When I was five years old, I wanted to be in The Beatles, but all the jobs were taken … By the age of 12, I wanted to be a scientist and I became one. At the age of 18 I took a job with a philanthropic pharmaceutical company, working around the world and developing the first human insulin, novel medicines for herpes and to bring the first HIV / AIDS treatment to the world in record time. This means that I bring a scientific mind, curiosity and rigour to your enterprise.
By the age of 30 I had developed an interest in business leadership and began teaching MBA programmes, having completed 3.5 degrees myself. At 34, I took myself out of a paid job and, for the last 28 years, I have worked independently as a consultant, author and speaker with people at all levels all over the world, helping them to transform their enterprises. My clients seek to balance their passions, purposes and profit for a more responsible and sustainable form of capitalism in the 4th industrial age. I also help leaders digest what we call "wicked problems and opportunities", in other words, the issues that keep them awake at night, using a unique mixture of divergent and convergent thinking skills. My 28 years of consultancy experience bring a wealth of expertise and wisdom to you, in enterprises as diverse as Unilever to the United Nations.
Along the way, I have written 12 books on leadership, innovation and creativity, gaining a prize for my work from Sir Richard Branson and various accolades from Professors Charles Handy, Adrian Furnham, Tom Peters et al. Over some 50 years, I have gradually combined my three passions of science, business and music into a potent mixture which reaches the head, heart and soul of your enterprise.
In combination, your enterprise benefits from rigour, analytics and curiosity due to my science and business background, plus the emotional intelligence, creativity and improvisation skills that come from my life as a music composer and producer. As a musician I have been privileged to interview world class musicians such as Roberta Flack, John Mayall, AC / DC, members of Prince’s ensembles, Queen's production team and Meatloaf's singing partners for their insights into leadership, innovation and success.
I am a passionate advocate for better politics and better business for a better world, fighting populist politicians and short-termism in our global affairs. I am an "HR" person, i.e. a "Hippy Realist": green by ideals, but pragmatic by actions to change the world towards more sustainable behaviour.
Paul Bowers, our parliamentary lobbyist has produced an excellent letter to promote All-Party Parliamentary action on the EU which we may customise (attached).
We seek to target wobbling Tories as a first tranche and, of course, opposition parties.
Please go to the Google sheet and populate the sheet with details of relevant MPs and add your name if you plan to write to your MP.
Here is the letter to customise:
[Name] MP
House of Commons
London
SW1A 0AA
Dear [MP]
All-Party Parliamentary Group on European Union
I am writing as a constituent to ask you to consider setting up an All-Party Parliamentary Group on the European Union.
[I am a member of {name of activist group}]. I voted Remain in the 2016 referendum, and I have campaigned on the issue ever since.
[Insert personal connection here – In addition, my husband is Estonian; I have fond memories of studying at the Sorbonne; I once ate a croissant … ]
As you know, leaving the EU has damaged the UK’s fishing communities, threatens our farmers and food security, has cost eye-watering sums for financial services, harmed our creative industries, and forced many exporters either to scale down or to relocate. The Government’s encouragement of relocation is as much an admission of failed policy as are its plans to support retraining for farmers. Brexit has also damaged UK democracy, reduced our standing in the world, stigmatised EU nationals, and divided our country.
I believe that membership of the European Union is a necessity for the UK.
However, the response of the major political parties to the result of the 2019 general election risks creating a vicious circle of despair. Many voters wish to rejoin the EU, but feel that this is not possible because politicians are not showing leadership to that end. They feel politically homeless.
If no voice in Parliament even addresses the damage of our loss of membership, nor points out the opportunities presented by new developments within the EU, such as the growth of the green and digital sectors from the ambitious NextGenerationEU recovery and transformation plan, we will not be in a position to take advantage promptly of any opportunity to promote membership that might arise.
According to the APPG Register of 2 June 2021, there are Groups on individual European countries, on Erasmus and on Reuniting Britain Post-Brexit, but not on the EU itself.
As you may know, Article 11 of the Trade and Cooperation Agreement provides that the European Parliament and the UK Parliament may establish a Parliamentary Partnership Assembly “to exchange views on the partnership.”
