Three years after the United Kingdom largely left the European Union, Britons who voted to leave are right to feel betrayed by the Conservative Party’s mismanagement, which has repeatedly refused to deliver on the promise and potential of Brexit.
Thousands of Brexit supporters gathered in Parliament Square on January 31, 2020, for an unofficial — the British government had declined to hold a celebratory event — celebration of the UK’s departure from the EU.
Brexit leader Nigel Farage welcomed the crowds, reflecting on both the “euphoria” of the day and his disappointment now, three years later, with a Conservative party in power that never wanted Brexit and has done nothing to help it since.
Mr Farage noted that the United Kingdom is free to be self-governing and make its own decisions, but that the government was abusing that freedom.
Mr Farage said in a message to supporters that how border control was developing was a clear acid test for Brexit.
Speaking to the camera, he reflected on the United Kingdom’s appalling open-borders situation, despite the British public consistently voting for parties or causes that speak the language of border control for over a decade.
“…the reason we got the Brexit result in the first place was control of our borders. We’d seen immigration, population rises, pressures on wages, school places, housing, GP appointments, on a level people had never before conceived.
Last year, net migration was 500,000, legal immigration 1.2 million, and 45,000 crossed the English Channel… with Brexit, the message was we could stop this happening to our country and it hasn’t. I think it’s fair to say three years on for those millions of people who voted primarily to get back control of our borders, to get immigration numbers down. What this Conservative government delivered is nothing short of a betrayal.”