‘Equivalent Hysteria’ – or how ‘Remain’ failed in 7 quotes

There were people turning up who had never voted before. They did it this time because they were very angry with what they felt had been done to them in their communicates over decades – the decline of industry, the rapid increase in people coming to this country, the levels of austerity.

In a General Election they might think it doesn’t matter who you vote for because they’re all the same. In the Referendum, they recognised this could lead to something different. Maybe they didn’t anticipate all the consequences…but there was a sense that you could change things

-Jack Straw, in the wake of EU Referendum defeat

I’m sure there will be many analyses written in future years on why the ‘Remain’ camp lost a vote they initially thought they would win easily, but this in-depth article from The Guardian seems to sum it up rather well (Read the full story).

In a nutshell, ‘Equivalent hysteria’ from both sides cancelled out the more researched arguments (to the detriment of ‘Remain’) in favour of the more emotive ones (to the benefit of ‘Leave’).

The failure of the BREXIT ‘Remain’ campaign in 7 quotes from party insiders:

Rose was like a world-class rugby player who was handed cricket pads and expected to bat

• The rushed-through appointment of Stuart Rose (ex M&S CEO) to lead the ‘Stronger In’ campaign.

Tory MP Steve Baker described Europe minister David Liddington’s defence of the draft deal as ‘polishing a poo’

• The draft deal in question being Cameron’s Feb-16 EU renegotiation proposals.

There was the sense that we were bringing knives to a gun battle

• Cameron had been reluctant to sanction aggressive attacks on Gove and Johnson, whilst increasingly aggressive claims were being made by the ‘Leave’ campaign.

We did not expect leading members of a Conservative government to turn up offering themselves as an alternative government

• After Johnson and Gove launched a set of alternative policies, including an Australian-style points-based immigration system.

Things weren’t landing properly….even Obama didn’t land properly

• Focus groups reflected simmering resentment of foreign influence and an ingrained unwillingness to believe any statistical argument presented by the government.

We understand that Labour needs to sort out its immigration policy…but the time to do so is not a week before polling day on live fucking television

• An internal row developed in Labour (in the ‘Remain’ camp) about whether the free movement of workers should be up for renegotiation in interviews with the BBC by Tom Watson (Deputy Leader) and Ed Balls (former Shadow Chancellor)

Emotional fear wasn’t credible because they felt their lives were already shit

• MPs reported ‘Leave’ sentiment spreading like wildfire in their constituencies, especially amongst lower-income, working-class supporters as opposed to university-educated, middle-class supporters.

The Conservatives were hamstrung by their ludicrous migration cap and the inability to talk positively on immigration

• Cameron had promised in 2010 to limit annual migration to ‘tens of thousands’, a proposal which could not apply to EU nationals