Brexiteers favour closer ties with the EU, poll suggests

Keir Starmer is being pushed to have more ambition in his Brexit relations reset with the EU after new polling suggested voters – even Brexiteers – now support reversing large parts of the UK’s departure from the bloc.

- DAVID MADDOX KATE DEVLIN

The survey of 9,278 voters was commissioned by the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR). The YouGov and DataPraxis survey of six European countries (France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Poland and Spain) is the most comprehensive poll of public attitudes towards UK-EU relations since 2016.

In the UK it found that British citizens are reluctant to follow America’s lead during a second Trump presidency, and a majority – including many Brexit-voting citizens – now favour a “closer” relationship with the European Union for the coming period. The polling suggested that Brexit-era divisions within Britain have abated, with both Leavers and Remainers now prepared to countenance free movement in exchange for a stronger economic relationship with the EU.

Meanwhile, among Europeans, there is an openness to granting the UK “special access” to the EU single market and access to the bloc’s research programmes, in exchange for deeper security cooperation.