Month: January 2019

Brexit – how would you vote now?

In the 2016 EU referendum Hertsmere, which is Radlett’s electoral district, voted Leave by a small margin. In an opinion poll we took just before the referendum, you voted Remain, by an equally small margin.

In our opinion poll we asked exactly the question that we knew we’d all be answering in the referendum itself (and we added a ‘don’t know’ option because you don’t get one of those in the polling booth).

Although, like all web site polls, it wasn’t at all scientific, we did get a reasonably good sample: 361 people (or about 5% of the Radlett electorate) participated. The end result was a small majority for Remain. Dividing ‘don’t knows’ equally across the two referendum responses gives us a result of 50.7% Remain to 49.3% Leave. Given the profile of the area, that doesn’t seem implausible.

Radlett Wire EU referendum poll results graphic
Results of our pre-referendum opinion poll.

The wider polling district, Hertsmere, voted Leave by 50.8% to 49.2%. We also subsequently learnt that neighbouring Shenley had actually voted Remain – by a margin of 51.78% to 48.22% so that might also serve to confirm the validity of our poll.

So, two months before Britain legally leaves the European Union (whatever the deal), how would you vote now? Click the survey button and answer our two referendum questions (it’s entirely anonymous). We’ll share the results here and on our social media accounts.

Oyster cards at the ready

Number 41On 30 November last year, Oliver Dowden, our MP, announced on his web site that he’d secured a promise from the Department of Transport that the Oyster scheme would be extended to Radlett and Potters Bar (both in his constituency, of course – but the extension will also take in St Albans and go out all the way to Luton Airport). This is, of course, unreservedly good news. It’ll make it easier and cheaper to get into town and it’ll give commuters an alternative to costly season tickets.

But – forgive us – we’re sceptical. We’ve heard this before (in 2016, for instance). In fact we’ve heard it several times before. And on each occasion, of course, it’s not actually happened. Our MP is presenting this as a ‘victory’ and the Minister has apparently promised that it will happen this year (2019) but, having followed this story for years, now, we’re going to believe it when we see it. And, in the meantime, we’re going to run a countdown on our Twitter account. Or rather a count-up. It’s been 41 days since we heard that Oyster is coming to Radlett. We’ll keep counting until it actually arrives. Let’s see how long it takes.