Re: EU referendum
And Cameron himself is weakened, thanks to the Panama Papers revelations about his finances and his hesitant, contorted response. The in campaign drew up its battle plan assuming Cameron would be the same asset to them that he was for the Tories in 2015, sufficiently trusted to persuade the country that his assessment of the national interest was the right one. But that assumption now looks shaky. Britain is not immune to the anti-establishment mood spreading across Europe and the US, and 23 June could offer the perfect outlet for it.
On top of all that are the very specific defects of the official in campaign, Britain Stronger in Europe. Putting aside the confusion about whether it, or Downing Street, is in charge, even its allies despair that its top-down, old-fashioned reliance on corporate suits is a turnoff. They believe it has failed to engage wider civil society and to deploy the sort of voices younger voters might listen to – and that it lacks the killer instinct embodied by leave’s resident rottweiler Dominic Cummings.
Remainers have waited for the takedown that would expose the wild inconsistencies of Boris Johnson, for example, but worry that BSE – a campaign with a name that sounds like a disease – lacks that ruthless appetite for the jugular. Even as Project Fear, it has failed: the picture it paints of a Brexited Britain is clearly not scary enough.
This is the context into which Jeremy Corbyn stepped on Thursday. The risk is that he might succumb to one of Ed Miliband’s great failings – and believe that, having given a single speech, he has done enough. He hasn’t. He has to campaign constantly and vigorously for in, between now and 23 June. He should relish it – for this is a challenge for which he is unusually well suited.
His task is not to win over the entire country, where he might struggle, but Labour voters, where he should be strong – and, specifically, the young, where his admirers insist he is stronger still. He even has an organisation at his disposal, perfectly equipped for the task. He needs to unleash his grassroots movement, Momentum, right away. Momentum can use the EU campaign as a demonstration exercise, proving its much-vaunted muscle by mobilising the Labour voters who will determine this referendum.
In this mission, Corbyn’s own backstory is an asset. With sincerity he can say that he empathises with the misgivings so many Britons have about the EU: he has them too. He can reiterate this week’s message that he has overcome his doubts, because he sees that the progressive cause – of protecting workers’ rights and combating climate change and tax avoidance – is best served as one of 28 nations rather than alone. And he can do all that in a language and demeanour that shows him to be as unspun and outside the establishment as Nigel Farage.
Do not let success go to your head and do not let failure get to your heart.
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