Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 5:51 pm on 27 March 2019.
My position's been very clear, Darren—I want a people's vote, and I notice you haven't bothered defending Theresa May today.
Even after stinging criticism from all sides there was no attempt to reach out and compromise. Like something out of a Bertie Wooster novel, the Prime Minister then invited a bewildering bunch of posh white men to her country retreat in a bid to sort the whole thing out. That the assembled ranks then decided to refer to themselves as 'grand wizards', a title associated with the Ku Klux Klan, tells you absolutely everything you need to know about where some of the key architects of Brexit are on the political and intellectual spectrum. It takes something for the Tories to keep pace with a UKIP party now fully associated with Tommy Robinson, but this week they've managed it.
And what of UKIP? The motion we have before us today simply shows the complete lack of responsibility they have for the lies we were all told in the 2016 referendum. There's nothing new here—no proposed solutions to today's crisis. Just tired, reheated rhetoric about a European superstate. If you could turn the tiny, soggy, Leave Means Leave march into an opposition day motion, then this is what it would look like.
The terrible state of this grubby Brexiteer campaign could not have been put into any sharper relief than by the 1 million-plus 'Put it to the People' march in London on Saturday—1 million people, whose determination was matched by their dignity showed that where Westminster is failing, the public is not. I was incredibly proud to be there, marching alongside London's mayor, Sadiq Khan, and members from all political parties and people from all walks of life. Much is made of the age divide and class divide between remain and Brexit voters in 2016, but everyone was represented on that march. It was positive, it was vibrant, it was forward-looking—exactly the kind of Wales and Britain we should all want in the future. Add this to the unprecedented public petition to revoke article 50, which at the latest count looks ready to go beyond 6 million signatories, and it simply cannot be said that the country just wants us to get on and to get out of the EU. Things have changed, the mood has changed, people's views have changed. At the time of the EU referendum, UKIP had seven Members in this Assembly. They now have three. That is indicative of a movement that has collapsed, a moment in time that has gone, an idea that had no basis in reality.
Brexit is a dangerous fantasy that has thankfully been exposed at the eleventh hour. It is time to afford the public the same right we exercise in this Chamber every week—the right to change our minds. It is time to put it to the people.