I REFER to the letter regarding Brexit from Neil Middle (‘No vote’, Postbag, July 19), who challenges the notion of a People’s Vote, for which I would like to make a case.

There is extensive evidence supporting the benefits of the UK remaining in the EU, yet a dearth of it supporting our leaving.

Pretty much every economic forecast, including HM Treasury’s own, shows that we will be poorer - the harder the Brexit, the worse the forecast.

Compare this with the ‘milk and honey’ that voters were promised: The deal was to be the ‘easiest thing in human history’ [Fox], the NHS would get an additional £350m per week [Vote Leave], and we would be ‘Part of a free-trade zone stretching from Iceland to Turkey’ [Gove].

Now it turns out that: 1) it isn’t easy, it is horribly complex; 2) there will be no Brexit dividend; and 3) thanks to the Brextremists we will leave the Single Market and the Customs Union. 

This last point will be a disaster for manufacturers and the financial sector (which on its own generates 11 per cent of tax revenues).

Companies have started to vote with their feet and will continue to do so - this is not ‘project fear’, it is happening - real people, real jobs.
Brexit will likely impose a hard border on the island of Ireland, thus threatening a hard-won peace. 

The question of Scottish independence is also back on the agenda.

The Electoral Commission recently found that Vote Leave acted unlawfully. 

We already know that the Leave campaigns blatantly lied - but this goes well beyond lying - this is dishonestly procuring the result of the referendum by breaking the law.

Through government incompetence it has taken two years to come to a position on which the Conservative party is yet to agree - let alone the rest of parliament or the EU.

Article 50 should not have been triggered without a coherent plan of how the UK would exit.

The result is gratuitous damage to our economy and the UK’s standing in the international community.

I know it is fashionable for Leavers to dismiss these inconvenient facts - but they represent tangible evidence of the damage that is being done to our country: evidence that people simply had not seen two years ago. 

Surely, it is essential to review earlier decisions in the light of new facts?
Indeed, is this not fundamental to any democracy?

A recent Survation poll for the Independent shows those supporting a People’s Vote on the final deal outnumber those opposed almost two to one (48 per cent vs 25 per cent), and a recent YouGov poll predicts a victory for Remain were such a referendum to take place.

There seems to me to be a compelling case for a People’s Vote, wherever your loyalties lie: for Remainers a chance to stop Brexit, and for Leavers the opportunity to refresh the mandate and ensure that, if we Brexit, we do so because the people really want it.

DR SHAUN DAVEY
Minehead