Morning vigil of tranquility turned into a day of shocks

I got up just before dawn in Beijing to watch the BBC's coverage of the EU Referendum decision with a cup of Twinings English breakfast tea at hand.

All seemed becalmed. David Dimbleby, a reassuring presence who has been an anchor of all the broadcaster's election programs since Margaret Thatcher's election victory in 1979, was discussing the latest opinion poll and market, betting that both were forecasting a win for Remain.

Then the result from Newcastle-upon-Tyne came in and just did not quite fit with the expected outcome.

Within a few hours, not only had Britain decided to leave the European Union, but David Cameron - looking evermore like a latter day Lord North, the prime minister who lost the American colonies - had also announced his decision to resign as prime minister.

The outcome confounded my view that in UK elections you could always trust the British people to come up with a common sense judgment, whether you agreed with it or not.

All the evidence, particularly from economists, the business community and trade unionists, pointed overwhelmingly toward Remain. The economy was performing well, and part of that success was acting as a bridge for foreign investment from countries such as China into the European Union. So why?

I recently returned from a two-week trip to Britain, where I interviewed leading figures on both sides of the debate. I also spent time speaking with more ordinary people, including friends and family. What surprised me was the way many people were actually trying to work out how to vote, as if they had been set an exam or a puzzle. They seemed to have no previous view at all on EU membership until the referendum.

My mother asked me how she should vote. I replied that if she did not know, then the only sensible decision was to stick with the status quo.

On one occasion, at a lunch at a garden center (not for me the high table of Oxford colleges or London clubs), my visiting cousin, whom you would have thought something of an internationalist since she is given to cruising around the world, surprised the rest of us by outing herself as an "outer".

She said we needed our country back and that we would soon be overrun with Turks, even though Turkey's accession to the EU is still only a remote possibility. The rest of us - pragmatic rather than passionate "remainers" - were taken aback.

With the vote being 52 percent to 48 percent, there must have been many other families and households similarly divided on the issue.

With stock markets globally - notably the European bourses as well as London - and the pound plummeting, many now may be asking themselves what they have done.

Many factors other than EU membership have fed into the decision, including fears of immigration, loss of identity, stagnant incomes and a wish to simply protest.

It is an outcome, though, that sees a country facing a significant crisis after otherwise doing well and just looking forward to Wimbledon.

Contact the writer at andrewmoody@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 07/02/2016 page10)