02/07/2016 Reporters

Welcome to this special edition of Reporters.

I'm James Reynolds, here at the European Union

in Brussels, as Britain deals with the fallout from its historic

referendum result to leave the EU.

We have got a range of reports from our correspondents

across Europe about what the vote means for the future of Britain

and also the future of the EU.

Coming up:

Europe without Britain.

EU leaders meet for the first time in more than 40 years

without the UK.

But there are angry clashes in the European Parliament.

I said that I wanted to lead a campaign to get Britain to leave

the European Union.

You all laughed at me.

Well, I have to say, you're not laughing now, are you?

I ask Mr Farage, if you had an ounce of decency in you,

you would apologise today to the British.

Shame on you.

Hurray, hurray, we're out today.

A divided nation.

Mark Easton examines the social and generational splits behind

the referendum result.

I think it's gone too far.

I think the country's gone too far.

I think the country will never be the same again.

I really feel really ashamed of my country at the moment.

So, yeah, yeah, it's really sad.

As Sinn Fein calls for a poll on Irish unity, Fergal Keane reports

from what will become the United Kingdom's land border

with the EU on concerns for the Northern Ireland peace process.

You just take your country back.

Take our country back.

It's not racism.

They are just coming across too much.

Race and the referendum.

Ed Thomas investigates reports of a rise in cases of abuse

and hatred towards immigrants, following the poll.

And a message from the millennials.

Europe's youth tell the EU what they think

about Britain's exit.

Britain, come back!

If last week's Brexit vote was, as some have called it,

the most seismic result in generations, then this week

came the after-shocks.

The battle for David Cameron's job, turmoil in the opposition

Labour Party, and Britain's exclusion from an EU

meeting for the first time in more than 40 years.

These were all some of the highlights.

But perhaps the most memorable exchanges of all came from a special

session of the European Parliament to discuss the referendum result.

Damian Grammaticas reports now on the reaction of Europe's

politicians to the UK's decision to leave.

Across town from where Europe's leaders were meeting,

a British winner in Brussels today.

Nigel Farage, preparing to savour his moment of triumph over

the EU and its institutions.

The president of the commission, Jean-Claude Juncker,

banned his staff from having any negotiations with British officials

until the UK gives notice it is exiting the union.

Now, after staying silent throughout the referendum,

Europe's politicians held little back.

The worst liars can be found among Ukip.

On Friday...

APPLAUSE.

On Friday, Nigel Farage said publicly that the promised

?350 million a week would finally not go to the National Health

Service.

It had all been a lie.

I ask Mr Farage, if you had an ounce of decency in you,

you would apologise today to the British.

Shame on you.

APPLAUSE.

Most here are, of course, believers in Europe's project,

shocked by the outcome and also by the tone

of Britain's referendum debate.

What makes it so hard for me and I think also for the other

groups' leaders and for everybody here in this house is

the way it succeeded.

The absolute negative campaign.

The posters of Mr Farage, showing refugees like in Nazi

propaganda because they...

APPLAUSE.

He replied with scorn of his own.

I know that virtually none of you have ever done

a proper job in your lives.

APPLAUSE.

The chamber had to be called to order.

The reason you are so angry has been perfectly clear from all the angry

exchanges this morning.

You as a political project are in denial.

You are in denial that your currency is failing.

That drew jeers but some shared Nigel Farage's views.

TRANSLATION: Our British friends' vote in favour of leaving

the European Union is by far the most important event

in our continent since the fall of the Berlin Wall.

It is a signal of freedom sent out to the entire world.

Then came this, an impassioned Scottish plea to Europe.

My colleagues, there are a lot of things to be negotiated.

We will need cool heads and warm hearts.

But please, remember this, Scotland did not let you down.

Please, I beg you, chers collegues, do not let Scotland down now.

The ovation a sign that sentiment now has considerable sympathy here.

For Nigel Farage, this is the culmination of a lifetime's

political project, to get the UK out of the EU.

What we heard from the European side is they want talks now to begin

as soon as possible and there will be, they say,

no favours, no cherry-picking by Britain in those.

Damian Grammaticas, BBC News, Brussels.

Divisions in the European Parliament, there, reflecting

the divisions exposed within the UK itself.

Northern Ireland and Scotland voted to remain.

But England and Wales chose to leave.

Of the nine English regions, only London voted to stay.

