Yesterday’s “Domshell” revelations from Cummings are out there for all to see. However, Cummings managed to sidestep one vital issue. The extent to which the Government’s decisions on COVID were themselves informed by the obsessive need to “Get Brexit Done”. Here we report on the Cummings and Goings after a brief interlude from a spoof edition of “FHM Magazine” which illustrates the type of gaslighting we will be expecting in the cummings days:
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Cummings could hardly admit that his pet project of Brexit was in any way a cause of the indecision, cronyism, delay and lies put forward to fool the public about our world beating deaths under COVID and the losses of lives and livelihoods due to stop start lockdowns and failure to use circuit breakers under the advice of scientists. However, it is plain to see that Johnson used COVID as a mask to “Get Brexit Done” last Christmas, when no-one seemed to care about anything else other than turkeys and an end to the COVID crisis. Johnson was able to railroad his own MPs and the opposition into signing a deal with zero scrutiny. We are only just beginning to see the outfall of Johnson’s decisions on Brexit, see Brexodus and to misquote a well-worn phrase “the worst is yet to come”
Brexit + COVID overload
At the most basic level, our problems with COVID deaths and emerging Brexit problems are a resourcing and time management issue in Government and The Civil Service in spite of best efforts on the part of most people. No other civilised country in the world has tried to deal with a pandemic PLUS a constitutional coup at the same time. Stretched resources meant that decisions were either not taken or delayed. Bad decisions cost lives in a pandemic, at least 150 000 unnecessary COVID-related deaths. The decisions made by Johnson’s Cabinet were masked by lies, which also grew on an exponential scale alongside pandemic deaths.
Hancock’s half hour
Although Matt Hancock has been served up to face the public, he is not the root cause of the problems with COVID deaths. They go back to the irresponsible decision to Get Brexit Done alongside the pandemic and the people who pushed for this are strangely silent. Lest we forget their names:
We warned of the problems from dither and delay over a year ago in March 2020. Cummings revelations are welcome. If he is now to clear his record, he must go further and admit that the toxic combination of Corona crisis + Brexit disaster has delivered a Britastrophe. I am not forgiving Cummings yet, but his candour is welcome and I believe his testimony. To quote some well worn phrases:
I agree with Dom
Let’s talk about BREX .. it
Decision making is a function of effective leadership
The wonderful work of Cold War Steve with an insertion of my Britastrophe banner. Find Steve’s work by clicking the image.
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.
Five years on and Brexit’s still undone. I often get quaint looks when I talk about Brexit in Kent now and some subtle or even less subtle social disapproval. For the record, I’m quite happy to be considered to be “so last year” until I am returned to the soil by my maker, or Brexit is placed in a shallow grave, whichever comes soonest. Brexit is in fact undone now that Johnson has realised he never read the contract. It will never be “done”. I told everyone that we’d be doing Brexit for the next 50 years and it begins to look that way. In five years it becomes apparent that we still don’t know what Brexit means but we are beginning to make some evaluation of what Brexit has brought us.
Economiceffects
£2.3 Trillion was lost in just one month from the city of London. Just for comparison and scale, that’s 58 years’ worth of our contribution of £39 billion to the EU wiped out in just one month. So, we would have to make up our losses due to Brexit until 2079 just from this impact alone. Let that sink in!!
Our Australia trade deal is worth 0.02% of GDP over 15 years. It would take 2000 deals like this to even make up our losses from our arrangements with the EU. At a generous estimate of our rate of deal making, we can expect to make up the losses from Brexit in trade deals by the year 3021. I know that’s bad economics as not all trade deals are worthless and some also take years not months but I think you should get the point.
£37 billion has wasted on test and trace. That’s more than what it takes to land a space mission on Mars at a mere £22.5 billion. Our contribution to the EU is £39 billion per year.
Despite promises made to fishermen on Brexit, the UK fishing industry will have been filleted by the time any new arrangements come into being with £1 Million being bled from the fisherman every DAY. Yet, we plan to spend £200 million on a Royal Yacht that the Royal family do not want or need. Brexit McBrexitFace will no doubt spend its time trawling international waters trying to net trade deals without catching anything more than scurvy.
Brexit shrank UK services exports by more than £110 billion over a four-year period. That’s 3 x our yearly contribution to the EU, much of which we get back.
