Abstract:

If EU immigration had remained at its 1991 level, the Leave vote share may have been considerably lower. That is one of the conclusions of CEP research by Monica Langella and Professor Alan Manning, which explores the effects of the demographic and industrial composition of local areas on the share of the Leave vote. Their study finds that while individual demographics were a key influence on the Leave vote, so too were characteristics of local areas. They conclude that politics, immigration and the decline of manufacturing all played a role in the referendum outcome.