In its Resolution 2021/2658(RSP) of 28 April 2021, the European Parliament endorsed this, envisaging an Assembly which would monitor implementation of the TCA, and suggesting that its remit include “the right to submit recommendations for areas where improved cooperation could be beneficial for both parties and to take joint initiatives to promote close relations.”
An APPG could support this work, and undertake a number of other roles:
Raising awareness of the damage caused by Brexit and the broken promises of Brexiteers
Channelling constituents’ views on policies that might reconcile them to EU membership
Creating a basis for lobbying within your own party in an effort to shift the leadership towards Rejoin
Representing the experiences of EU national constituents and their children
Providing scrutiny of the TCA, now that the Government has abolished the Commons Committee on the Future Relationship with the European Union
Commissioning research, providing spokespeople to the media and promoting an informed view of the EU, life outside, and the accession process
Providing a conduit to Parliament, through external membership, for informed activists
Contacting the Conference on the Future of Europe to discuss reforms that might help reconcile UK voters to a future return, and to stay in touch with new developments in the EU
I hope you will consider this suggestion positively, and speak to other Members about the possibility of creating an APPG on the EU. The longer we go on without one, the more glaring the omission, and the harder it will be for politicians to break the silence on this most vital of issues.
Desperate to avoid responsibility for the breakdown of the Good Friday Agreement, Johnson seeks to place the blame on the EU. He and his henchmen describe the EU’s position as “purist” and demand that the EU show flexibility. As usual, where Brexiteers are involved, matters are not so simple.
During the referendum campaign, the sillier Brexiteer parents made little placards stating “We want WTO” for their children to wave at demonstrations. Except in the case of tariffs, that is precisely what they got. Non-tariff barriers, which include health and safety regulations applicable inter alia to sausages,, have since 1 January 2021 fallen under WTO rules in trade between UK and the EU. One of the strongest principles of WTO is non-discrimination between members. If one member ‘relaxes’ rules on one or more products to the advantage of another member, then it must extend the relaxation to all the others. So, if the EU abandons the right to check sausages and other processed meats brought into Northern Ireland from Britain, it is bound to do so for the US, Mexico and other WTO members exporting meats such as sausages. The EU negotiators therefore have practical grounds for rejecting the UK demand, to protect their single market.
It is in fact the British government which is open to the accusation of being unreasonably purist, by refusing to align with EU food standards. For over 40 years we have lived comfortably with these standards – and indeed helped to draw many of them up. Now we refuse to solve the Northern Ireland problem by aligning because “it would compromise our sovereignty”. This is dogmatic bigotry. If Johnson and his regime stick to it at the expense of the Good Friday Agreement, any resultant bloodshed will be on their heads, and theirs alone.
Brexit : they think it’s all over. But it’s far from done. As the COVID umbrella lifts, Brexit is beginning to show its ugly heads. And, in the vernacular of Priti Patel, it’s all kickin’ off on Saturday 12th June with the worldwide premiere of Rage Against The Brexit Machine’s new song Alo’ Vera – Football’s Comin’ ‘Ome Euro Mix.
Saturday marks the start of the Euros and an exclusive live performance of the song at Chesham to celebrate Rejoin EU’s campaign in Chesham and Amersham. As with the Eurovision song contest, it rather seems that Global Britain’s attitude to aid and trade will leave us with “nil points” when it comes to re-booting Britain.Having asked for extra time for the transition period to mask Brexit carnage, Johnson is now losing trillions of pounds on “penalties” and he no longer knows where the goal is. But has Britain got the legs? Or will it crash out of the Euros, and of being a serious player on the world economic pitch?
Rage Against The Brexit Machine (RATBM) aims for the Premiere League, lining up for a Number One on Friday June 18th. Alo’ Vera latest release in our Pop versus Populism series, a rousing football-inspired pop pathos marching tune. A match for any match, it’s a tale of what’s finally comin’ ‘ome, and it ain’t Priti Patel’s fruit pickin’ teams, the European Corona care nurses or the easiest deal in history.
“Brexit was a game of two halves … but now the players are off the pitch, we wonder whether we should be supporting another team?”
Peter Cook, Brexorcist in Chief, RATBM.