Farmers have also been sold down the river with the introduction of hormone fed beef and the dumping of poor quality products into UK markets, just so that Liz Truss can claim success.
The building industry is beginning to show cracks with materials shortages and other supply chains being affected.
Food and drink exports from UK have declined by 50% since the beginning of 2021.
Coming soon, having lost EU steel import protections, our steel industry now faces a wave of cheap imports.
Hired goons distract people from Brexit shambles. Help us Re-Boot Britain by clicking the image.
Social / Welfare / Environmental
Brexit has been all consuming on Civil Service bandwidth and this means that there have been numerous areas of neglect. For example: social care, Grenfell, The Northern Ireland protocol and citizenship issues remain undone with massive consequences for lives and livelihoods. 305 000 people are caught in civil service backlogs for settled status and Johnson says he will not budge on the deadline of June 30th with impact on breaking up families and imprisonment at borders. Big issues in 2016 are still issues in 2021 due to the significant entropy of Brexit on progress across the board of Government.
“You can stay but your kids can’t”.
We are yet to see the whole impact of the end of the grace period at the borders but already all major supermarkets have imposed rationing on tinned tomatoes with food shortages predicted in the coming months and the army on standby.
And, of course, far from taking back control of £350 million per week for the NHS, Dido Harding is on the way to privatising your NHS. Was this on the side of a bus?
We did not need to do Brexit to deal with immigration. Our hostile environment has discouraged Europeans to work here. In particular we have seen a sharp decline in fruit pickers, care workers and other professions. The arguments made by Brexiteers to “grow our own” have not gathered any takers …
Instead of planting veg this year I have taken the Brexiteers advice to "grow our own". I have planted 3 doctors, 10 nurses, 5 scientists and 20 farmers in the ground. I now await the results #Brexiteers#BrexitReality#NHS#farming#ScienceResearch
— Re-Boot Britain – Rage Against The Brexit Machine (@BrexitRage) June 21, 2021
Political / Constitutional
The destruction of peace in Northern Ireland has already begun by the reckless abandonment of the Good Friday Agreement. Johnson promised there would be no border down the Irish Sea. He broke that promise, ending 30 years of peace on the island of Ireland. Kate Hoey has been cynically and dangerously stoking the fires of unrest in Northern Ireland, having promoted Brexit.
The destruction of the United Kingdom has begun with Scotland seeking independence, reunification of Ireland and independence movements beginning in Cornwall and the North East. Independence for Scotland and unity for Ireland are of course good things and entirely predictable consequences of Brexit. In extremis, England will be reduced to the People’s Republic of Thurrock by 2040!! Gibraltar has special status as a means of dealing with the fact that the majority of residents work in Spain. In 10-20 years time we can expect Gibraltar to be under Spanish control. The same goes for The Falkland Islands, The Channel Islands and The Isle of Man.
The UK is now a four nation state and a one party state with no effective opposition. It may sound hard to say this but Brexit is as much a product of a passive and fearful opposition than it is the result of a hard core of Brexit ultras and psychopaths.
Britain no longer has a special relationship with the USA as President Biden seeks to re-educate us about the realities of breaking international law. At the same time Biden has forged stronger links with Europe as a natural partner of similar size in terms of trade and other opportunities.
I invite Brexiteers to provide a list of benefits of Brexit – Five years waiting
Ethical / Legal
Protest is now being clamped down on, using COVID as an umbrella to hide under. Boris Johnson is to remove the powers of the Electoral Commission after they asked awkward questions about the redecoration of his flat.
Crony contracting continues as The Good Law Project reveals details of companies offered lucrative contracts based on personal networks rather than competence in the chosen industry. If you are to shrug and say “so what” to this, these contracts were for PPE. This means that people will have died unnecessarily because of faulty selection procedures. You may well say that the pandemic demanded a speedy response. Well the speediest response would have been to select companies with the capacity and competence to make the products rather than novices.
My own MP Mr Rehman Chishti is under investigation for having his hand in the till over property development scandals. You can help by reporting him to the bar council.
— Re-Boot Britain – Rage Against The Brexit Machine (@BrexitRage) June 21, 2021
We have still not found the identity of the Tory rapist. Is this an example for our children to look up to?
