It’s unfair to blame the EU for this mess

It wasn’t their decision for us to leave and they have to look after the interests of the other 27 countries. That being said it will harm their industries and jobs as well as those in Britain so I believe they are doing their best to get a deal, which is more than can be said for Boris Johnson and his government who seem to be happy for us to crash out with the dire consequences warned about in the leaked Yellowhammer report.

It is true that a lot of folk who live in the old Northern and Midland industrial areas of the country voted to leave. I would suggest that there are many reasons, but would argue that a major factor was the disappearance of various industries with decent well-paid jobs that have only been partly replaced by service type, low-paid, zero hours jobs.

I would argue that the Thatcher government created this situation by what happened under their stewardship (three million unemployed and two recessions). Also subsequent governments of both colours did little to address the unequal sharing of the national wealth, but somehow the EU and ‘free movement’ has been unfairly blamed.

This, combined with the Tory austerity programme has left a lot of communities behind. The referendum was their opportunity to give the ‘powers that be’ a bloody nose by voting against their advice and wishes. I have to say this was understandable and even though I voted to remain I accepted the democratic outcome and would have happily supported a Leave deal that protected workers’ rights, environmental regulations and stayed in a customs union whilst a trade deal was being negotiated.

Sadly this Tory government has totally botched the chance of getting a deal through parliament by kowtowing to their hardliners, leaving us where we are.

Boris Johnson was installed by 92,000 Tory party members (0.14% of the electorate leaving the other 99.86% with no choice at all so he has no mandate and no majority for a no-deal Brexit). By throwing out long-standing senior parliamentarians including one of our local MPs (Margot James) for simply voting for what is in the best interests of their constituents and the country, he is taking the Tory Party further to the right than they have ever been in modern times. Even his own brother would rather resign than support a no-deal Brexit.

I have written to my MP (Mike Wood) asking why he has supported these ludicrous and dangerous actions and am awaiting a reply. There will inevitably be a General Election that may or may not get this issue resolved.

Even though I am against referenda in general (we elect a parliament to make these important and complex decisions) I suspect that now we are aware of more of the facts the only way out of the current mess will be to have a people’s vote. In the meantime parliament must do all it can to avoid crashing out.

Kevin Archer, Kingswinford