The talks on Britain’s future relationship with the EU are reportedly coming to a crunch. Publically, at least, both the UK’s chief negotiator, David Frost, and his EU counterpart, Michel Barnier, are pessimistic about the prospects of a deal being reached in time for it to be put in place before the transition period terminates at the end of the year. Meanwhile, the UK government is said to be willing to contemplate the prospect of a ‘no deal’ outcome.
In adopting this stance, the government presumably anticipates that such an outcome would not make it unpopular with voters. In practice, whether or not it would probably depends on what the consequences proved to be. However, to date the polls have been silent on how voters currently view such a prospect, even assuming – given the continued dominance of COVID19 in the news agenda and in voters’ everyday lives – they have contemplated the possibility at all.
However, what we can examine is the (relatively limited) evidence in the polls on how voters react now when they are asked about the principle of Brexit. If those who voted Remain have come to accept the ‘reality’ of Brexit, then perhaps voters are ready to move on from the Brexit debate irrespective of what happens at the end of the year. On the other hand, if the country still appears divided on Brexit the government might find itself facing a more critical reaction than it could currently be anticipating.
We last examined this issue in April. At that point, we suggested that there was some evidence that some Remain voters had come to accept Brexit, and that this was most clearly the case when voters were asked how they would vote in a referendum on whether the UK should rejoin or stay out of the European Union as opposed to one on whether it should ‘Remain’ or ‘Leave’. But where do things stand some four months on?
One piece of recent polling has confirmed that a majority of voters might now vote to stay out of the EU. Until July Kantar were still asking people whether they would vote Remain or Leave in another referendum. Once (a substantial body of) Don’t Knows were put to one side their last two readings of this kind, in May and June, produced figures of Remain 55%, Leave 45%, and Remain 56%, Leave 44% respectively. In contrast when Kantar administered their new question in July just 46% said they would vote to rejoin, while 54% backed staying out. Only 70% of those who voted Remain in 2016 backed rejoining, whereas in the two earlier polls as many as 84% had said they would vote Remain again. We certainly need to be aware that when the Brexit process has come to its final conclusion there may well be a body of voters who would still prefer Britain to be part of the EU but who are not necessarily keen to embark on an immediate reversal of the process.
Moreover, the 55% and 56% estimated levels of support for Remain in Kantar’s polls in May and June were not typical. On average the half-dozen polls of how people would vote in another Remain vs. Leave referendum (see here and here) have put Remain on 52%, Leave on 48%. However, that is only a slightly narrower lead than the one of 53% to 47% that was to be found in the last half-dozen polls conducted immediately prior to Brexit Day at the end of January. In short, polling of how people would vote now in response to the question that appeared on the ballot paper four years ago does not suggest that there has been a dramatic shift of attitude – in either direction.
However, the most intensive polling of attitudes towards the principle of Brexit in recent weeks has been provided by YouGov. Ever since the EU referendum that company’s principal means of tracking attitudes towards the principle of Brexit has not been to ask people how they would vote in another referendum but rather to ask, ‘In hindsight, do you think Britain was right or wrong to vote to leave the EU?’. That formulation has now come into its own. Unlike continuing to ask voters whether they would vote Remain or Leave, the question can still be asked without raising questions as to whether its meaning is still clear to voters or whether it is simply the ‘wrong’ question to ask now that Britain has already left.
The table below summarises the responses that this question has received since last October (when the general election was precipitated) not only among voters as a whole but also separately among those who voted Remain and those who backed Leave. Between October and January these reflected what had become a familiar picture ever since the withdrawal agreement that was originally negotiated by Theresa May was unveiled in November 2018. On average, rather more voters said that the decision was wrong (47%) than indicated that it was right (41%). And while most Leave voters were still of the view that it was right and most Remain supporters that it was wrong, Leave voters (83%) were a little less likely to affirm the decision to leave than Remain supporters (88%) were to express doubt about its wisdom.