It now seems that our children are to sing a Soviet styles song in school to unite the country. I have a better suggestion – see the song below
Ignorance is strength – Post Brexit education syllabus
I could go on but I won’t. All this in just five years … and we’ve only just begun …
A collaborative effort to mark five years of Brexit carnage from Greg, Lisa, Patricia, Irina, Andrew, Adrian, Mike, Helga and the good people at Re-Boot Britain. Join us every Monday to Break Brexit Before Brexit Breaks Britain.
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There is a job going for Director, Brexit opportunities in the Cabinet Office – I was excited by the prospect of finding out what these were after five years of waiting patiently so I have applied. My application is below. I’d urge you to do the same. Here is the specification:
Dear Lord Sir David Frost,
I have been an avid follower of your work ever since The Frost Report and I was excited to see your research post for a Director of the BOU (Brexit Opportunities Unit). You need look no further, as you have found your man. To quote ELO, ‘I’ve been searchin’ for five years on my own account, meticulously comparing what we had in the EU with what we are getting, now that Brexit is out of the oven. I’d like to continue that research in the quest for the economic, social, technological, ethical, environmental and constitutional benefits of Brexit. As far as your job specification goes, I meet and exceed your requirements, in brief:
I am a skilled researcher, covering qualitative and quantitative methods, survey design and communications. With 3.5 degrees covering science, business and HR, I am quite used to dealing with the distortion of data by politicians, so I’d be more than able to extract the Brexit benefits from the background noise, if they exist. Broadly speaking, I am happy to continue with your line of “if the facts don’t fit the story, change the facts or just erase them”.
I am used to dealing with intelligent senior people across industry, politics, media and in public life. I am quite sure I could “level down” to work with imbeciles, sycophants and psychopaths as required by the role. I met the Prime Minister in 2012 shortly after the Olympics when he was dating a young woman so we have actually met.
In terms of change management, I have written 12 books on leadership and one on the question of changing minds on Brexit. Admittedly, the strategies in “Let’s Talk About BREX .. it” are directed towards the removal of illusions and fantasies about Brexit, what I call “Brexorcism”. However, these change management strategies are just as applicable to the erasure of people’s minds who voted to Remain, although it may be a lot quicker to round these people up and send them to a BCC (Brexit Concentration Camp) – in fact, I will make a proposal on this separate matter to Priti Patel shortly. I am prepared to work on this for 50 years as suggested by Jacob Rees-Mogg.
Change minds on Brexit
In terms of commanding confidence, I am a skilled practitioner of speaking truth to power. I see that lying is a precondition for doing the job and I would cope with this by using a placard saying “fake news” whenever I give a public brief to the media for greater clarity. In any case, in the post-Brexit world, the truth is an expensive luxury. I see that you, Johnson, Patel, Hancock, Raab, Duncan Smith, Francois et al. have managed to get by without needing to get dragged down by the truth. Bravo!!
As regards changing laws, I have no respect for the law, having been let down by the Police on several occasions when being attacked by Brexiteers. This means that I regard the law as unimportant in the quest to get Brexit done. Judges and the judiciary are one of the areas we must target to remove the scales of justice from people’s eyes.
I was considered to be too organised to get a job for Dominic Cummings. This demonstrates my ability to stick at something that has been a proven failure over the long term.
Dealing with the Russians at Parliament – Photograph by Bruce Tanner http://www.brucetanner.com
Crucially I have no political experience at all, a massive asset in a political world befuddled by political experts. Who needs experts (Gove, Govia). But I am good at coming up with meaningless phrases to describe the toxic cocktail of Corona crisis + Brexit disaster aka “Britastrophe“.
In the words of The Clash “I hate the army and I hate the R.A.F. I don’t wanna go fighting in the tropical heat. I hate the civil service rules. I won’t open a letter bomb for you.”
Put plainly, if Dido Harding can run the NHS, I can run the fucking Cabinet Office, FFS.
In summary, 27 years diverse experience as a business consultant, author, speaker and academic, working with companies such as Unilever, Pfizer, The UN, Virgin, BP. Find me at Linkedin.
On the suggestion of Julia Smith, may I ask for these other fringe benefits:
Free flags for my home, car etc.
