Brexit

[Rival]

I debated making this thread. I think it will go badly but I've become tired enough of some accusations thrown around on RF about Brexit and Brexiteers.

This is the idea that we voted because of a campaign; because of Farage, or Boris Johnson, or because we couldn't stand the sight of Guy Verhofstadt. While the last one might be half true, these aren't generally why anyone I know (in Northern England) voted for Brexit. We voted because we'd always been of the mindset that we wanted to disunite from the EU. I'd been raised with the idea since before the idea of Britain leaving was even seriously floated. I'd since evaluated my views on that and made up my own mind based on other factors, but none, or almost none, of those factors were Brexit 2016 related.

I voted for Labour when Corbyn was in, even after voting Brexit I didn't vote for May's government.

My Brexit voting family mostly voted Labour, too.

We didn't care for bus campaigns or vapid slogans. These aren't why we voted. As far as we were concerned, long before 2016 we'd needed no more reason to want to leave the EU.

Blaming us for the current government is unfair and uninformed. Many Brexiteers are disenfranchised Labour voters who felt let down by Champagne Socialism. Social right-wingers who find no room now in either party.

But the bottom line is, even if there were no Brexit campaign at all, everyone I know who voted for Brexit would still have voted for it and voted Labour at the same time.

This is not a simple issue.

 

[ChristineM]

You voted Brexit for your reasons, many people voted because Bozo promised the world on the end of a stick, lies that never materialised.

 

[Rival]

You voted Brexit for your reasons, many people voted because Bozo promised the world on the end of a stick, lies that never materialised.

Yes, but what I'm saying is it's not as simple as most folks changed their minds based on a campaign. The sides were broadly picked long before any of this. I don't know anyone, and I live in a Brexit area, who voted based on the campaign. They voted based on years of personal experience. I didn't even have any idea there was a bus campaign, for instance. I'm not sure anyone else did. That was only in London. Where I Iive needed no campaign as they'd have been preaching to the choir.

 

[Subduction Zone]

And from the outside looking in I am still a bit confused by how it passed. Membership in the EU seemed to be a good deal all around.

 

[Rival]

And from the outside looking in I am still a bit confused by how it passed. Membership in the EU seemed to be a good deal all around.

It's mostly complex issues between rural Northern England, which is incredibly impoverished, vs London and the wider London area and often Southern England in general, which is richer and has more job prospects. We broadly thought London was paying too much attention to international rather than national issues and we in the long impoverished North had enough. Brexit was as much an anti-Westminster vote as it was anti-EU. The result (the government decisions) were not what we wanted at the end of this at all. We hoped Whitehall would look at who in England voted this way and why and finally realise the North of England exists, but it just doubled down calling us racists instead. All we want are jobs and higher wages.

I'll give you a clue: My local hospital seems to be threatened with shutting down. It's in my local town which has 20,000 folks. We look at this and go, What kind of sick budgeting is that? Our next hospital is ~28 miles away.

 

[RestlessSoul]

It's not going very well, is it?

I can confirm that as a Londoner, I've always felt English, British, and European, not necessarily in that order. I'm very sad that my European citizenship has been taken away from me, as may soon be the case with my legal status as a Briton (if Scotland leaves the Union). Brexit has made life a lot more difficult for my French partner, and her grown up son who was born in London and is now at an English university.

I do recognise that sentiment outside London (and Manchester and Liverpool and Newcastle, it's not all a North/South divide) is different. Some areas have never recovered from the loss of the old heavy industries and the well paid jobs that went with that. Brexit is done now anyway, at least for a generation; we have to forge a new relationship with our European neighbours, and make it work for all of the UK's population.

Life in London is a struggle for everyone but the rich, btw; work is easy to come by, but the cost of living has been out of control for years, and the housing crisis is crippling a generation.

 

[Koldo]

It's mostly complex issues between rural Northern England, which is incredibly impoverished, vs London and the wider London area and often Southern England in general, which is richer and has more job prospects. We broadly thought London was paying too much attention to international rather than national issues and we in the long impoverished North had enough. Brexit was as much an anti-Westminster vote as it was anti-EU. The result (the government decisions) were not what we wanted at the end of this at all. We hoped Whitehall would look at who in England voted this way and why and finally realise the North of England exists, but it just doubled down calling us racists instead. All we want are jobs and higher wages.

I'll give you a clue: My local hospital seems to be threatened with shutting down. It's in my local town which has 20,000 folks. We look at this and go, What kind of sick budgeting is that? Our next hospital is ~28 miles away.

That definitely sounds like a really bad way to achieve what you expected... Completely inefficient. You have voted for one thing expecting to receive another completely unrelated. That's really not a sensible approach.

 

[Rival]

That definitely sounds like a really bad way to achieve what you expected... Completely inefficient. You have voted for one thing expecting to receive another completely unrelated. That's really not a sensible approach.

