Peter Robinson quoting text from Douglas Murray’s book – From the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648 up to the late 20th century, the Nation State had generally been regarded not only as the Best Guarantor of the Constitutional Order and Liberal Rights, but the Ultimate Guarantor of Peace. Yet this certainty has also Ended. Central European figures like Chancellor Kohl of Germany in 1996 insisted that, and here you quote Kohl, ‘The Nation State cannot solve the Great Problems of the 21st Century, close quotes. But, Brexit and the European Elections? Discuss”. Douglas Murray – “Brexit was an attempt by the British public, a majority of the British public, to Reassert their Belief in the Nation State. I voted Brexit, like most of my fellow countrymen, and I did so I think, for the same reasons as most of them, which is that I thought we’d lost our Understanding of how we were Governed. And that this was absolutely Central is one reason why we’ve had a Pretty Peaceful Country, Britain, for some Hundreds of Years. Parliament was Elected by the People. It was Accountable to the People. And if it Let you Down, you Turfed them Out! And this wasn’t so with the European Union, we felt, and I know lots of people who think very differently to that. But most of us in Britain felt we didn’t know how we were governed. We didn’t know how to get rid of them. We didn’t know who they were once they were put there. We didn’t know who put them there! A Brexit vote is a shout of a Reassertion that we would like to be governed in the way that we thought we were governed!”
017. Douglas Murray – The Death of Europe Part 10
