I campaigned for Brexit for nearly 30 years, but this destructive government has made me a Remainer (for now)

We are being railroaded into an illegitimate and undemocratic Brexit which threatens to destroy the very things we set out to save

I recently and publicly disassociated myself from Brexit after nearly 30 years of campaigning for it. I did not do this lightly or because I am suddenly converted to a new EU-centric vision of the UK’s future. In fact, I still maintain that Brexit is the better path for both the UK and the EU.

However, this WTO-only Brexit this government seems wedded to is a greater threat than membership of the EU on current terms could ever be.

I am a Conservative, meaning I am inherently sceptical of radical, revolutionary moves. Babies get mixed-up with bathwater when zeal-for-change replaces rational decision making. And sadly, because Brexit has become an unintended revolution, the Brexit many voted for in good faith, is now dead.

And worse, the “alt-right” Brexit seems predicated on portraying every legitimate exercise of scrutiny as elites conspiring to thwart the will of the people.

This Brexit, an alt-right coup straight-out of the Steve Bannon play book, must be paused and a national conversation had about where we go next.

We Brexiters promised a rational transition from the EU’s institutional trajectory toward full political union, to an arrangement of political independence underpinned by continuing economic and trade partnerships.

For “long-march” Brexiters like me, this inevitably meant leaving the EU and its common policies on trade, fishing and agriculture, and repatriating the UK’s full political and legal independence, whilst maintaining close economic and institutional links with the EU via the European Economic Area (or an agreement like it), and continuing joint UK-EU projects like (to name just two) Erasmus and Galileo.

The EU and its member states would remain extremely important partners and friends, with the UK continuing to work closely with them on key common interest issues, like climate change, migration pressures, and while Russia seems ready to go rogue at any moment. Working with the EU, but not run by the EU.

Sadly this promise has been subverted by those inside and outside the Conservative Party who have pushed both May and now Johnson to adopt an extreme vision of Brexit which will not only fail to deliver the economic value a proper Brexit would, but is in fact a Brexit certain to cause an economic shock I can only conclude is deliberate. This will only fuel demands to return to EU membership granted on worse terms than we have now.

Furthermore, it is a Brexit which destroys diplomatic partnerships we have worked hard to foster since the 1950s, and in a quite appalling manner, attacks key domestic institutions such as parliament, the judiciary, the union and even the monarch. It even plays fast and loose with the peace in Ireland, which risks a return to violence we’ve not seen since the 1990s.

In short, it is about as un-Conservative as it is possible to be.

This sham-Brexit is a Trojan Horse designed to hoodwink the UK into a set of economic and trade policies we would never consciously consent to. It is therefore a wholly illegitimate and undemocratic Brexit which threatens to destroy the very things we set-out to save. The mandate to leave was never a mandate to destroy our constitution in order to deliver it.

The very criticism we (rightly) made about the EU must now be levelled against ourselves: we use sophistry to avoid the need to justify outcomes which lack democratic consent, we misrepresent obvious realities, and we ignore the rules to suit our objectives.

Worse, while it was inevitable Brexit was always going to attract unwelcome support from small-minded racists, anti “foreigner” sentiment is now the predominant aspect of Brexit-vocabulary, a virus poisoning national life, shamefully driving-out those Europeans who made the UK their home. Nothing illustrates this more than the recent appalling attacks on Angela Merkel by Leave.eu, comparing her to Hitler.

The irony is those who hark back to plucky Britain defeating European fascism are perilously close to the very fascism they ridicule. Arron Banks and Nigel Farage live in a 1940s mind-set of Brits still at war with Europe, are a national embarrassment, advocating simplistic nationalist and authoritarian solutions to complex international problems. Whilst not being in office, they seem to be in power.

I cannot, with any credibility, be critical of an EU which preaches democratic values it does not sufficiently practise whilst not at the same time criticising what Brexit has become; a bitter, hate-filled revolution which if not redirected, will damage our country, its global standing and its peoples for many years to come. It will also destabilise Ireland and potentially the EU. That is not only unfair, it is dangerous.

We need urgently to pause for reflection, hold some form of national conversation and ensure that any Brexit we now advance is one based on liberal values, democratic consent and sustainable economics, and isn’t a Brexit reflecting only the values of a small minority of the population.

It has to be a Brexit which delivers the promise as well as limiting the negatives so remain supporters can also tolerate it. Because consent has been a feature of our constitution since the Model Parliament of 1290s when King Edward decreed “what touches all must be decided by all”. And parliament was established precisely to be the voice of the people deciding on the people’s behalf.

So the “winner takes all” Brexit now being advanced by government is wholly unconstitutional in that it ignores the legitimate desire of the 48 per cent who voted against it to moderate its negative impacts. And parliament, not the government, is the people, so parliament, and not government, must be the final arbiter of how Brexit is implemented.

Right now, that government is pursuing a Brexit which will make the UK poorer economically and socially, will destabilise our neighbours and will fatally undermine the very institutions it sought to empower. It is a form of Brexit that does not enjoy majority support, and probably never did. It is not the Brexit I campaigned for, and I am sorry I voted for it.