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With nearly all the votes counted, it looks like the UK will be splitting up with the EU and going it's own way.
I'm surprised at the results, I had expected the Remain votes to win out, but I am not surprised the Leave vote was as popular as it turned out to be. For big reasons and small, the EU has never been a popular thing in the UK. Membership has it's benefits, but also it's drawbacks.
I'm very far from being Pro-EU myself, but the Leave vote didn't seem like a great choice either. I am however, somewhat proud that the UK had the highest turnout rates of voters in recent history and everyone was given the opportunity to vote on what is probably one of the most important democratic events in European history since WW2. Whether for feelings of disillusionment with the political parties, a strong sense of independence or just sheer bloody mindedness to stick it to the rest of Europe, the UK, (particularly England) has voted to leave the EU.
What the long term effects of this will be, no-one really knows for sure. Scotland voted heavily in favour of Remain (though with a lower average turnout), so this could trigger a second Scottish referendum. Popular political parties are gaining ground against the established groups in several EU countries and I have already seen a call for a Frexit. France and Germany have both had big changes to their political status quo over the last year and both have national elections due next year. If either of them should call a referendum, the EU is finished. In the short term, the stock markets are going loopy and investors are dropping the Pound and the Euro and investing in the Yen, which is the primary reason why I am writing all this.
The Yen was already at a one year high of about 150 yen to the Pound last weekend. Since this morning, it has gained even more ground, making it 137 yen to the Pound the last time I checked. This will probably drop still further once the UK stock markets open. For those of us here in Japan, ordering from the EU just got a LOT cheaper.
So, won't you, my fellow ex-pats, help me stabilise the economy by spending all your new found financial strength on hobby products from the UK and Europe?

An interesting decision, although from what I've read, a referendum isn't actually binding in the UK, so who knows what will actually happen. I can't imagine that the timeline for possible devolution or whatever it's called will be quick. Mind you, despite knowing many Brits, and thinking I knew a lot about British culture, the how, why, who etc of the 'Brexit' is a bit of a mystery to me.

For us lot as gamers I think it will be a bit of a double edged sword. The collapse of the pound vs. the stodgy old yen would seem to be the beginning of another 'Golden Age' i.e. UK made minis at great prices. I know the Perry twins will be getting a largish donation come pay day. Mind you, I don't think anyone will be buying GW armies in bulk like the post-Lehman Shock days. However, the probable economic chaos and barriers to previously open European markets must surely be bad news for large and small UK manufacturers alike. Hopefully everyone manages to keep their heads above water.

I'm kinda glad I'm a Kiwi living in a relatively safe, laissez-faire corporatocracy, 'fronted' by a bunch of passively racist but ultimately benign old farts that dare not do anything too radical.

Hum.

Can't say as I'm too pleased with this, but yon milk is already on the floor, so no point wailing about it. As Prim says, now would be a good time to be buying things from the UK, but as Pikey wisely points out, things may be difficult for UK businesses in the long run. Worst case scenario, it's good news for PP, CB, and RH, bad news for GW, Warlord and Perry et al.

As for Scotland, there's no "could" about referendum triggering. If the SNP aren't already writing their speeches calling for one I'll eat my shoes. Must be the first time Scotland has found itself in complete agreement with London

Oh, and I see Cameron's beating a hasty retreat. Can't say I blame him. The fallout from this'll be bloody apocalyptic. Best of luck to all those left to work out the the details.

Overall, I'm very disappointed that the UK public (well, not the Scots, Irish or Cockneys. Clearly common sense won out there, but I digress ) has voted with their gut and not their head. The economic stats just never stacked up for a Brexit, but the Leave campaign was able to persuade people that winging it and hoping for the best would work out for everyone. I hope it does. I really do.



But I'm really quite worried about my family and friends back home. I just can't fathom how the UK turned into a country where the likes of UKIP are a viable political party. I'm feeling rather ashamed to be British,today, tbh.