Alo’ Vera – Football’s Comin’ ‘Ome is the follow up to “The Brexit Party” album” – the party album to end all parties. This includes other Brexit classics, which we will be performing from 11.00 am in Chesham, an unlikely location for a worldwide song release!
• A Chas & Dave Cockney Brexit Knees-Up “Bollocks to Brexit”.
• The punk-metal-trance-funk grind “Nigel Farage’s Garage”.
• The unforgettable Bojo French sex anthem “Take Back Control”, a fusion of “Je T’Aime” and AC/DC.
• A poignant dance floor track called “In Limbo”. An epic project with 20 voices from all over Europe.
• An 18th Century Tory Trance Floor Acid House Groove “Jacob Rees-Moog”.
“Music reaches our heads, hearts and souls in ways that politicians only dream of. The art of protest just found its 21st century voice. Corona Crisis + Brexit Disaster = Britastrophe”.
For an exclusive interview on Rejoining the EU, contact me and we will arrange with the Rejoin party leader / candidate.
Please join us in Chesham/Amersham this weekend to support The Rejoin EU Party from 10 am each day and tbc Batley and Spen. The economic reasons to rejoin the EU are now so widely published, given the disasters that have unfolded for so many industries since Brexit day (the fishing industry, the farming industry, the finance industry, the entertainment industry, the list goes on!) that I do feel that for many of us on the Rejoin EU side of the argument it’s become low hanging fruit.
But let’s remind ourselves there are so many more reasons to be part of the European Union than the economic ones.
The EU has been the biggest and most successful peace project in history, taking a continent that has an almost non-stop history of war for two-and-a-half millenia and forging an unprecedented peace. Some will argue that this is a product of a higher level of civilisation we have now reached, and it would be simply unthinkable to go back to our warlike roots. But when you consider the speed with which Britain despatched its warships to a protest by small fishing boats recently, you have to wonder.
People of my generation (mid 50s) were also able to take advantage of educational, cultural and lifestyle choices within the EU unrivalled by any other generation in history. The Erasmus scheme (which the current government spitefully chose to jettison, even though we could have continued whilst being outside the EU) opened the door for hundreds of thousands of UK young people to travel the continent. Many of whom chose to go on and base their lives within the city of their choice only to have it cruelly ripped away from them with Brexit.
As for the UK itself, it now finds itself in an existential crisis with the future of Scotland and Northern Ireland more uncertain than at any point in recent history.
And then there’s the science projects, the global environmental activism, the protection of food standards, the safeguards on dignity of lifestyle for those of us in the LGBTIQA+ community. All gone in a heartbeat, with total power over all our lives now in the hands of a hard right government with no obvious moral values (and I certainly don’t need to remind anyone where that can lead to).
So, to a question I often find myself turning to these days : “where is the opposition to this”?
When I was persuaded that establishing the Rejoin EU party as a registered political party as well as a pressure group was appropriate, I thought we’d spend more time supporting other opposition parties and their candidates then standing ourselves. We are pledged to provide a rejoin EU voice in any by election where one doesn’t otherwise exist.
In Scotland, that means very little work on our part. With the Scottish Greens and the SNP unashamedly arguing for our return to the top table, all our party has to do is be as supportive as possible.
Sadly, we don’t have the same options in English by elections. The Labour Party are calling on us to “embrace Brexit”, the Liberal Democrats have a leader who’s stated they are “not a rejoin party” and shows no sign of retracting this statement, whilst the Lib Dem conference supports only a “long term aim” of rejoining the EU (i.e. WON’T be giving voters that choice in the next general election) and the Green Party limit their discussions to rejoining the customs union.
Whilst many firm pro-EU advocates within these parties are trying hard to get stronger commitments, the collective narrative that “Brexit is done” becomes harder and harder to shift. Which is why we are lucky to have two amazing candidates in Brendan Donnelly for Chesham & Amersham and Andrew Smith for Batley & Spen in the upcoming by elections.
And even if, as Private Eye have phrased it so eloquently in the past, we end up as the only folks “sitting on the fruit cake stall” whilst the political mainstream ignore the issue so be it. I regularly ask myself, am I just crazy being the only one who can’t see the benefits of Brexit? Perhaps it’s part of the arrogance that comes with being a middle aged white dude, but in this instance, to quote Lily Allen, : “it’s not me, it’s you”.
