A generation of young Britons who were locked out of the 2016 EU referendum because of their age now believe that Brexit has failed, with a majority demanding a fresh vote to rejoin the EU, exclusive polling shows.
Gen Z Britons show deep dissatisfaction with the UK’s departure from the EU, according to new polling of 18- to 28-year-olds conducted by the thinktank More in Common and shared with the Guardian.
The data reveals that 60% of this cohort would vote to rejoin the bloc if given the opportunity, compared with 9% who would vote to stay out.
When filtering the results to focus solely on those likely to cast a ballot in a hypothetical second referendum, the margin becomes a landslide, with the pro-EU Remain/Rejoin camp capturing 81% of the vote against just 19% for remaining outside.
The More in Common study, which surveyed 440 young people across Britain, shows that 50% of gen Z Britons categorise Brexit as a failure. In contrast, only 16% view the project as a success, while 34% remain undecided.
Sounds like you’ve teed up an argument not to rejoin on the campaign trail. Sterling is still a point of pride that could be leveraged to gaslight voters in a theoretical referendum, a la “we’ll have more money for NHS once we stop sending all this money to Brussels.”
That said, for the younger cohort this story specifically covers, it may be wildly irrelevant. Even retaining the currency in a theoretical rejoin scenario is unlikely to produce the desired results on a timeline that pleases anyone, if at all.