Private health insurance delivered by the NHS
Cocaine discounts
Free use of the Royal Yacht Brexit McBrexitFace at weekends
Exclusive access to PPE contracts for which I am quite unsuitable @ £107 million per item
I require a minimum of two cats in the office at anyone time and a supply of fresh food for the kitties
A job for my son in strategic management
A gravy train and two year’s supply of Bisto
Yours in waiting
Peter
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The repetitive “why” technique is good for getting to root causes which I’ve used extensively as a scientist and MBA tutor. Here is a vastly reduced form of the technique applied to the case of “Matt Hancock’s Half Hour”:
Q : Why is Matt Hancock being investigated?
A : Because he kissed a woman and grabbed her arse?
WRONG.
A : Because he made policy decisions that led to 150 000 Corona deaths?
WRONG.
A : Because Johnson needs a distraction from the growth of the COVID Delta variant?
In part, YES.
A : Because Johnson needs a distraction from the next stages of Brexit?
In part, YES.
Q : Should Hancock be sacked?
A : Yes, but, of course this lets Johnson, Gove, Redwood, Sunak, Leadsom, Patel, Raab, Baker, McVey, Francois, Truss, Whately, Duncan Smith, Mogg, Dacre, Murdoch, The Barclays, Foster, Davis, Jenrick, Zahawi, Coffey, Farage, Eustace, Hoey, Trump, Elliot, Cameron, Corbyn, May, Mc Cluskey, Fox, Field, Jenkin, Hannan, Cummings et al off the hook, not to mention their shadowy acolytes. Who did I miss? Sunak is an interesting example as many people think him benign. However, Julia Smith points out that Sunak deliberately ignored 3.5 million self employed people. A small number of these killed themselves as a result. Brexit extremism is not without its human consequences.
Q : What then is the root cause of Hancock? i.e. Why is Hancock Hancock?
A : Johnson.
Q : What then is the root cause of Johnson? i.e. Why is Johnson Johnson?
(a) 100,000 of those deaths could have been avoided but for this government’s inexcusable incompetence. That makes Johnson and Hancock Premier League mass murderers.
(b) Brexit was always for the benefit of tax dodgers and other criminals. It was never for the benefit of decent people.
(c) Johnson has a licence to be dictator until 2024.
The worst is yet to come.
Read our recent articles:
Five Years – A review of five years of Brexit “benefits”.
Career opportunities – Our application to work for the Cabinet Office to find the Brexit benefits.
Wednesday September 8 2021 – from 19.00 – 21.00 – The first hour is the seminar plus questions. The second hour is a participative opportunity to reflect upon Professor Grayling’s seminar, an opportunity for dialogue and an event to update our draft scenarios for rejoin. Here is our working draft:
Click on the images to get your ticket
Please attend our induction events every Monday at 8 pm on ZOOM. We will be considering scenarios to Rejoin EU in August in preparation for Professor Grayling’s input.
In case you are not familiar with Scenario Planning, it can be summarised as “a history of the future”. We will consider a long time horizon of at least 10 years and then identify plausible events along that time line. These will be the PESTLE factors: political, economic, social, technological, legal and environmental events. From this we construct the most likely scenarios, bearing in mind that our politics are in flux, so disruptions must be examined. I will be leading you through the process. You can read a little on the process at Scenarios although our time horizons will be longer than the example given.
So, please give some thoughts as to the likely events coming up in the next decade.
The first 100 tickets were free and now we need support to help cover our costs in increasing our ZOOM contract. We aim to run more events and need £480 to cover a yearly upgrade on ZOOM. Once we reach this, all our events into 2022 will be free.
Professor Grayling will speak on what we need to do to rejoin the EU sooner rather than later with some very practical suggestions for all of us to act upon.Anthony Grayling is the author of about 30 books on philosophy, biography, history of ideas, human rights and ethics, including The Refutation of Scepticism (1985), The Future of Moral Values (1997), Wittgenstein (1992), What Is Good? (2000), The Meaning of Things (2001), The Good Book (2011), The God Argument (2013), The Age of Genius: The Seventeenth Century and the Birth of the Modern Mind (2016) and Democracy and its Crises (2017).He has been a stalwart campaigner for our continuing membership of the European Union.