Every day, people of all persuasions tell me “Brexit is done – we can do no more”. More than many, I understand just how wearing nearly five years of gaslighting, shapeshifting and obfuscation is on the soul. But, in spite of it all, we can and we must:
Re-Boot Britain is a pan-political advocacy and lobbying network. Let’s restore humanity, humility, democracy and truth in politics to Britain. Nearly five years of lying, gaslighting, shapeshifting and obfuscation gave us Brexit. Lets’s put the populist genie back in the bottle, by bettering the populists at their own wicked games:
* Reform politics towards representative democracy.
* Break the parliamentary paralysis that broke Britain.
* Take back control (sic) of populist media across our divided nations by making our case for a Better Britain in a Better Europe for a Better World
* Create mind-shifts to move popular opinion about Britain’s role in the world.
Brexit has consumed Britain : 3 elections, 3 Prime Ministers and 3 failed attempts to Brexit. It has left us weak and vulnerable in our response to COVID.
A political backbone has been absent in Britain for nearly five years and probably longer. The diverse and disparate Remain movements have sometimes gold-plated the strategy that lost them the referendum, albeit with the best of intentions. Various attempts to build cohesion and collaboration into our movement have failed, rather like one of the biggest silo-based monolith public sector organisations.
Yet we cannot allow the greatest disaster next to climate change to threaten the next generation’s futures to continue. Our continued resistance is both moral, a fight worth having and certainly not a waste of tiWatch the video below for a quick overview of the project:
Read more about the background to this in our paper “Brexit Futures“. Although the paper was published in January 2020 and is therefore out of date, much of what it says remains relevant, especially the second half, on the question of reforming our fragmented movement. The paper has been adopted by Grassroots for Europe and a number of other large pro EU institutions including the Federal Trust and Hendrik Klassens, the originator of the #FBPE hashtag.
The panic buying associated with the Corona outbreak gave us a sneak preview of what Brexit will look like. This is merely an hors d’ouevre for Britain, if we allow things to continue. As I write on Jan 04 2021, people are beginning to work out the impact of our thin deal via companies who are refusing to supply UK with goods and services, problems with Amazon / ebay etc.
THE WHY : OUR AIMS
THE HOW – STRATEGY
We are building a full time professional advocacy movement with the aim of breaking the deadlock of our “dead cat” politics:
1. Breaking Parliamentary Paralysis – via lobbying MPs using a variety of means.
2. “Taking Back Control” of populist media via press and media activity in national and local print / radio and TV media.
3. Develop much better reach into social media, in terms of honesty, depth of penetration and reach across Britain.
4. Changing minds on Brexit via 1:1 conversations and / or en masse via online leaders’ debates and other grassroots strategies.
HOW II – OUR ORGANISATION
We have a team-based network structure across Britain and Europe. What we cannot do ourselves, we do with others e.g. The European Movement, Grassroots for Europe, EU Flag Mafia, UKPEN and so on. We invite you to join one or more of these bubbles, giving consideration to your skills and will. We run weekly ZOOM meetings. Please drop me a message to join an induction meeting or one of our regular tactical meetings where we create campaigns and media.
HOW CAN YOU HELP?
We ask that you join us with a suggested donation of £10 per month or £100 pa for Silver membership. If you can spare more, please consider higher level donations of £25 pm / £250 pa or £50 pm / £500 pa. Or please just give what you can afford on an ad hoc basis. Everything helps.
