Keir Starmer may have built his credibility on Brexit and the demand for a people’s vote, however, he’s now accepted leaving the EU is a matter of reality. This has unsettled many left Remainers who backed him, but will it really hurt him in the way it hurt Jeremy Corbyn? Most likely not, but why?
For starters, Starmer can rely on the media and parliamentary establishment to support him regardless of Brexit. Many of the people who claimed to be fanatical Remainers were actually just anti-Corbyn and not anti-Brexit. They saw the people’s vote as a wedge issue to divide the Labour membership from key swathes of the Labour vote.
At the same time, the people who really do care about Brexit – namely Labour members and a big portion of Labour voters – are locked out of politics now. Those people are cornered and will have to begrudgingly accept Brexit going forward.
This is the same reason Tony Blair felt he could implement Tory policies on the economy and not lose support from Labour voters. As for Labour members, the centrists and the right-wingers never wanted a mass party because it might be difficult to control.
In short, Labour has come full circle in less than a year into Starmer’s reign. Left-wing Remainers may grizzle and whine over Brexit, but they will be ignored and many of them will vote Labour anyway. This is another sorry chapter in the history of British ‘democracy’.
Joshua White 