In 1975, the last time Britain held a European referendum, Londoners voted resoundingly for staying in what was then the European Economic Community. The margin was 67%-33% - a thumping 2 to 1. Yet the capital, along with other urban areas, was not the centre of pro-Europe sentiment. The shire counties of England were even keener on economic integration with their continental neighbours. London was eurosceptic by comparison.
Today, it appears to be a little more eurosceptic that it was 41 years ago. And yet, unlike the rest of the country, it is still very firmly europhile. A recent poll suggested that Londoners will vote to remain in the European Union (EU) on Thursday by a 60%-40% margin, confirming that the metropolis is the most Europe-friendly part of the entire UK with the possible exception of Scotland.
Londoners’ support for remaining in the EU seems in line with the profound economic and cultural ties to the continent (and Ireland) it now has. There are, for a start, nearly 850,000 EU-born Londoners, close to one tenth of the city’s population. Around 616,000 of them work here, most numerously in financial services, construction, and hotels and catering, though there are many in other sectors too. London has over 33,000 EU students studying at its universities, comprising 8% of undergraduates and 13% of post-graduates.
Polish Londoners form the city’s largest EU group - 158,000, or 1.94% of London’s total population. Next come Irish (130,000), French (67,000), Italian (62,000), German (55,000), Romanian (45,000) and Portuguese Londoners (41,000). Estonians (3,000), Slovenians (800) and Luxembourgers (700) are the smallest groups.
Some of the city’s European connections date from long before the 1957 Treaty of Rome, of course. Italian restaurants, the evolving intakes of Roman Catholic schools and a noted Dutch church come directly to mind. There is a long-established French presence in South Kensington. Today, Polish builders, Romanian cleaners and Portuguese custard tarts are embedded elements of London life. There are Hungarians in Barnet, Lithuanians in Newham and Swedes in Westminster.
What might happen to these people if Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage have their way? What will happen to the city whose political leader Johnson was until just seven weeks ago? He and fellow Leavers have said their current rights will be protected, though others think their futures are as tricky to predict as everything else a Brexit would bring about.
Research for the Financial Times by Oxford University’s Migration Observatory found that three-quarters of EU citizens working in the UK would not meet the visa requirements currently made of non-EU workers. The future supply of labour from the EU into those sectors of London’s economy that values and depends on it would, of course, be reduced.
There is alarm among London’s larger businesses and universities about the economic consequences of a vote to Leave. In the last quarter of 2015, London exported goods to the value of £3.4bn to the EU, around 40% of its total. The value of its service sector exports, encompassing everything from financial to artistic to educational expertise, is estimated to be many times higher. The capital’s “knowledge economy” is large, growing and has proved resilient. EU membership is also calculated to have raised London wages thanks to open trade conditions boosting productivity.
Many of the facts and stats above have been pulled together by thinktank Centre for London to demonstrate the closeness of London’s links with Europe. Richard Brown, who is the Centre’s research director, concludes that because London trades all round the world “it would bounce back from Brexit” eventually but that leaving the EU would “change the capital’s character, fly in the face of its citizens’ preferences and drive a wedge between London and the rest of the UK”.
Londoners who are citizens of other EU nations do not have a vote in the EU referendum, but well over five million other Londoners do. Boris Johnson used to laud London as the engine of the UK economy. On Thursday the city’s people could play a crucial role in the fate of their country by electing to keep London that way.
