I have not discussed this subject much, despite is being around now for six years. I have seen and heard both sides of the argument, the hatred and name calling. The fierce fight between the two factions to be vindicated in their choices and decisions. To make sure it is used at every possible chance for a slur, put down or justification for something. I don’t know how others genuinely think or feel about it, apart from my own family. So like my other posts, I will share my thoughts and opinion on it.

I voted to leave the EU. During my adult voting life I have not stuck to one party, having voted Tory, Labour and Lib Dem in my time. Depending on which candidate was purporting to be able to implement the right changes the the area, community and country that were needed at the time. We pick ‘the best of a bad bunch’ as they say. But for Brexit, it was different, there were foreign policies to understand and way more material to digest than for previous votes. I tried my best to be informed, I watched the news like everyone else, trying to gauge the for and against arguments. I felt a heavy weight with that vote – I knew it was important and would change many things, but I felt that in the right hands, it would be the best for this country. I spoke to my grandpa to ask him about pre EU Britain and to get another opinion from someone who was there and paid attention at the time. I won’t lie, I was influenced by others, the media and what I thought I knew.

I had lived in Germany and Cyrpus and visited France, Switzerland, Turkey and Holland by that point, so thought I had a good grasp and experience of where and what we were discussing. Turns out you can never know enough when making decisions for millions of people. And after we voted to leave and it was decided, I moved to Spain, for a chance to experience what had been available for decades and was about to be taken away. I did feel sad for what we had done, but it also still felt like the right thing to do. I spent two years in Spain, then came back to the UK, knowing it couldn’t work out and it had a deadline.

Now, in retrospect and with hindsight, I would have still voted to leave, but wished it would have happened so much sooner, with better preparation and to be done in grown up way. The idea of the EU being a friendly group of countries helping each others was just that, an idea and a fanstasy that never came to fruition, just no-one wanted to admit it. Instead it was hijacked from the very start to be a controlling force over European countries, to make them ‘fall in line’ and be puppeteered. We were all misinformed and are being led by grossly incompetant people who want money and power and are being led by their ego, not by common sense. So it was never going to work.

But it has made me realise how little I really knew about it all before I voted. My own fault, the information was there and readily available, I could have been better informed, would the result have been different for me? No. But I would have understood the consequences and implications of it a bit better. I don’t deride anyone for their vote or decisions, and realise that was part of it from the beginning, to make sure we are split by opinions and keep both sides fighting, because while we were busy being distracted by that, something else was neatly wheeled in to take over.

(c) K Wicks