United Kingdom Referendum on European Union Membership

[ChrisDR68]

Interesting discussion on the BBC.

20% of all votes are by postal vote and indications are that they are overwhelming for Leave

[ChrisDR68]

Wow as soon as results starting to come in it started to look good for Leave.

Genuinely surprised (but obviously delighted) by what's happened so far.

Long way to go though!

[ChrisDR68]

Wales is a bit sh**t. Let's be honest.

Not true.

Just had a very nice 3 day break in Betws-y-Coed thank you very much

[ChrisDR68]

Hopefully this means further integration for the remainder of Europe now that they are not weighed down by the UK.

You think there's really much appetite for the pan European state on the continent?

I doubt that very much.

[ChrisDR68]

What you all need to understand is that a vote to leave doesn't mean that the UK immediately exits the EU. Oh no. Firstly this is an advisory referendum and is not legally binding and secondly the EUs own rules don't allow for anything so simple. What it means is the start of a lengthy period of negotiation and haggling the end result of which is by no means clear. The range of possibilities are rather large...

It's the direction of travel that's the important thing not how long the process takes.

[ChrisDR68]

Outside of Scotland and London this referendum isn't close.

Amazing

[ChrisDR68]

Damn, ITV says this process of leaving the EU is going to take years. At least 2, probably more.

So?

It will take as long as it takes

[ChrisDR68]

Nigel is On!!!

Looked like he'd been crying before he made his speech!

[ChrisDR68]

Isn't the whole reason for the existence of this referendum the fact that Cameron saw it as an effective way to stop Tory voters from defecting to UKIP in the 2015 election?

More about party management: the Europe issue has been utterly toxic for the Tories since the 90s and the promise of a referendum if the Tories won a majority was his way of putting the genie in the bottle.

I think it's mainly UKIP's rapid rise in the polls in the 2010-15 parliament. Cameron was scared the Tories would lose a couple of dozen seats in the south because of it so offered the referendum to ward that danger off.

[ChrisDR68]

BBC, SKY and ITV all calling this for Leave

[ChrisDR68]

Well, Angela...you've brought about the secession of a major EU country.

I don't think it's Merkel's fault.

You can lay this event at the hands of Jacque Delores for pushing through the creation of the Euro.

The European project went wrong at that point.

[ChrisDR68]

https://twitter.com/ITVAllegra/status/746191648850206720

ITV is reporting that Cameron and Osborne are on their way out, and it will be a "dignified exit".

Wow.

Cameron will probably stay on as PM but resign a Tory leader pretty soon and a new leader and PM announced in time for their party conference in September.

Osborne's political career is over. Richly deserved for his disgraceful Remain campaign.

[ChrisDR68]

Leave officially reaches the 16,800,000 votes it needs to be certain of victory. Just being announced on Sky right now.

[ChrisDR68]

Even as a Brixiter it feels a bit unreal today.

Only for a brief few days in early June did I think Leave could win when several opinion polls showed large Brexit leads.

By the weekend that had changed and continued to change during this week so I was confident that Remain would win the day in the end.

As early as the Newcastle and Sunderland results it looked promising for Leave and apart for results in Scotland and London the results were a consistent Brexit majority in most polling areas.

As Janet Daly said on Dateline London following President Obama's intervention and the subsequent negative reaction to it by British voters "history shows that the British are a resilient lot and refuse to be bullied".

Not understanding that character trait of the British people was one of the main errors of the Cameron and Osborne campaign strategy.

And so it proved last night

[ChrisDR68]

Even as a Brixiter it feels a bit unreal today.

Only for a brief few days in early June did I think Leave could win when several opinion polls showed large Brexit leads.

By the weekend that had changed and continued to change during this week so I was confident that Remain would win the day in the end.

As early as the Newcastle and Sunderland results it looked promising for Leave and apart for results in Scotland and London the results were a consistent Brexit majority in most polling areas.

As Janet Daly said on Dateline London following President Obama's intervention and the subsequent negative reaction to it by British voters "history shows that the British are a resilient lot and refuse to be bullied".

Not understanding that character trait of the British people was one of the main errors of the Cameron and Osborne campaign strategy.

And so it proved last night

You really think Obama had anything do with the result?

Yep I've talked to several people who said that that was the moment they decided to vote Leave. Obama's intervention went down like a lead balloon with many people here.

[ChrisDR68]

LibDems should run in the next election on Europe.

To what end? Vote for us and we'll stop the exit? Can't see that going down too well, now that Brexit is decided I don't see a single issue libdem can run on

I imagine such a position would be very popular with some voters.  Even if that number is 20% of the electorate, that's a lot more than what the LibDems are currently getting.

