On Saturday 23rd March, an estimated million people flooded the streets of London, with one purpose: to get the government to hold a second referendum on leaving the EU. There were chants of ‘Hey, hey, Theresa May, we should have the final say’ and placards saying things like ‘We Have Mouths But No Voices’ and ‘Revoke, Remain, Reunite’. But why do people want a second referendum?
The Leave campaign was riddled with factual inaccuracies that could have led several voters to vote Leave based on these promises. One example of this was the claim that we would be getting £350 million a week that will be put into the NHS. This was called a ‘clear misuse of official statistics’ by the UK Statistics Authority and did not consider the money that Britain get back from the EU. Then there is the question of what people believed leaving the EU would mean. Before the referendum, Daniel Hannan, a Conservative MP who is commonly referred to as the ‘Godfather of Brexit’, said ‘absolutely nobody is talking about threatening our place in the single market.’ Since the referendum, Theresa May has repeatedly said that Brexit would mean leaving the single market.
In the first referendum, more than 16 million people voted Remain, only 1 million fewer than voted Leave. This large percentage of the population feel forgotten amongst the rush to find the right deal before we leave. Theresa May constantly says she wants what the people want but the 48% feel that they are being silenced.
MPs have turned down Theresa May’s deal three times now and have failed to come up with a solution. On Wednesday 27th March, MPs voted on eight possible options including ‘Revoke Article 50 to Avoid No-Deal', ‘No-Deal’ and ‘Labour’s Brexit Plan’, none of which had a majority. It appears that Parliament cannot agree on anything so it should be put back to the people to decide what should happen. Hey, hey, Theresa May, we should have the final say!
