Keith, from what I have read it is fairly settled law that referenda are not binding because this conflicts with the sovereignty of Parliament. Parliament can choose to make a particular referendum binding, but in this case it did not do so. Nevertheless some have argued that its being binding was implied because of statements made by the Government.

I am not a lawyer, so I cannot say if that claim has merit. It does seem to overturn the usual presumption, however the Government did not seek in the case before the High Court to argue that it is legally bound by the result. That suggests to me that the Government chose to accept the result of the referendum not because it believed it was legally bound to do so but because it felt it was the right thing to do. Indeed, the point of the referendum was to "let the people decide". I call that a political decision.

Let me be clear that, although I am unhappy with the result of the referendum, I agree that the Government has no real choice but to accept it. To ignore it would be unthinkable (politically, not legally). The issue now is to see that it is done properly and lawfully. This is in both sides' interest, but I keep making the point that Brexiteers should want this even more than Remainers, if they don't want the process to be disrupted by further legal challenges in both the UK and European courts.

I think it is important that in this the Government is subject to proper Parliamentary oversight, not because I think this offers a hope of overturning the result (I believe this is wishful thinking) but because the country is so divided over this and because there is still no clear idea of what success looks like.

Everyone who voted to leave seems to have their own priorities: for some it was simply to leave and damn the consequences, others want to have varying degrees of free trade with Europe, some will accept some movement of people while others won't have any. That's before you factor in the views of the only slightly smaller number who voted to remain, and those who for whatever reason didn't vote but have now woken up to the fact this affects them too. We need a clear strategy for leaving, and in a representative democracy it is the role of Parliament to help frame that.