Exactly. It will not be enough to win an election: so neither Labour, nor Tories will be able to adopt it. But LibDems, who have no chance to form the government on their own, may well increase their representation by it, clearly distinguishing themselves from the main parties. And, being firmly pro-EU they could, actually, condition their participation in a government, if coalition is necessary, on a repeat referendum - providing an excuse for whoever the PM is to run one.

That's like telling the Lib Dems to be pig headed and going for a strategy aimed at killing the party all together.

The UK is going to leave the EU (just listen to Jeremy Corbyn's speech today if you think it's not going to happen). Being stubborn about being "pro EU" is a complete platform non-starter.

The best the Lib Dems could do is bang on about seeking as deep a cooperative relationship with our European neighbours as possible from the position of being in an independent UK.

They see themselves as internationalist after all.

[ChrisDR68]

Some Labour people are suggesting that Labour's main pledge at the next GE should be to take us back in. Evidently they haven't seen the Nuneaton and Bedworth result.

I'm re-watching the referendum results programme on BBC Parliament right now. What is striking is the geographical spread of the Leave vote and how heavy it was in certain areas.

In many, many areas in north, south and in the midlands there were Leave percentages in excess of 65%.

There was a constant stream of blue (for Leave) showing up across the bottom of the screen from about 2am the whole time.

Some very large majorities in London and Scotland has masked what a hammering Remain took in most of England and Wales.

[ChrisDR68]

Interesting interview just now on the Sunday Politics with Liam Fox.

He's saying there needs to be a government department set up to handle the negotiations with the European Union with politicians, business leaders, trade experts and lawyers involved.

Once a new prime minister is in place he or she then needs to create a trade department that we currently don't have and start informal discussions with the EU about the framework for negotiations.

Then at the end of this year invoke Article 50 of the Libson Treaty on the assumption that we'll formally leave the EU on January 1st 2019.

All this seems to make a lot of sense to me

[ChrisDR68]

Good comment from Rekaert in the comments section under this article in the Independent:

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/editorials/eu-rhetoric-has-been-counter-productive-a7103011.html

The problem with the EU is they never had legitimacy to begin with, so this was a problem planted many years ago that is only now coming to fruition.

It was mis-sold to the British back in the seventies that there would be zero impact on our sovereignty, which was clearly a lie.

The rejected constitution was repacked into the abomination that is the Lisbon treaty to avoid nations even having the chance to reject it.

It's only over the past decade and half that they've been more honest about their intentions to push for Federalisation and absolute union, effectively making a new nation.

They kept very quiet about it till they thought it was too far along to stop. Since then it's been power-grab after power-grab, and usually by stealth, small bit at a time so we wouldn't become alarmed.

Hardly surprising then that a huge chunk of people are not on-board with this.

Forcing a national identity on people just doesn't work.

Agree 100% with all of that

[ChrisDR68]

Ex govenor of the Bank of England Mervyn King interviewed yesterday:

This is the most dispiriting campaign I can recall in my lifetime. Both sides were exaggerating. I think the government has to take responsibilty for setting the tone for that. I do think they said things that were not easy to sustain or support.

It's true there was a great deal of uncertainty about the outcome in economic terms. That would have been enough perhaps to have made their case but they went way beyond that about using precise numbers about how much our living standards might fall. We had all kinds of scare stories and I was travelling around the UK a lot at that time and I was struck by how many people said to me that they didn't like the scaremongering tactics.

They didn't like to be told that if they were to vote to Leave they would be idiots. If you say to someone you're an idiot if you don't agree with me you're not likely to bring them in your direction.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QP7Ps1A107Y

Couldn't agree more with his sentiments

[ChrisDR68]

My prediction from a few pages back wasn't too bad:

Remain 48.6%
Leave 51.4%

Just 0.5% out with both figures

Where I got it wrong was on turnout. I predicted 58.8% but it was miles more than that at 72.2%. The highest turnout for a nationwide election since the 1992 general election.

[ChrisDR68]

The thing that most surprised me about the result was the West Midlands. The East Midlands and Eastern (East Anglia) were always likely to be heavily Leave but not the West Midlands.



Remain 1,207,175 (40.74%)
Leave 1,755,687 (59.26%)



Of the 30 voting districts only Warwick had a Remain majority.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Results_of_the_United_Kingdom_European_Union_membership_referendum,_2016

[ChrisDR68]

Nigel Lawson's speech from the Lord's debate on the EU Referendum yesterday:



My Lords, one of the most momentous decisions of our time has now been taken. Parliament agreed by an overwhelming majority that the people should decide in a referendum whether our country should stay in the European Union or leave. The people decided, on a massive poll, that we should leave.

