Ok, we are out, what now?

"Our politicians know their stuff"????
I guess that's what Germans thought in 1933 when Hitler was elected.

'Politicians know their stuff!!?' ethel your faith is touching but sadly misplaced.

Reading this, I see the words, 'devastated' and 'upset' and I think what on earth is wrong with some people. We just have to move forward and get on with it. Our politicians know their stuff no matter what party they represent. Life goes on, we still have to pay bills and live as normally so let the politicians get on with it. No one knows what will happen in the future, no one ever did. I must agree that ordinary people don't know enough and can be manipulated, referendums are bad in that respect. I did not know enough.
Let the young people run the country in their own way, they will forge their own futures and nothing we can do or say will alter that. What will be will be.

All Ive ever heard from locals is that they want to vote 'out' to stop immigrants from taking over, nothing else, no reasoned argument just immigration which has been played up to by the 'out' brigade, we have all been manipulated.

I woke up this morning hoping yesterday was just a nightmare but was appalled all over again to find that our country had been so incredibly stupid and plunged us into such an all round disastrous situation.

I agree with wot Leticia says.

I am too upset about this decision at present to even think about how we can get out of this mess. Financial and Political.

I have been horrified at some of the reasons and reasoning for voting us out of the UK but, to be honest, I think our own politicians are to blame. For years they have blamed all the ills of this country on th EU and all the praise for the good they have taken for themselves.

I support democracy but don't think referendums are a good idea, it is better left to the experts than people voting for all sorts of silly reasons. I despair when someone really thinks that we will go back to the old style light bulbs!!

I think she'll stand again, especially as the president has said he will not be standing again (he's 79). She won't leave her party in a weakened position.

There's speculation every so often that Merkel will step down. There was serious doubt in 2011 and after she admitted so many immigrants. Somehow she manages to hold things together and 'Der Spiegel' reckons she's planning to stand again in 2017.

OK! I support the idea that people should have a genuine right to vote and I support a list system or other form of PR, even if we have to put up with people we really can't stand. At least they have a platform. I'm not in favour of referendums, because I think they're a blunt instrument (yes/no) and there's no way of knowing if people really understand all the issues or if they're gullible or vulnerable people who have been manipulated. Once the decision is made, that's it. There is no leeway or flexibility. The conduct of the EU referendum has been a disgrace. If it's true that people have voted one for such silly reasons as people are now saying, I really despair.

One way or the other, the future of the UK will be profoundly affected by the outcome of this referendum. Future historians will know the date, but they will probably be tearing their hair out trying to understand what motivated people to vote as they did.

If we support democracy we have to accept that everyone, whether friend or foe, self-interested or altruistic, understanding the issue or not, even those with different views to me (!!) has a right to vote and we all have to live with the results.

Democracy isn't perfect, but it is better than all the alternatives.

There was speculation that Angela Merkel was planning on stepping down before next year's elections, but that seems to have faded away. If she's not re-elected, I can see that being a real issue for the EU because she's been one of the pillars of the current EU model.

On the news tonight they were interviewing people from Hartlepool who said that they could not see how things could get worse so they were voting to leave to get rid of Cameron.

So our children and ghrandchildren's not very rosy future is decided by people who can't tell the difference between a general election and a referendum about membership of the EU.

It's beyond belief.

And I don't like the fact that by being inescapably English (I don't think my Jamaican Granny would qualify me for a Jamaican passport) I am associated with such total unthinking idiocy.

I have yet to find out how the EU impinged so badly on the personal lives of my contemporaries that they felt compelled to vote Leave.

I am devastated, as are many of my friends.

It depends which websites you look at. The extreme right wing party in Denmark is the second largest party and won 21% of the vote in the last election. www.adjacentgovernment.co.uk/local-council-news/denmark-follow-uk-referendum/25816/

I think there are a range of reasons. I was at a party last weekend mostly local business people in Cheshire, one police officer, one or two retired people and me(education). I said we have the 5th highest economy and we've done that through trading with our European neighbours and with the rest of the world, what's wrong with that?