We felt we could do nothing else. The rural North has been impoverished since the 80s when Thatcher gutted it. After nearly 50 years of this we're about done with regular voting. We had a protest vote. We saw the problems and we voted against what we thought is causing them.

 

[Rival]

That definitely sounds like a really bad way to achieve what you expected... Completely inefficient. You have voted for one thing expecting to receive another completely unrelated. That's really not a sensible approach.

Brexit vote explained: poverty, low skills and lack of opportunities | JRF

• The poorest households, with incomes of less than £20,000 per year, were much more likely to support leaving the EU than the wealthiest households, as were the unemployed, people in low-skilled and manual occupations, people who feel that their financial situation has worsened, and those with no qualifications.
• Groups vulnerable to poverty were more likely to support Brexit. Age, income and education matter, though it is educational inequality that was the strongest driver. Other things being equal, support for leave was 30 percentage points higher among those with GCSE qualifications or below than it was for people with a degree. In contrast, support for leave was just 10 points higher among those on less than £20,000 per year than it was among those with incomes of more than £60,000 per year, and 20 points higher among those aged 65 than those aged 25.
• Support for Brexit varied not only between individuals but also between areas. People with all levels of qualifications were more likely to vote leave in low-skill areas compared with high-skill areas. However, this effect was stronger for the more highly qualified. In low-skilled communities the difference in support for leave between graduates and those with GCSEs was 20 points. In high-skilled communities it was over 40 points. In low-skill areas the proportion of A-level holders voting leave was closer to that of people with low-skills. In high-skill areas their vote was much more similar to graduates.
• Groups in Britain who have been ‘left behind’ by rapid economic change and feel cut adrift from the mainstream consensus were the most likely to support Brexit. These voters face a ‘double whammy’. While their lack of qualifications put them at a significant disadvantage in the modern economy, they are also being further marginalised in society by the lack of opportunities that faced in their low-skilled communities. This will make it extremely difficult for the left behind to adapt and prosper in future.

 

[Rival]

It's not going very well, is it?

I can confirm that as a Londoner, I've always felt English, British, and European, not necessarily in that order. I'm very sad that my European citizenship has been taken away from me, as may soon be the case with my legal status as a Briton (if Scotland leaves the Union). Brexit has made life a lot more difficult for my French partner, and her grown up son who was born in London and is now at an English university.

I do recognise that sentiment outside London (and Manchester and Liverpool and Newcastle, it's not all a North/South divide) is different. Some areas have never recovered from the loss of the old heavy industries and the well paid jobs that went with that. Brexit is done now anyway, at least for a generation; we have to forge a new relationship with our European neighbours, and make it work for all of the UK's population.

Life in London is a struggle for everyone but the rich, btw; work is easy to come by, but the cost of living has been out of control for years, and the housing crisis is crippling a generation.

I just wanted to make clear that no Brexiteer I know voted for or foresaw the mess we're now in re the Tories. I didn't vote for this the first time and I definitely, perhaps naively, assumed that upon offering the referendum the government had a plan for if we voted to leave. They clearly hadn't and that told me all I needed to know about how well some of them had read the public mood outside of certain areas - i.e., not at all. There's a huge difference between the Brexit politicians and the grassroots Brexiteers who are just as appalled as anyone else at this mess. I'm just tired of hearing 'you voted for this' when literally nobody voted for this.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Brexit vote explained: poverty, low skills and lack of opportunities | JRF

• The poorest households, with incomes of less than £20,000 per year, were much more likely to support leaving the EU than the wealthiest households, as were the unemployed, people in low-skilled and manual occupations, people who feel that their financial situation has worsened, and those with no qualifications.
• Groups vulnerable to poverty were more likely to support Brexit. Age, income and education matter, though it is educational inequality that was the strongest driver. Other things being equal, support for leave was 30 percentage points higher among those with GCSE qualifications or below than it was for people with a degree. In contrast, support for leave was just 10 points higher among those on less than £20,000 per year than it was among those with incomes of more than £60,000 per year, and 20 points higher among those aged 65 than those aged 25.
• Support for Brexit varied not only between individuals but also between areas. People with all levels of qualifications were more likely to vote leave in low-skill areas compared with high-skill areas. However, this effect was stronger for the more highly qualified. In low-skilled communities the difference in support for leave between graduates and those with GCSEs was 20 points. In high-skilled communities it was over 40 points. In low-skill areas the proportion of A-level holders voting leave was closer to that of people with low-skills. In high-skill areas their vote was much more similar to graduates.
• Groups in Britain who have been ‘left behind’ by rapid economic change and feel cut adrift from the mainstream consensus were the most likely to support Brexit. These voters face a ‘double whammy’. While their lack of qualifications put them at a significant disadvantage in the modern economy, they are also being further marginalised in society by the lack of opportunities that faced in their low-skilled communities. This will make it extremely difficult for the left behind to adapt and prosper in future.

