What does Leave mean? Reporting from a city very much wanting Brexit
Gavin Foster, managing editor of JPIMedia’s three North East daily titles — which includes the Sunderland Echo — gives an insight into the responsibility of representing its local audience over a topic as complex as Brexit.
A photographer captures an image of a woman wearing a red ‘Vote Leave’ T-shirt being held aloft in defiant victory.
As Sunderland declared the first city to vote to leave the EU in a historic night which sent shockwaves around the globe, no one imagined that the image and the city would become synonymous with Brexit.
As we all sat watching in the newsroom, the results coming in — as equally stunned as the rest of the UK, we realised a Sunderland Echo poll days before had predicted the same result.
A staggering 69% of Sunderland residents voted to leave in the referendum on June 23, 2016.
And 73% of 5,200 readers who took part in our online poll had already indicated their views — a result even we dismissed.
In the months and now years that have followed, Sunderland has found itself at the centre of a storm — with negative media attention from as far as the New York Times with a shocking portrayal, that we, as the city and its people’s champion, were forced to attack.
MPs, city chiefs and business leaders have all been given the opportunity to air their views in our printed and online pages, as have the many thousands of readers.
Nissan’s Sunderland plant has equally been central to the plot with the threat of possibly leaving the UK if a ‘no deal’ Brexit became apparent — a move which many believe would be disastrous for the city and the North East with some estimated 33,000 employees reliant on the plant directly and through supply chains.
Sunderland’s views didn’t go unnoticed by the far right — who saw the result as an opportunity to target the city, with various marches, protests and sometimes disorder.
We’ve covered every twist and turn as a local paper should from the perspective of its city — sometimes under siege from the weight of responsibility.
The chaos and changing mindsets of the UK around Brexit have equally been reflected in various polls we carried out since, including a full swing 12 months later as a city declared it would vote remain if asked again.
But the pendulum has continued to swing to and fro — with readers asking for a second referendum and then deciding against just a few months later.
In the last weeks with the nation losing its patience, as a paper we could sense the noise change in the mood from what we were seeing in reader comments on our website and social media channels.
And this was evident in our latest poll days before Parliament had its chance to vote when 70% of Echo readers sent a clear and stark message to the Prime Minister and the city’s own MPs that they wanted to leave the EU without a deal.
Many reasons have been suggested as to why Sunderland voted to exit. Was it immigration? Was is an anti-establishment vote, Was it a socio-economic divide, was it a protest? Was it the older generation to blame?
What is clear is that the city and its people have had enough.
Our front page displaying the stunning vote result the day before Parliament voted received a huge amount of attention and coverage from a city and its local paper which have become a Brexit barometer.
Throughout we have created engaging content, garnered opinions, offered political insight, gathered reaction, measured the temperature, but most importantly listened to our readers.
Our coverage is a clear indicator of the importance of local newspapers in representing and campaigning for the views and rights of its readers.
