The North of England voted to Leave the European Union in the referendum held on 23 June 2016. Few people saw a possibility of the Leave campaign winning by any kind of margin, leaving many in the country in a state of shock and disbelief upon waking up to the results. Despite the best efforts of the Remain campaign – bringing out experts in their droves and assuring us that remaining in the EU would be the best thing for the country – the winners of the referendum were Nigel Farage, Boris Johnson and Jacob Rees-Mogg.
If the results are plotted out onto a map of the United Kingdom, it’s clear that Northern England overwhelmingly supported Leave, with a few spots of Remain sticking out like a sore thumb. My own home region of Yorkshire and the Humber voted to leave – much to my surprise. But what drove the industrious Northern regions to vote the way they did?
It’s unarguable that we have had a North-South divide since the 1970s. London and the South East have long experienced the benefits of living in one of the richest economies ever. Transportation gains more funding, educational attainment is higher, and even the life expectancy is higher. Northerners often look on at the South East in envy whilst travelling from York to Hull on a conked-out Pacer Train (literally an out-of-date bus with the chassis of a freight train stuck to the bottom).
Northerners have had enough of London getting all the spoils and retaining most of the power. Northerners feel left behind, and we’re feeling a growing sense of bravery in terms of demanding change. It’s this emboldened attitude of change and a hope for a better future that has been the driving force behind the ‘Northern Powerhouse’. Love them or hate them, the current Conservative Government is making efforts to re-balance the economy and hand more devolved power to the Northern regions. Large regions of the North are now bidding for the chance to elect a Mayor with similar responsibilities to the Mayor of London, with some having already elected a Mayor (Manchester and Sheffield springing to mind). We’re even seeing proposals from ‘Transport for the North’ which will supposedly assist in developing the transport network across the North and with it bring increased prosperity. HS2 is (not without controversy) ploughing ahead and will one day link major Northern cities to Birmingham and London – slashing journey times and delivering economic growth.
HS2 and the whole Northern Powerhouse initiative may encourage Northerners to feel as though they have control over their own destiny, and will soon reap the benefits of a growing economy. But for far too long it has taken far too long for any of this to materialise. In response to this sluggishness, the referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU presented Northerners with an opportunity to stick two fingers up to the establishment and grab more control.
The rhetoric of the Leave campaign was immigration/free movement – but the North of England didn’t vote for purely those reasons. For the North it was more about shaking the London political bubble to the core and telling the powers-that-be that we won’t be taking the inequalities anymore. It was a wake-up call.
“Listen to us, or else!”
The Remain campaign can argue all day and every day about how the EU invests significant amounts of money in the North and how freedom of movement has been of benefit to our Northern regions – but people in the North don’t want to hear it because that’s not the overarching reason for the vote to leave.
The referendum result could have easily been predicted, had the North of England been listened to. It wasn’t about immigration or even money per se. It was about taking back control. The only real solution to the divisions within our country is to continue the efforts towards devolution and to hand power back to the people. Continuing with the London focused Government in the same way will drive people further away from Westminster politics. We’re once again seeing calls for Scotland to leave the UK and just before the EU referendum we saw a petition for the North to leave the UK and join a newly independent Scotland. There are even some calls (albeit probably small for the time being) for Yorkshire to seek independence.
My message to the Government and the entirety of Britain’s political class is this:
“Ignore us at your peril – because you could so easily lose the North of the country in growing bids for independence”.
“A Simple Question” by Tone’o is licensed under CC BY
