Those of you who voted for Brexit when is it going to get better and how?

[N0addedsalt]

I didn’t and didn’t see any benefits. Tried to refocus anger about the lies during the campaign to resignation and acceptance. Was ready to try and embrace/ focus on positives and move forward but still really can’t see any. Now just getting increasingly worried and also fearful.

Hit me with all the benefits and when we’re going to see them impacting our lives.

You won't get any answers from leave voters OP. The one thing I have realised is that they will never admit they fucked up. You do need to get over it though, it's happened, it's shit and you can't change it.

It's astounding to me how whatever people wanted from Brexit it's Brexit itself that has completely screwed it up and made it worse.

Brexit is like a reverse Midas power turning everything to shit.

And you're still following all those EU laws, and paying in billions.

And going cap in hand to other trading blocs round the world begging to be allied to give sovereignty to them too.

Because all Brexit took away was the benefits of being in the EU from the British people.

We can change it and we will because we cannot allow this downward slide to continue.

17 million isn't half the country though is it @ImAvingOops?

There's 68 million of us.

(Approximately. No one really know since we don't check incoming lorries from the EU and our government kept telling the world we weren't going to, so nobody knows who or what is coming in.)

People who are 25 year olds now didn't get a vote.

Most who did get a vote have either died or changed their mind.

More are dying or changing their minds all the time.

The insanity of keeping the Brexit millstone around our necks based on lies from 2016 hasn't reached a tipping point yet,

But it will.

But how if ‘we can’t rehash the Brexit debate’?

As has been posted a few times on this thread and others.

If the media is too scary to approach it as some have said then it will not change.

@Anyotherdude

You may be telling the truth but increasing numbers of Leave voters are denying voting Leave. They tend to talk Leave then claim to have voted Remain. No-one wants to look stupid, and also they know if they admit to have voted Leave they may not be taken seriously.

Does this come up much with you? Ie do you ask people how they voted

No-one in politics or media want to go near it now (other than the FT). But conditions in this country will force the discussion eventually. There will be a consistent long term swing among the electorate which political parties will have to face eventually; and unfixable economic doldrums will necessitate addressing the loss of 4% of GDP and ways to fix it.

How do you know this?

I hope you're right

From the people I know who voted Leave - they used to be out and proud, now some say it was a mistake, others stand by it but less ebulliently, and some just pretended they voted Remain which is not what they said at the time.

Online, when you see posters talking Leave, attacking Remain but then claim to have voted Remain, how likely is it? That particular poster may be telling the truth but I suspect many aren’t.

It’s inevitable that many Leave voters, when the consequences of Brexit become clear, deny their vote.

I voted to stay because I felt the common market benefits outweighed the negatives of our membership. However, I don't work in an unskilled, level entry job nor am affected by labour skill wages being undercut as a contractor.

Due to the nature of my work, I did see that a lot of these jobs were taken by European workers, often overqualified and highly skilled. As an employer it's a no brainier. Do you employ the person who has literally crossed countries to work or the person who has applied for your vacancy so they are not sanctioned by the job centre for failing to seek work?

Since Brexit we have seen a rapid reduction in unemployment coupled with a rapid rise in National Minimum Wage. I don't doubt that employers lament us leaving as free movement meant they had a ready source of willing, able workers and wages were low. There's been quite a turn around and employers are having to address the skills gap to give their jobs to people they would have not considered before. This is good news for those of us in the UK who leave school with no or few qualifications and for older, non-professional workers returning to the workplace.

We all vote for what suits us best. I didn't vote the same way as the building site labourer who couldn't find work for example. This is where the racism argument becomes confusing as Europeans are predominantly white and essentially I voted to remain in a club that gave privilege to Europeans with free movement and free trade from which the rest of the (none white) world was excluded.

If you asked an employed entry level worker now earning over £10 an hour if they are seeing the benefits of Brexit, I suspect you would get a different answer to the one I would give you as a Remainer.

From what I’ve gathered, the general consensus was that greedy company owners were making a killing from employing cheap Polish labour, at the expense of British workers being unemployed. People didn’t think the companies would get poorer if the Polish workers left - they thought the companies would make less profit because they’d have to hire British workers on proper salaries. So the companies would still operate the same but the fat cats would get less in their pockets at the end.

And while it’s very obvious now that our government is just shit at handling immigration, it wasn’t obvious at the time. I mean, why on earth would our government fail to protect us from this problem if they had the power to do so? The only logical answer is that they don’t have the power, and indeed that’s what the media was shouting about - how the EU will “force us to take a quota” and we need to “take control of our borders”. Most people wouldn’t have assumed that the government had the power to protect us but was choosing not to use it, because that would be insane.

You can’t say re online that’s just projection. I’m sure angry remainers have tried to lob this at me but they couldn’t be more wrong. I likely posted at one point in 2016 my vote anyway so they can search it up if so sure.

The world has shifted since then so I’m up for the debate. But I find some of the posts re how thick people are, or how they look and the general tone off and these threads generally not conducive to discussion. Eg a poster who did vote Leave and said sod this I’m off, I was interested in hearing more as it was good insight. I don’t want just to hear my own remain views coming back and insults tbh I find the latter off putting.