This picture did change somewhat in the immediate wake of Britain’s withdrawal from the EU. On average the ‘lead’ of ‘wrong’ over ‘right’ halved to three points. Indeed, Leave voters were now as convinced that the decision was right as Remain supporters were that it was wrong (though those who did not vote in 2016 were more inclined to take the latter view). In short, there was some sign that voters might be beginning to accept the decision to leave the EU, albeit that it remained a subject on which the country remained more or less evenly divided.
However, YouGov’s more recent polling suggests that that apparent change has not been sustained. The figures on the right-hand side of the table for the last three months replicate almost exactly those for the period between October and January. Those who think the decision to leave was wrong once again outnumber those who believe it was right by six points, with Remain voters being a little more likely than Leave voters to affirm their original point of view.
On this evidence at least, it looks as though the country will regard the outcome of the talks on Britain’s future relationship with the EU in much the same mood as it watched the parliamentary toing and froing about Brexit during the course of last year – that is, deeply divided and largely entrenched in its views. Perhaps most Leave voters will be inclined to endorse whatever outcome the government secures. However, those on the Remain side of the argument have mostly yet still to be convinced of the wisdom of the project on which the government is embarked – and are likely to view the outcome with a critical eye.
By John Curtice
John Curtice is Senior Research Fellow at NatCen and at 'UK in a Changing Europe', Professor of Politics at Strathclyde University, and Chief Commentator on the What UK Thinks: EU website.
Is it the case that those who would now say that it was wrong are younger and more likely to have been university educated than those saying it was right to vote to leave? In other words as per the original vote? Report
Totally redundant and divisive piece. We are out and we’re staying out. If, buts and maybe’s have no relevance other than to the remoaning media Mr Curtis.Report
I’m not surprised by the poll findings as most people made up their minds years ago about the rights and wrongs of leaving the EU. I think people are unlikely to change their mind much in the future too. Its just too emotional a subject and nobody likes to admit they got anything wrong. They are more likely to use whatever excuses they can find to justify their original decision. Its just human nature.
I do think that there are differences in the reasons why people voted the way they did. I think the vast majority of remainers made their decision based on economic and trading factors along with a sense that belonging to a larger grouping of nations gives greater security and influence.
Leavers were much more likely to be concerned about control of borders and immigration and also disliked the number of new regulations coming out of Europe over which they felt they had any control.
As I see it, the only reason people would change their mind is if the factor they made their mind up on mostly turned out differently to what they expected.
For remainers, this might be that the economic damage isn’t as bad as feared and that, under a different regulatory regime, new businesses such as IT (gaming, media etc) or some other high tech start ups provide a boost to growth. Its always difficult to envisage what new businesses will be created in the future, much easier to see those under threat from any changes.
For Leavers, this might be an increase in immigration from other parts of the world albeit under a points based system or a dramatic increase in regulation from the UK government. I heard too many leave voters say they would still vote the way they did even if they or a close family member lost their job to believe that would cause any change of mind.
Either way, we won’t know anything until we have completely left the EU’s trading and regulatory environment next year. As a remainer, I remain sceptical of the whole endeavour, but I believe that if things do go wrong with our relationship with the EU, future UK administrations will eventually fix it. Its just too important a relationship, economically and culturally, to ignore.
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Brexit worries me terribly. I voted leave stupidly and have regretted it ever since. I feel we were misled and future generations will suffer as a result. I would love to get a chance to change my vote as I want to remain in the E.U. Report
My first impression of the polling is it still reflects an emotional attachment to the way people voted in the referendum. It isn’t until the transition phase of the withdrawal has ended that the consequences of leaving will be felt.
It will be interesting to follow the polling trends over the next few years as the reality of being outside the EU becomes an everyday experience and it begins to impact on everyone’s life. Over time the answers to the question ‘In hindsight, do you think Britain was right or wrong to vote to leave the EU?’ will reflect how people experience the consequences of leaving.