Silver : Gives you basic early access to our daily stream of writing and media
Gold : Gain copies of our work in advance of release (books, music, media). Exclusive invites to our regular series of conference calls and seminars
Platinum : 1:1 coaching in the art and discipline of changing minds on Brexit plus all other benefits above
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Isn’t Brexit already done? A piece of paper was signed
We had our “Chamberlain moment” on 31.01.20 plus Boris Johnson some time spent in a gulag (fridge), finally getting Brexit done through using COVID and Christmas as a weapon to distract us from the realities of the “oven-ruined Brexit deal”. But Brexit is a political process and the law is merely a servant to the politicians. We now face a winter of discontent, as the realities start to bite. Anything is possible in such a climate, including the dramatic fragmentation of an 80 strong majority and / or the slow removal of the populist culture carriers from power, just as Trump has been leavened gradually. If you are not sure on the relative powers of politics versus the law, just think of ONE occasion when the Government obeyed the rule of law in the last five years, or other precedents. Here’s a few where they didn’t:
1. Gina Miller’s Supreme Court Case 2. The Cooper No Deal amendment – No Deal was deemed illegal, yet it was used in 2020 as a threat to secure Brexit 3. Pro-rogation of Parliament 4. The 6 million petition was ignored 5. Planning to break international law to get Brexit done 6. Allowing rapists to continue acting as MPs 7. Re-introduction of the death penalty, which threatens our trade agreement with the EU
… and so on. Our Government is beyond the law. We should not be so keen to give them excuses to continue doing this.
If political will changed, the law would be made to fit the circumstances and lawyers would spend years and earn a lot of money re-arranging the law to fit the circumstances.
Is it too late? We finalised things?
We have now exited the EU via a highly compressed timetable and limited scrutiny of the trade deal. Mark Francois has already declared that the fight for a hard Brexit will continue and negotiations will continue for many years as contradictions and conflicts emerge. We can use various legal devices such as Article 49 and or the formal review process built into the trade agreement. We live in a disruptive political climate with the toxic mixture of Corona + Brexit = Britastrophe and we have no idea whether Boris Johnson’s Government will survive the oncoming tsunami.
What will we do with the money?
We will hire a small organisation – A PA, fundraising team, professional web platform and so on. Also allocate up to 50% of the funds to support our full-time input. Voluntary activity is fine but we need full time professional help to be agile and able to react. I am prepared to set my work aside to do this but I also need to live. Of late we have had to install security and surveillance measures due to death threats and actual attacks on my property from angry people who claim that continuing to talk about Brexit is anti-democratic.
What is our organising structure?
Strategy and Leadership team – Members of this team are established strategists and people who can lead and manage others. All leaders of the other teams are automatically part of this team and we invite people from other Remain / Rejoin organisations for collaboration purposes.
Fundraising team – Members of this team understand how to raise funds for a cause or are willing and able to amplify the efforts of the leader of the fundraising team.
Social media amplification team – We need a team of people who have time to give across the major social media – Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram etc. either in content generation or pure amplification of our social media footprint. Our ABV (Anti-Brexit Virus) Super Spreader networks are already established on Facebook and Twitter. Our real enemy is not Corona, it is the populist politics that offer “easy answers” to complex problems.
Mainstream media team – Members of this team write great letters, articles and / or conduct credible interviews with MSM across print, radio and television. You may be members of the public with media skills, business leaders, political pundits, journalists, celebrities and so on. We must punch above our weight in MSM using colourful material with gravitas added.
People, Parliament and Power team – You will likely possess skills of influence and persuasion, both in terms of positive advocacy and possibly the “dark side of the force” e.g. Machiavellian and Sun Tzu type strategies to deal with opponents. European Movements liaison team – Our strength is the extent to which we are able to operate as ‘boundary crossers’ to minimise the silo-based structure of Remain. You will be an avid and capable networker, able to gain co-operation from the main organisations.
Scotland, Ireland, Wales and The EU team – Brexit means that there will be significant moves towards independent nations and regions of the UK. We will support local elections and other activities to help others gain independence. You may live in England. Website and media production team – We’re looking for people with skills to upgrade the website and produce video and other media.
Events team – Working with other national groups such as EU Flag Mafia, Grassroots for Europe, we support other grassroots groups in delivering impactful events. We have already staged a Festival of Brexit and other events and plan more. Administration team – We are looking for a team to assist our professional PA to smooth communication and co-ordination. We plan a weekly briefing to members and our networks to help bridge the many silos in the Remain organisation.
Holding Brexit to account team – Essentially, you will be a good analyst and someone who can interrogate data and convert it into powerful information via reports and other media.
Oh, no, not another anti Brexit movement?
