Should we be suprised by the Brexit victory?

[rippedupno1]

Like many people I suspect ,I was surprised when I woke up this morning to find that the leavers had won. The question I have been asking myself today is should I have been surprised?
When I googled a few facts it has become fairly obvious that I shouldn't be surprised at all. In last years general election Ukip polled nearly 3.9 million votes, this for a party that had no other policy other than to leave the EU ,and yet in our own General election the best part of 4 million people put aside their domestic politics/preferences and voted for them. That must mean that Brexit had a 4 million vote head start and when you think that it was s straight question ,in or out , it was always going to be a tough number to overtake.
My own experience here in the West Midlands over the last couple of months, talking to friends ,clients and just generally to people was that I was struggling to find many people who were for remain but like lots I guess I put this down to maybe just my small area and not representative of the country as a whole.
The two things after uncontrolled immigration that I kept finding was firstly, the number of leavers were frightened to come out and say that they were for leaving for fear of being branded racists or fascists by the political elite and secondly the feeling that if you are not living in London or the south east then your somehow from another country and that your opinion doesn't matter. Given that 80% of the population does not live in London or the south east and looking at the results map there is a valuable lesson for the politicians to learn .
It almost seems to be the same as what is happening in the American election run up. Now I do not agree with most of what Donald Trump espouses but it seems millions of Americans do and for the opposition to brand them all as racists, uneducated......etc. .etc.... seems to me to be asking for the same bloody nose that the UK gave the government/EU last night.
Iam not entirely sure why I have posted this ,I think maybe just to put into words what I had been thinking and to get it out of my system so Iam not looking to start an argument .
Happy cycling folks and ride safe.

 

[mike killay]

The UK is a terribly divided nation, not the all sweet and loving place that politicians tell us it is.
Banksters, flashy grab-alls, scam artists, poor service, you name it we've got it.
But, for the well educated, particularly in the South East and London, the EU was just fine.
But for the artisans, the low and unskilled in the old industrial areas it was a nightmare.
Immigrants flooded in putting pressure on jobs, housing,schools, medical services.
This did not affect the higher educated because the numbers of highly educated immigrants were low, but it certainly did affect the lesser well off.
That is why we now have a nation where Scotland, and Northern Ireland, largely unaffected voted to remain, but the rest of the UK bar London had enough and were fed up with being despised by what they considered the 'London' elite.
Neither Labour nor Conservatives ever listened to them except to lecture them, tell them that they were 'wrong, little Englanders, fascists, racists.'
But, we live in a democracy and the will of the people is at long last apparent.

 

[rippedupno1]

I guess the lesson to be learned here is that the vast majority of any country's population is made up of regular, Decent run of the mill folks who just tend to keep their heads down and make the best life they can for themselves and their families and will only be pushed so far before standing up en masse and telling those that think they know better who the actual majority really is. A bit like the tories had to learn in the 97 landslide.

Sent from my SM-G925F using Tapatalk

 

[flecc]

the rest of the UK bar London had enough and were fed up with being despised by what they considered the 'London' elite.

But the sad thing is that it's the ordinary people of London who wanted to remain, and we are not an elite, we are just ordinary people who aren't despising anyone.

We live with a far higher degree of immigration that anyone else in the UK. Less than half the London population are white British born, and we are happy with that, not inclined to blame immigrants or the EU for every one of our own government's failures as so many elsewhere have done in the way they voted.
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[Yamdude]

The UK is a terribly divided nation, not the all sweet and loving place that politicians tell us it is.
Banksters, flashy grab-alls, scam artists, poor service, you name it we've got it.
But, for the well educated, particularly in the South East and London, the EU was just fine.
But for the artisans, the low and unskilled in the old industrial areas it was a nightmare.
Immigrants flooded in putting pressure on jobs, housing,schools, medical services.
This did not affect the higher educated because the numbers of highly educated immigrants were low, but it certainly did affect the lesser well off.
That is why we now have a nation where Scotland, and Northern Ireland, largely unaffected voted to remain, but the rest of the UK bar London had enough and were fed up with being despised by what they considered the 'London' elite.
Neither Labour nor Conservatives ever listened to them except to lecture them, tell them that they were 'wrong, little Englanders, fascists, racists.'
But, we live in a democracy and the will of the people is at long last apparent.

Very true..... not forgetting zero hours contracts and people priced out of buying houses and trapped in renting with ludicrously high rents. Plus food banks, pay day loans and those rip off Brighthouse shops to buy inflated priced furniture and electricals on tick. Then there's those on benefits being demonised like they're the scum of the earth, while they have to put up with being sanctioned for any excuse possible. Also the sick & disabled being declared fit for work, as if they're all faking it. Then we have the bedroom tax and having to pay contributions to Council Tax out of their pittance of benefits.
Its no wonder a lot of less well off people wanted to stick it to the establishment...... and i doubt they care much about the consequences, probably think it cant get any worse.

