EURO ELECTIONS INDICATOR OF APPETITE FOR SECOND REFERENDUM

The European election results held no surprises.

I was not the only one predicting that the Brexit Party would take the biggest share of the seats — but my question is this.

If the Brexit Party took 32% of the votes — around 6 million votes — where were all the other original leavers placing their votes?

Some 17 million originally voted leave in 2016’s referendum and in many ways the European Election was a second referendum.

Turnout was just below 37% — the second highest in any European election in the UK with the Brexit Party receiving the highest share of the vote in nine of the 12 regions.

The British public told us, using the only avenue open to it, that Brexit is THE one issue it wants resolved — and what has come through loud and clear is that it wants the opportunity to make a more informed decision, leave or remain.

While it is impossible for every citizen to grasp every element of what is involved in the leave process, what the European elections told us was that people are having second thoughts. This far down the ‘leave’ road, the view isn’t what many pro-Brexit voters had hoped.

I still strongly support Mrs May. A remainer, she didn’t hesitate to put every effort into delivering what the British people thought they wanted, what they voted for.

Now, despite every word on best practice within a democratic system of governance, I believe we have no choice but to go with a second referendum.

If British voters have used the only way open to them to get their message across — and they have — then they need to be listened to.

So we should now speed toward a second referendum and the options should be to remain — or leave without a deal. What do I think will happen if we have this referendum? I think we will see a significant shift towards remaining within Europe.