Our difference comes from the fact that we will be more direct than professional politicians, outsmarting Nigel Farage et al. at their own wicked games. We will also rely more on professionals in their field rather than volunteers. This will give us the edge in terms of responsiveness and agility. At the same time we will collaborate with other pro EU and anti-Brexit groups across the board, acting to amplify their efforts. Despite best efforts of the many local grass roots EU organisations and various central quangos which have now folded, much of our work has suffered from “initiative constipation” – see Brexit Futures for more insights on this. In brief:
* We collaborate with the major national and international Remain movements.
* We have no party politics but work with people across parties.
* We allocate full-time professional effort to our organisation. Voluntary effort alone, whilst welcome, has not given us sufficient energy, agility and focus.
When I was five years old, I wanted to be in The Beatles, but all the jobs were taken … By the age of 12, I wanted to be a scientist and I became one. At the age of 18 I took a job with a philanthropic pharmaceutical company, working around the world and developing the first human insulin, novel medicines for herpes and to bring the first HIV / AIDS treatment to the world in record time. This means that I bring a scientific mind, curiosity and rigour to your enterprise.
By the age of 30 I had developed an interest in business leadership and began teaching MBA programmes, having completed 3.5 degrees myself. At 34, I took myself out of a paid job and, for the last 28 years, I have worked independently as a consultant, author and speaker with people at all levels all over the world, helping them to transform their enterprises. My clients seek to balance their passions, purposes and profit for a more responsible and sustainable form of capitalism in the 4th industrial age. I also help leaders digest what we call “wicked problems and opportunities”, in other words, the issues that keep them awake at night, using a unique mixture of divergent and convergent thinking skills. My 28 years of consultancy experience bring a wealth of expertise and wisdom to you, in enterprises as diverse as Unilever to the United Nations.
Along the way, I have written 12 books on leadership, innovation and creativity, gaining a prize for my work from Sir Richard Branson and various accolades from Professors Charles Handy, Adrian Furnham, Tom Peters et al. Over some 50 years, I have gradually combined my three passions of science, business and music into a potent mixture which reaches the head, heart and soul of your enterprise.
In combination, your enterprise benefits from rigour, analytics and curiosity due to my science and business background, plus the emotional intelligence, creativity and improvisation skills that come from my life as a music composer and producer. As a musician I have been privileged to interview world class musicians such as Roberta Flack, John Mayall, AC / DC, members of Prince’s ensembles, Queen’s production team and Meatloaf’s singing partners for their insights into leadership, innovation and success.
I am a passionate advocate for better politics and better business for a better world, fighting populist politicians and short-termism in our global affairs. I am an “HR” person, i.e. a “Hippy Realist”: green by ideals, but pragmatic by actions to change the world towards more sustainable behaviour.
Anti-Brexit activism
On terms of my work over the last five years, I have led the Rage Against The Brexit Machine project, having written three albums of anti-Brexit protest songs and got one of them to Number One on the Amazon chart. “Brexorcist in Chief” for Mid Kent 4 EU, I wrote a book on the subject of having difficult conversations with Leave voters from many thousands of hours of activity on the street, in cafes and bars. Out of all this time, on one occasion I gained two black eyes for misjudging an interaction with angry leave voters. I was also arrested by Essex Police for driving a Mini Cooper with “B*llocks to Brexit” on the side. They asked me to remove the signage on the hard shoulder of the M25. Sadly for Essex Police I called 999 to have the officer arrested. 250 000 Tweets later, Essex Police had to retreat with an apology for putting their lives and ours at risk. I should emphasise that the vast majority of our dealings with the Police and public have been cordial and uneventful.
I stood a stuffed cat in the 2019 General Election. Although the cat was only there to create tactical voting, to my surprise, Stan the Cat did not come last in the ratings, beating the Christian People’s Alliance who had been campaigning for 15 years with a budget !! Aside from the above sensationalism, I’ve managed to get our cause into the BBC, ITV, Sky, LBC and all major print media from The Guardian to The Express without ANY media agency or budget, just by using a professional approach. Whilst some Remainers consider me “underground”, my approach is much more effective than the blowhards in committees who simply watch things happen.
For nearly 5 years I have acted to dispel the illusions of Brexit. At 62 I am at some risk from Corona and consider that a fitting epitaph for my life would be the destruction of Brexit populism for the sake of future generations.
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