Mark Easton has been looking at the results and what they reveal

about the country's social and generational divides.

Peterborough has Anglo-Saxon roots, a cathedral city on the edge

of England's fenlands, that voted decisively

to leave the European Union.

Since the enlargement of the EU in 2004, this city has seen

the arrival of some 15,000 Eastern and Central European migrants,

helping fuel an economic boom in the city but also putting

pressure on public services and perhaps most fundamentally

of all, changing the character of this ancient English settlement.

Hurray, hurray, we are out today.

People here are excited about Brexit, optimistic that

leaving the EU means a better Britain, with more homes...

I might be able to get accommodation that has been given to a refugee.

More opportunity...

English people will be able to get more jobs.

More control...

We want our own borders back and we can make our own laws.

And a better life.

Now should be a bank holiday, Independence Day.

On Peterborough's Lincoln Road, where the EU arrivals have set up

businesses and put down roots, one quickly gets a sense

of the resentment that immigration has spawned.

This might help explain why Peterborough voted Leave,

a traditional English bakery, closed after 136 years and why?

Well, people tend to blame something that has happened two doors down,

a shiny new Polish delicatessen.

The three generations that ran the shop, it traded

for over 100 years.

I think it's gone too far.

I think the country's gone too far.

I think the country will never be the same again.

But we can only hope that we can put a stop to that and perhaps rebuild

it a little bit better.

Just 40 miles south, a city of similar size with a very

different view of Brexit.

Cambridge voted by almost three to one in favour of Remain.

Its economy is international.

Its population thinks globally.

At the city's station, there's a multistorey bicycle park.

This is a young, energetic, highly-educated place that sees

Europe not as a threat but an opportunity.

Today, for many, is a dark day.

I really, feel really ashamed of my country at the moment.

So, yeah, yeah, it's really sad.

It's incredibly depressing.

The world fragmenting is not a world I want to live in.

I'm the founder of a company in this area that has attracted

lots of investment and employs 70 people in Cambridge

and people worldwide.

We will be seriously thinking about moving on from there.

I don't know what to say.

Just need to see what's going to happen.

Do you feel very nervous about it now, as somebody from Italy?

I think I still need to realise what happened!

Britain finds itself deeply divided.

Optimism and pessimism swirl like counter-currents

in the same stream.

Successful navigation will require cool heads and skilled hands.

Mark Easton, BBC News, Cambridge.

Scotland voted to remain and its First Minister,

Nicola Sturgeon, has said she will do everything possible

to prevent Scotland from being forced out of the EU.

Britain's decision to get out has sent shockwaves across the Republic

of Ireland, the only country to share a land border with the UK.

And as Fergal Keane reports, it raises the controversial question

as to whether or not border controls may have to return between Northern

Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

The army used to call this "bandit country", The borderlands

of South Armagh.

When I reported here during the Troubles,

it was a place of blocked roads...

You can't come down this way, no.

The road is closed.

Of ambushes and watchtowers.

But political compromise and EU money helped to change

the landscape.

The guns vanished.

The security bases closed.

Thanks to the peace process, the physical manifestations,

the huge security presence along the border is no longer necessary.

But because of Brexit, the Irish Republic now becomes this

country's land border with Europe, with unknown political

and economic implications.

The Republican dead are still invoked to support Sinn Fein's

campaign for a united Ireland.

Today, the party seized on the Brexit vote to say the time

had come for a border referendum.

Roisin Mulgrew is a local politician and businesswoman.

We have always felt that as a 32-county Ireland,

we are stronger.

We can attract investors.

That is what people need to sit down and really look at it.

So it is an economic rather than a nationalist argument?

It's both.

Close to the border, Protestant farmer Roy Harper has

bitter memories of the Troubles.

Ten of his neighbours were killed in a sectarian massacre nearby.

Prosperity and peace should have made him a natural Remain voter

but he is celebrating, glad to be rid of red

tape, he says.

We are told there is going to be a lot of money available

because we are not sending it into the EU coffers.

But I don't think the Troubles...

Well, I sincerely hope not but I couldn't see any connection

between the two things.

You have Sinn Fein today calling for a referendum on the border.

A lot of people tell me they would rather be as we are not

be in a united Ireland.

Catholics as well as Protestants?

That is Catholic people as well as Protestants.

Just a general mix of people.

A lot of people don't want anything to do with a united Ireland.

We are better off here.

