Thread by @shaunjlawson

Given the, um, 'discussions' going on earlier, here's a thread for you. How could our departure from the EU have been avoided? How culpable are Labour, Corbyn or anyone else? I'll try to keep this civil. It's Christmas, after all.

I'm going to take this back a long, long way. To New Labour. Specifically:

1. Their failure to ever hold a referendum on anything to do with the EU, which only made the public steadily more and more angry

2. Their failure to put any limits on mass immigration from the east

Other EU states did limit it. The UK did not: essentially because the UK's flexible markets and service-based economy demands lots of immigration. Which highlights New Labour's failure to do anything about those markets or that unsustainable economy.

At the same time, New Labour failed to make the case for lots of immigration. It was too terrified of the Daily Mail to even try most of the time. So the public were expected to accept it, called racist if they didn't, and never given a democratic say either. Not a good combo.

Even as far back as the early 2000s, the Tories' increasingly virulent Euroscepticism was popular - just as many of Labour's policies are popular now. The problem in both cases is it takes a lot more to be considered a credible government in waiting.

The Tories looked like a single issue rump, up against a professional, competent government. But the underlying factors causing our exit were already there and being entirely ignored. New Labour was only ever a medium term electoral coalition which sowed a long term downfall.

Then we come to the second key point in history. Ed Miliband's disastrous failure to heed the warning of UKIP's rise at the 2014 European elections. Most pundits assumed UKIP would imperil the Tories. In fact, it was Labour voters they were after: and won over in 2015.

At that 2015 GE, Miliband ran opposing an EU referendum. Which looks quite sensible looking back... but was an electoral disaster. Because again, it played straight into the narrative of a liberal elite denying the British public a democratic say over their lives.

But by the same token, if you both voted Tory in 2015 AND are a furious Remainer now... well folks. Be careful what you wish for. And take responsibility for your choices. Had Miliband won, imagine how different the UK might look now, in all sorts of ways.

Beyond his failure to back an EU referendum, think about the laughable reasons people used not to vote Labour in 2015.

- He's weak
- He's a geek
- Nicola Sturgeon will dominate him

The British electorate was played for fools then, just as it was again this year.

Then came the referendum itself. When after decades of failing to provide any positive reasons to stay in the EU, an absolutely pathetic, miserable campaign... failed to provide any positive reasons to stay in the EU.

That campaign was mostly led by the same people who'd masterminded Labour and the Lib Dems' catastrophic campaigns in 2015. It was bleak, it was grey, it was all based on fear... exactly when the message had to be bright, optimistic, hopeful. The left never wins without that.

And because it was so gloomy - and so dominated by Cameron and big business - it amounted to the establishment demanding the public vote status quo. Well: the public had had quite enough of the status quo, thankyou. Because the status quo was and is a failure. It's shit.

Leave, meanwhile, could offer... whatever the heck it wanted. No detail, no plans, the have your cake and eat it Brexit. Narnia on stilts.

But it was up to Remain to offer a positive vision and show in detail why Leave was a con. It did neither.

All it did was warn of financial disaster, emergency budgets and the like. It needed to show why the EU was a great thing for Britain; and to explain why controlling immigration while staying in the single market was impossible. It didn't. It was a joke.

And the reason it was a joke is that it was complacent, arrogant, and took the British public for granted. Kinda like how governments had done the same for decades. So the public responded by giving the establishment a long overdue kicking.

After that debacle, did Remainers change their tune and listen? Nope. Instead, for three and a half years since, it was mostly more of the same. "You're thick. You're racist. We need a People's Vote!" (presumably because the wrong kinds of people voted last time?)

I say all this as a Remainer myself. Brexit horrifies me. What Johnson has planned is an absolute catastrophe. But far too many Remainers have been in denial since 2016 - and aiming their ire in all the wrong places.

After 2016, how could Brexit have been stopped? Answer: by returning a Labour government in 2017. If any Remain voters didn't vote Labour in 2017... well, more fool them, frankly.

What the hung Parliament which resulted did achieve was to stop Theresa May in her tracks, and provide a desperately needed check on Tory plans. Corbyn's Labour went on to block No Deal and block her deal again, and again, and again.

Yet what did so many Remainers do?

Against basic maths and reality itself, they blamed Corbyn regardless. Blamed Corbyn for not delivering a second referendum despite it being arithmetically impossible to do so. Blamed Corbyn for not bringing down the government despite it being arithmetically impossible to do so.

Of course, the Lib Dems could've tried to back a temporary Corbyn administration intended to steer the UK through this crisis. They played petty politics instead and developed an entire approach which attacked Labour constantly, and ignored the Tory government. Incredible.