I suspect people will still identify emotionally with their choice in the referendum and will be prepared to gloss over any minor inconveniences, there will always be a hard core for whom the sovereignty and immigration control issues will be more important than economic prosperity. However I expect opinion to change amongst the section of leave voters whose emotional attachment was less strong, when the painful consequences of Brexit impact directly on their lives and personal prosperity.Report
The REAL situation is, that the backer of the Leave campaign for the EU Referendum, using Leave.EU, together with the likes of now PM BJ’s aide, DC, guiding what was being said and posters used, and, with NF and the key elite brexiteers, used the Leave campaign, time since and likely having a no deal trade agreement, so that they caused harm to the UK economy, whereby financial bets, placed to that likely effect, have raked them in £millions over now 4 years.
The Leave campaign for the EU Referendum was NEVER REALLY ABOUTHE EU or anything else, except as a basis for getting people in the UK having racial concerns and especially about immigrants, as NOBODY IN GOVERNMENT has ever made known that about 95%+ of ALL IMMIGRANTS EACH YEAR THAT WERE COMING TO THE UK WERE DOING SO TO, AND DID, WORK, and just WHY THAT’ WAS HAPPENING.
The REAL REALITY is that to 1974 in each year the UK had a FAR GREATER birth rate, than from 1975, so from 1993, and likely to 2042+, in EACH YEAR there would be a FAR GREATER number of older people that retired from work, that younger UK born people that would start work, thus EAXCH YEAR AN EMPLOPYMENT GAP, and the jobs in it at ANY level of experience and ANY level of pay.
AND, without the immigrant workers coming EACH YEAR to fill those vacant jobs, the UK would have an economy crisis, like it HAS HAD NIOW FOR 4 YEARS, due to NOT having enough immigrant workers coming, due to 2 situations.
The first being the Leave campaign for the EU Referendum and their very misleading statements and posters about what was LESS THAN 0.1% OF ALL THE IMMIGRANTS COMING TO THE UK EACH YEAR, but in the UK people equated what was being said to ALL IMMIGRANTS, and it caused many immigrant workers already in the UK to leave and fewer to come since, especially with regards to the EU.
The second, whilst the Leave effect was happening, was action taken by the then Home Secretary, TM, WHO had NO CLUE as to what, after 6 years as HS, the Net Immigration number each year reflected, like INCLUDED EFFECT OF THE ADDITIONALLY NEEDED IMMIGRANT WORKERS TO FILL THE EMPLOYMENT GAP JOBS, thus her, and as a result, PM DC, both talking in terms of bringing immigration down to just 10’s of thousands, something for the UK economy, NOT POSSIBLE, without impacting it AND BADLY, but due to here complete ignorance, it seems, of the annual EMPLOYMENT GAP, and its’ effect on the Net Immigration number. She modified the Immigrant Workers Process by adding a Minimum Salary under which no immigrant worker could come to the UK and work, and then made that £30,000, thus VERY WELL SCREWING UP THE UK ECONOMY, employment and people’s standard of living in the UK, and WHY IN THE G7 THE UK HAS SLIPPED FROM TOP TO BOTTOM ECONOMICALLY!!!
The ONLY way to REALLY get the UK economy expanding again, is to put BREXIT ON ICE FOR THE FORESEEABLE FUTURE, and also RESET THE IMMIGRANT WORKERS PROCESS AS WAS BEFORE IN EARLY 2016 TM CHANGED IT SO THAT CHANGE ABND ALL SINCE ARE NULLIFIED, and businesses again, INCLUDING THE NHS, are able to PROPERLY EMPLOY THE PEOPLE THEY NEED AND THEIR BUSINESSES FUNCTION PROPERLY!!!
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I voted ‘out’, but with a heavy heart. I hoped for a solution such as Norway has but now realise they are forced to accept dictats from Brussels without a seat at the high table. That might be worse than a ‘no deal’ Brexit.
