Monday 16th October 2017
9 people were present. 2 sent their apologies.
The meeting took place amidst much commentary in the media about the real prospect of a ‘hard Brexit’ and we had some awareness of movement in parliament towards some cross party plans to reject such a conclusion.
There appears to be little agreement amongst politicians on many issues and little public understanding of such details as to what Britain might be judged to ‘owe’ the EU. There is a hard core of Tory hard Brexit people, but their view is shared by very different groups such as Mansfield voters (a traditional lab seat which went Tory in last election.)
Is a socialist Europe best created from within EU, or would it require rejection of EU altogether? Again, we had little knowledge of the constraints imposed by the EU on state support and nationalisation of industries and so we were unable to decide whether prospects for socialist changes were better inside or outside the EU. We mostly favoured the former, but aware that now Austria is added to the right wing orientation of EU states, that might be unrealistic. We returned to consider whether some economic assumptions were now being questioned. Eg. Politicians would now find it hard to say “There Is No Alternative” with any conviction like they could only a couple of years ago. But what might the alternative be? George Monbiot proposes the need for an alternative ‘narrative’. But what would be its themes? Fairness, perhaps? We need a new socialist narrative.
Corbyn’s position has been ambiguous and some of us thought that was a wise position to hold: hanging back while the Tories cut their own throats. But if this leads to the collapse of the Tories – a very real possibility – then Labour will have to articulate a much clearer position on EU in order to sort out the mess. With this in mind three different alternative focuses for the Labour Party were suggested:
1. Address the issues of social inequality and injustice and other issues apart from Brexit
2. Articulate a clear position on Brexit, which reflects Labour values
3. Press the Tories on those issues which are most likely to bring down the government and lead to an election and Labour government.
Although we did not directly share opinions about whether the ‘decision’ for Brexit should be reversed, and there was some opposition to the idea of another referendum, many of us expressed a strong commitment to attempt to stay in the EU or at least end up with a ‘pro-Europe’ position.
We were told of the Hope For Europe local movement, which is joined to the Europe Movement. It is to hold a meeting on Friday 20th October in Bradwell. See Val for details.