Findings will bolster those in No 10 who want to negotiate on re-entry but some senior figures remain wary
Andy Burnham’s personal preference to rejoin the European Union after the next election is supported by almost half of all voters, a new megapoll has found, although cabinet ministers concerned about reopening Brexit divides are privately urging him to proceed with caution.
The poll by the Messina Group (TMG) found that renegotiating the UK’s relationship with the EU could boost Labour’s vote share by as much as seven points, if the prime minister offered a fresh referendum in which he campaigned to re-enter the bloc.
Almost 1/3 of voters said an in-out referendum would be needed first, while more than one in six felt that a general election mandate would be sufficient, and the same proportion thought parliament could make the decision.
The overall findings will bolster the case of those inside Downing Street who want to promise at the next election that Labour would at least negotiate over re-entry, which the prime minister has said he wants to see “in his lifetime”.
half of the UK never wanted to leave
the groups that voted to leave are now dead/retired or moved abroad probably anyway
They are blaming immigrants for our problems now instead of the EU. If you stop immigration they will just move onto blaming the ones already here. Remove them and now second generation immigrants are a problem. Repeat until death camps get built.
Half the country didn’t want to leave in the first place.
Don’t take this badly but judging by what Labour is doing to anti-Genocide demonstrators, the UK nowadays is even more Fascist and authoritarian than it was back when it left the EU.
The country is so Far-Right that even the Brexiter Tories aren’t Far-Right enough for a significant fraction of its population and Reform UK emerged and has significant support
Now that the Poles and the Hungarians have solved that specific problem in their countries, if Britain was to rejoin the EU it would be the most Far-Right and authoritarian country in it and, worse, it the weird American-style Fascism with its thick strain of hateful preachy moralism such as transphobia.
IMHO, Britain needs to change its politics and popular mindset before it rejoins the EU.
England did not learn that shit from the US. The US are a freed colony of England’s and run by the heirs of the same gentry that financed the rebellion, for the purpose of avoiding taxes.
My pet theory is that England laid the cultural blueprint for the entirety of right wing thought in “The West”. The US just got bigger when everyone else was reeling from WW2.
IMHO neither Poland nor Hungary have solved their far right problem. It looks like Poland will elect far right at their next election, and Magyar is hardly further left than Orban, just less corrupt.
That said, the UK does need to change before if it wants to rejoin, we have enough far right trouble as it is. Besides, 50% is not convincing. If a referendum is held, the psy-ops will kick in and that will become 45% again. There needs to be a minimum 60% lead for rejoining or it will backfire.
Even the majority supporting it quickly goes away though if you tell them that they wouldn’t join with their previously privileged status
Edit: Spelling
Yup. The survey should have a few simple questions:
- Are you willing to switch to the Euro from the Pound?
- Are you willing to support open freedom of movement (Schengen zone)?
If they answer no to either of those, then they’re not really wanting to be part of the EU. They just miss the benefits from the sweetheart deal.
Not all countries in the EU has the euro, so that is a silly requirement.
All new joiners officially has to work towards getting the Euro, I believe Sweden and Poland both have that deal. But there’s plenty of ways to delay the adoption for eternity.
There’s a few member states which hasn’t agreed to adopt it, but that’s because they joined before it existed
There’s a few member states which hasn’t agreed to adopt it, but that’s because they joined before it existed
Yeah, like our little country, Denmark, where we just have this even worse deal of pegging our currency to the Euro. So we get none of the benefits of having the Euro, and all of the downsides of not having our own currency. Pay exchange fees every time we buy from other countries, can’t manage the valuation of our currency…
There is one factor you’re forgetting, Danish mortgage rates have been .5-1% below the eurozone. Due to the Danish currency being stronger than its valuation, ever since the debt crisis of '08.
If we didn’t have a peg, our mortgages would be a fair deal higher - As European investors considers the DKK safe to park money in
Yeah, I really don’t think that The Guardian is doing Labour any favors by running articles of this sort without covering that important tidbit.
If it were off trying to convince people that the UK should rejoin, whether-or-not previous opt-outs were granted, that’d be a different story; then there’s a serious, pro-EU policy end goal. If the UK is going to do a Rejoin at some point, then I expect that that’s probably the public opinion bar that’s going to need to be met. Probably not a bar that’s going to be met overnight, so might as well start on it now.
privilidged
This assumes the European Union is open to the idea of the UK rejoining. And I’ll tell you what: after all that needless drama, I don’t think Europe wants to deal with the drama queen for many years to come.
