Brexit: Regret or Resignation?  'Majority believe it was wrong to leave EU', on the fence to rejoin - video Dailymotion

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00:00Well, today marks five years since the United Kingdom finally left the European Union following

00:05the lengthy Brexit negotiations.

00:07In 2016, Britons voted by 52% to 48% to leave the EU.

00:12It was not a legally binding referendum, but the conservative government promised to respect

00:18it.

00:19Now, polls show that a vast majority of Britons think leaving the EU was wrong.

00:23To discuss this and more, I'm joined by Mariam Sarrachi, an associate professor of

00:28comparative politics at the University of Reading.

00:30Hello to you, and thank you for joining us.

00:33Five years on from that fateful date, how is Brexit viewed today in the UK?

00:40Well, you're right in pointing out that a wide majority of people think it was wrong

00:47to leave.

00:48It has been, you know, the public opinion has been quite stable on it for a while, at

00:54least 2023.

00:55When you dig a bit deeper, though, what does that mean in practice?

00:59I've argued recently it's more of a sense of resignation rather than regret.

01:07Because when you ask them to rejoin, you know, the majority is not that big and also it's

01:13very conditional.

01:15So if you, you know, if you say, oh, if you rejoin and then the EU asks you to do this,

01:20and it might very well be the case, we don't know what rejoin, what those rejoin negotiations

01:24are going to throw at us.

01:27And that support is sort of is conditional, right?

01:29If you ask, for example, joining the euro, which is unrealistic, but say that this is

01:34one of the conditions, then support for rejoin drops even further.

01:40And there is still polarization on that, right?

01:42So what there is agreement on, definitely, is that we should have a stronger relationship,

01:50closer trading relationship, especially with the EU.

01:54But rejoining is still a bit far-fetched, I would say.

01:56Right.

01:57What to do as an alternative is very unclear, very debatable.

02:01But the YouGov poll I was looking at moments ago cites just 11 percent of people that say

02:07Brexit has been more of a success than a failure.

02:12That's a really damning statistic.

02:15It is.

02:16It is.

02:17And if you look at, you know, reformed UK supporters, conservative supporters, leave

02:23past leave voters, you then see a different picture.

02:26You see that they are more on the fence.

02:28They don't say it's a success so that we can take that.

02:31Right.

02:32They don't admit it.

02:33Not a lot of them admit it was more of a success.

02:35Right.

02:36But they are more on the fence.

02:38And they seem to be when you dig deeper in the public opinion analysis, they seem to

02:42say, well, you know, if we had better politicians, if we had better negotiators, Brexit is not

02:47done.

02:48It's not done the way I would have done it.

02:49Right.

02:50So there is still a fine line to thread.

02:53It's it's it could still be very polarizing.

02:55Yeah.

02:56And there are a couple of asterisks that I think deserve to be mentioned over these past

03:00five years.

03:01There was the pandemic, the war in the UK, in Ukraine, the cost of living crisis.

03:05So it's five years, really enough time to be a fair judge.

03:10Well, it is, I think, if you look at the economic analysis and you then compare the UK with

03:16other countries that have gone through covid and have gone through, you know, the war in

03:19Ukraine and the energy crisis, you definitely see a Brexit specific impact.

03:25And even, you know, even the UK government and our own analysis from various departments,

03:30but also from the Office of Budget Responsibility, they're very clear.

03:34Trade in the UK is 15 percent lower than it could have been if we were still in the EU.

03:40Right.

03:41So we're still doing this sort of comparisons with with other countries and we what could

03:44have been 15 percent lower and the overall economy four percent smaller.

03:51So this is 100 billion pounds.

03:55So economically, it's quite the story is quite clear that UK is quite a bit poorer.

04:01And on the other promise on immigration, which was another promise of that campaign, net

04:07net migration levels have not changed.

04:09It's just that the composition that has changed.

04:11So we have EU citizens migrating, but we have an uptick of non-EU.

04:18So net migration overall stayed the same.

04:20So we haven't solved that particular issue that, you know, some had in the UK.

04:30Migration is quite stable.

04:32And we have made that you were that's clear, even subtracting the covid effect and the

04:37energy crisis.

04:38OK, OK.

04:39So some of these voters, they they want more trade with the EU.

04:42That much is clear.

04:44What is Keir Starmer's government going to do about that?

04:48It is, as I as I was mentioning in the beginning, it's quite a, you know, particular fine line

04:54to thread.

04:55Right.

04:56Because you don't want to reopen that polarization.

04:57And some of the options might be more polarizing than others, especially, you know, rejoining

05:03also because we don't know what the rejoin negotiations are going to entail.

05:07Right.

05:09So there is scope, I think, in public opinion for, you know, maybe giving up some regulatory

05:13alignment.

05:14There is scope, for example, on student mobility.

05:15I think UK public opinion would be fine with that.

05:18A lot of leavers also want a closer relationship rather than a, you know, an even more distanced

05:24relationship.

05:25So there is a window of opportunity.

05:27But I think they have to thread very lightly and carefully because the potential for exploding

05:33those divisions is still there.

05:35Maryam, you've rightly pointed out a number of times.

05:38There's so much uncertainty as to what's next.

05:40But I'm going to put you in that hot seat and make you guess anyway, the EU open to

05:45the UK one day returning.

05:47Do you think a return is ever possible?

05:50Ever likely?

05:51How about that?

05:52Well, then, you know, I might have my hopes and dreams, right, that come into that.

05:59Not in the near future, I wouldn't say.

06:03And again, it's really contingent as you as you may be.

06:07You're trying to push me here, but you can spin and sell everything in politics.

06:11Right.

06:12So there is a window of opportunity.

06:13A future government might be able to sow.

06:16It's about sowing the seeds and maybe in the future, not in the short term, I don't think.

06:21All right, Maryam.

06:22Thank you very much for that.

06:23I appreciate that.

06:24Maryam Sorachi speaking to us here.

Brexit: Regret or Resignation? 'Majority believe it was wrong to leave EU', on the fence to rejoin

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