Blog 2023 Malcolm Blair-Robinson

It was a concept built on lies, delivered to feed raw nationalism, to achieve a ‘have our cake and eat it’ outcome, which was never realistic and never on offer. Not only is it one of the greatest political mistakes in our history, it is one of the most disreputable.

The referendum which enabled it was undemocratic because of the four nations making up the UK, two voted to Remain yet were forced to leave against their democratically expressed will. Both Scotland and Northern Ireland may end up leaving the UK as a consequence.

It lacked integrity because not only did it fail to carry the constituent nations of the UK, it failed to achieve a margin for Leave that showed a clear and true majority of votes for major constitutional change. This included the withdrawal of E U citizenship from millions who did not wish to lose it.

Finally it was built on a tissue of lies and imaginings, not a single one of which has proved true in the event. We are now left to make the best of a very bad job, the multiple downsides of which have been masked by the Covid crisis, but which, day by day in so many little ways as well as big ones, are  becoming depressingly clear.

There are still paths that could lead to a new dawn for our country and a new purpose for the Union. Whether they are within the competence of this bizarre government to navigate is another matter.

We should make it our New Year resolution to find out.

That depends on many things. Circumstances, choices, opportunities, both good and bad. Of course Covid still looms, but for the purpose of these thoughts, let us move past the pandemic.

Overall there is now an underlying current driven by COP26, with much more widespread recognition of the threats posed by climate change and this will inform decisions. When you drill down into the need to reach the ultimate goal of zero carbon, the changes coming will not just be political. they will be personal.

As I am beginning to emphasise in blogs already published, this means we have to consume less of almost everything. That has unwelcome consequences for a consumer society with an economy based on consumption plus inflation of fixed assets.

So we will need to switch from using to making and much of the making will have to be about creating a green revolution of sustainable energy, communications, transport and housing, very different to what we have now. Everything will have to be built or made to last. Not to use once and throw away. Faults will be repaired not replaced, except for one exception, set out below.

If we pull this off, the outcome will certainly be sunlit uplands, but these must be for all, not just for the lucky or the pushy.  The mangled concept that the individual is everything, the state is a burden, the markets are masters and globalisation is good for all purposes and at any cost, is broken. This should not and cannot be repaired. To achieve the survival of humanity more or less a we know it, it has to be replaced.

For over a decade I have been writing and blogging about the weaknesses in our state structures, the need to reform and the rough and tumble of politics generally. The underlying core of Western society, its ambitions and aspirations remained constant. We were so pleased with the way we were, that we even sought to impose our ways on others. This led to a remarkable string of failed states and ungoverned spaces.

Social media is now awash with opinion about every facet of political, personal, family and emotional life. Brexit, Covid and Climate Change are between them delivering hammer blows to the attitudes, structures and norms of everything that went before. Yet behind the priorities of how, where, when, for whom and how much, there is a new dawn breaking. It is one of remarkable self-realisation and empowerment. It is this.

You are not your job, or your car, or your home. You are not your new kitchen, nor your social status. You, your happiness and your sense of place in the universe has nothing to do with any of these things. It is not about faith, or religion, or belonging to something.
It is about the unique miracle of the whole you as a person, an individual part of a great interdependent tapestry of conscious life, the future of all of which now depends on the priorities we apply to life now. And as we search for the best choices over issues about which a few months ago we knew little to nothing, we must accept one fundamental truth. There are millions of questions challenging the onward progress of life, but before you can help find the answers, you must first find yourself. Because the future is one not about having. It is about being.

It is also a future about having less and sharing more. Of less new and more used. Because vast recourses will be needed to mitigate climate change and become carbon neutral, creating new industries and more enlightened values. There will have to be less, a lot less, greed and fairer rewards for the millions whose daily efforts keep the state, upon which we all depend for the essentials of life, running smoothly. This will require a huge increase in investment to correct years of cuts and neglect.

In the end we will need a new appreciation of the purpose and value of the state, as the institution of civilisation which enables us collectively to survive and prosper. With it will come a new and enlightened state of mind. With that will come the understanding that the only way the individual can be truly free, is for each to work together for the common good of all.