Gina Miller isn’t a woman to rest on her laurels. Following her two history-making victories over the government at the Supreme Court, the businesswoman and campaigner has by no means retired from the fray. Instead, she has some fresh requests, which she made clear in her distinctive, deceptively unflurried style this week at a TV industry conference hosted by Freeview. And bearing in mind her unique part in the recent politics of the nation, it’s probably worth our taking note…
‘Can we all move on?’
Miller may be forever associated with the battle for Brexit in the UK, celebrated and denounced in equal measure as the woman who took her government to court over its authority to withdraw from the European Union, but as far as she’s concerned, she’d actually like us all to find the strength somehow to move on.
According to the businesswoman and campaigner, sticking to our guns on either side of what happened with the Referendum is preventing this country and its leaders from having the important debates about what happens next.
“We keep going back to what happened three years ago and I’m not sure that’s particularly helpful in trotting out these phrases, ‘what happened in 2016…’ It would be so much better to have a debate about where we are now, and go forward.”
‘Don’t call me a Remainer’
Despite being recognized as one of the country’s most high-profile campaigners for Remain through her lawsuits, Miller argues that both Remain and Leave labels are out of date, both for her and everyone else…
“You don’t need to put a label on people. I’ve been a campaigner for 30 years, people don’t say I’m a transparency campaigner, they say I’m an anti-Brexit campaigner. Actually I’m not, but that’s a label that’s always there. It’s constant.
“What did taking the government to court have to do with how I voted in the referendum? I say, tell me how a court case is anti-Brexit?
“To say I’ve been talking about justice from the point of view of a Remainer… I run an investment company, I look at data every single day. I’m looking at what’s happening with UK bonds, money moving out, private equity and investments and that’s not about the fact I’m Leave or Remain.
“It’d be great to have this conversation about actually what’s happening in our country. I’m not talking about these things because I’m a Remainer. I’m talking about them from the point of view of news. That’s what happening on the ground, that’s what’s happening to sterling. We have to be able to get back to having discussions, not through a dichotomous lens.
“We’re talking about moving on, healing the nation – how do we do that? Surely one of the ways must be to be talk around the issues without saying whether they sit in Remain or Leave. At some point, we are one country so the effects on the NHS, the effects on the environment, are going to affect all of us, and every time you introduce someone as being a Remainer or Leaver, you are completely confirming those divisions. How do you move on if you’re going to keep confirming them?”
‘Have you actually read the agreement?’
Following her first victory in the Supreme Court, when 11 judges agreed that the government didn’t have the authority to withdraw from the European Union without a parliamentary vote, Miller was dismayed by how this was presented in some parts of the media as a judicial coup…
“I think that TV has been very unfair, not just reporting with me, but what’s it done in devaluing the law, the judges. To destabilise the institution of the rule of law is very irresponsible.
“Can you think of any other walk of life where 11 Supreme Court judges give a robust judgment and the next day it’s repositioned as something completely different?
TV studio after studio [visited by Miller the day after], I asked, ‘Have you actually read the judgment?’ The government had completely repositioned and the commentators they’d put out weren’t being questioned on what they were saying. Whatever they’d been sent the night before, they were just reading it out, and I thought this is not helpful to an institution that is fundamental to our democracy.
“When I asked them why, they said, ‘We haven’t had time.’ I found it extraordinary they weren’t being challenged more on the comments they were saying.
Fake news
“It is extraordinary the way stories are put into papers, which have no basis in truth. I was apparently going to be leader of the Lib Dems. That story was a four-pager in a Sunday paper, and not a single person spoke to me. How does that happen from a senior journalist?”
‘What people really want is information’
Despite her central position in some of the fiercest battles of the Brexit era, Miller is convinced that what is needed now is to unite the country and provide a sense of certainty…
“When I go round the country now, what I feel more than anything else is a real sense of depression, where people feel they don’t know what is going on. You can’t have a nation where people feel distrust for everything. As human beings, we need some sense of certainty, and if we could move forwards, not just talk about Remain and Leave, but talk about the detail a bit more, not just pitting people one against the other.
“We’re in a really difficult place, I appreciate that, but I’m not positive that it will stop when Brexit stops, as I see Brexit as the last straw of divisions quite significant in our country. It is addressing those divisions and the things that belie Brexit that will really heal our country.”
‘There’s something happening against women across the board’
Finally, following the departure of so many female politicians from Westminster ahead of this election, Miller adds her voice to those saying the level of intimidation and abuse is unacceptable, and asks for men to stand up in defence…
“We need some of the men in politics to stand up and say it is unacceptable for female colleagues to be receiving this, or to be treated like this, because we pay the price with women leaving politics.
“It’s not just female politicians, it’s female experts, it’s across the board. There’s something that’s happening against women in every walk of life who have a public platform.”
