Tony Blair told it is time to accept he lost the EU referendum and it won’t be re-held
Labour's Gisela Stuart says Brexit was people with nothing left to lose taking back control
SNEERING TONY BLAIR sparked fury today by hinting Britain should be allowed a second Referendum – as people may change their minds.
The former PM – who famously ducked a national vote when he was in No.10 – insisted the country “should keep its options open”.
He said: “Yes the Referendum expressed the will of the people but the will of the people is entitled to change.
“It wasn’t 70-30, or 60-40 it was 52-48. Let’s be very blunt about it, some of the claims made for the Brexit case somewhat collapsed even in the week since we’ve been doing this.”
The extraordinary blast followed a march by 30,000 ‘Remain’ fans at a pro-EU rally in London - chanting ‘Fromage not Farage’.
And it comes just days after the ex-PM’s former chief of staff urged political leaders to be “courageous” and re-run the vote.
But it was immediately slapped down by Brexit campaigners who yesterday claimed they would have been “laughed out of town” if they had lost – and called for a second chance.
Gisela Stuart, the Labour MP and Out campaigner told the Sun: “The establishment just won’t accept the result.
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“It’s people who don’t want their lifestyle changed complaining bitterly and sneering at people who – with nothing left to lose - voted to take back control.
“If we had lost and called for a second Referendum people would have laughed at us and called us bad losers.”
“Imagine if it was a General Election. What’s the Tory majority, 12 seats? Does anyone question that? Do people trust that outcome? Yes they do.”
Dan Hannan, the Tory MEP added: “This is why people dislike and distrust their politicians.
“MPs voted to give us a referendum and in that referendum, more Brits voted to leave the EU than have voted for anything ever.
“Now Tony Blair and his henchmen and trying to overturn the result.
“They think people were too thick to get it right. In fact, people knew exactly what they were voting for.
He added: “Already Project Fear is falling apart. All that talk of emergency Budgets and bombs under the economy has dried up. The voters were right and Tony Blair was wrong – again.”
Tony Blair and the former Labour Government promised a referendum on ratification of the European Constitution Treaty in 2004 a year ahead of a General Election.
But after France and the Netherlands voted against, Ministers got cold feet and ditched the promise.
But 2007, when the European Commission proposed a replacement treaty – the Lisbon Treaty – Labour said it was a different document and therefore a referendum was not needed.
Last week, Jonathan Powell, Tony Blair’s former chief of staff, said while the Brexit campaign had won the Referendum – it did not mean “it is the last word on the subject”.
He added: “One of the advantages of our flexible constitution is that we always have room for manoeuvre, we always find a way of muddling through.”
He said given that voters were not given a picture of what they were voting FOR in the event we left the EU, it should be put to a second referendum, adding there were “plenty of precedents”.
Mr Blair insisted he was not saying “we should have another referendum”.
But he said: “I am simply saying there is no rule about this – we are a sovereign people, we can do what we want to do.
“As a country we should keep all our options open because right now we don’t really know what lies on the other side.”