Just 24 per cent of Britons want to remain outside EU: Report

The British Social Attitudes survey found that 24 per cent of respondents believe Britain should be outside the EU.

• Vivek Mishra
• 12 June, 2024

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By: Vivek Mishra

Only a quarter of Britons believe the country should be outside the European Union (EU), according to a report published on Wednesday.

This marks the lowest level of support for leaving the EU since the 2016 referendum.

Britain will hold a national election on July 4, the first since formally exiting the EU in 2020.

Despite Europe being a long-standing issue in British politics, Brexit has not been a major focus in the election campaign so far.

The British Social Attitudes survey, conducted by the National Centre for Social Research, found that 24 per cent of respondents believe Britain should be outside the EU.

This is a decline from 36 per cent in 2019 and 41 per cent in 2016. The survey also revealed that the perception of Brexit’s impact on the economy and immigration is now more negative than in 2019.

This change is particularly notable among those who voted ‘Leave’ in 2016. About 40 per cent of Leave voters now think the economy is worse off due to Brexit, compared to 18 per cent in 2019.

Nearly two-thirds believe immigration has increased since leaving the EU, up from just 5 per cent who previously expected that.

“In short, it appears that for many of those who voted to leave the EU, Brexit has not turned out as they anticipated,” the report, co-authored by polling expert John Curtice, stated.

The survey of 5,578 people, conducted between September 12 and October 31 last year, also found that public trust and confidence in the government had reached record lows.

Forty-five per cent of respondents ‘almost never’ trust British governments to prioritise the nation’s needs over their own political interests.

(Reuters)