I suspect that it is six of one and half a dozen the other over the difficulties in dealing with M Barnier. It is not helped by the influence of Macron. It will be sad if an agreement cannot be reached but the threat of a hard Brexit may yet encourage both sides to see sense.
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Very sensible Sir – I’d put a tin hat on if I were you – balanced and reflective doesn’t go with Brexit!Report
Project fear or project wishful thinking?
We are about to find out.
In any event the English Brexiteers will have to own it.
Will it be cheers or tears?.Report
Strange that the Remain voters failed to own the economic crash, unemployment increasing by 500,000, 30% house price crash plus the need for an emergency budget, in the event that we had the audacity to vote Leave..Report
Surely, all that this shows is that people know Brexit is happening like or not – and the majority do not – and they see no merit in rehearsing all the arguments against it that went on unsuccessfully for three and a half years after the referendum and up to that avoidable general election. They’ve got lives of their own to lead, and see no point hitting their heads against a brick wall. Nobody now believes a word any government minister says about the future, and very little of what anyone else may predict. So even those who are against Brexit,,as I am 100%, reckon it prudent simply to wait and see what happens in the run up to next January and beyond, rather than repeat the dismal forecasts that are most probably justified, and bring on themselves yet another blast of shrieks about Remoaners. Certainly the absence of positive and constructive contributions from Brexiteers about what the UK will be doing outside the EU that it couldn’t have done before speaks volumes of the pointlessness of Brexit.Report
Volumes I agree.. Most Brexiteers nowadays just seem to think we had to do it because of the vote and the rest does not matter.,Report
Brexit is a boomerang. In January it will come back and hit us hard.Report
Very interesting piece ,looks like the Prof has thrown in the towel on unity in Brexit. If anything the division is greater and regret greater. Which is hardly surprising when nothing at all has yet been delivered. Even the election was only won on a hope Boris would get shot if it, get it done and forgotten, not any more than that.If we manage to trade with reasonable continuity in January, this division might not get any worse but if we don’t there will surely have to be a serious reckoning about all the endless lies.Report
I am a firm remain voter and have not changed my mind. I am absolutely disgusted that we have a government that is happy to crash out with as little fuss as possible. They do not want the truth of Brexit to come out and are probably hoping it can all be blamed on Covid.
Unfortunately for the young people of this country they will find it very difficult to be able to rejoin the EU and definitely not on the terms and status we have left it on.
If we by some miracle do get a deal, it may at least mitigate some of the harm for those of us who are just the ordinary people.
I am saddened that the truth of the situation. Many who did vote leave did not vote for a no deal and have no real idea of what that even means. The typical stiff upper lip is not really going to do the younger generation much good and it’s their lives and futures that will be most affected. There are no Benefits to leaving as far as I can see. I have written to my MP and others but so far no one can give me a benefit we did not already have inside the EU. Report
I quite agree with you Elizabeth. During the referendum Boris confidently predicted we would get an excellent frictionless trade deal with the EU within two years!! A brazen and ridiculous lie.Report
I can understand why you feel so sore,after losing to a bus!.Report
Apparently on the run-up to the referendum, vote leave wanted to target the undecided 2.5 million or so people. So they poured millions of pounds into a social media campaign using a bankroll form a number of foreign billionaires (for foreign read US I think.) who used a military grade psychological assault on those voters, by setting up thousands of bots to behave like human subscribers. They used powerful data mining techniques to find out each person’s likes, dislikes, hopes and fears to target highly personalised political messages to each individual, in order to swing thier vote (and I’m not talking about jazz here). That is what it is alleged gave the leave vote the 2% margin they got. It was all entirely illegal although in the age of social media, the law is not fit for purpose. In any case, after the referendum result, these bots simply disappeared. Making then almost impossible to trace.*
*Brexit: A Corporate Coup D’Etat
by Amazon Media EU S.Ã r.l.