It was always an ambitious notion that being part of Europe

would soften Ulster's battle of identities, especially

in working-class communities.

But the EU played an important role in supporting peace,

not least with money.

A 500lb bomb...

Where an army base once stood on the north Belfast peace line,

it built this cross-community centre.

Let's get a bit of feedback from around the room as well.

This class is for young people who lead summer camps

for mixed groups of Catholic and Protestant children.

What do you feel about what has happened?

Um, well, I feel it's an absolute...shame, like.

Our whole future, of young people, is just...

It's not going to be what it was supposed to be.

There won't be a border poll any time soon, but in a climate

of reviving nationalisms in the UK and political uncertainty,

the delicate political balance here can be easily upset.

Fergal Keane, BBC News, Belfast.

Back in Britain, David Cameron has condemned reported incidents

of abuse and hatred towards UK immigrants following

the referendum result.

He said that his government will not tolerate intolerance.

Ed Thomas reports now on how race and immigration dominated

the referendum campaign.

Immigration - for decades, it has shaped this part of Leeds.

But right now, the latest to arrive, the Eastern Europeans,

are facing a test like never before.

People keep saying, "Why are you still here?

Why are you not going back to your own country?"

Vilius is from Latvia.

He says every day after the referendum, he's faced abuse.

Do you feel under threat?

At the moment, yes because I don't know what it is going

to be like later.

It's very simple.

When people shout that at you, to get out, what do you say?

Why should I get out?

There is tension.

This is my street, yeah?

Obviously, we had no Romanians or Polish people here before.

Where are they now?

We have got them here.

They are at the end of the street.

Consider Rubel, a second-generation immigrant, now frustrated

at Europeans arriving in the place he calls home.

I work and pay taxes.

I got married abroad myself but I am paying the way

to get my missus here.

I'm in a situation where like, I can just see these lot coming over

and messing things up for me.

Immigration, was that your big issue?

yeah, yeah.

Do you want it to stop?

I want it to stop.

And many here feel like they can now speak out.

They've got their own country as well and not just flood Britain.

Take Wayne, who voted out after years of concern over immigration.

Just close the barrier, stop.

Because it's too much.

Do you want the migrants to go home now?

I want them to go out as soon as possible, really.

To go back to where...?

To go back to where they came from.

There's more that have a reason to say that.

After the Brexit vote?

Yes.

It's important to put this into perspective.

We have heard of dozens of cases of European migrants facing abuse.

But this is a sensitive time and many people in places like this

are worried about what happens next.

EU migrants have been told they have a right to stay but that

message is not getting through to everyone.

Renata left Lithuania four months ago, a single

parent looking for work.

TRANSLATION: It's going to be different.

We have been for many years in the EU, so we are just

all guessing what is next. Everyone is really scared.

And then we find Lee.

I'm a nationalist. I am for this country.

Outside a Polish shop, proud to call himself a fascist,

and wanting to talk.

Just take your country back. Take our country back.

It's not racism.

They are just coming across too much.

Once that vote happened, what were your thoughts

and feelings? A sense of relief.

You felt relieved after the Brexit vote?

Yes.

There are extreme voices, and for some European migrants,

a fear, fed by uncertainty, of what will come.

Ed Thomas, BBC News, Leeds.

The results, as we've heard, confounded the pollsters.

It came after a nine-week campaign characterised by bitter debate

among political allies as well as opponents.

James Landale reports on how the campaign

was won and lost.

Leave EU!

So how did they do it?

CHEERING.

How did the Leave campaign defy expectations and win so many

votes in so many areas?

We are better off, we are stronger, we are safer inside...

The start of the campaign was dominated by pro-Remain

politicians warning about the economic risks of Brexit.

But voters did not trust the experts or the celebrities and by the end,

it was Leave's slogan that you could not escape.

Vote Leave to take back control.

Take back control.

Take back control.

Is it not time we took back control?

At the same time, people heard Leave's warnings about the impact

of immigration on public services and its fears about what it saw

as the threat of Turkey joining the EU.

The Leave campaign was very disciplined in getting

its message out on money, migration and accession,

especially of Turkey.

Secondly, I think it had an optimistic note.

It was much more hopeful about what you will get

if you are willing to leave.

And if we Vote Leave and take back control, I believe that this

Thursday could be our country's Independence Day.

And in Boris Johnson, Leave were blessed with a popular

figurehead who, with Michael Gove, brought political showbiz

and intellectual credibility to a campaign that reached out

to swing voters.

