Actions you can take to register your disaffection with Brexit

I'd like to call this post 'Actions you can take to stop Brexit' but that would be a bit naive so the weasel-worded version will have to stand for now.

Petitions you might like to sign
Demand a people's vote
https://www.peoples-vote.uk/

If there is no agreement to leave the EU then brexit must be stopped
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/219905 - at time of writing 109,189 signatures
 
Stop Brexit - at time of writing 21,448 signatures
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/226509

List of open petitions about Brexit (pro and anti) to Parliament
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions?q=Brexit&state=open

Urge amendment to secure a people's vote - 3,721 signatures
https://www.change.org/p/members-of-parliament-urgent-amendment-to-secure-a-people-s-vote

Brexit.. a second referendum -143,404 signatures
https://www.change.org/p/the-prime-minister-brexit-a-second-referendum?recruiter=574276334

Keep permanent EU citizenship even in event of Brexit
https://eci.ec.europa.eu/002/public/#/initiative
This requires not just UK folk to sign but a minimum number of people from each EU member country. More info from an earlier post from me.

Write to your MP
You can do this via WriteToThem and People's Vote has a pre-filled letter (you need to vary the text) letter to send. I sent something via that link but completely changed the text, a copy of that is here. Also you can do this via Not Buying It.

I've written to my MP asking him to support a People's Vote

I've written the following to my MP and as it was sent via an online form I've learned to capture a copy of the text before sending as there's no guarantee that the form will automatically CC me. Normally I just send a copy of the email to myself but I thought others might like to see it.

As far as I'm aware my MP accepts that Brexit is happening and is supporting it. I wish I'd added in my email some info about the fact that so many people seem to have changed their mind and the latest sampling evidence suggests that the narrow gap between Remain and Leave has widened considerably, in favour of Remain.

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https://www.peoples-vote.uk/write_this_wrong

Dear Matthew (Greenwich, but the geography is pretty irrelevant here)

Had the 2016 Referendum returned a vote of 70:30 or even 60:40 I probably wouldn't be writing to you to ask you to support a People's Vote. Such a close-run thing of 52:48 doesn't suggest a 'slam dunk' in favour of Britain leaving Europe.

Admittedly I've tried to avoid the endless minutiae of the Brexit rumblings but it now seems clear that information given before the Referendum was not clear and in some cases quite untrue. It also seems that I cannot avoid hearing about some new iffy thing the Leave campaign has perpetrated, whether it's financial or behavioural.

And then there's the equally unavoidable impression that 'Brexiting' is not going particularly well, either the discussions or the fact that so many organisations have highlighted potential future damage.
All this - an unconvincing Referendum result, suspicious campaigning activity from the Leave team, the gloomy predictions and the problems already at our door - makes me wonder what we're letting ourselves in for.

The public now has much greater information about what Brexit actually means, with more concrete examples.

Please, when considering the next deal, give us a chance to consider it too by letting us have a public vote, thank you.

I am happy to receive any reply by email to save paper / costs.

[Form has automated 'Yours sincerely' sign-off in place]

Let's see if we can keep Permanent EU Citizenship, even if Brexit happens w @EUcitizen2017

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Vote, by 23 July 2019, for Permanent European Union Citizenship - this is an EU citizens' initiative. [Campaign website]

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1. Oooh! I've been a bit wary of all these Stop-or-Mitigate Brexit-themed petitions (I worry that we're diluting stuff) but this one looks more promising.

Even despite the europa.eu URL I greeted it with the same suspicion, but have since searched for the URL on Twitter to see who's been tweeting about it, and Guy Verhofstadt had so - real enough for me. The petition is just over a day old (it was registered in July 2018 but voting seems to have opened only on 22nd August).

2. In the UK we regularly see people sharing petitions to Parliament, which have this banner across the top of the page.

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions

These can be created on Parliament's website by any UK citizen - if the petition reaches 10,000 votes then Parliament must respond and if the votes reach 100,000 then Parliament will consider it for a debate. It does not necessarily mean that the thing you're petitioning for will happen though.

3. The EU Citizens' Initiative (ECI) is an EU-wide equivalent of this (I presume each member state has its own petitions site but I only know about the UK one). Any EU citizen can suggest an ECI for consideration. For an ECI to meet its threshold it requires 1,000,000 votes overall and for minimum thresholds to be reached in 7 of the member countries. Each country has its own numeric threshold depending, I presume, on the number of people in its voting population.

The UK needs 54,750 votes and so far has 19,583 (35%) - so I think we'll probably manage 100% - but Germany would need 72,000 and has only 761 (1%), or Latvia needs 6,000 and only has 12. Early days though!

4. I've no idea if it's more likely that countries with smaller thresholds (Cyprus, Estonia, Luxembourg and Malta need 4,500) will be more easily reached than countries with larger thresholds (Germany has the highest but there are a few above 40,000) or if it's more to do with which countries are most engaged. Currently the votes are (not surprisingly, given it's less than two days old!) languishing at the 1 or 2% end of things for each country but the UK is already at 36% (20,001 votes) - another few hundred have come in while I've been drafting this. It's not too surprising that UK folk are currently the most engaged.

5. Here's what the petition website looks like, and where you can find out how many votes are still needed [screenshot captured at 3pm on 23 August 2018].

https://eci.ec.europa.eu/002/public/#/initiative

Note the English (en) to the right of the above image - with the drop-down arrow you can read the page in any EU language.

Threshold status is very much not yet reached, but there are a few months to go... the images below come from the Permanent European Union Citizenship's ECI page - you need to click on the 'More info' button to bring up the extra panel. You can see all countries' responses one one page or scroll through a 'gallery'.

 

More countries listed on the website.

6. ...And here's what info about the initiative looks like on the main European Commission website

http://ec.europa.eu/citizens-initiative/public/initiatives/ongoing/details/2018/000003

Amused and amazed at Chris Heaton-Harris' letter to universities re: Brexit

MP Chris Heaton-Harris has written to universities' vice-chancellors asking for...

"...the names of professors at your establishment who are involved in the teaching of European affairs, with particular reference to Brexit.

Furthermore, if I could be provided with a copy of the syllabus and links to the online lectures which relate to this area I would be much obliged."

Not surprisingly academic Twitter is up in arms about it, with heavy sarcasm. There's a piece about it in the Guardian from which I got the text of the letter above.

The academics quoted in the article, on either side of Brexit or Remain, have said that they don't push a particular angle and that their opinions are acknowledged as just that.

I think the letter fails on two counts.

1. It asks for 'professors' not 'lecturers'. I suspect many (most?) university classes are people called Dr, not Prof. The letter's imprecise wording narrows the scope considerably.

2. I think it asks to look in the wrong thing. Surely it's the admin emails (sent to everyone) which convey the uncertainty and concern about Brexit. The ones I've seen (I work at two universities) don't push any particular agenda but they don't have to, the Brexit process is unknown and the presence of the emails - let alone their content - communicates that. The emails are about providing people with support, advice (including legal), collecting examples, considering future EU funding applications etc.

I presume that these facts are obvious to Mr H-H and that his letter serves another purpose that I must have missed.

Perhaps the syllabuses contain more informative information than I'm imagining they do, but 'topics' are quite different from how they're framed.