Do we need to wait a generation for a new referendum?

Forty-one years passed between the UK voting to remain a member of the EEC in the 1975 referendum and voting to leave the EU in 2016. So, Brexiters say, why shouldn’t it be another 40 years until the next vote?

However, the public disagrees. A 56% majority of people polled say there should be a new referendum on the EU within the next decade. (This rises to 80% among Labour voters.)

Sir John Curtice, the UK’s leading pollster, has said that he expects a new EU referendum by 2040. Curtice added: “If you look at the age profile of attitudes towards Brexit, you can see why.”

No one born this century voted for Brexit

By 2028, no one under the age of 30 will have been able to vote in the EU referendum

The fact that it was necessary to be 18 to vote in the EU referendum means that no one born this century (or, in fact, a few years before) was able to vote in the referendum. At the time of writing, this means that some people who were too young to vote in 2016 are already in their mid-20s. An estimated 5.5 million people have turned 18 and gained the right to vote since the referendum, and this number grows daily.

Given that this age group supports rejoining the EU by four to one, this cannot help but mean a growing crisis of legitimacy for the 2016 vote. By 2028, no one under the age of 30 will have been able to vote in the referendum.

The generational shift on rejoining the EU has already happened. Would it really be fair for today’s 18-25 year olds, who did not get a chance to vote in 2016, to be made to wait until they are in their fifties before they finally get a chance to have their say?

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