EU Referendum: The Facts
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After yesterday’s Queen’s speech, Twitter went wild with memes mocking the monarchy, gifs of George Osborne holding back a laugh when the ‘northern powerhouse’ was mentioned and an angry Natalie Bennett (leader of the Green Party).
However, despite the online humour, there was one serious point of the Thatcher-like, all-Tory speech and that was the EU referendum.
Due to take place before the end of 2017, the national referendum on whether or not the UK wants to stay in the European Union will be one of the most controversial yet. It was legislated yesterday – unlike the scrapping of the Human Rights Act – and will only include a certain group of people in the UK.
The rules on who can and can’t vote are very similar to those of the General Election. Anyone under 18 cannot vote in the referendum despite the fact that 16 and 17-year-olds were given a voice in the Scottish referendum last year. But, fear not young people! The SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon is going to push for a 16 and 17-year-old vote as well as the Labour Party, Lib Dems and the Greens.
Excluded from the vote are foreign EU nationals living in Britain. Unlike the young vote issue, no party has pushed for this rule to be changed and so it will undoubtedly remain the same.
If you’re eligible to vote in the EU referendum, pat yourself on the back. You’re one of the very few.