Barny for Brexit

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Our day on Barnard Castle Market Place was an outstanding success for a change and we were able to hand out more than 300 Grassroots Out and EU Myths leaflets to people who were keen to study the issues in preparation for the big day on June 23rd.

Our stand also attracted people for particular reasons who were firm "Remainers" and we believe they left our stand after considerable debate having a broader view and thinking again about their stance.

One of the reasons that we were able to engage in debate with "Remainers" was the pull of our "Ball Poll" as they were determined to participate to prove that their views predominated.

Our actual count figures when we opened the count box was Remain - 30 and Brexit - 69 but we needed to modify these figures following an incident where a man and wife came to our stand and he watched his wife drop his ball in OUT which annoyed him to the extent that he grabbed six balls and stuffed them in the IN box. His wife, seeing his actions grabbed a further 5 balls and pushed them in the OUT box before we were able to intervene and prevent a ball stuffing competition. We therefore needed to subtract 5 from either side giving final count of :-

STAY IN EU  ---  25   (28%)

BREXIT       ---   64   (72%)

However, there was a significant number of people that would not participate in our ball poll because they had not yet decided and admitted they needed far more information before they would commit. These people were pleased to take our literature in the full knowledge that we were presenting the case for leaving so that they could study at their leisure before coming to a conclusion.

In many way we were preaching to the converted in Barnard Castle and we were delighted that the local press "Teesdale Mercury" became aware of our presence and despatched a reporter and photographer to our event who was so keen to know the result over the day of our ball poll returned at the end of the day for the final figure. Whilst the reporter came along as a "Remainer" we felt that by the end of discussions he was giving serious consideration to voting out. So make sure you get your copy of the Teesdale Mercury next Wednesday 6th April to see what their take on our presence is.

Whilst the majority of people engaging with us were local, (around 1 in 4 people were tourists), and it is felt that as warmer weather draws ever closer this proportion will increase, this makes Barnard Castle an ideal place to engage with people on Market Days leeading up to June 23rd and with a fee of £10 was excellent value. The only danger is that the Labour influence in Barnard Castle Council may see the success through the Teesdale Mercury report and try to block further market days for us, although this would be a dangerous choice as it would be news worthy at a much higher level.

This wil be further discussed in our meeting on 31st March at The Manor Pub - Henknowle - Bishop Auckland start 7:15pm.