The UK wide result for the 2016 referendum was 51.8% to 48.2% with England the most Eurosceptic at 53.4% to 46.6%.
In Selby the result was 59.2% to 40.8% so we were quite a bit more Eurosceptic than the average. The total number of votes cast in the district was 51,603 with 30,532 voting to leave while 21,071 voted to remain. We also had a relatively high turnout at 79.2%. In fact it was one of the highest in the country so not only were we altogether more enthusiastic about voting we were more enthusiastically Eurosceptic.
It doesn't take a genius to see we have an uphill struggle to change minds and perhaps Selby will never love the EU. But on the other hand we need just 4731 people to switch their opinion or we need to persuade most of the nearly 14,000 people who didn't vote at all to support rejoining.
During the campaign I spoke to a lot of friends and many said they would vote to leave although I didn't think it would be a majority. Those wanting to leave were, in my opinion, shockingly consistent in not knowing what they were voting for or why. To a person they did not read any of the government publications that were freely available to download. Not only did they not know any facts they did not want to know any. As if facts or expert opinion might taint their muddled thinking.
I think I was alone in reading most of it - including the 1032 page tome (HERE) produced by the Leave campaigner Matthew Elliot - for Business for Britain, to try and understand the issues before voting (OK I didn't read it all, I'm not a masochist!). This is not to say I was unbiased. Having worked for companies with European connections since 1969 I am strongly Europhile but at least I tried to get some balance. Most of my acquaintances and friends got their's via the newspapers, many of which were blindly and violently anti-EU.
The Electoral Commission website has all the UK results (HERE) if you're interested.
