Predecessor | Britain Stronger in Europe |
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Headquarters | Millbank Tower, 21–24 Millbank, London, England, SW1P 4QP |
Owner | PV Campaign Ltd (aka: Baybridge 2019 Limited) (75%) [1] |
Executive Director |
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Chairperson | Roland Rudd [2] |
Directors |
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Affiliations | People's Vote |
Website | www |
Part of a series of articles on |
Brexit |
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Withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union ContentsGlossary of terms |
Open Britain is a British pro-European Union campaign group set up in the aftermath of the 2016 European Union referendum. [7]
Following the referendum, the official remain group in the 2016 EU referendum, Britain Stronger in Europe, changed its name on 25 August 2016 to Open Britain. [8]
Open Britain defines itself as campaigning for the United Kingdom to be open and inclusive, open for business, open to trade and investment, open to talent and hard work, open to Europe and to the world. [9] It originally campaigned for Britain to remain in the Single Market as part of the outcome of the Brexit negotiations. [10]
In October 2016, Open Britain launched a 'Write to Remain' letter-writing campaign directed at Theresa May asking her to guarantee the right of EU nationals to stay in the UK. [11]
The individuals involved in the campaign group include former Ministers Pat McFadden (Labour) and Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat). [12] Conservatives Anna Soubry, Nicky Morgan, and Dominic Grieve cut their ties with Open Britain in April 2017 after it began to campaign against the re-election of anti-EU members of parliament, mostly Conservatives. [13]
Open Britain continues to campaign in collaboration with other major pro-European campaign groups such as Britain for Europe and European Movement UK. It launched and promotes People's Vote in April 2018 to campaign for a second referendum. [14] [15]
In October 2019, shortly before the 2019 general election, CEO James McGrory was forced out [2] of People's Vote and Open Britain. Almost all the directors resigned. As the lead organisation behind the People's Vote campaign, this led to a major staff walkout in protest at Roland Rudd's, the Chairperson's, actions.
In 2022 Open Britain began a campaign called 'Stop The Rot' promising "Enough is Enough - Johnson Must Go Join the #StopTheRot Summer of Action". [16] [ better source needed ]. The campaign to remove Boris Johnson was backed by 'Fairvote UK' and 'Let's Take Back Control Ltd' run by campaigner Kyle Gregory Taylor, a former candidate for the Advance Together party in the 2019 general election. [17]
The European Movement UK is an independent all-party pressure group in the United Kingdom which campaigns for a close relationship with the European Union, and to ensure that European values, standards, and rights are upheld in British law post-Brexit. It is part of the European Movement International which pushes for a "democratic, federal, enlarged European Union". It is the most prominent pro-Europe group in Britain.
On 23 June 2016, a referendum took place in the United Kingdom (UK) and Gibraltar to ask the electorate whether the country should remain a member of, or leave, the European Union (EU). The result was to leave, triggering calls to begin the process of the country's withdrawal from the EU commonly termed "Brexit".
Brexit was the withdrawal of the United Kingdom (UK) from the European Union (EU). Following a referendum held on 23 June 2016, Brexit officially took place at 23:00 GMT on 31 January 2020. The UK is the only sovereign country to have withdrawn from the EU. The UK had been a member state of the EU or its predecessor, the European Communities (EC), since 1 January 1973. Following Brexit, EU law and the Court of Justice of the European Union no longer have primacy over British laws. The European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 retains relevant EU law as domestic law, which the UK can amend or repeal.
Arron Fraser Andrew Banks is a British businessman and political donor. He is the co-founder of the Leave.EU campaign. Banks was previously one of the largest donors to the UK Independence Party (UKIP) and helped Nigel Farage's campaign for Britain to leave the EU.
The 2019 European Parliament election was the United Kingdom's component of the 2019 European Parliament election. It was held on Thursday 23 May 2019 and the results announced on Sunday 26 and Monday 27 May 2019, after all the other EU countries had voted. This was the United Kingdom's final participation in a European Parliament election before leaving the European Union on 31 January 2020, and was also the last election to be held under the provisions of the European Parliamentary Elections Act 2002 before its repeal under the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 and was the first European election in the United Kingdom to be held on a day that did not coincide with any local elections since 1999. This was the first of two national elections that would be held in the United Kingdom in 2019 with the 2019 general election being held six months later in December 2019.
Vote Leave was a campaigning organisation that supported a "Leave" vote in the 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum. On 13 April 2016 it was designated by the Electoral Commission as the official campaign in favour of leaving the European Union in the Referendum.
Britain Stronger in Europe was an advocacy group which campaigned in favour of the United Kingdom's continued membership of the European Union in the 2016 British referendum. It was launched at the Old Truman Brewery in London on 12 October 2015, and declared as the official "Remain" campaign for the referendum by the Electoral Commission on 13 April 2016.