Learn more: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07L8C1DHB/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_SEEvFbC29D73Y
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Thank you for your comments Graham
Have you read Peter Geoghegan’s book ‘Democracy for Sale’? It sheds light on how huge sums of money was channeled through the DUP in the 2 months before the Brexit vote. The DUP spent 7 figure sums on advertising throughout the UK in favour of Brexit. The donor/s of this money cannot be disclosed, unlike in the rest of the UK, because of historical security issues and the laws in place to protect individuals from terrorist threats.
The Prime Minister has the power to make that disclosure if he feels the threat is removed. I am guessing no such disclosure would ever be made by Johnson
It is a mad world that we live in and a scary one
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Hello Jean, and thank you for your reply. You are absolutely right. I have read a sample of that book, and it gives a lot of information. It shows how this BREXIT has been 30 years in the planning. Liam Fox’s name keeps coming up all the time, and Dominic Cummings and others. And it has got nothing to do with democracy. If this government is so good at respecting referenda, Why is NI, and Gibraltar being dragged out of the EU against their will?
Quite a lot has happened since I posted on this web site. Brandon Lewis has admitted that the Internal Markets Bill breaks the law, in a specific and limited way. Did he drop that bombshell by mistake, or did he draw the short straw? Is this an attempt to provoke the EU into forcing us out without a deal? Was it intended to lower the UKs standing globally, so that we would be increasingly vulnerable to those who’s aim it is to exploit us?
I would like to finish up on this comment with the following:-
The European Union is not an empire.
No one forced us to belong to it. We asked to join.
The EU are not stopping us from leaving. But it would be rank stupidity to leave without a deal.
Most people do not want a damaging hard BREXIT. But during the referendum Vote leave mislead the public about whether we may remain in a customs union, or otherwise.
And finally, the EU does not negotiate in bad faith. It is the UK that had chosen a hostile negotiation strategy.
I will stop there.Report
How deluded are you people?
You had a vote
The nation spoke
Democracy in action
Brexit legally mandated by its voting population
Deal with your loss the same way Britons dragged into the eu unwillingly did. But stop this ridonkulous delusion that democracy means we keep voting till I get my result. Grow up.Report
Grow up? An interesting and calmn debate was going on here Dominic till you barged in shouting slogans.. Why on earth are you so defensive, and given it is done are we not even allowed to have a calm discussion about the future?. My sense is you are secretly terrified BREXIT will be a complete mess as predicted.Report
Grow up seems to be the righ commentt for you. You seriously don’t have a scooby and need to wake up! If you can’t accept the vote, go live in Belarus!Report
Dominic – you are simply wrong on one point. Brexit was not legally mandated by the voting population. Maybe it’s time you learnt that Parliament is sovereign in Britain, not “the people”Report
It was legally mandated. The vote was accepted and ratified by Parliament and recognised as legally binding from that point.Report
If people can’t change their mind, then they have no democracy. Every five years we vote for a new government. If we weren’t allowed to change our minds, we would have one government in perpetuity.
When we had the EU referendum, people were voting for different things. Some wanted to leave without a deal, others wanted a Common Market, or a Norway style deal. Yet others wanted a Canada style deal. Voting for BREXIT must have been like sticking your hand in a Jamboree bag and seeing what comes out. How can that be equated to democracy? It’s gambling pure and simple. The single most important vote has been reduced to a gamble for those people who voted leave.
The people of Northern Ireland voted overwhelmingly to remain and they are, as we have been told, they belong to a different jurisdiction and therefore had the right to remain within the EU, even if the rest of the UK voted to leave. Those people as we now can see, did not have their collective wills respected, when they spoke. The irony of this though, is, that had they belonged to the same jurisdiction. The over all vote for the UK as a whole would have swung in favour of remain. Based on the fact that Vote Leave only won on a margin of 2%. That is without counting Gibraltar, who also did not have their views respected in the referendum, because of the way their grandparents voted back in 2002.
