This is just one of the great views of Folkestone from the cliffs near Capel on one of my recent training walks. My training is all focused on a personal pilgrimage (or Camino) from Astorga to Santiago de Compostela, that I am due to start on 31st March and complete on 12 April. The problem is that, even today with less than two weeks to go, the UK government still has no idea whether or not Brexit will be happening on 29th March, and if it is happening, how orderly or otherwise it will be.
Tempting as it is to blame the government, or Parliament, or particular public figures arguing vehemently for one point of view or the other, the truth seems to me that democracy in any form can only work when the people, as a whole, arable to live with a shared view of what they can all tolerate, and with Brexit, that seems not to be the case. The country as a whole is roughly evenly divided as to whether or not we are better off socially and economically as members of the EU, or as an independent nation state. And if the people do not know what they want, then how can the Government, or Parliament, or anyone else deliver it for them?
Against this massive problem, the timing of my own long walk seems simple – and I have resolved it by booking a flight to Madrid for 28th March and then taking a bus to Astorga from Madrid on 30th ready to start walking on 31st. That seems to me to be the lowest risk strategy in the face of the continuing uncertainty.
Terry Cooke-Davies
Folkestone. 10th March 2019