And while there were some tensions with Nigel Farage,

the Ukip leader ran his own campaign and appealed beyond his core support

to traditional Labour voters, many of whom sensed Jeremy Corbyn's

equivocation about supporting Remain.

Leave won the referendum because they successfully mobilised

a particular section of British society.

Economically disadvantaged, mainly white, older,

English voters who live outside of London but don't feel

as though they have been winning from globalisation,

from European integration, and who wanted to send a very

strong message on identity concerns like immigration.

A group of people who are not regular voters but whom Leave

deliberately targeted.

This campaign wasn't just about Boris and borders.

It was won by the Leave campaign because they tapped into a wider

sense of antiestablishment feeling which won the support of voters

who feel left behind by globalisation and often ignored

by mainstream politics.

James Landale, BBC News, Central London.

Membership of the European Union and before that, the common market,

has been a central focus of Britain's foreign policy for more

than 40 years.

So leaving will mark a fundamental shift in Britain's place

in the world and in its relations with other countries.

Here's James Robbins with a look back at Britain's relations with

Europe and the impact of the result.

The entire course of Britain's post-imperial history has

been turned on its head.

Now to represent the Queen in the celebrations

marking the transformation of the century-old Gold Coast...

60 years ago, The Age of Empire was coming to an end.

Colonies started getting independence and Britain

struggled to find a role.

It was a new alliance with our European

neighbours which beckoned.

Officially, we became members at midnight, local time.

1973, Britain finally joined the common market.

Is Europe stronger with Britain a member?

Yes!

40 years on, a leading historian of post-war Britain says it's

impossible to exaggerate the magnitude of this

referendum's effects.

Never in our peacetime history have so many dials been reset as a result

of a single day's events.

The only thing comparable in my lifetime, and I was born just

after the war, is getting rid of the British Empire.

But this is sudden, guillotine time, quite extraordinary

and in peacetime, quite unprecedented.

Once upon a time, Britain seemed enthusiastic

about staying in Europe.

This was Margaret Thatcher campaigning in the 1975 referendum.

But as Prime Minister in the '80s, she became increasingly hostile.

Both feeding and feeding off popular headlines which helped drive

a growing sense that Britain was surrendering

too much sovereignty.

No, no, no!

Fast forward to this century and British opposition

to the entire project grew.

A combination of migration, global economic crisis,

plus the Eurozone's travails, tipped British public opinion

to this outright rejection of the European Union.

So will Britain find a new role and can it remain America's first

friend after quitting Europe's top table?

Where would you like us?

That is the danger, that Britain seems like Little Britain,

if you like, that it won't be speaking for a whole block

or anything more than itself.

It will still obviously be available as an ally for the US in terms

of military support and intelligence support but whether it counts

as much symbolically, which has been part of the value

to Washington, that is what is in doubt now.

For 50 years, Britain's prime ministers have come and gone,

courting Europe, joining Europe, by turns infuriated and sometimes

enthused, until David Cameron bet his job on it and lost.

Britain has chosen another, quite different path.

James Robbins, BBC News.

Only around a third of young voters between 18-24 took part

in the referendum.

But what do their European counterparts think of Brexit?

We have been speaking to a number of millennials,

Europeans of a similar age, to find out what they think

the EU should do next.

I think, just, we go back to our social values because we have

I think, just, we go back to our social values because we have

changed everything to please countries like Great Britain.

I don't like Juncker, not that much, but I think he was right,

out is out.

All you should do is just go away.

I think that Britain should have stayed in the EU but on the other

I think that Britain should have stayed in the EU but on the other

hand, I also understand they left because I think

the EU just went too far.

They should keep the countries more independent and they should

introduce less laws.

My message to European leaders is that I think young people

want to be living in a world, like, an open world, free

for everyone to travel and to meet new people, new cultures.

I don't want countries to follow the example

of the United Kingdom.

Britain, come back!

My message to the European Parliament is that I understand

the choices that were made with the Brexit.

We have a similar thing going on in Denmark where we don't

like the bureaucracy and the control over our traditions and such.

However, I think that we should compromise on our ideologies

for the greater good.

The view of Europe's youth on Brexit.

Will things ever be the same again?

That is all from this special edition of Reporters for this week.

From me, James Reynolds, here at the European Union

in Brussels, it's goodbye for now.