The event is co-promoted by Re-Boot Britain, Mid Kent European Movement, East Kent European Movement, Alliance4Europe and Dorset European Movement. Alliance4Europe is a non-profit working to activate citizens for a more democratic, inclusive and sustainable Europe. It builds coalitions for pro-European action for more impactful campaigning. Omri Preiss is a co-founder and managing director of A4E, with a background in EU policy-making and human rights advocacy.
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It was not until late Match 2020 that the UK Government began to arrange for protective equipment (PPE) for hospital staff and care workers. The EU had done so in early January. By then Britain had to do so in emergency conditions, and a tightening global market for PPE.
In order to speed up procurement, it set up a up a high-priority channel to assess and process tenders and grant contracts, without going through normal procedures. To maintain transparency, the government was required to declare details of such contracts within 30 days of awarding them. Lord Bethel, a junior health minister, promised that suppliers would be evaluated by officials on their financial standing. On 27 March Government began to invite tenders for PPE.
By the end of 2020, following a report by National Audit Office (NAO) and court cases brought by the Good Law Project, it was clear that the the new system had resulted in setting aside safeguards ensuring good value for public money and against corruption. Suppliers with political connections (such as Ministers, Tory MPs and Cabinet Office officials) were being directed to a “VIP” lane where their tenders for lucrative contracts were automatically treated as credible and prioritised by officials. Such bids were 10 times more likely to succeed than those of non-favoured suppliers. VIP tenderers also got very favourable terms. Despite Government efforts to cover up VIP profits, it is known they received inflated margins of 35% – 45% or more , on contracts up to hundreds of millions of pounds. By comparison, a normal profit margin was 10-20%
The NAO also criticised government for other failures, including lack of transparency, and conflicts of interest. In particular, it noted that the Cabinet Office and Health Ministry had failed to explain why companies with government connections and poor due diligence records were chosen to provide crucial services such as supplying PPE, consulting and policy advice. Some lacked any experience of PPE; NAO disclosed that 195m pieces of PPE had proved to be unusable.
A further report in April 2021 by Transparency International, (TI), a respected anti-corruption organisation, stated that 1 in 5 government COVID contracts awarded between February and November 2020 were marked with 1 or more red flags indicating a need for investigation for possible corruption. 27 PPE or testing contracts worth £2.1bn had been awarded to firms with clear connections to the Tory party. £255m of contracts had been awarded to companies that had only been formed within the previous 60 days. (Such a short lifespan suggests no track record of actual business). As for the Government’s claim that the system was a form of triage, to prioritise serious companies over chancers, a senior TI researcher commented :. “Triage fine, bur why on earth ask politicians to do it? Did they even ask any medical experts? Or was it just prioritised on the basis of who managed to ring the right person at the right time?” TI concluded that there was “apparent systemic bias in the award of PPE contracts that favoured those with political connections to the governing party”. It called on the Government to disclose the identities of companies awarded public money through the VIP lane urgently, a request which the government has so far illegally refused.
All in all, the Government spent £17.3bn on contracts awarded to private companies without competitive tender to tackle the crisis . The total awarded in all COVID contracts was more than the capital expenditure budgets of major government departments such as Defence, Transport and Housing. Although Government regulations require all contracts valued more than £10,000 to be published and sent for publication within 30 days, the procurement consultancy Tussell found although the Health Ministry had spent about £15 bn on PPE by 1 October, only £2.68bn worth of contracts had been published.
This scandalous record of deceit and misuse of public money should be viewed against the PM’s Ministerial Code of conduct, issued in August 2019:
Johnson went on to say:
“There must be no bullying and no harassment; no leaking; no breach of collective responsibility. No misuse of taxpayer money and no actual or perceived conflicts of interest.; the precious principles of public life enshrined in this document – integrity, objectivity, accountability, transparency, honesty and leadership in the public interest – must be honoured at all times as must the political impartiality of our much admired civil service.”
As a business consultant and author of 12 books on leadership, I was asked to explain how a model for change offered valuable insights on how we might change minds on Brexit. The Gleicher formula offers a model for thinking about change. You can find a full treatment of the model and my modification in my 2016 book for Bloomsbury “Leading Innovation, Creativity and Enterprise“.
