The referendum did not give a mandate for No Deal

As an increasing number of politicians, including government ministers, take up the refrain that No Deal is necessary to respect the referendum mandate, let's take a look at whether that claim actually stacks up.

To deal with this issue, we have to answer a particular question: how do we know whether one outcome or another does or does not respect the result of the 2016 referendum? 

The most logical way would be to look at the ballot paper. As many will recall, the question was: should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union or leave the European Union? It would be fair to assume then that any result which saw the UK leave the European Union would be compatible with the referendum.

By this definition, a No Deal Brexit would respect the result of the referendum. So, case closed? Well, the problem is that while a No Deal Brexit fits this definition, so too do a number of other Brexit outcomes, including very soft forms of Brexit that No Deal Brexiteers insist would be a betrayal of the 2016 vote. When Brexiteers claim that the instruction of the referendum was simply to leave the EU, specifics be damned, they are trying to have it both ways. You cannot shut down claims that No Deal is not justified by arguing that the referendum mandate was so open-ended it included basically any outcome that saw the UK leave the EU and at the same time argue that the referendum was so specific that it excluded a variety of forms of Brexit that you happen to disagree with.

If the ballot paper is insufficient, then what else can we turn to when judging whether a Brexit outcome fits the mandate of the 2016 referendum? The next-best source comes in the form of the Vote Leave campaign itself and the promises they made when trying to convince people to vote for Brexit.

So, what did Vote Leave promise to its voters in 2016?

One big promise Vote Leave made was this one: There is a European free trade zone from Iceland to the Russian border and we will be part of it.

Of course, what Vote Leave failed to mention is that there is only one such European free trade zone and it is the European Single Market. And yet when it comes to the suggestion that the UK should stay in the Single Market post-Brexit, many Brexiteers, and especially those who support No Deal, react with outrage. Few things can more rapidly draw the accusation that you are not respecting the result of the referendum. But this is precisely what was promised.

Putting that aside, even if there were another European free trade zone that happened to go from Iceland to the Russian border that wasn’t the Single Market, and which held none of the Single Market’s obligations, leaving the EU on No Deal would certainly not result in the UK being part of such a free trade area. By definition to be in a free trade area needs a negotiated agreement, a deal. Without a doubt, on this promise, No Deal does not meet the standards of the referendum mandate.

Let’s look at another big promise that was made by Leave campaigners during the 2016 referendum: There will be no change for EU citizens already lawfully resident in the UK. EU citizens will automatically be granted indefinite leave to remain in the UK and will be treated no less favourably than they are at present.

No Deal, as with a number of other forms of Brexit, definitely does not respect this promise. Indeed, far from preserving the status of EU citizens, a key plank of Brexiteers’ vision is to rip up the entire construct of EU citizenship in the UK so that it grants no particular rights whatsoever. Current immigration policy being drawn up by the government would not give any kind of automatic guarantee to EU citizens but instead requires them to pay in order to even be able to claim the right to indefinite leave to remain. As for other rights that EU citizens currently possess, such as the right to vote in local elections, that is also set to be scrapped.

Now on this particular point, No Deal is not a much worse offender than Theresa May's version of Brexit, but nonetheless No Deal certainly does not perform any better when it comes to respecting the promises made to voters in 2016.

The status of the border in Northern Ireland has also become a key sticking point over the course of the negotiations. Both sides have committed to keeping the border completely free and open as it is now and indeed so did the Leave campaign. Voters were assured that there would be: no change to the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic.

A No Deal Brexit would bring about a great deal of change, to say the least. Under WTO rules (supposedly the saving grace of a No Deal crash according to its supporters), both the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom would be obliged to impose the correct border checks. Even if Brexiteers wanted to violate international law (a strange move for their idea of Global Britain) the main result would simply be to turn the border region into a hub of smuggling and other organised crime.

The opening of borders requires carefully negotiated and enforceable international agreements. The solution proposed by No Deal Brexiteers, of simple lawlessness, would be an act of extraordinary irresponsibility. 

Under all circumstances, a No Deal exit would lead to substantial and highly negative changes around the border between Northern Ireland the Republic.

And turning to another part of the union whose status has been more than contested in the past few years, Scotland’s place in the United Kingdom is also a point of major concern. During the 2016 referendum campaign, leading Brexiteers declared confidently that leaving the EU would strengthen the British Union. Now, this statement was made on the assumption that if the UK as a whole voted to leave, this would include a majority of voters in Scotland. The reality proved to be very different, with 62% of Scottish voters deciding it was best to stay in the EU.

It is therefore not an outlandish view that if Scotland is to be kept within the United Kingdom, if the claim of the 2016 Leave campaign to strengthen the UK can even come close to being upheld, then the Brexit settlement would have to be one that compromised with the strongly pro-European sentiment in Scotland. It does not take a genius to work out that a No Deal Brexit, the hardest form of Brexit possible, completely severing ties to the EU and crashing out with no agreement, does not and cannot deliver in this area.

Or now how about this, voters in 2016 were told that Brexit would be a: careful change, not a sudden step, and that voting Leave would not lead to a: sudden change that disrupts the economy. Reassuring words, to be sure. And yet what could be a more sudden step than to exit the EU without a deal? 40 years of integration, intense political, economic and legal ties interweaving the fabric of British society in with that of 27 other European states. All, cut off overnight. This would be the sudden step to end all sudden steps.

Not only that but Leave campaigners specifically and explicitly declared that the UK would negotiate a new treaty before the UK left the European Union. To claim that No Deal would be compatible with either of these points from the Leave campaign is more than showing a lack of respect for the referendum, it is a brazen and shocking insult to the intelligence of voters.

And finally, let us finish on one of the more amusing ideas from the Leave campaign - the belief that Brexit would lead to better relations with the rest of Europe. Brexit in any form was never likely to bring about a notable improvement in relations between Britain and other European countries, but even within the context of an already dubious claim, the belief that No Deal, possibly the most aggressive and hostile way for Britain to leave the EU, could have any positive diplomatic effects is an absurdity.

To be clear, there are many other examples I could have given based on the disastrous effects of No Deal but the points are highlighted are notable for the way that they fail even on the Vote Leave campaign's own terms.

Taken all together, it may be that there are a number of voters out there who would indeed like to leave the EU without a deal. But whether there is a majority in favour of such an outcome is far less certain. Granted a slim majority voted in favour of Leave in 2016, but they did so on the basis of a number of claims and assurances that would have no relation whatsoever to the reality of No Deal. There is no democratic legitimacy in No Deal Brexiteers trying to claim the 2016 referendum mandate as their own. A No Deal Brexit may be many things but the one thing we can say for certain is that, on the basis of the promises made by the 2016 Leave campaign, the referendum result did not give a mandate for a No Deal Brexit.