Brexit referendum result aftermath

[Friend or Foé]

The crisis is gas driven.

You’re quite correct, my error. Now corrected above.

[Tenbury]

Zero hours contracts and the 'gig' economy have so muddied the waters in terms of what is now classed as working, that measuring economic progress by reference to 'employment /unemployment figure comparisons further back than 4 or 5 years is pretty much meaningless.

[SammyLeeWasOffside]

That’s very Jacob Rees-Mogg-like on your time scales Sammy.

I don’t think that when they voted leave in 2016 that many had any inclination that the time table for Brexit working would be “generational”. I certainly don’t remember that being said, or even remotely the impression given by Johnson, Farage, Rees-Mogg, that bloody bus, etc.

You’re right in the sense that IF it is going to work it would take decades because clearly from opinion polls people don’t think it’s been working up to now. I can’t see a it’ll-be-alright-in-several-thousand-nights line being accepted by many.

Well I can't speak for other people's thoughts, expectations or understanding of what might happen. If people voted for, then pushed to get done, something they hadn't thought through then I get the frustration but have little sympathy tbh.

Imo anyone looking at things rationally would see that things take time, lots of time. All the economic guesses about doom or boom were based on 15, 20 even 25 year time frames for, I imagine, that reason. Lots of people on here were also Rees Moggian (isn't that something from Gulliver's travels) in their gdp will grow slightly less over 15 years reasoning for voting no.

If people expected instant then (even without other world events) they were going to be disappointed, so yes in that case I can get people expecting now now now see things as not working out now now now.

People don't have to accept it if they don't want but it couldn't be a vote for now in economic terms. Even if everything had been properly thought through and put in place it would still have taken years for the world to adjust to it. What we have got to instantly (very loose use of the word)is the state created by the political outcome, all the posturing and point scoring. Now the rest of us have to work out how to live and work in that framework while the framework itself shifts about at a more sedate pace.

Joining is relatively easy and that took years to adjust to. Leaving is far more complicated. Leaving means leaving even more so.

[Cornelius Beal]

As I said changes will be generational, slow evolution not over night revolution. That's how these things always work. Integration with EU markets took decades to spread, political integration was an ongoing drift since Maastricht. It takes time for people and businesses to adjust, to start up, to get used to the new world they operate in.

I'm still waiting for all sorts of stuff I've been promised by politicians. Forget levelling up I'm still on the look out for the northern powerhouse, regional parliament, HS2 etc.

Which goes back to the referendum and misleading ( that's being kind) leave campaign.
Can't recall many timescales being mentioned , except lots of warnings from some on the remain side about thousands of laws that would need unravelling, how to solve the NI border with an EU member problem, years to sort out new trade deals etc.

Really don't think there will be many people as patient as you Sammy. Who campaigned for change decades down the line?

HS2 won't happen as promised and will cost way more than ever promoted, yet predicted by many. Brexit too won't happen as promoted but predicted by many.

[SammyLeeWasOffside]

Which goes back to the referendum and misleading ( that's being kind) leave campaign.
Can't recall many timescales being mentioned , except lots of warnings from some on the remain side about thousands of laws that would need unravelling, how to solve the NI border with an EU member problem, years to sort out new trade deals etc.

Really don't think there will be many people as patient as you Sammy. Who campaigned for change decades down the line?

HS2 won't happen as promised and will cost way more than ever promoted, yet predicted by many. Brexit too won't happen as promoted but predicted by many.

As I said to Dave above I can't speak for anyone but myself. I didn't expect or vote for the things being touted as a failed brexit and I fully expected things to play out over long time scales. Change isn't down the line (the changes are essentially what you are complaining about) the impact of the changes will come in (good or bad) down the line.

If people genuinely thought one system would stop and another click in immediately and seamlessly and that got their vote then they had more faith in Westminster than me.

[Hummer_I_mean_Hammer]

CB, as someone who voted leave, I never in my wildest dreams thought that anything significant would happen immediately, I thought that two years transition was stupid, should have been closer to five years. Especially given the sh*t show in government at the time/now (and by that I mean incompetent/insipid - not simply just because they're tory, could have equally been labour).

Nor anyone else who I know who also voted leave. I mean how could it? We've had decades of integration with the EU, that's not going to vanish overnight and (IMHO) anyone who did, must be a bit thick tbh.

[YGNB]

As I said to Dave above I can't speak for anyone but myself. I didn't expect or vote for the things being touted as a failed brexit and I fully expected things to play out over long time scales. Change isn't down the line (the changes are essentially what you are complaining about) the impact of the changes will come in (good or bad) down the line.

If people genuinely thought one system would stop and another click in immediately and seamlessly and that got their vote then they had more faith in Westminster than me.

Perhaps they shouldn't have promised that it would then should they? Though of course, then they wouldn't have won the referendum. Which is entirely the point.

[SammyLeeWasOffside]

Perhaps they shouldn't have promised that it would then should they? Though of course, then they wouldn't have won the referendum. Which is entirely the point.

Did someone promise that? A seamless transition done instantly?

[Cornelius Beal]

Did someone promise that? A seamless transition done instantly?

'Leave means leave' , yet no voter had a choice of what type of exit, how future relationships would evolve.
Subsequently ' Get Brexit Done'. Do what?

It wasn't a tea or coffee question, much more complex.
Without going as far as the previous comment about voters being thick, it is unequivocal that the complexities were way beyond the average voter.