When applied to our strategy for change, some observations may be made:
A – CREATIVE TENSION Whereas there is massive creative tension (dissatisfaction) with the present situation re Brexit, it is by no means shared. Our fieldwork on the ground shows that many people who previously described themselves as remainers no longer believe that Brexit can or should be reversed. This is what I called “Learned Helplessness” in the book “Let’s Talk About Brex it“. For example many young people at the Reading Festival last week think that Brexit is irreversible. Some were surprised to learn that we are still attempting to renegotiate the Brexit deal as it has been airbrushed out of the media by all political parties.
ACTION : We must work on awareness that Brexit is not done, with individuals, communities and of course political parties. See communications strategies below.
B – SHARED VISION This is the area where Remainers struggle the most. There are multiple diagnoses of the routes to rejoin. Some think it can never be done, others think it will take 20-30 years, others much shorter timescales. Some think it can only be done by working on politicians, others on voting systems, others on the ground, and so on. A lack of leadership and shared vision is a hardy perennial in the Remain movement and our work on Scenarios to Rejoin could be used to help focus people on the more viable pathways to Rejoin.
ACTION : This is the most urgent area for attention. It requires leadership, strategy and structure. It is itself a major obstacle to progress. In the first instance, please join us every Monday to help refine our Scenarios for Rejoin. Longer term we must convert these into strategies and persuade leaders and opinion formers of the value of having a shared vision of the routes to Rejoin.
C – ACTIONABLE FIRST STEPS In the absence of a shared vision, we have a scattergun approach to C. Some say we cannot wait for strategy and we must do something, almost anything to change the situation. Others say we must wait for the needed clarity, yet it has not been forthcoming in the last five years. Purposeful action arises when there is clarity on item B. In the meantime our four objectives at Re-Boot Britain are a useful interim set of goals. Others have similar ambitions, expressed differently but there is good coherence amongst grassroots groups about what needs to be done. It is a case of gathering, harvesting and multiplying that work. Interim goals such as the Customs Union and Single Market may be stepping stones on the journey, but one must also be minded of the fact that such things will radically reduce the pool of people and interest groups that want Brexit stopped. For example, once industry is satisfied about the way things are, reclaiming the rights of 68 million people may be much more difficult. The goal of “logical incrementalism” versus an “all or nothing” strategy must be thought deeply about. Our Government understand this, hence attempts to buy off sectors with inducements, in order to reduce the pool of people who remain unhappy about Brexit. Play this forward five years and it is not clear that a Rejoin movement of any size would exist at all. The time is now in terms of working on all elements of the change model, even if some of the actions are preparatory.
ACTION : We can all act to call Brexit to account, by continuing the conversation about Brexit Carnage and the lack of benefits coming through. What are your top five daily actions as an individual? What can you do with others in your local area?
D – COST OF CHANGE Undoing something is always harder than doing it. As we diverge further from EU alignment, it becomes more and more difficult to Rejoin. This is perhaps one of the reasons why the Brexit ultras wish to do this. Never forget that Brexit was won on emotion and not a plethora of facts. Rejoiners need to think more about how we can talk Leave voters down from the mountain. At an individual level, the book Let’s Talk About Brex it is a how-to guide on changing beliefs and even identities on the Brexit debate. We plan a series of masterclasses on the processes of change. Join us every Monday via ZOOM to find out more.
ACTIONS : Your call
Please write to me to flesh this short piece out. I am happy to expand upon this article with your views.
Part of our work on element C is changing the view that we cannot expect better than Brexit – join us by clicking the image
I am presently applying for Branches Forum Chair at The European Movement with an election on September 04 on ZOOM. Here is my short and longer pitch:
Some thoughts on the challenges ahead as final nominations for The European Movement branches forum chair close this afternoon Monday 09 August. You will have a choice of at least two candidates.
Yvonne Wanke and I have spoken about the needs of The European Movement going forward. Having campaigned together at events in London and Barnard Castle, I’m glad to have friendly competition. Free and fair elections will strengthen our Movement by making it more accountable to you and your groups. Mass membership means making our Movement fully accountable to our members.
Over the past few days people have rung me with questions, suggestions and comments. Please feel free to call with any issues anytime on 07725 927585 – it will be great to hear your views and to get to know your concerns.