It is regrettable that some, unhappy with the result, seek to prevent its implementation, whether by way of a second referendum or some other device. It is difficult to imagine anything more irresponsible, either democratically or politically. I can only assume that living in an elitist London bubble they are blithely unaware of the alienation of a large and growing section of the British people from the London-based political and banking establishment. Any attempt to overturn the referendum result would invite mayhem of the most grievous kind. It would not only be dishonourable, it would be playing with fire. I invite those who entertain this desire to consider the consequences. Incidentally, they might also reflect on what their response would be had the referendum produced a majority to remain in the European Union and the disaffected losers then demanded that it be re-run.

The only question before us is how best to implement our departure from the European Union. Our starting point should be that we wish the best possible relationship with the peoples and Governments of Europe, against whom we have no grievance whatever and a multiplicity of mutual interests. One important point that follows from this is that we must respect the EU doctrine that to remain a member of the so-called single market we would have to accept the freedom of European citizens to live and work here. That is something the British people have made clear is not on, so we must accept that we will be outside the single market. That is scarcely a disaster. The rest of the world is outside the so-called single market and trades happily and profitably with the European Union. You do not need a trade agreement to trade. Moreover, if we were to seek some special trading relationship with the EU, not only would we be adopting the position of a supplicant—which I do not like—but it would be a futile quest.​

Following the invocation of Article 50 of the Lisbon treaty, it is important that our negotiations with the EU are completed as speedily as possible. A prolonged period of uncertainty can only be damaging for British business and the British economy. By ruling out the chimera of trade negotiations, a speedy process becomes practicable.

Instead of wasting time and energy on a futile and wholly misguided attempt to secure a trade agreement with the EU, the British Government need to focus on how we plan to conduct ourselves as a self-governing nation outside the European Union. The Government also need to repeal the European Communities Act 1972, which makes UK law subordinate to EU law, with a delayed commencement date to be determined by Parliament in due course. All this is a substantial and vital undertaking, which needs to be started now. It is all entirely in our own hands and not a matter of negotiation with others.

The result of the referendum was a tribute to the courage of the British people. Project Fear may have been successful in reducing the size of the Brexit majority but most of our fellow citizens declined to be cowed. The next Government and the next Prime Minister, whoever he or she may be, will have a historic opportunity to make the United Kingdom the most dynamic and freest country in the whole of Europe and to become a beacon to our European friends, currently embroiled in a failed and doomed experiment.


Clearly Lawson is going for a clean break with the EU and the WTO option. That would certainly be the speediest way of removing the UK from the EU.

My guess is that this is probably Andrea Leadsom's approach as well going by what she's said since the referendum result.

https://hansard.parliament.uk/lords/2016-07-05/debates/16070548000162/OutcomeOfTheEuropeanUnionReferendum

[ChrisDR68]

Got really bored and couldn't sleep, so here are some results of the referendum by Parliamentary constituency where I could find them.  Only got about 50, but it's better than nothing.



Now realize I am tired, so any mistakes are do to that fact.  I mostly used that link to the google docs and used the results that were listed in the column that was marked local authority results.

Also going through conclile websites and seeing if they have ward data posted, if so, using that to add to the map.  Already getting Bristol done with that.  However it is kind of hard since some wards have been combined and renamed since the districts were drawn.  If I come across that, I'll just map an educated guess at to where they fall.

Yes keep going with that if you can.

I'd love to see a final seat total for Remain and Leave.

Given the geographical spread of the Leave vote in England and Wales I'm guessing there was a sizeable majority of between 50 and 100 seats in their favour overall in the UK.

[ChrisDR68]

This is interesting:

Leave was always in the lead: why the polls got the referendum result wrong



By controlling for mode and house effects, our analyses enable us to estimate underlying trends in the dynamics of support in EU referendum vote intentions. The results indicate that Leave led Remain over the entire period from 11 January 2016 onward. The size of the Leave lead varies widely—from a low of .39 per cent (4 February) to a high of 13.2 per cent (12 June)—but Leave is always ahead.

The analysis also provides insight regarding the effects of various events that occurred during the campaign. For example, contrary to his intentions, US President Barack Obama’s widely publicized ‘UK to the back of the queue’ intervention may have boosted, rather than diminished, Leave support. In contrast, as numerous observers have speculated, the murder of Labour MP Jo Cox on 16 June may have precipitated an ongoing erosion in Leave support over the final week before the vote. That downturn in Leave’s vote intention share notwithstanding, the analysis documents that over the last month of the campaign the lower bound of the 95 per cent credible (confidence) interval for the Leave vote always exceeds the 50 per cent mark. This means that Leave was very likely ahead throughout this entire period.

http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/eu-referendum-polls/?utm_content=buffer3009c&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer