Ten years after the 2016 referendum, the United Kingdom remains paralysed. The debate is still trapped between "respect the result" and "another vote." But both sides miss the fundamental truth: the referendum did not decide anything. It could not have decided anything.
The Supreme Court confirmed that referendums in the UK are advisory, not binding. The question was ambiguous - "leave" could mean hard Brexit, soft Brexit, or anything in between. The majority (51.9%) was not clear. The devolved nations of Scotland and Northern Ireland, which voted to remain, were simply overridden.
The real damage is not the referendum itself. It is the mindset that has taken root since: the belief that "it" decided something that cannot be reopened. That belief has paralysed Parliament, poisoned public debate, and prevented rational policy-making.
This book offers a way out. Not a second referendum (which would repeat the same errors). Not a campaign to rejoin or remain. A constitutional reset.
Drawing on the Supreme Court's judgment in the Miller case and the Canadian Clarity Act, the author argues that the only thing we need to do is recognise the mistake, file the referendum away, and let Parliament do its job - consulting the devolved nations, putting all options on the table (rejoin, associated membership, EEA, improved trade deal, or the status quo), and deciding based on the national interest, not on a flawed opinion poll from 2016.
Brexit, Don't Look Back in Anger is a short, rigorous constitutional argument for anyone exhausted by the binary debate. It does not prescribe a destination. It prescribes a process: parliamentary sovereignty, reasoned deliberation, and a return to normal democratic governance.