In any case, even if the UK does rejoin, it certainly won’t get the special treatment Thatcher got it the first time around.
Nobody in the EU is enjoying all the extra paperwork for shipments to and from there UK. All it is, is a head ache.
Everyone I’ve spoke to, at least in Germany, is completely fine with the UK rejoining. Just under the assumption that the UK won’t get special treatment.
Its a major market for goods, services and labour, and it would simply arrangements in Ireland. Its military would come in handy too.
Negotiations would be hard, but I see a few smaller concessions around say exemption from the eurozone.
It’s not the only factor. The other, major issue with the UK is that it most often aligns with the US, and the last thing Europe needs is a fascist outpost in its midst.
Russian drones are there… But I do agree the UK can lean too much to the right.
If the EU opens exceptions for the UK it needs to open exceptions for all new members, and rewards bad behaviour.
At most there can be a tacit agreement that the EU will ignore the UK monkeying around to not be eligible for the Eurozone like Sweden does.
When self interests align, even tribalism can fade
EU is not doing that great and is looking for new alliances to stand up to US. 4 years ago I would agree with you they they are not interested in taking UK back. Today? Not so sure.
We’re not rejoining the EU any time soon.
Andy Burnham deliberately did this to distract the right wing press from his proposals to abolish the “Triple Lock” on pensions; an expensive policy that benefits older people only by guaranteeing pensions rise by the highest of average earnings, inflation or 2.5% a year. He wants to make it a “double lock” and use the savings to fund social care.
By talking about possibly rejoining the EU (alongside other options - he effectively said he wouldn’t rule out rejoining) he’s managed to get the right wing eurosceptic press up in arms talking about this instead of the triple lock.
He is not going to actually follow through on the EU because that would be a gift to reform to fight the next election on that issue. Don’t get me wrong, I have no doubt Burnham does want us to rejoin the EU long term, but there is no way that is going to be a major issue in the next election. Expect any government proposals to be quietly displaced “until after the next election” as is the standard practice in UK politics to ignore a major topic.
is supported by almost half of all voters
Almost
In the 2016 referendum 48.11 % were against leaving, so almost half the voters were in favour of remaining in the EU.
Half of UK doesn’t want to. Same as always.
We should have defaulted back into EFTA where we came from.
cabinet ministers concerned about reopening Brexit divides are privately urging him to proceed with caution.
I think they have a valid point here, although it may not be the point they intend. The process of getting people onboard with rejoining, and the negotiations themselves will have to be approached with caution, as screwing them up now will mean an even longer delay, and even more harm, before rejoining.
Come back guys, we still like you.
Love and miss you guys xoxo
Eurovision song contest makes me feel otherwise 🥲
Yeah, but this time gotta pick the euro!
it’s gotta be a lot higher than half. it was just over half for the referendum. now we’ve witnessed the devastation first hand. the few idiots i know who voted to leave have all very much changed their views. is there really anyone who still thinks our economic suicide was good???
Yeah this won’t happen; it needs to be 60% before any politician would seriously consider risking everything over a referendum on this again.
This is just a distraction to annoy the right wing press and get them talking about Europe instead of the abolishment of the triple lock on pensions.
a referendum on this again.
It wouldn’t be a referendum on that again. What once was is now gone for good. It could be a referendum about joining the EU, but on very different terms than the last time.
UK won’t be rejoining without switching to the Euro and joining the Schengen area. I don’t see its people wanting those two things for the next two decades at least.
A lot of the people who supported it are either dead or changed their mind when they realised brexit was moronic.
I hope we do rejoin
almost half of all voters
If almost half support rejoining, as in under 50%, it doesn’t seem like all that many died or changed their mind.
Good thing there’s an infographic in the link, the for and against are as follows.
Topic Pro | Against
Rejoining EU 50 | 28
Customs union 47 | 21
Single market 45 | 23
Associate Membership 45 | 21
The rest remain undecided/don’t care/whatever it’s politics.
So going forward with an associate membership seems like something that’d garner support for a PM rather than abolish them. If they’d be master negotiators, they’d aim for a Swizz or Norwegian type deal.
or some fled the UK after brexit.
There will be the undecided/don’t knows and the people who just won’t vote, which last time round accounted for 30%.