This approach culminated in:

1. Them helping usher through the legislation forcing a snap election

2. Labour doing the same... a mistake, but it couldn't afford not to given how weak it would've looked

3. A campaign of purest sabotage against Labour MPs across the country

Many of us warned about point 3 throughout the campaign. What resulted was inevitable; a disaster. I'm desperate for a progressive alliance - but we're kidding ourselves if we think it could ever have happened while Swinson was taking the Lib Dems down a process of Toryfication.

Then, there was FPTP. Far and away my biggest criticism of Corbyn and Labour is their miserable, indefensible failure to call for proportional representation. That shows a chronic lack of vision, or even awareness of how FPTP distorts and twists our politics completely.

And after Iraq, it's my biggest domestic criticism of New Labour too. They betrayed Paddy Ashdown; they ignored the Jenkins Commission completely. And most New Labour types remain quite stupefyingly oblivious even now to why PR is desperately needed.

Under FPTP though, Labour's options were as follows:

- Support Leave, and lose respectably

- Support Remain, and lose a lot worse

- Try to offer both, and get mowed down... which is what happened.

There is NO scenario under any Labour leader in which backing Remain would not have resulted in a bad, bad defeat. None. Not when 40% plus were going to vote Tory under any circumstances; not when Johnson announced his 'deal', in particular.

That is the reality of FPTP: in which Leave seats vastly outnumber Remain seats. Oh, and by the way: even if Labour had completely backed Remain, the Lib Dems would still have eaten into their vote thanks to their never-ending lies, disinformation and naked cynicism.

I find it quite extraordinary that so few Remain supporters were even aware of what FPTP would do. And equally extraordinary how oblivious they were of the 2017 reality: that without backing Brexit, Labour would've lost as badly as it did this year.

You've spent the last 30 months constantly turning your fire on your own side, folks. What did you think that was going to achieve? So many of us warned of the consequences of that. Politics is not a game.

The moment Labour announced its support for a second referendum, the Lib Dems should've stepped down in all seats in which they weren't directly up against the Tories. Anything else would bring about the disaster we're in now.

Instead, what did they do? Up the ante with a quite mad, disgraceful proposal to revoke Article 50 altogether. Appalling. The contempt for democracy this exposed was incredible, and made Leave voters more determined than ever to get what they wanted.

As it was, Labour had already reached an as near as dammit pro-Remain position: confirmed by what their proposed franchise for the second referendum would be. A proposed franchise which infuriated Leavers who'd voted Labour in 2017.

But you'd never have known that from Swinson. "Corbyn wants Brexit!", she lied - trying to make Labour's position seem identical to the Tories'. Outrageous. Never has someone more deserved to lose their seat than she did.

And you'd also never have known it from the absolute scores of people on here who lied and lied and lied some more about Corbyn.

- He voted Leave! (no: he campaigned for Remain and voted Remain)

- He hardly campaigned at all! (a flat out lie)

- He wants No Deal! (you what?)

There was a long, long period on here when it was like dealing with a bunch of entitled beyond belief toddlers. No lie was too outrageous for some of them. And oh the irony: in the process, they showed themselves no better at all than Leave's smorgasbord of compulsive liars too.

All this steadily took its toll on Corbyn. I do wish he'd stepped down earlier this year - but it'd have made no fundamental difference. Not under FPTP. Labour would've only stood the slightest chance by backing Leave.

And probably, trying to out-Tory the Tories on immigration too. Awful.

I'm very relieved they didn't. I'm proud of Corbyn for trying to do the right thing and bring a divided beyond belief country back together. He's a good, honourable man.

But the outcome of him being attacked day after day, night after night by so many ON HIS OWN SIDE was... practically a Tory landslide. Whereupon all those who'd spent the previous 30 months attacking him then blamed him personally for the defeat too. Delightful.

So now, we are where we are. I'm on record as stating that I think Labour's future is as a post-Remain party: because we cannot just ignore where most of our members or voters are. And I'd never have agreed with an electoral strategy which disregarded half the country either.

But in terms of Remain: people, it's over. Get over it. Move on. Maybe one day - one day - we'll return to the EU. But I'm talking 15 or 20 years from now. Anyone advocating a party backing Remain now isn't just delusional. They've learnt not the slightest thing.

Remainers like you and like me had our chance. We had 44 years. And all of us - every single one of us - blew it.

So own it. Take responsibility. Stop slagging off anyone who doesn't agree with you and focus on what we all need to do now. Pull together, for everyone's sakes.