By the way, the referendum was only advisory and not a legal mandate.Report
One reason why some remain voters may seem more reconciled to leaving the EU is that they believe that it is only when leave voters experience the consequences of being outside the single market that they will come to understand the error of their vote in the referendum.Report
John Curtice is the establishment’s and unionists pollster he takes the side he is told to and as mentioned is in the media way too often he starts to believe the drivel he comes out with. On the E.U. the Come of age are never asked how they would vote on whether to rejoin the E.U. or whether they would have voted to leave just as the younger age group adults are rarely asked their view on Scottish Independence Curtice knows that in the 18- 35 age group support for Independence is at 78% which is not what the establishment want people to hear so Curtice rarely mentions it.Report
I still remain to be convinced that there are any advantages in leaving the EU. I foresee at least medium term problems. However a decision has been made and must be respected. It is possible the EU might benefit from our departure. I suspect that sometime in the future we might reapply but not for several years. Report
There has been horribly little coverage in the mainstream media of what Brexit actually means as regards the continuing survival and profitability of businesses based in the UK. The polls could well be different now if there had been decent coverage of the business and employment consequences of Brexit (in all its forms) but regrettably most of the reporting has been purely “political” (and very superficially “political” at that). An ill-informed public can only learn by experience – which is a great pity as the UK’s losses from Brexit may be irrevocable.
The public have a strong interest in businesses continuing to employ people in the UK – and for the full gamut of job opportunities being open to them. They’ve no idea they’re likely to lose the UK’s bigger and better paid jobs (eg Chief Executive, Chartered Engineer, etc) and whole employment sectors. They don’t understand why this process will occur, never having had to consider how business law, transport logistics, currency movements etc affect businesses’ ability to win profitable sales.
We’re now within about a month of crashing out without a trade deal with the EU. We’ve no trade deals with other countries to replace the trade we’re losing. We may not be able to feed ourselves by Christmas. All this should be front page news most of the time … but it isn’t. Report
No need to worry,reducing the £ 80 billion EU trade surplus will do wonders for our balance of payments not to mention the income from tariffs on EU imports.Fortunately we never joined the Euro (thank you Gordon Brown) so tariffs imposed by the EU on the vast majority of UK exports have been more than offset by sterling’s depreciation. Report
First, I am a passionate and convinced Remainer.
But, even so, what might we lose when fully outside the Community ?
Europol ? European Defence planning ? Community Market arrangements for food ? European
Air Traffic regulations ? the Erasmus Education initiatives (from which a grandchild benefitted) ?
We will be unable to vote, or really to influence many decisions that will affect the UK; we’ll be unable to stand by the Nordic group, or the smaller states in the 27; We’ll be unable to add to European solidarity
for the Ukraine, or Belarus.
Germany will soon have a new Chancellor; Covid-19 still rampages across Europe; there is no clear policy with regard to in-coming refugees, or clarity about Climate Change policies.
And just suppose that the USA re-elects Donald Trump this November.Report
You are quite right, Hugh, and the government have just today asked us to be ready for a no deal brexit, which I have always believed was their real objective.Report
Although I can find no fault with this analysis, I have always been slightly suspicious of professor Curtice. He is definitely an establishment figure who gets too much publicity at election time and whose summaries can affect the results. I would like to see comments from other academic figures once in a while.Report
Has anyone asked those people who were too young to vote at the time of the referendum, and who would have come of age by now?
I voted remain and would do again if we were still in the EU. I would like to say that I hope we do reverse BREXIT in due course. But it has cost both the UK and the EU a lot of time and money and a great deal of pain. Would they have us back with open arms?
If asked to I want to rejoin, that would be an unequivocal yes! But do I think it would be practical to try and rejoin any time soon. I would think we need to build up trust first and convince the EU of our commitment. That may include accepting the Euro as our currency and accepting Schengen. Or at least one of those two options. I think Schengen is a good idea. Although I’d like to have the Euro one must consider economic viability. In the meanwhile we coud stay in the Single Market and the Customs Union. Maybe we could apply to rejoin in around five years time.