I've come to despise this Tory government..... and seeing Cameron having to announce his resignation today gave me as much satisfaction as the time i saw this picture

 

[JuicyBike]

After 6 years of austerity it's just too easy for those most affected to jump to the conclusion that strangers are to blame.

Austerity has badly affected those outside of London, whilst London itself has benefited most from the opportunities from banking and financial services, it has also managed to tolerate the increased stresses of a rapidly growing, if localised economy.

I guess a thriving local economy helps folk accept the increased pressures of a growing population, even if funded in part by the billions in bailouts to finance institutions, itself the excuse for austerity.

My own daughter has stayed in London following her studies there, pursuing her career in the creative sector. I grew up in London and I always look forward to visiting her and can witness the changes of the last 50 odd years. I love the vibrancy of the cultural mix and generally put on some foodie pounds each visit.

Strangers are not to blame. The austerity divide of the last six years bears the main responsibility for the brexit voting pattern, a fact ignored by a superficial campaign of dog whistles and threat.

My concern now is the ease with which finance services can so easily be moved around the globe. I hope London and my daughter continue to both thrive. God forbid if finance moves abroad, but if immigrants and foreigners then leave too I hope her northern accent doesn't become a target of strangeness.

 

[gray198]

But the sad thing is that it's the ordinary people of London who wanted to remain, and we are not an elite, we are just ordinary people who aren't despising anyone.

We live with a far higher degree of immigration that anyone else in the UK. Less than half the London population are white British born, and we are happy with that, not inclined to blame immigrants or the EU for every one of our own government's failures as so many elsewhere have done in the way they voted.
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i cannot disagree flecc, but can't help thinking that as London is where government is based they will get a disproportionate amount of resources compared to some of the other areas where extra people have strained local services etc. Of course I could be totally wrong but that perception may be quite common

 

[flecc]

i cannot disagree flecc, but can't help thinking that as London is where government is based they will get a disproportionate amount of resources compared to some of the other areas where extra people have strained local services etc. Of course I could be totally wrong but that perception may be quite common

It is a common perception, but wrong. We earn huge amounts directly into London but have to pay our own way. How many realise that we Londoners are all still paying for the London Olympics via a surcharge on our council tax, and will be doing so for many years to come? You all enjoyed it, we are paying the bill.
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[bateman]

London's taxes prop up most of the rest of the U.K.

 

[mike killay]

Although I appeared to blame London, I was reporting what I see around the country and peoples attitudes.
In reality, London is an indivisible part of the UK. Many regional businesses aspire to have a London office. Young hopeful school leavers gravitate towards London, so it is natural that where you have a concentration of the nation's important structures (Crown,government, Finance and so on), you get a concentration of wealth and wealth creation.
Smaller examples that parallel this can be found in Dublin, also Cardiff and Edinburgh

 

[flecc]

Although I appeared to blame London, I was reporting what I see around the country and peoples attitudes.
In reality, London is an indivisible part of the UK. Many regional businesses aspire to have a London office. Young hopeful school leavers gravitate towards London, so it is natural that where you have a concentration of the nation's important structures (Crown,government, Finance and so on), you get a concentration of wealth and wealth creation.
Smaller examples that parallel this can be found in Dublin, also Cardiff and Edinburgh

Although there's a lot of truth in this Mike, there is also an opposite effect. I could quote you a very long list of companies who've taken their head offices out of London over many decades due to the combination of costs and staff shortages. They are also strongly encouraged to move out to other regions by the government and often subsidised to do so, and we previously lost all of our large manufacturing sector to other regions in this way.

The most recent in my borough was Nestle's UK head office with the loss of several thousand jobs in one swipe, and their giant tower block complex is currently being converted into town centre apartments.

Unlike Welsh steel, these big losses never reach the media since we've been good enough with job creation and large scale population movement to mask them, but they still hurt a lot.
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[mike killay]

I agree Flecc.
But with a huge population, quite large job losses seem to get masked in the general busyness of the City.
Port Talbot on the other hand is a steel making plant about 4 miles long, and about the same size as the town itself.

 

[flecc]

But with a huge population, quite large job losses seem to get masked in the general busyness of the City.

In fact one of our largest job loss/shift masks is population movement. For the last two decades we've been exchanging our white British population for migrants at a rate of around a quarter million of each per year.

Each year an average of 250,000 white Britons have been moving out of London, either moving out to the sticks or overseas. Simultaneously well over 200,000 from other countries and the rest from elsewhere in the UK have arrived. That's how we've gone from being predominantly white British to just 46% white British in a very short space of time.

The constant movement, the shifts in employment and new company creations, often by immigrants, have done much effective masking.

