EU Referendum


EU referendum: at last they notice


29/04/2014



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Even to this day, one tends to think they know more than they actually do. So, when we've been banging on since 12 March about the "inners" outstripping the "outers" in the EU referendum poll, having written several other pieces on the theme, right up to early April, we were under the impression that the bubble-dwellers knew this as well.

But we should never underestimate their ignorance. Despite the trend being well established, with the latest YouGov showing 40-37 in favour of the "inners", only now does Iain Martin pop up, bleating: "one opinion poll finding seems to have been all but overlooked. Eagle-eyed George Trefgarne spotted it this morning".

"YouGov for The Sunday Times yesterday", bleats Martin:
… asked voters how they would vote in the event of a referendum on the UK's membership of the EU. Despite the country being, according to Ukippers, on the brink of a revolution which will bring down the entire political Establishment and liberate Britain from the LibLabCon tyranny, the numbers suggest that Britain wants to stay in the EU.
So, it's taken him nearly seven weeks to wake up to the fact that the tide is changing. And during that time, we've had dozens of articles about UKIP, and not one of these perspicacious commentators has picked up the contrast between an apparent increase in support for UKIP and the decline in support for leaving the EU. How good does that make them?

Mind you, there is no real incentive for these idle hacks even to bother. When Martin's tardy discovery is on its way to generating 3,000 comments, he is pulling in quite enough traffic to keep his masters happy with advertising click-throughs. There is obviously no premium in getting there seven weeks earlier.

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