The British working class was the backbone of the army that maintained the Empire and, on June 23, 2016, the same working class backbone delivered ‘freedom day’ to the United Kingdom.

For four long post-Empire decades, all the ills faced by Britain, including having to endure ‘straight bananas’ (UK’s tabloid press fiction), were blamed on undemocratic, devious Brussels.

But, finally, the ‘Empire fought back’ and, by virtue of the great democratic demonstration that the least informed may determine the outcome, David Cameron can now retire to contemplate how his gross political miscalculation might prove responsible for Scotland leaving the kingdom and for the unification of Ireland.

June 23, 2016 may well be a prominent date in future European history books.

Regarding our own parochial self-interests, one hopes our long-standing close relationship with the UK will continue and won’t be tarnished by re-introduction of tediously negative customs tariffs and inspections as we have with the US.