Well, for (roughly) every two Scots who voted Remain, one voted Leave and two didn't bother voting. You can't really say that Scotland is in complete agreement over the matter.
Financially, the UK would be better off in the EU, but how much of that benefit reaches the people voting Leave has obviously been one of the key points of the referendum. Control over borders, immigration and national identity Vs. more money in the pockets of London's fat cats hardly seems like much of an argument to people struggling with minimum wage. Labour did a poor job of convincing people that that wasn't the case.
The EU does offer big benefits to big corporations. Manufacture goods in countries with cheap labour, sell them in countries with high incomes, declare profits in countries with low tax rates. For smaller businesses, they can't get much from that deal. They do get access to the wider markets, but in many cases they got a lot of extra red tape to deal with. Being outside the EU should (hopefully) free up some of their time and energy that can be better spent elsewhere. Customers will have to pay taxes on their goods, but the English VAT will be discounted in the same way it is for us here in Japan, so the impact may be a lot smaller than on bigger corporations who now need to pay full taxes on UK profits. (Starbucks paid something like 1% tax in 2014-15).
The weaker pound will also help to drive sales to other countries as well.

Overall, there is going to be a massive economic fallout from all this, but a lot depends on how the EU negotiates the Brexit with Cameron's successor. Fingers crossed it all works out ok in the end.

As for UKIP being a legitimate party, they are a Nationalist group intent on getting the country out of a Union that they feel is bad for it. They aren't that far removed from the SNP across the border really.

I'm going to choose to be optimistic about the whole thing, though I'm pretty sure the country is screwed seven ways to Sunday.

It wasn't Labour's responsibility to convince people of anything. Cameron was leading the Remain camp, and there were quite a few Labor, Lib Dem, and Green ministers in the Leave camp.

On the issue of immigration, fiction and propaganda won out over facts.
1 out of 5 UK care workers is an immigrant.
3 out of 5 London care workers is an immigrant.
11% of the people ho work in the NHS are immigrants.
Immigrants pay more in tax than they claim in benefits.
For the 3 million immigrants we have, the EU has 2,000,000 of ours, a large majority of which are retirees who don't pay into the local economies.
Without the immigrant birth rates, Britain would be facing an aging population/falling birthrate problem like Japan.

The EU has already said that want England out of the EU as fast as possible.

Johnson and Gove will end up privatizing more and more NHS services. That magic 350,000,000 will not make its way into the NHS.


The large number of the British public fell for it all hook, line,and sinker.

Personally, I'm quite happy about it. My USD pension is looking quite good, my stocks in every market except Britain are looking even better, and the yen I'm going to exchange for pounds when I go home in December should make for a much cheaper holiday
Scotland will most certainly be having a second referendum, and good luck to them I say.

Spevna wrote:It wasn't Labour's responsibility to convince people of anything. Cameron was leading the Remain camp...

So all the Labour supporters who detest the Tories should have blindly gone along with what the head of the Tory party was saying? It was the job of all the politicians who wanted a Remain vote to convince their voters that Remain was the best course regardless of political leanings. The Leave supporters produced a much more united front. Corbyn et al. could have done a lot more. There are already calls for him to follow Cameron out the door.

Regardless, what is done is done. The next few years should be interesting.

Primarch wrote:

Spevna wrote:It wasn't Labour's responsibility to convince people of anything. Cameron was leading the Remain camp...

So all the Labour supporters who detest the Tories should have blindly gone along with what the head of the Tory party was saying? It was the job of all the politicians who wanted a Remain vote to convince their voters that Remain was the best course regardless of political leanings. The Leave supporters produced a much more united front. Corbyn et al. could have done a lot more. There are already calls for him to follow Cameron out the door.

Regardless, what is done is done. The next few years should be interesting.

You said "Labour did a poor job of convincing people that that wasn't the case. "

It wasn't Labour's responsibility to do that, it was, as you said in your last post, the responsibility of the remain camp as a whole.

me_in_japan wrote:
I'm feeling rather ashamed to be British,today, tbh.

That's exactly how I feel right now mate.

This sums things up nicely:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptfmAY6M6aA

I feel much the same way as MiJ does, gutted and disappointed in my fellow Brits.

But, the more I'm reading in the aftermath, the more I'm geginning to understand the whys. I feel people underestimated the support that leave had in the more impoverished working-class areas of the country. There is austerity based anger out there, for which the EU became a scapegoat. In today's Guardian, there was a quotation from a Mancunian: "If you're rich you vote in, if you're poor, you vote out". For them, this was a protest vote from those with less, who were past caring about the implications of leaving. I think many saw the EU referendum as the only way to influence anything. Ironically they will get even more of the same right-wing policy which has hit them hard in the first place, judging by the likely successors.

Tldr: Bloody hell, this was a bad decision. Even Johnson looks shell shocked at what has occured.