Their answer? - We want more.

It's baffling isn't it, varian? I have a number of Facebook friends from the North East (mainly distant cousins) and, without exception they were pro-Leave. They're not unemployed and poor - quite the opposite in fact. They all have well-paid jobs and, because housing is so cheap in the North East, many have holiday homes in Spain, France or Greece. I know that at least one is a Conservative supporter.

I've read their posts on Facebook and it seems that they are totally disillusioned with a London-centric government and Brussels is even more distant. I detect xenophobia and there have been problems with some groups of immigrants, who have joined the gang culture in some places. From what I've read, this is nothing new, because there have always been problems with white British gangs.

My impression is that the 'take back control' mantra had an effect, but I'm at a loss to understand what they think they're going to be controlling. Control without any power or wealth is, I fear, going to be a very hollow victory.

durhamjen what you seem to be saying is that the NE has had a good deal from the EU but a bad deal from the British government - so why vote to leave the EU?

@jingle

I think Merkel is genuinely fond of union and co-operation. She likes the British and respects us and is probably genuinely sad at what's happened. Don't forget her background. She was born in West Germany, but brought up in East Germany. German re-unification was a genuinely emotional time for her. She has also done more than perhaps any other Chancellor along with Brandt to come to terms with Germany's past. I think that allowing so many immigrants into Germany was a genuine attempt to atone for Germany's history.

Merkel is under considerable pressure in Germany for her stance on immigration. She also has to keep her coalition partners happy. She has done a great deal to keep Germany stable, especially as there is a frightening rise in neo-Nazism in the former East German states. She has always admired the UK's stability and I suspect she really is sad. The UK was in many ways Germany's natural ally.

I hope the mood doesn't turn really angry as people realise the promises made to secure their votes are now being denied or proved to have been lies and undeliverable.

Whilst some of us are angry and feeling fearful of the uncertain future, we don't want anger spilling out onto the streets of our towns and cities.

Last Wednesday, I drove up the coastal route to Amble, and saw a new park of wind turbines. They would be with EU money. This government has cut back on subsidies for renewables. Blyth is a centre for renewable research.
If it wasn't for the EU, the north east would be sending money down to London and getting very little of it back.
Hitachi are building new trains. In the north east, a lot of ours are converted buses, even though the new trains are being built up here.
We still do a lot of the manufacturing but do not have the money to buy the goods we manufacture. The north east is the only part of the country that exported more than it imported, and most to the EU.

Yes, I sa he. Very sad. I think she is fond of DC.

yes I saw her - and Hollander, Tusck and Juncker.

Did anyone else see Angela Merkel on the news? I thought it looked like she was only just keeping it together, you could hear the emotion in her voice.

I was just thinking the same thing as Granny2016 and wish the vote was not so close. I would have found it easier to take if one side had won a decisive victory. I also wish Scotland wasn't a unanimous vote to stay in the EU. This has created a very divisive situation.

I worry at the responses coming from Russia -

Sergei Sobyanin, the mayor of Moscow, also raised the prospect of looser sanctions in the wake of the vote, saying that "without Great Britain in the EU, no one will so zealously defend the sanctions against us".

Among other senior Russian diplomats to respond to the vote was Boris Titov, a Kremlin insider, who said in a Facebook post that the "most important long-term consequence of all this is that the exit will take Europe away from the anglo-saxons, meaning from the USA".

He added: "It's not the independence of Britain from Europe, but the independence of Europe from the USA."

Daniel Hannan on BBC has just said that the leave never said leaving the EU would cut migration to less than 100,000!!! He said there would still be immigrants coming here to work! Evan Davis got a tad het up about this!

I am quite heartened to come on here and find that people are equally devastated - I am fed up being told that the over 65s have destroyed the future for their children and grandchildren but am forced by the statistics to find that it was my age group that swung it to leave.