BreXrated, March 2017
In the EU referendum last year, the unpopular, more divisive politicians won. Remain voter Rob Lawson called Nigel Farage “a horrible little man”, author Will Self called Farage and Donald Trump “grubby little opportunists” on Question Time, and Remain voter Paul Millar saw Boris Johnson “more like a chauffeur or a clumsy butler”, rather than as a politician. Millar also referred to the entire Leave campaign as a “bunch of bell-ends”.
A survey by BreXrated showed that voters dislike politicians in general, but tend to vote for people they like. When asked if they liked the last person they voted for, 83 percent said “Yes” or “A bit”. Similarly, when asked whether they liked the person who convinced them to vote the way they voted in the referendum, 82 percent said “Yes” or “A bit”. However, when asked if they liked politicians in general, only six percent said they did. In the sea of politicians they deplore, it seems voters often find someone they like. The respondents of the poll identified themselves on all different parts of the political spectrum, young and old, suggesting that people find someone they like, listen to what they have to say and disregard everyone else.
Anthony Wells, research director at polling firm YouGov, said: “Farage is very Marmite, Gove is very Marmite, they divided people into people who really, really loved them and people who really, really hated them.”
Anthony Wells said there was a constant struggle between Vote Leave, the Leave campaign associated with Conservatives such as Boris Johnson and Michael Gove, and the more right-wing alternative leave.EU. He said leave.EU “wanted as much Nigel as possible”. Meanwhile, Vote Leave felt that Farage couldn’t be allowed to be seen as the figurehead of the Leave campaign as he was considered toxic to the key swing voters they were trying to appeal to.
Dr. Alan Renwick, the deputy director of the constitution unit at University College London, said: “Certainly in the referendum campaign, the individual campaigners matter. People often don’t know what they think at the start of the campaign. We have evidence of the endorsements of the Leave campaign by people like Boris Johnson being very important to some voters in changing their attitude.”
Rob Lawson thinks that if Boris Johnson hadn’t chosen to campaign for Leave, Remain would have won. He said: “For all everyone says I think Nigel Farage has a very limited popularity, whereas Boris is seen as this likable clown figure and he was able to deliver the slightly more mainstream right-wing vote. People who vote Ukip was always going to vote Leave, I don’t think Farage swung it.”
Paul Millar said Boris is “kind of like that work colleague that keeps cocking up so you keep covering for him and absorbing his workload because you don’t want to see him fired”.
Some UKIP leaning folk don’t see themselves voting for UKIP, they’re voting for Nigel. Not Nigel Farage. Just Nigel. He’s like a really close friend they’ve never met. When Ted Cruz was asked to identify a weakness of his in a Republican primary debate in October 2015, he said: “If you want someone to grab a beer with, I might not be that guy.” While representing some of the same anti-establishment sentiments in the UK, Nigel Farage is rarely seen without a pint in his hand. Rob Lawson said: “There’s no one more establishment than Nigel Farage and yet they seem to have convinced people that they are against the establishment, where actually they’re just in it for themselves, much more so than the people campaigning for Remain.”
Mitchell Goldie has been involved in campaigns to leave the EU since the age of 12. He was a ground campaign assistant for Vote Leave. While Mitchell agrees that Nigel Farage says things which are “not put in a politically correct way”, he thinks he was always a vital part of the push to leave the EU. He said: “From the start, Nigel Farage and UKIP were needed in the campaign to bring out the core vote, the people who were going to vote to Leave anyway. Without them, we wouldn’t have had a referendum and we wouldn’t have left.”
The Vote Leave campaign was very concerned with how, and even if, they were going to talk about immigration in the months leading up to the referendum. Anthony Wells said: “Vote Leave initially didn’t want to talk about immigration because it would be toxic and worry voters who didn’t want to be seen as bigoted and racist.”
Mitchell argues Vote Leave was used to “move away from the stigma which is attached to leaving the European Union, that you’re a racist, which is mostly fuelled by some of Nigel Farage’s comments”. However, Mitchell agrees that the benefits of “The Nigel” didn’t come without problems. He said: “Some of his divisive stuff nearly lost us the referendum, such as his poster.” A week before the referendum, Nigel Farage unveiled a poster depicting hundreds of Syrian refugees on the move in Slovenia, with the words “BREAKING POINT. The EU has failed us all.” The poster was reported to the police for inciting racial hatred and compared to Nazi propaganda. But it was when Vote Leave started to talk about immigration that they moved ahead in the polls. On 1 June last year polls showed a jump from a ten-point lead for Remain to a 4-point lead for Leave. Strategist Sir Lynton Crosby credited the lead for Leave to the increased focus on immigration.
Anthony Wells said: “Nigel Farage does speak about immigration in a way that to some people comes across as not being quite right, but immigration ended up being one of the major things that drove people to vote to leave.” Some argue xenophobia is being normalized. According to the National Police Chiefs Council, hate crime rose by 58 percent in the week after the vote to leave the European Union last June. The election of Donald Trump to the US presidency had a similar effect.
David Kurten is one of two London Assembly Members for Ukip. He said: “While a small number of people may have been swayed by personalities, I think that most people made their minds up on the issues which are far deeper and more long-lasting than mere personalities.” But Kurten still admits that Nigel played a huge part. He said: “Nigel Farage was a huge figure in British politics and a strong and charismatic leader.” Members of UKIP want to believe there’s a future for the party post-Nigel, now with working-class scouser Paul Nuttall as leader.
David Kurten believes that although only ten Labour MPs came out in support of Brexit, compared to 108 Conservatives, a lot of traditional Labour voters turned the tide for the Leave campaign. He said: “The Labour party is now utterly out of touch with ordinary working voters who traditionally supported the party. The leadership of the Labour party is largely a metropolitan clique more concerned with political correctness than representing patriotic working voters who voted for Brexit in very large numbers.” Hopefully, for Ukip, Paul Nuttall will soon be just “Paul” with traditional Labour voters as well as those who will forever miss the one and only Nigel.
Data sets obtained by BreXrated from writetothem.com showing MPs’ responsiveness to constituency mail revealed that popular MPs weren’t those who engaged more. One of the most popular Leave campaigners, Boris Johnson, only responded to 19 percent of constituency mail, and Michael Gove only responded to 33 percent. Theresa May only attended 57 percent of votes in the House of Commons last year while Johnson and Gove attended 72 and 81 percent respectively. On the other hand, May responded to 58 percent of constituency mail, more than twice as much as Boris Johnson.
The data suggest that Michael Gove and Boris Johnson prioritize going to votes and sounding off over answering people who write to them. It’s not surprising that the two people who were among the most prolific campaigners during those vital weeks in June prefer going to the Commons where one can shout at Right Honourables at the benches opposite, rather than responding to Mrs. Cunningsworth’s email about her sick cat.
Dr. Renwick argues feelings of hatred and affection have become more important in recent elections. He said: “I think a lot of people are very angry and feel that they have been excluded from politics for quite a long time. In that context, an emotional appeal can play quite prominently.”
Michael Gove kept pushing the point that the British people were tired of experts and when one has grown tired of those who usually bring you factual statements, emotional appeals are the only thing left. Boris appealed for people to believe in a Britain outside of the EU and Nigel appealed for people to not believe in anything that wasn’t British. It all worked surprisingly well.
Gustaf Kilander 