alt Hacker NewsIf I recall correctly, the Brexit referendum wasn't binding either. When the result ended up the way it did, there was sufficient political capital to push it through without a follow up vote.
If I recall correctly, the Brexit referendum wasn't binding either. When the result ended up the way it did, there was sufficient political capital to push it through without a follow up vote.
The Brexit referendum was non-binding for important constitutional reasons.
Legally, leaving required an Act of Parliament. To hold a binding referendum, they would have had to pass an Act that says "here are the exact details of how we'll leave the EU, coming into force if the referendum passes".
But that would have required them to figure out all the exact details of what it means to leave the EU, and they didn't bother - they just held the referendum and assumed they could figure out the details later if Leave won, which they didn't expect would happen.
We all saw how well that worked out.
> there was sufficient political capital to push it through without a follow up vote.
This seriously overstates how smoothly things went between 23/6/2016 and 31/1/2020