The difference between leave and remain was 3.8% or 1.3 million in favour of Leave. However, in a close analysis, virtually all the polls show that the UK electorate wants to remain in the EU, and has wanted to remain since referendum day. Moreover, according to predicted demographics, the UK will want to remain in the EU for the foreseeable future.
And it makes not a penny of difference because the PM has sent the letter to the EU and we have asked to leave.
There have been more than 13 polls since June 23rd which have asked questions similar to ‘Would you vote the same again’ or ‘Was the country right to vote for Brexit’. People haven’t changed their minds. If you voted leave then you still want to leave. If you voted remain then you still want to remain, but of course many people failed to vote.
Eleven of the polls indicate that the majority in the UK do not want Brexit largely because of those who failed to vote.
It’s important to remember how tight the vote turned out to be. The poll predictions leading up to the referendum narrowed but a significant majority of late polls indicated that the country wanted to remain. The leader of UKIP even conceded defeat on the night of the vote, presumably because the final polls were convincing that Remain would win.
In fact, according to the first post-referendum poll (Ipsos/Newsnight, 29th June), those who did not vote all 12.9m of them, were, by a ratio of 2:1, Remain supporters. It is well known that polls affect both turnout and voting, particularly when it looks as though a particular result is a foregone conclusion. It seems, according to the post-referendum polls, that this was the case. More Remain than Leave supporters who, for whatever reason, found voting too difficult, chose the easier option not to vote, probably because they believed that Remain would win.
Percentage lead of LEAVE or REMAIN according to the polls post June 23rd
By now (March 2017) with Article 50 initiated, there will be approximately 563,000 new 18-year-old voters, with approximately a similar number of deaths, the vast majority (83%) amongst those over 65. Assuming those who voted stick with their decision and based on the age profile of the referendum result, that, alone, year on year adds more to the Remain majority.
A Financial Times model indicated that simply based on that demographic profile, by 2021 the result would be reversed and that will be the case for the foreseeable future.
Sadly nothing less than a second, fairer referendum could redress the unfairness felt by the exclusion from the electorate of both the 16-18s and the non-UK EU residents. This all paints a very sorry picture of the effectiveness of UK democracy. Brexit is not the will of the people in the UK. It never has been. Had all the people spoken on the day the result would almost certainly be what the pollsters had predicted, and what the UK, according to the polls, still wants, and that is to Remain.
We are where are. Calls to unite together behind the brexit banner are loud and insistent.
They can fuck off.