"Get Brexit done" was the promise, repeated to the point of tedium, that took Boris Johnson's Conservatives to a landslide victory in Britain's 2019 election. But the subject - for so long the defining issue in UK politics - has barely featured in the current campaign.
Keir Starmer, whose Labour party is 20 percentage points ahead on the average of opinion polls, hardly mentions Britain's relationship with the EU.
Anand Menon, the director of the thinktank UK in a Changing Europe, said: "There is an underlying nervousness because Starmer is felt to be vulnerable to attack as a former remainer, anti-Brexit, and Labour needs to hold on to pro-Brexit leave voters."
Although the Brexit referendum took place in June 2016, resulting in a narrow 52% vote in favour of leaving the EU, there was no clear plan for its implementation. That unleashed a period of political turmoil that ended only when Johnson won the 2019 election.
In the run-up to that vote, Starmer, then the party's Brexit spokesperson, pressed for Labour to support a second referendum, saying: "We would campaign for remain." But so emphatic was Johnson's election victory, and so important Labour's need to win back Tory votes among Brexit supporters, the topic has been suppressed.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة June 21, 2024 من The Guardian Weekly.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
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هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة June 21, 2024 من The Guardian Weekly.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
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