Labour Leave is a Eurosceptic campaign group in the United Kingdom. The group is unofficially affiliated with the Labour Party, and campaigned for the United Kingdom to vote to withdraw from the European Union, in the June 2016 EU Referendum. The group was led by eurosceptic Labour MPs: Graham Stringer, Kelvin Hopkins, and Roger Godsiff.
A number of politicians, public figures, newspapers and magazines, businesses and other organisations endorsed either the United Kingdom remaining in the EU or the United Kingdom leaving the EU during the 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum.
Campaigning in the United Kingdom European Union membership referendum began unofficially on 20 February 2016 when Prime Minister David Cameron formally announced under the terms of the European Union Referendum Act 2015 that a referendum would be held on the issue of the United Kingdom's membership of the European Union. The official campaign period for the 2016 referendum ran from 15 April 2016 until the day of the poll on 23 June 2016.
After the British EU membership referendum held on 23 June 2016, in which a majority voted to leave the European Union, the United Kingdom experienced political and economic upsets, with spillover effects across the rest of the European Union and the wider world. Prime Minister David Cameron, who had campaigned for Remain, announced his resignation on 24 June, triggering a Conservative leadership election, won by Home Secretary Theresa May. Following Leader of the Opposition Jeremy Corbyn's loss of a motion of no confidence among the Parliamentary Labour Party, he also faced a leadership challenge, which he won. Nigel Farage stepped down from leadership of the pro-Leave party UKIP in July. After the elected party leader resigned, Farage then became the party's interim leader on 5 October until Paul Nuttall was elected leader on 28 November.
Best for Britain is a civil society campaign formed of researchers, data scientists, strategists, and activists who say that they are working to fix "the problems Britain faces after Brexit". Originally launched on 26 April 2017 to stop Brexit and continue the UK's membership of the European Union (EU), the organisation's aim since 2021 has been strengthening UK-EU ties as well as protecting democratic rights within the UK.
Russian interference in the 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum is a debated subject and remains unproven, though multiple sources argue evidence exists demonstrating that the Russian government attempted to influence British public opinion in favour of leaving the European Union. Investigations into this subject have been undertaken by the UK Electoral Commission, the UK Parliament's Culture Select Committee and Intelligence and Security Committee, and the United States Senate. "The Russia Report" published by the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament in July 2020 did not specifically address the Brexit campaign, but it concluded that Russian interference in UK politics is commonplace. It also found substantial evidence that there had been interference in the 2014 Scottish independence referendum.
The European Research Group (ERG) is a research support group and caucus of Eurosceptic Conservative Members of Parliament of the United Kingdom. In a Financial Times article in 2020, the journalist Sebastian Payne described the ERG as "the most influential [research group] in recent political history".
Since the United Kingdom's vote to leave the European Union in the 2016 referendum, a number of demonstrations have taken place and organisations formed whose goal has been to oppose, reverse or otherwise impede that decision.
People's Vote was a United Kingdom campaign group that unsuccessfully campaigned for a second referendum following the UK's Brexit vote to leave the European Union (EU) in 2016. The group was launched in April 2018 at which four Members of Parliament spoke, along with the actor Patrick Stewart and other public figures.
A referendum on the Brexit withdrawal agreement, also referred to as a "second referendum", a "rerun", a "people's vote", or a "confirmatory public vote", was proposed by a number of politicians and pressure groups as a way to break the deadlock during the 2017–19 Parliament surrounding the meaningful vote on the Brexit deal.
Several allegations of unlawful campaigning in the 2016 EU referendum have been made. Some allegations were dismissed by the investigating bodies, but in other cases wrongdoing was established, leading to the imposition of penalties. Sanctions have included the levying of the maximum fine possible on Facebook for breaches of data privacy.
Brexit was the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union at 23:00 GMT on 31 January 2020. As of 2020, the UK is the only member state to have left the EU. Britain entered the predecessor to the EU, the European Communities (EC), on 1 January 1973. Following this, Eurosceptic groups grew in popularity in the UK, opposing aspects of both the EC and the EU. As Euroscepticism increased during the early 2010s, Prime Minister David Cameron delivered a speech in January 2013 at Bloomberg London, in which he called for reform of the EU and promised an in–out referendum on the UK's membership if the Conservative Party won a majority at the 2015 general election. The Conservatives won 330 seats at the election, giving Cameron a majority of 12, and a bill to hold a referendum was introduced to Parliament that month.
"Why the Government Believes That Voting to Remain in the European Union is the Best Decision for the UK" was a one-off pamphlet created in April 2016 by the government of the United Kingdom. The leaflet was created in anticipation of the United Kingdom European Union membership referendum in June, which would ask the British public whether the UK should leave the EU. After internal polling revealed that 85 per cent of the public wanted more information before making their decision, Prime Minister David Cameron announced that the government would send a leaflet to households across the UK, explaining why remaining in the EU was the best choice for the UK. The leaflets were paid for by British taxpayers at a cost of £9.3 million, and were delivered across the UK in two waves: the first to households in England, and the second to households in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.