What would happen in an EU referendum?
Posted in Europe, Politics on October 23rd, 2011 by Leo – 1 CommentThe front page of today’s Sunday Express claims that 75% want Britain to quit the EU now. This is pure nonsense.
As described on Tabloid Watch, to get to their 75% figure, the Express have added together the proportion who say they’d leave (28%), with the much larger proportion who say they’d vote to renegotiate membership (47%).
But putting this dodgy reporting aside, we’re left with the timely question of what the UK does think of EU membership, and how any referendum would fall out.
Fortunately, we’ve had plenty of polls that can answer this, and which lately have had a good level of consistency.
Starting with a straight up ‘should I stay or should I go’ question, polls over the last few months give us about 3 in 10 wanting to stay, and about half wanting to leave. An August YouGov poll was typical:
But break this down further, and the desire to leave becomes less clear.