But the move does not seem to have made your situation any better. The lower middle class in my country largely supported Trump, even though he did nothing to make the situation better for them. You may have been sold a bill of goods by someone or a group of someones that could profit from the Brexit.

 

[Rival]

But the move does not seem to have made your situation any better. The lower middle class in my country largely supported Trump, even though he did nothing to make the situation better for them. You may have been sold a bill of goods by someone or a group of someones that could profit from the Brexit.

Yes, this is why were are saddened and angered. It's not what we voted for.

 

[RestlessSoul]

I just wanted to make clear that no Brexiteer I know voted for or foresaw the mess we're now in re the Tories. I didn't vote for this the first time and I definitely, perhaps naively, assumed that upon offering the referendum the government had a plan for if we voted to leave. They clearly hadn't and that told me all I needed to know about how well some of them had read the public mood outside of certain areas - i.e., not at all. There's a huge difference between the Brexit politicians and the grassroots Brexiteers who are just as appalled as anyone else at this mess. I'm just tired of hearing 'you voted for this' when literally nobody voted for this.

Yeah, pretty much no one foresaw the mess we're in now. But then. look at the world, including the rest of Europe; these are troubled times we're all living through. But my grandparents (probably your great-grandparents) lived through worse - two World Wars and the Great Depression.

 

[Altfish]

I debated making this thread. I think it will go badly but I've become tired enough of some accusations thrown around on RF about Brexit and Brexiteers.

This is the idea that we voted because of a campaign; because of Farage, or Boris Johnson, or because we couldn't stand the sight of Guy Verhofstadt. While the last one might be half true, these aren't generally why anyone I know (in Northern England) voted for Brexit. We voted because we'd always been of the mindset that we wanted to disunite from the EU. I'd been raised with the idea since before the idea of Britain leaving was even seriously floated. I'd since evaluated my views on that and made up my own mind based on other factors, but none, or almost none, of those factors were Brexit 2016 related.

I voted for Labour when Corbyn was in, even after voting Brexit I didn't vote for May's government.

My Brexit voting family mostly voted Labour, too.

We didn't care for bus campaigns or vapid slogans. These aren't why we voted. As far as we were concerned, long before 2016 we'd needed no more reason to want to leave the EU.

Blaming us for the current government is unfair and uninformed. Many Brexiteers are disenfranchised Labour voters who felt let down by Champagne Socialism. Social right-wingers who find no room now in either party.

But the bottom line is, even if there were no Brexit campaign at all, everyone I know who voted for Brexit would still have voted for it and voted Labour at the same time.

This is not a simple issue.

May I ask "What did you expect to be the benefits when we left the EU?"

 

[ChristineM]

Yes, but what I'm saying is it's not as simple as most folks changed their minds based on a campaign. The sides were broadly picked long before any of this. I don't know anyone, and I live in a Brexit area, who voted based on the campaign. They voted based on years of personal experience. I didn't even have any idea there was a bus campaign, for instance. I'm not sure anyone else did. That was only in London. Where Iive needed no campaign as they'd have been preaching to the choir.

Broadly picked, yes, but the campaign grabbed enough swingers to tilt the balance in a close race.

The bus campaign was on TV news every evening, I'm surprised you missed it


BTW, Bozo has resigned

 

[Rival]

May I asked "What did you expect to be the benefits when we left the EU?"

- An end to agency work that allowed only immigrants to work for them. E.g., where I live all the agencies are owned by and will only employ Polish and Russians. In turn, companies prefer to hire these workers over natives, as they cost less etc. We hoped this would be stopped, pretty much for the good of both parties. We saw immigration as the ultimate cause of this.

- An actual Northern Powerhouse where money was diverted to us instead of outside of Britain.

- Getting rid of the Human Rights act, many of which principles we disagreed with (i.e., allowing prisoners to vote [not that we ever implemented this!] iirc).

- An increased focus on internal issues more broadly.

- Making our own trade deals.

- Decentralisation from the EU.

etc.

 

[Rival]

The bus campaign was on TV news every evening, I'm surprised you missed it

I don't own a TV

 

[ChristineM]

I don't own a TV

Ah ha, the solution presents itself.

 

[Stevicus]

Blaming us for the current government is unfair and uninformed. Many Brexiteers are disenfranchised Labour voters who felt let down by Champagne Socialism. Social right-wingers who find no room now in either party.

But the bottom line is, even if there were no Brexit campaign at all, everyone I know who voted for Brexit would still have voted for it and voted Labour at the same time.

This is not a simple issue.

Sounds similar to the reasons why many Americans voted for Trump, as they felt disenfranchised by limousine liberals.

 

[Rival]

Sounds similar to the reasons why many Americans voted for Trump, as they felt disenfranchised by limousine liberals.

Yes, it's the same Western phenomenon.