This is not a pro-Remain article. Rather, my point is that a referendum is a horrible way of making political decisions, and we are where we are as a direct result.
Between 1997 and 2005, public sector spending rose from £336 billion to £517 billion a year. But its output has increased little, so its productivity has fallen dramatically.
Most people would resent any payments after we cease being members.
Just 0.6 per cent of London homes – and 0.8 per cent nationally – are vacant for more than six months. That’s down hugely in recent years.
We should seek the closest possible relationship with the EU and an open trade policy. Firms need confidence to invest.
Churchill saw a century ago that the existing party machines will always prove the stronger, and UKIP and the SDP have confirmed this.
All agree that something must be done. But everyone would prefer that someone else is the one to do it.
Unresolved questions about refugees, debt crises, security, and general financial instability will force these questions on more people, and not just Britons.
When I wrote on this website last year that we should not underestimate him, some ridiculed my argument. Now we have to educate a new generation about the dangers of Labour.
We simply don’t know yet what outcome could command a broad consensus. Everything short of no deal and remaining in the EU should be kept on the table.
The idea that Brexit is a threat to defence co-operation is a myth.
There is no foreign policy that could appease the likes of the Manchester terrorists. Islamists damn us if we intervene, and damn us if we don’t.
By seeing off Le Pen and electing the most ideologically pro-EU president since Giscard d’Estaing, France has changed the game.
It’s sad in a way, but the quicker Labour is eclipsed and a new leftist party emerges, the better for everyone.
France’s new president may be a more positive force for Britain than people expect. But we need to be ready – deal or no deal.