The trouble is that you don’t get all the above when asking a few simple questions.Report
It doesn’t matter if those people were asked. The whole point of a once-and-for-all vote (the words of David Cameron) is that it happens ONCE. You don’t get to move the goalposts just because you don’t like the result. Moreover, your points are pretty weak….
It cost a lot of time and money because Left Wing traitors were trying to overturn a democratic vote for 3 and a half years, including legal challenges at taxpayers’ expense, and negotiations that weren’t real negotiations at a cost of £1BN a month. The pain is also as a result of that. If MPs had done the public bidding in 2016, we’d be out, have not been bullied because of weak leftie/liberal MPs, and would have a lot of money still in the bank.
You seem to live with your head in the clouds. Accepting the Euro means devaluation, and since the currency is not supported by adequate gold and silver reserves, it will periodically experience problems. Then again, given the accounts of the EU have not been audited in 20+ years in spite of its charter, it’s not surprising the EU are hush-hushing anything bad said about the Euro.
We will not be rejoining. Get that through your head. We don’t want the single market or the customs union. We voted to leave those things. If you don’t want to leave the EU, I’m sure you can apply to go live in Germany under the crippling rule of Merkel and her minnions.Report
Not true about not wanting the single market. Most leavers wanted and expected the UK retaining access to it, just to leave the political union. And Farage, Johnson and Rees Mogg all said that we would retain free trade. No deal is a long way from the wishes of many leavers. And given that only 28% of UK adults actually voted to leave, and only a small proportion wanted to leave with no free trade you have a country being led into a very poor outcome wanted by only a tiny % of its people. Report
In answer to the first comment. The next generation will not be bound by the previous generation. No one should be bound by the choices of their grand parents and great grand parents.
I don’t think the word traitor is one anybody should be using in connection with this. We are not at war. The EU is not an empire. We weren’t forced to join, we asked to join, and the people voted back then to remain in the Common Market, we didn’t have to sign the Maastricht Treaty, that is something we as a country chose to do. I resist calling anyone traitors, even when people make decisions that are not in the best interest of the country i.e. the countryside is being carved up to make unsightly lorry parks. There will be shortages of essential goods including medicines. Food standards will be impoverished, environmental protections, worker’s rights all being rolled back in the name of deregulation, to facilitate free market capitalism in its most egregious form.
I agree there are economic risks associated with of joining a single currency because there is a risk of contagion if an economy fails. Nevertheless. I do not think any country has sufficient gold reserves due to fractional reserve banking. Gold is leveraged many times over by the banks. Which was why the government couldn’t allow the banks to fail.
In answer to Mr. Blogs’s assertion that it is we left wing —–s trying to undermine the alleged democratic will of the people that has cost the economy so much money. I would remind the same that we agreed a pay-out of 40 billion uk pounds to settle our liability with the EU and all this at a time of austerity. There arises the question of , was it a democratic referendum, when so many were denied their vote. Was it a fair referendum when so many lies were told that poor Boris must be tripping over his nose. If so many lies were told in court, the case would have been thrown out. What most people seem not to know was that BREXIT has been a long time in the planning. Thirty years to be precise, and a campaign of lies and disinformation has been going on, for all that length of time. Trying to blame all Britain’s problems on the EU when in fact ti was and always has been the government that was to blame.
Mr. Blogs finishes by telling me to ‘Get it into my thick head. We don’t want the single market or the customs union.’ I wonder who he speaks for, apart from himself? I would suggest he waits until the 1 January when everything changes and see if he remains of that opinion.Report
Graham Smith……I agree with everything you have postedReport
Check.Report
So many problems with what Bloggs has written. I’ll confine my comments to this: fundamentally he / she misunderstands democracy. As that vociferous Brexiter David Davis said ‘If a democracy cannot change its mind, it ceases to be a democracy.’ Report