As a remainer who has grown up among traditional Conservatives where anti-Europe instincts run deep, I was deeply affected by reading Peter Oborne’s heartfelt piece this week in which he suggested that Brexit may need “rethinking altogether”. Was this, finally, a pivotal moment? Reading it repeatedly on Sunday night, I even sacrificed Line of Duty.
Oborne is the former political editor of the Daily Telegraph, a prominent and respected Brexiter and a lifelong Conservative. And here he was with quiet intelligence talking directly to his fellow Eurosceptics, persuading them to take a breath, swallow their pride and consider again. “We will never be forgiven if and when Brexit goes wrong. Future generations will look back at what we did and damn us.” He and his wife have five children, so for him this is not metaphorical.
Put his carefully calibrated arguments together with the attorney general Geoffrey Cox’s remark that “we have underestimated (Brexit’s) complexity”, and you could be forgiven for wondering whether something significant is happening. The parents of friends I know who voted leave, against their children’s wishes, are beginning to look distinctly sheepish. They angrily cast aspersions on parliament, huffing from behind their newspaper, but they don’t defend Brexit any more. They just sigh.
Buoyed by Oborne breaking ranks, I tweeted Fraser Nelson, editor of the Spectator, to ask if there was any chance he might now stop peddling his nonsense. I hoped in the midnight gloom, beside his Swedish wife, his children nearby, he was also reconsidering. After all a recent cover of his magazine was headlined “Brexit – a losing game” and he has claimed to be a “soppy Europhile”. He merely recycled a piece he wrote in 2016, and said his reasons for switching from remain to leave were still the same: Europe’s obstinate attitude to reform.
Clearly the revolution hasn’t quite started, then. And, of course, we will find no converts on abandoning Brexit among the Tory leadership. They are already preening for the big race, their eyes locked on the mesmerising prize of succeeding Theresa May. I watched my brother-in-law David Cameron’s friends knife him to enable their pitch for power. It is the nature of politics. And even before Theresa May announced she would stand down, I was being asked to help style an overly excited incumbent for their dizzying moment in the spotlight.
No potential leadership candidate will risk losing the support of the grassroots Tory membership with that ballot paper hovering nearby. Hope lies instead with those who have less to lose career-wise, whose support for Brexit was always sincere, but who don’t fear the damage to their ego at changing their minds.
I realise this narrows the field somewhat. But there are centrist, sane leavers – Conservative MPs, councillors, supporters, writers and thinkers who will know in their hearts – like Oborne – that the dream is dying. They are not all ideologues or naive believers in a Brexit utopia just around the corner. They will be increasingly horrified at the mad behaviour of the Brexit hardcore and their desire to exit whatever the cost. There are many others who don’t see either their own lives or their core values reflected in Jacob Rees-Mogg and know that Boris Johnson as prime minister will be a disaster.
My bet is that for them it is becoming clear that Brexit will be something they regret rather than feel proud of. It is these Brexiters Oborne was addressing. Will they be brave enough to say after all we have heard and seen, is it time to take the safer, saner course?
Wishful thinking? Maybe. But who could have imagined even a year ago we would be reading headlines on revoking article 50? Those reasoned voices that command respect among the Tory ranks, such as Oborne’s, may yet build to a swell and help turn the tide.
• Emily Sheffield is founder of ThisMuchIKnow – news on Instagram
