Just three in ten Britons now say that it was right for the UK to vote to leave the EU, according to a new poll published on the eve of Brexit’s fifth anniversary.
Three in ten, or 30%, is the lowest proportion of the public saying that Britain was right to vote to leave since polling organisation YouGov began asking the question in the aftermath of the 2016 referendum.
It compares to 55% who say it was wrong for the country to vote for Brexit in 2016.
Britain officially left the European Union on 31 January 2020, following the 2016 referendum won by “Leave” on a margin of 52% to 48%.
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Five years on, new YouGov research has found that one in six Leave voters (18%) now say that it was wrong for Britain to choose to leave the EU.
66% still say Britain made the right decision.
From YouGov: Belief that Britain was right to vote to leave the EU falls to a new low of 30%
— Josh Self (@josh-self.bsky.social) 2025-01-29T11:02:54.121Z
Just 7% of “Remainers” now think it was right for the UK to leave, compared to 88% who still think a vote for Brexit was wrong, according to YouGov’s polling.
Three-quarters of 18-24 year olds (75%), who were unable to vote in the 2016 referendum, say that Britain was wrong to vote to leave the EU. That is against one in ten (10%) who say the UK made the right choice.
More than six in ten Britons (62%) say that Brexit has so far been more of a failure, versus 11% who feel that it has been more of a success.
20% of Britons consider it to be neither a success nor failure.
Leave voters are more likely to consider Brexit to have gone badly than well, with 32% labelling it more of a failure so far, compared to 22% describing it as more of a success. Four in ten Leave voters (38%) see Britain’s exit from the EU to have been neither a success nor a failure.
87% of Remain voters say Brexit has been a failure, with just 3% believing Brexit to have been a success.
Josh Self is Editor of Politics.co.uk, follow him on Bluesky here.
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