Brexit: the great betrayal

By Richard North - February 1, 2025

I can’t say that I will ever find Brexit, as such, boring. I have invested too much of my life energy in it ever to be indifferent to its progress. But I do find much of the commentary on the subject utterly tedious, not least because so many people, and especially high-profile characters such as Farage, still don’t understand what it is all about.

Currently, this man has been sounding off at one of his self-aggrandising rallies, telling all and sundry that the Conservative party should “never be forgiven” for “betraying” the public over Brexit.

Of the party’s involvement, he says, “’They didn’t really want to leave the European Union. It was all a game about who leads the Conservative party”, in an analysis which probably has an element of truth in it. The Tories wanted control over the referendum campaign because they feared that a robust fight could split the party (more than it was already) and lead to its complete collapse.

That – as far as I can work out – is why Cummings was brought in at an early stage, to manage the process and to ensure that it didn’t become an anti-Tory diatribe. It is also why he would not entertain a formal exit plan as that, he felt, would divide the Eurosceptic wing of the party, the various factions of which had widely divergent views on how we should arrange our departure – should the referendum be won.

But when it comes to talking about “betrayal”, the one person most heavily implicated in causing the mess that Brexit became was Farage himself. Way back in 2002-3 he was strongly advised – by myself amongst others – that we needed a “exit and survival plan” to ensure that the leaving process was coherent and delivered the anticipated benefits, while avoiding the more obvious pitfalls.

Then and several more times in successive years, Farage rejected that advice which, in the absence of any initiative from the official “Vote Leave” campaign, meant that we emerged from the successful referendum with no clear (or any) idea of what to do next.

The resultant political vacuum marked one of the darkest periods for parliamentary democracy as the MP collective repeatedly showed itself unable to identify a single preferred exit strategy, with many individuals demonstrating a profound ignorance of the way the EU worked, and what could amount to a sensible solution to the complex task of reordering the UK in a post-Brexit world.

In fact, there was only one workable solution, which I set out in Flexcit, my own published plan which remains to this day the most comprehensive template ever produced.

The core element was that the UK should leave the EU but remain in the EEA, thus continuing to participate in the Single Market as part of a progressive separation, on the basis that it was unrealistic to expect a clean break, immediately unravelling forty-three years of integration in a single step.

A key requirement of any settlement, which was eventually to cause more trouble than any other aspect, was the insistence that there should be no hard border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

The most obvious and only equitable solution, which would avoid a procedural border between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, was the retention of the Single Market but, once Theresa May ruled out that option, there was never going to be a settlement that would satisfy all the parties.

We ended up with the inglorious fudge which, despite half-hearted and largely unsuccessful attempts at renegotiation, culminating in the so-called Windsor Framework, it with us today as a festering sore which serves as a reminder of the collective failure.

It was never my intention, incidentally, that the EEA should be a permanent solution. There were aspects of that agreement, negotiated in bad faith by Jacques Delors, which gave the Commission far too much power, but it nonetheless provided a suitable framework on which to base a long-term, stable trade agreement.

But, if post-exit trade agreements were a key part of any settlement, they were by no means the whole (or even most important) element of Brexit. As I wrote in the final sixth part of Flexcit, there was little point in recovering powers from the EU, only to hand them back to the same institutions that gave them away in the first place.

Further, even without EU influence, the UK was then an overly centralised state, so the repatriation of powers from Brussels only for them to reside in London or one of the other devolved capitals afforded fewer benefits to individual citizens than might be imagined.

Thus, to a certain extent, the effect of restoring a degree of “independence” would simply be to swap one ruling class for another, with very little by way of beneficial effects for ordinary people. Without then any further changes, there would also be nothing to stop the same institutions which gave away our powers from repeating the process or simply governing us in the same undemocratic manner as did the European Commission.

In fact, though, that is precisely what has happened. Stripping the EU of its powers as they related to governance of the UK has not resulted in any great empowerment of the people. Rather, the bulk of those powers released by the EU have been absorbed by the executive, which is even more powerful and over-mighty than it was.

For that reason, therefore, Brexit was never going to be a single event. As I wrote many times, it is “a process not an event” and the reordering of UK governance was never going to be a speedy process. The immediate exit settlement, culminating in the Trade and Cooperation Agreement, was not the end of the process but simply the first stage in a long journey.

In that sense, Johnson’s fatuous slogan for his 2019 election of “let’s get Brexit done” always was misplaced. Brexit, on the 31 January 2020 – the fifth anniversary of which we “celebrated” yesterday – was then unfinished business and remains so today.

To argue now that Brexit was never done, or variations on a similar theme, is to miss the point. It is perfectly respectable to argue that Brexit will never be “done” as such. The UK and the remnant of the EU are on separate journeys. There will be instances of continued divergence and some areas where we come together in the common interest.

It is extremely tiresome in that context though, to see the continued chatter about rejoining the EU, with the advocates showing no better appreciation of the nature of the EU and our relationship with it, than they did during the exit negotiations.

The procedural blocks to the UK’s re-entry are so formidable that, even if this government was determined on joining – which it isn’t – this could never happen in the space of a single parliament and then, not without a full and divisive referendum which no administration would enter willingly.

And any agreements with the EU, short of full membership, that might be concluded by this administration, could just as easily be undone by the next. Despite the continuous alarums, there is no realistic prospect of the UK entering any permanent arrangements with the EU, beyond those already in force. There are more serious things to worry about.

The great “betrayal”, therefore, of which Farage speaks so stridently, is the one he needs to address – his consistent refusal to formulate policy which has the prospect of taking us to the next and further stages in our struggle for independence and self-determination.

He may now take up the cry of “unfinished business” but he has no more idea of how to finish it than he ever had. As Pete points out, his form of rudderless populism will go whichever way the wind is blowing, and the closer Reform gets to power, the more out of touch it’ll become.

Brexit, therefore, will remain undone and will thus continue to attract controversy and debate, without ever reaching a resolution. On the tenth anniversary, I would venture, we’ll be rehearsing the same tired tropes that we are today.