Brexit: People voted to leave EU because they feared immigration, major survey finds

Claims Leave vote was a result of general disenchantment with politics were 'widely off the mark', according to report

Nearly three-quarters of those who are worried about immigration voted Leave, compared with 36 per cent of those who did not identify this as a concern, the research found (EPA/PETE MACLAINE)

Britain’s vote to leave the EU was the result of widespread anti-immigration sentiment, rather than a wider dissatisfaction with politics, according to a major survey of social attitudes in the UK.

Findings from the British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey published on Wednesday show Brexit was the result of widespread concern over the numbers of people coming to the UK – millions of whom have done so under the EU’s freedom of movement rules in recent years.

The research, collated by the National Centre for Social Research through a survey of nearly 3,000 British people, states suggestions by politicians and others that the Brexit vote represented a lightning rod for a general disenchantment with politics were “widely off the mark”.

Nearly three-quarters (73 per cent) of those who are worried about immigration voted Leave, compared with 36 per cent of those who did not identify this as a concern, the research found, showing the discrepancy in views about immigration between Remain and Leave voters.

It also reveals that the longer any given voter felt EU migrants should have lived in the UK before qualifying for welfare benefits, the more likely they were to vote to leave the EU.

Meanwhile, 45 per cent of those who trust the Government a great deal or tend to trust it voted to leave, compared with 65 per cent of those who distrust it greatly — marking a less considerable difference and suggesting trust in politicians was less of a driving factor in the vote for Brexit.

While the survey results find that those with less interest in politics may have been a little more likely to make it to the polls than in general elections, the multivariate analysis concludes that the vote was a “litmus test of the merits of the EU project”.

It states that for the most part, only items associated with people’s sense of national identity and cultural outlook were significantly associated with vote choice, concluding that the outcome of the referendum reflected the concern of more “authoritarian”, socially conservative voters in Britain about some of the social consequences of EU membership, most notably immigration.

Roger Harding, head of public attitudes at NatCen, told The Independent: “For leave voters, the vote was particularly about immigration and the social consequences of it.

“We find a bit of correlation with people who don’t trust Government, but that’s not nearly as strong. Two biggest guides to why people voted leave were those most concerned with immigration and those with a lower level of education.

“On the topic of immigration itself – we found a big divide between young graduates who were positive about the social impact on immigration and older school leavers who were much more negative. The view in Britain on aggregate is pretty middling, but underneath is that stark divide, and this division could be a problem for all political parties trying to win over the country post-Brexit.”

Mr Harding added that the BSA survey didn’t question people directly on why they voted the way they did in the referendum, but rather assessed the correlations, which he said offered a more accurate insight.

“We didn’t ask people directly why they voted the way they voted, because people aren’t the best guides to how they voted,” he said.

“We did a deeper and more accurate assessment by calculating close correlations. We found the Leave vote relates to concerns about immigration and education. Many politicians have come out and said it was all about sovereignty and other things, but our findings indicate this isn't the case.