Maybe Port Talbot needs to take the core of Norman Tebbit's old advice, "Get on yer bike and look for jobs". Not too literally of course, they'd need to go further, but there are plenty of jobs in the world and they can't travel to people.
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[gray198]

Flecc, why do you think a lot of the local population have decided to leave London??

 

[trex]

after they make a mint selling their houses.

 

[flecc]

Flecc, why do you think a lot of the local population have decided to leave London??

Immigration was a big factor of course. I was born in London 80 years ago and have lived here for the last 54 years. Fifty years ago London had its large complement of bigots and racists just as elsewhere. We even had landladies with notices outside proclaiming "No blacks, no Irish". Over time some have moved way to other parts of Britain, many have died and been replaced by younger more tolerant people. The white British left now are almost all like me, happily accepting anyone from anywhere.

Another big factor is living conditions in a large and ever growing city. Such things as transport pressures, traffic congestion, parking and the congestion charge, the crowding caused by the promotion of London as a major tourist destination.

A big factor has been house prices. When someone realises that the moderate cost house they bought years ago is now worth well over £2 millions, they take the money and go of course. Wouldn't anyone when they can buy elsewhere for a quarter of that, so this particularly applies in older years, often enabling an earlier retirement. It worked for me, I retired at 54, partly due to the properties I owned, though I stayed here.

N.B. Crossed with Trex's post.
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[(NoLongerRegistered#15675)]

Very good original post. Totally agree with your sentiments. I,d.expected a stay win and by some margin. I,d seen Governents propoganda machine brought into play, their manipulation of data,their scaremongering and thought it would win the day. I really think Blair has got a lot to answer to, he probably set precedent of outright lying to public and we all know he did. He aligned himself with Cameron and I wonder how many thought they are all lying.
I also thought we were living in Google age. Everybody would go there and buy into whatever it threw up, with its asdumed impartiality I,d assumed folk would be convinced.Is that the reason younger generation tended towards staying ?? On reflection we should have known better. Leavers played racist card so stayers played theirs close to chest. Nobody wants to be labelled racist but an anonymous vote reflecting how you really feel is backbone of democracy.
I had little faith and assumed few others would go to lebghtse our household did. Spike with Stock brokers, ex bank managers ,independent finacial houses and even 2 solicitors. General concensus from these was optimistic on economic front.( its been opposite in here)
I then looked at my families experiences in Europe and what we had seen.
Taking all this my immediate family were resounding out. Seems many more either went through similar process or bought into out's rhetoric. Which I doubt somehow. Suspect our society is far more aware of the BS , propoganda and lies pedalled by both sides.
I do think it was right decision but don't see it really as important as some. UK will not fail or succeed on basis of in or out of EU, which I saw ad doomed anyhow.

 

[Wicky]

And the poorer, more disenfranchised moved from London to Clacton, Tendering and promptly got themselves a UKIP MP and immmigrants were scapegoated for their woes. Though quite what they think when they have to visit the local hospital and are attented to by German, Hungarian Polish, Syrian, Spanish, Philippine Pakistani, Sri Lankan and Indian health careworkers from Doctors, Nurses and domestic staff...

From the BBC an interestning infographics showed that outside town and cities country folk voted out out and probably have only had fleeting contact with any kind of immigrant/refugee - but have a drawn an exaggerated perception that the UK was being invaded in some sort of reverse D-Day.

Heck as a son of of Hungarian refugee from the Soviets kindly and generously accepted in the UK - born and bought here I've embraced warm beer and cricket and due to being 'other white' slipped in quite nicely - but that has given me access to see first hand certain cricket clubs operating a white only policy and one inparticular having openly a British First social secretary.

Meanwhile my Essex town based cricket club do what we do with players drawn from a wealth of backgrounds English, Malaysian, Sri Lankan German, English Jewish, Australian, NZ, Bangladeshi - and funnily enough on Fri evening to restore some sanity a group of us went out with our partners for an Indian street food pop up resturant cooked by a native Suffolk lass from Constable country.

 

[(NoLongerRegistered#15675)]

Good post Wicky, only thing I,d like to add, I do think its been a mistake for remain to foster idea all brexit supporters are anti immigration , xenophibic or simple racist. Cant talk for all but most I know immigration is not the issue. We,ll still need migrants post brexit and no doubt it will still be problematic. Being of Jamaican descent it would be quite hypocritical of me to vote leave on any migrant issues.

 

[RobF]

To answer the OP's question, no, we should not be surprised.

The only surprise to me was the margin was so narrow.

I have long thought the general populace is fed up with EU meddling and would boot it into touch given the chance.

The surprise to me was we were given the chance.

Those who make their (non) living from pointless bureaucracy were unlikely to give us the opportunity to vote for less of it.

While I'm on, I've been disappointed with the whiny attitude to the result of the Remainers.

I voted out, but were I given the opportunity, I would also have voted to accept the result whatever it was and make the best of it.