The Telegraph’s apology for Brexit is not really an apology at all

There is “more joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, than for 99 just persons”. But when the key word is “repenteth”, the sinner really has to repent.

Which is why the admission from Sherelle Jacobs – hitherto a passionate Leaver – in the Daily Telegraph that Britain “should just rejoin the EU” fails to convince. Certainly, it is wonderful that the rant-filled pages of the Brexiteers’ house magazine have found the space for someone to admit that their pet project has been a calamitous failure. But the rest of the paper has not yet followed suit and the mea culpa is far from as complete as one would hope.

Sherelle Jacobs seems to think that the main reason to rejoin is that we have failed to take advantage of the “opportunities” afforded by Brexit, and that since we plainly lack the courage to seize the advantages of this brave new world, we would be as well snuggling up to Auntie Brussels for some comfort and protection.

Nowhere does she admit that the whole thing has been a failure from the start or that the “opportunities” we have failed to take advantage of never existed in the first place. In fact, she says the opposite that the “elephant in the room” is that “Britain is terrified of freedom.” Yeah, right!

For instance, the fishing industry is suffering not because its promised golden future was based on lies but because “Whitehall is terrified of allowing our fishing industry to thrive, lest trawlers decimate the ecosystem.” This sounds fairly sensible to me – we only have one ecosystem so it’s probably best not to wreck it still further – but on Planet Brexit it is a damning indictment of a failure to use our new “freedom”.

Likewise, Jacobs thinks “Britain is equally terrified of free trade” because we want to maintain some food standards at a time when cases of food poisoning are spiking.

Far more bizarre is her statement that “we are petrified of seizing on the biggest opportunity presented by Brexit and becoming an AI superpower.” Why Brexit would be good for AI industries if only we had more courage is not made clear. Perhaps we could ask an AI bot for some of the reasons.

Though Jacobs does say Brexit has “spectacularly failed”, she refutes what we all know – that it was “doomed from the start”. Her contention is that the Blob has won and therefore we need to get back into the EU sharpish – it is safer there, warmer, more comfortable and less frightening. It would give the UK more geopolitical weight and heft, which would make the world safer in the face of Russian and other threats.

Well, yes that is true but it always was true, it is not a consequence of failure and cowardice, it was always the reality of Brexit and Sherelle Jacobs et al were warned many, many times that this was what would happen.

The article gives itself away at the end by saying clearly and unequivocally that there is no halfway house, no membership of the single market or EFTA that will do. Jacobs insists we have to be back inside the EU and as soon as possible, and that Sir Keir Starmer is “deluded” if he thinks otherwise.

All the stuff about lack of courage and bureaucratic failure is a smokescreen and this is the sting in the tail. The whole article is an attempt to blame others for Brexit’s failure and then claim that the only solution is to rejoin immediately. And if we don’t rejoin immediately, to blame Britain’s economic woes on a new Labour government when the real blame lies with politicians like Telegraph columnist Nigel Farage, journalists like Telegraph columnist Sherelle Jacobs and newspapers like the Telegraph itself.

The Telegraph must have known for years that Brexit has failed and now it seems to be preparing the ground for a Damascene conversion. But I for one would like a lot more repenting – serious levels of repenting, obscene amounts of repenting – first.

You can read more from Jonty on Substack at Jonty’s Jottings