What next after Victory?

So, the Leavers won the contest, with a huge shock for the Political establishment both here and in Europe.

I was watching the proceedings last night until about 1am, so I got to see Gibraltar and the Newcastle results in real-time. I was a bit surprised that Gibraltar got a vote and thought the 38,000 votes they cast for remain might actually swing it, especially as the Newcastle result showed the smallest of margins for Remain.

Then the bombshell of the Sunderland vote struck home, wiping out the Remain lead in one single shell burst.

The looks on the commentator's faces was one I will remember for a while. The look of stunned shock, surprise and a quiet contemplation that the status quo was about to end. Jeremy Vine did his best to point out that Sunderland may be an aberration, that things were more likely to be as close as the Newcastle vote. But then a couple more results started to trickle in and the commentators took a breath as the swing went back to remain initially and then oh lordy, it went blue for Leave and mostly stayed there.

At that point, just after 1am I went to bed, hoping that Leave would carry the night and it did. I woke up with only 3 results to go and by that time it was clear that Leave had won.

A big two fingers up to unelected Eurocrats, a raspberry for our own political leaders who privately and quietly want to leave when not in the spotlight, but campaign for remain when pushed front and centre. To be honest neither party leader has covered themselves with glory during the referendum debate.

So, the fall out has already begun. David Cameron has resigned, when he didn't need to. He could have waited at least until after the weekend to reflect and then after a decent and considered pause, offer his resignation. Instead seemingly like a petulant child he has thrown his toys out of the pram and gone. Fair play to him, but it does look like he's done it with indecent haste.

But I respect the decision, he thinks he's not the man to negotiate our extraction from the EU. Hopefully the baton will pas on to someone with a more robust negotiating style and with a robust negotiating team.

Jeremy Corbyn has failed to fall on his sword, espousing that Labour is the party to take Britain forward after Brexit. Not sure how that works, but I'm sure in Jezza's brain the fact he chops and changes his stance on just about everything and talks a load of bollocks makes him a superstar political negotiator. His failure to resign has prompted a vote of no confidence. I've a feeling it has a good chance of working as even his most loyal supporters are growing weary of the immature bollocks he keeps spouting. Clean broom and all that, let's have a proper Eurosceptic in the labour top seat.

Earlier on I did wonder about UKIP. This would be an ideal time fro them to rebrand as the people's party and start to do the same for UK politics as they did for Europe. At least the voter will have an anti-establishment vote and without Europe UKIP will no longer be able to be called a one-trick pony. It will give the Leavers a local voice. There's a whole groundswell of feeling that the little guy is sticking it to the big guys to be tapped. We'll see, but I very much doubt that Nigel and his supporters will fade into the background.

So, the public have spoken, heads are rolling and hopefully we'll get the political realignment that actually puts us, the British voters first.