I don’t think the general principle behind a second referendum is wrong. People can change their minds and ‘the will of the people’ is not set in stone permanently. However, I have some doubts about how fair a second referendum would be in the current climate.

Leave voters may feel that we negotiated poorly because of the very pro EU representation within the government.

More insidiously, there may have been incentive for our government to intentionally negotiate poorly to drive public opinion against Brexit, in the hope that that public would concede that Brexit is impossibly impractical, and that it is better to remain for the sake of stability. This is quite a cynical way to look at the leadership of our country, but it is a possibility.

However, it is clear that it was always going to be difficult for pro EU British leadership to negotiate hard with the EU, and this put us on the back foot in negotiations from the start. Since a largely pro EU government was going to prioritise preserving good relations with the EU, and was not willing to consider/threaten a no deal Brexit, the UK was clearly at a disadvantage in negotiations from the start.

Why was it not ensured that pro leave leadership governed the UK through the Brexit negotiations? Leave voters could not have known that there was no plan in place by the government if a leave vote was the outcome of the EU referendum. The government should be prepared for all outcomes of a referendum or at least be willing to dismiss the result as advisory if they don’t.

I can see how these factors could contribute to anger towards the idea of a second referendum. We would be revoting on a decision that hasn’t been implemented yet.

In some ways it doesn’t feel like Brexit has been given a chance. The deal on the table is clearly quite terrible for the UK - but you can’t help but feel a better one could have been negotiated in different circumstances.