second referendum is electoral poison, that is why Corbyn’s opponents like Tom Watson and Margaret Hodge are desperate for him to drink deeply from this Brexit chalice – it’s their very last hope to get rid of him – before the Corbyn project gets rid of them.

Embracing a second referendum will end all hope of a Labour government, will destroy the Corbyn project and the overall democratisation of the Labour movement. Labour supporters will do well to remember that the party campaigned on a platform to deliver Brexit at the last election – if it now reneges on its election promises to deliver a soft Brexit it will never be forgiven and the toxic aftermath of a second referendum will taint the party for decades. 

The bald truth is this – if Labour’s Remain supporters want to see Corbyn at Downing Street they are going to have to set aside their factional Brexit fervour – or lose everything.