Ageing The average age of our Movement is over seventy. We must also engage with a younger and more diverse audience. This is very much in the hands of your branches and affiliates: you and your groups are our Movement’s bedrock. My own branch has recruited a wider audience via various activities involving music, stunts, writing and regular online events. Most recently, I engaged a rapper and a soul singer in our call to action titled “We Are Everywhere”. We need to unite and work together to attract more people to our cause.
Organising Our Movement faces necessary organisational development issues to make us stronger. Some complex issues will require skilful facilitation and navigation of differing viewpoints, but with shared will we can find common ground. The recent BARNS report vote has left “unfinished business” and it’s vital we resolve this constitutionally. We cannot keep dodging difficult choices. For example, to campaign effectively and highlight Britain’s Brexit failings, we need to fix Nationbuilder together with our invaluable staff.
With over twenty-five years of dealing with so-called “wicked problems” across the world – in organisations as diverse as the Metropolitan Police, the NHS, Pfizer, United Nations, Unilever – I pledge to you my undivided focus and energy as we enlarge our Movement and build on past successes. As the oldest pro-European Movement in the country, we have a history to be proud of. I will uphold our Movement’s traditions and ensure those at the centre do likewise.
Strategies to Rejoin We recently started a project producing scenarios to re-apply for EU membership, aiming for a shared vision on the most probable routes. Already we have a series of event strings, which need further input and consolidating into narratives to engage and unite our activities. If you would like to contribute, please call for a chat on 07725 927585, write in, or join our weekly ZOOM event every Monday at 8pm. Please note the items in blue are not entirely serious! 😊. Such blue sky brainstorming helps create a unity of spirit and purpose as people share ideas and solutions in an engaging and relaxing way.
Beyond the bubble We cannot shift minds on Brexit merely by preaching to the converted, nor can we rely on demographic changes alone. We must reach outside of the bubble that has been created as a result of our disunited Kingdom. Superb initiatives such as the Euro Cafés reflect what I have also done locally. Our Movement has developed many great approaches across the country. Now we must build on these to deal with sensitivity and grace with the concerns and beliefs of leave voters. I feel honoured to have worked on such grassroots projects with branches and affiliates alike from the North to the South. We need to share the good will around so that groups can adapt approaches to local contexts.
Media Branches and affiliates can shift the Brexit narrative by reaching parts of the media national organisations cannot. Much social opinion is embedded in what people consume in local papers and from the resulting social media comments. Through well placed letters, commentaries on articles, op-ed pieces in local newspapers, radio and TV interviews plus phone-ins, our groups’ social media amplification can change the “diet” of what people consume in the media on Brexit. Some of our branches and affiliates are experts on this and we should spread the word.
The Branches Forum is a vital part of our operations. We have opportunities to extend our impact within communities, sectors and regions by uniting in diversity to power our movement forward in every street, village, town and city. I write to you to introduce myself as a candidate for Branches Forum Chair at The European Movement. I have included a one page synopsis of my offer below. A longer document is available on request which explains my full background for those who perhaps don’t know so much of my work for the pro-European cause and you can always check out my Linkedin profile if you wish. For several years now, my personal mission is one that embraces everyone and which is consistent with Object 2 of the EM constitution and which relies crucially on our Branch network.
A Better Britain in a Better Europe for a Better World
I intend to make a valuable contribution to groups (branches and affiliates alike), Chairs and the wider EM UK membership, based on significant experience as a business leader, strategic adviser, grassroots activist and prolific writer / presenter across the mainstream media for our common cause.
I see the Branches Forum Chair role as that of a “gardener”, helping to germinate ideas, providing nutrients to convert embryonic ideas into action, cross-pollination of initiatives and so on to help branch chairs and committees develop, grow and strengthen their groups. I will contribute significant time to branch development, to increase meaningful collaboration and connections between groups. At the same time, an imperative for our movement is to engage a younger more diverse demographic and that relies on a strong network of Branches, suitably resourced, trained and equipped to engage people from outside our traditional demographic.
If you and or your committee members would like to meet me, to ask questions and so on, just call me on 07725 927585, or we can set up an informal meet and greet via Zoom. I have reserved every Monday evening at 7 pm to host consultations and Q&A if you wish to join me, or directly experience one of our events at 8 pm every Monday.
