100,000 people took part in demonstration to support new Brexit referendum
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At least 100,000 people took to the streets yesterday as part of the largest ever demonstration of support for a new referendum over Britain’s final Brexit deal.
With more businesses poised to issue dire Brexit warnings this week and senior Tories already drawing up plans to soften Theresa May’s exit proposals, organisers of the march on Sunday said it showed Britain’s departure from the European Union was not a “done deal”.
A former aide to Margaret Thatcher, several Labour MPs and pro-EU campaigners from across Britain took part in the demonstration, marking two years since the Brexit vote. Organisers said that people from every region and walk of life were among those who took part in the march down Whitehall.
People’s Vote campaigners said this represented a shift in their lobbying away from Westminster and towards building public support for a second referendum.
They are planning a “summer of action” with events across the country designed to foster opposition to Brexit and put pressure on the government to give the public more of a say.
MPs are expected to vote on the final Brexit deal in the autumn, with the government having repeatedly insisted that leaving the EU without a withdrawal agreement remains a possibility.
The march comes as a survey of voters found some 48 per cent wanted a referendum on the final deal, against 25 per cent who did not want another vote.
Conservative supporters marched alongside Labour voters and Liberal Democrats during the protest, which saw angry denunciations of the chaos that has ensued inside government since the Brexit vote. Labour’s leadership also came under pressure at the march for refusing to back a second public vote. There were chants of “Where’s Jeremy Corbyn” from the crowd. The Labour leader was on a visit to a Palestinian refugee camp.
Based on The Independent, Sky, BBC and The Guardian.