I do think we had the opportunity for change now and we’ve missed it, some think that opportunity will grow I’m doubtful. But we’ll see.

I heard a good piece from Blair on this and he talked about being bold now. I actually think he could have faced the media and sold a big change in. Starmer either can’t or thinks he can’t so no change.

I do still want closer ties, would have welcomed an opportunity to vote on change this GE and would vote remain again but conversations re shifting power globally and what it could mean plus impacts of climate change on borders are the types of posts from the other angle I prefer over thick, stupid etc

I know three people who voted leave.

1 is a racist who stands by his decision even though the people he voted to stop coming in boats come now in increasing numbers.

1 who still stands by Leave because "I didn't want a European army" and "We stood on our own in 1939 and we can do that again." (they weren't born until 1964)

1 who wanted to "Give a kicking to this government" and "Didn't really think we'd leave". They now regret it and will vote Labour at the next election for the first time.

How people who voted Brexit or Tory can look at the state of the NHS, our roads, education system, housing, libraries, social care, animal welfare (Kept Animal Bill delayed for three years running now), pay gap, pensions and pension age, workers rights, Covid record, public baths, employment situation, rivers and the ocean and still think Brexit and this goverment are working and better than the alternative I have no idea.

@MarshaBradyo If you read my post more carefully I simply questioned how likely it was that posters would talk Leave but vote Remain. I made no hard and fast claims about internetland - how could I?

I don’t find the kind of combination of feelz + erroneous claims that Leavers tend to post much conducive to debate either. But I have not labelled them “thick” despite your mentioning that twice in your post.

Also I’m not sure what opportunity for change you think we’ve missed. Could you clarify?

I’m talking generally not just your post. It’s mentioned far more times than twice on Brexit threads, no idea why ‘twice’ is an issue here.

You quoted my post and responded, if you’re just rambling generally that’s fine, just clarifying it wasn’t related to anything I had said.

I know 3 people who voted leave and they all still stand by it. They refuse to acknowledge that it's had any negative effects at all and any that are pointed out, they blame on COVID or say it's media brainwashing.

I do agree, @MarshaBradyo, that I would like Labour to take a much bolder stance on this. It seems from the stats that the majority of people now acknowledge that Brexit was a mistake. However, I can only assume that the Labour Party's research/ focus groups etc must be telling them something different.

Perhaps the "red wall" voters now realise that Brexit hasn't been the solution to all their problems but they also don't want to open that can of worms again because they're bored of hearing about the subject. It certainly seems to elicit a lot of bored/get over it type responses on MN, so maybe Labour think it would be toxic for the particular people that they need to target.

The reality is, rejoining the EU alone wouldn't solve anything for those people if domestic policy doesn't attempt to address their issues. Of course, being part of the EU would be better for our economy, which would give us more resource to tackle those issues, but I think this point is lost on many people.

@Mirabai ”You may be telling the truth but…” Wow. Just. Wow.
Do you approach everyone who might possibly have a different point of view from yourself and accuse them of lying?
FWIW, I like to look at both sides of an argument, and as a remainer, I felt very bad for those who were being roundly insulted for asking relevant questions that could have been answered, without insulting people (as I believe I have now just been, for pointing out that the Remain Campaign could have been a tad kinder by answering those questions politely)
No question is ever stupid IMO…

I have a friend who voted for Brexit on the impulse of the moment. She wasn't even going to vote, she walked past the polling station on the way home and thought "fuck it! it can't be any worse, can it?!"

I know someone who voted for Brexit so we can protect the environment better. She got a lot of Vote Leave ads about polar bears, orangutans, waterways and pesticides on Facebook.

I work with a very nice man who was worried that Turkey imminently joining the EU would increase the number of people in the little boats "into the tens of thousands"

My parents fall into the "too many brown faces" Brexit voter category I'm sorry to say.

My friend who works for a company whose main business is exporting to the EU wanted to reduce EU red tape.

Our old family friend (no longer with us) voted for Brexit because she said things were better in this country before we joined and we pay money in and get nothing back.

My volunteering colleague voted for Brexit because she didn't want corrupt greedy politicians telling her what to do while lining their own pockets.

A relative voted Brexit because a leaflet told him the EU would give prisoners the vote.

Another relative, no longer with us, didn't want all the grandchildren and great grandchildren conscripted into the EU Army at 14.

A retired couple in my husband's family voted for Brexit despite living in Spain because of "immigrants."

My husband knows a bloke who said he voted for Brexit because of David Cameron's smug face.

Our old neighbours voted for Brexit because of the 350 million for the NHS.

That's all I can think of for now

The EU would be mad to let us back in. We shot ourselves in both feet with Brexit, it’s absolute insanity. This won’t be fixed in my lifetime, it’s so depressing.

‘Rambling’… ok

Can you quote a post where you think they ‘talk leave but claim to have voted remain’

Not sure what you’re referring to