Former UKIP leader, and strong supporter of Brexit, says he is now warming up to the idea of a second EU referendum in order to end the “whinging and whining” of anti-Brexit campaigners.
Farage believes a second referendum could “kill off” the Remain campaign for a generation, and that “the percentage that would vote to leave next time would be very much bigger than it was last time round”.
Downing Street however stated clearly: “We will not be having a second referendum”.
Farage was a leading figure in the Leave campain, which won the referendum in June 2016 with 51.9% of the votes, resulting in the UK being set to leave the EU on 29 March 2019. Negotiations are currently taking place between the UK and the EU about how things are going to work after the UK’s departure.
A second EU referendum has been rejected by Brexiteers who claim it would be a betrayal of the will of the people. However, now that Article 50 has been invoked, anti-Brexiteers have been urging a rethink of the 2016 results, claiming that the people should be given another chance to vote once the terms of the withdrawal are made clear.
It was during a debate about Brexit on Channel 5 that Farage came out with these surprising comments saying that anti-Brexit campaigners and leading political figures like Tony Blair and Lord Adonis will never give up, “so maybe, just maybe, I’m reaching the point of thinking that we should have a second referendum on EU membership…and we may just finish the whole thing off”.
While former UKIP members have dismissed Farage´s comments, EU advocates have welcomed them as support for another referendum seems to be growing. The Lib Dems have assured their voters that in any referendum, they would be “leading the charge” to keep the UK part of the EU, and Labour MP Chuka Umunna, of the Open Britain campaign for close ties with the EU, said: “For perhaps the first time in his life, Nigel Farage is making a valid point”.
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