Two anti-Brexit marches have been announced for the coming months, to follow up the big demonstrations on 20 October 2018 and 23 March this year.
The first, on 20 July, noon from Park Lane, London, will go under the bland title “March for Change”, but bills itself as the “pro-European grassroots demo”. Its lead slogan is “Reunite with Europe”. It also has a string of other demands: “For the NHS; For the Environment; For our Rights, Freedoms and Equalities; For our Communities, our Jobs and our Pensions; For our Voice, our Votes and our Veto”.
Another Europe is Possible and Labour for a Socialist Europe are organising a “left bloc” on the 20 July, with spikier demands: “Decent jobs and homes for all; A Europe-wide green new deal; Workers’ rights and a living wage across Europe; Scrap all anti-union laws; Free movement for all – no to Fortress Europe; An economy that serves the many not the few, with democratic ownership and control; A Europe that challenges the power of big corporations, with tough regulation and taxes; A well-funded, entirely publiclyowned and run, NHS”.
The chief organiser for 20 July is Tom Bruffato, who bills himself as “chair, Britain4Europe, head of campaigns for People’s Vote”, the person who “organised the ‘PutItToThePeople’ march [on 23 March]”. People’s Vote as such — a conglomerate of groups — is not backing the 20 July march, and instead is organising rallies across the country from 22 June onwards, and a march on 12 October, for which the single slogan so far is “Let us be heard”.
The core group in People’s Vote seems to be Open Britain, of which the best-known officers are Peter Mandelson, Trevor Phillips, Richard Reed, and Will Straw. Britain for Europe is the umbrella for local groups like Leeds for Europe. Best for Britain is the chief mainstream lobby group not in the People’s Vote coalition. Chaired by George Soros’s sidekick Mark Malloch-Brown, it is backing the 20 July demonstration.
Solidarity and Workers’ Liberty are mobilising to establish a left-wing presence on both the July and the October demonstration, as well as organising local Labour for a Socialist Europe stalls and groups and pushing left anti-Brexit motions in Labour Parties and trade unions.
