As is the case with much of the country, views around the boardroom were split. The one thing we were unanimous on was a distaste for the tone of much of the debate from political leaders of both sides.
Politicians just don’t seem to trust in the power of reasoned debate. Instead they fall hopelessly into a downward spiral of ridiculous counterclaims and scare stories.
Three million jobs will disappear. The Third World War will break out. Increasing risk of sex attacks by migrants. An extra £2.4 billion for the UK to pay Brussels. Planes falling out of the sky even!
Plus, especially for us in travel, the cost of a family holiday will rise if we exit and new limits on duty free will mean the end of the booze cruise.
Headline grabbing perhaps. Helpful to the vast majority of voters taking the decision seriously? Of course not.
And the scaremongering is so short-term in its approach. Surely the momentous size of the choice to be made demands that it be based on the long-term consequences for our country overall, rather than ludicrous claims devised to promote selfish thinking about whether individually we’ll be a few quid worse off next year.
As do all good businesses and organisations, the board of Holidaysplease meet every month to review, react for the short term, and most importantly plan for the future. We’ll be thinking carefully about where we want to be in five years’ time. So far I haven’t heard anything from the Brexit or Remain camp beyond 2020. That’s only three and a half years away.
Looking back 40 years to the days when my ginger afro was a match for anything the Jackson 5 could muster, it seems the 1975 EU referendum threw up some interesting parallels to the current debate.
The Out campaign talked endlessly about sovereignty. Britain would become a mere province of Europe. Has that happened?
The In campaign countered the sovereignty argument by stressing that big decisions would be subject to a prime ministerial veto. This is no longer the case.
The Out campaign of ‘75 blamed rising unemployment on the increasing trade deficit due to our closer ties with Europe. The Ins said leaving would be disastrous for British industry as access to a market of 250 million people would be blocked.
Today it is clear that many of the worst-case predictions made by the Ins and Outs of 1975 failed the test of time. So perhaps us voters should apply a good pinch of salt to those being made in 2016 and make the most reasoned decision for the long term we possibly can on June 23.
Richard Dixon is director of Holidaysplease