[Cornelius Beal]

When they quiz citizens of ' the red wall' and ask they if and why they voted to leave, there's often the same theme.
Neglect, no infrastructure, no real alternative to the lost traditional local industry.

What they were sold that made their choice may have not claimed some kind of instant transformation ( apart from dubious numbers on the battle bus). If they were won over by ' taking back control' and they think they now have it, fair enough they have some control.

Timescales were not prominent in the campaign but they had or have no control of that, which is something many didn't think of.

[SammyLeeWasOffside]

'Leave means leave' , yet no voter had a choice of what type of exit, how future relationships would evolve.
Subsequently ' Get Brexit Done'. Do what?

It wasn't a tea or coffee question, much more complex.
Without going as far as the previous comment about voters being thick, it is unequivocal that the complexities were way beyond the average voter.

So nobody promised it.

The complexities way beyond the average politician as well I would say. But that's true of almost every issue we ever vote on. How many of us understand how to run the NHS, the implications of social policy, the knock on effects of fiscal decisions etc etc.

[Cornelius Beal]

So nobody promised it.

The complexities way beyond the average politician as well I would say. But that's true of almost every issue we ever vote on. How many of us understand how to run the NHS, the implications of social policy, the knock on effects of fiscal decisions etc etc.

We don't get a simple yes or no choice on any of those.

[SammyLeeWasOffside]

We don't get a simple yes or no choice on any of those.

In many ways we do but ok. No less complex though, not getting something is no bar to being able to vote for or against it.

I am with you on the vote on the type of exit, tbh I think it should have come first but once we have voted to leave the options for how should have gone back to the public. It definitely should once parliament showed it wasn't up to making its mind up.

[Samba]

'Leave means leave' , yet no voter had a choice of what type of exit, how future relationships would evolve.
Subsequently ' Get Brexit Done'. Do what?

It wasn't a tea or coffee question, much more complex.
Without going as far as the previous comment about voters being thick, it is unequivocal that the complexities were way beyond the average voter.

And yet I've heard it said many times since, that 'we knew what we were voting for'..
If you voted Remain, you knew what you were voting for - more of the same; what we already had. If you voted Leave, well, apart from 'taking back control', whatever THAT actually meant, it was more a leap of faith into an unknown future that no one really had any idea of what it would fully entail & when it would be 'done' by.
Vote Leave was sexy, Vote Remain wasn't, imo.

[Samba]

The complexities way beyond the average politician as well I would say.

Which is perhaps why we shouldn't have been given the vote, in the first place.
Or as you say, the way it was done.

[SammyLeeWasOffside]

Which is perhaps why we shouldn't have been given the vote, in the first place.
Or as you say, the way it was done.

We should really have had votes earlier imo. Maastricht, Lisbon etc lots were promised and never delivered. Votes on issues smaller than leaving would have helped shape what the EU was and given people more investment in it.

Its decades of idiotic, arrogant politics that it ever got to the point of a remain/leave vote being called imo

[DaveWHU1964]

When they quiz citizens of ' the red wall' and ask they if and why they voted to leave, there's often the same theme.
Neglect, no infrastructure, no real alternative to the lost traditional local industry ...

Talking of red wall voters there was a poll the other day of working class (termed C2DE or some combination of those faceless letters) voters, not just in the red wall, but all over GB. The working class voted overwhelmingly to leave by a margin of 65% to 35% in 2016. In this poll, there was now a (narrow) majority amongst even this group to re-join. The margin? 52% - 48% - I'm not making that up

You Gov polling out this week:

Brexit has already been a success: 7%
Brexit hasn't been a success so far, but I think eventually it could be: 19%
Brexit hasn't been a success so far and I don't think it ever will be: 73%

Notice they use the word 'could' there rather than 'will' so hardly unbending optimistm even amongst some/ many of that 19%.


Presumably it's the kind of feelings indicated in that poll that are driving the results of polls like this Omnibus one from yesterday ...

Stay out: 29%
Re-join: 49%

(excluding don't knows - Stay out: 37%, re-join: 63%

None of this means there should be another referendum any time soon but it does mean that if Brexiters want to stop that possibility, their politicians will need to show more than they've shown up to now and deliver (that word they always use). And soonish not at some undetermined point perhaps decades into the future.

[bubbles1966]

It's worth remembering that Yougov were claiming Remain would win by 4 on the actual day of the referendum. They were also claiming leads of 10 a year before the actual vote.

They have form for this at every major voting event in the last ten years, so I'd caution about any resolute belief in them. That caution should apply to the 2024 election as well.

At the moment, all we hear is the voice of opposition - but there will come a point when a vote really starts to come into view , when these views will be actively countered and there will be a need for something much more substantial than mere complaints.

It's a bit like the Moyes Out movement in the GD. Many were absolutely adamant he's terrible and must go - and then when the reality of Benitez or Dyche came sharply into view, many wobbled.

[DaveWHU1964]

UTJ is in Lincolnshire isn't he? Maybe he's in one of our islands' last three constituencies that are currently still Brexit strongholds ...

https://twitter.com/tnewtondunn?ref_src ... page%3D194

Sorry boss

[Plashet Grove Pete]

Perhaps they shouldn't have promised that it would then should they? Though of course, then they wouldn't have won the referendum. Which is entirely the point.

Zhou En Lai, asked in 1972 about the impact of the French Revolution was reputed to have said "It's too soon to tell".

So I hope you're not thinking that all will be right with the country on day one of a Labour government? You do realise that improvements get measured in years or even decades?