June 23rd, 2016, was the day of the Brexit referendum, with Brits both in the UK and across the world waking up on the 24th to learn that the Leave side had narrowly won.
To mark the ten-year anniversary of the vote, The Local asked Brits living in Sweden about how they had been affected in the aftermath, from practical matters like residency permits, finances and passport stamping to more emotional concerns like the loss of European identity.
Of the 22 people who responded to The Local's survey, the majority described the referendum as painful for them personally and practically disruptive. Three of them even went so far as to say that the vote had so shocked them that they had decided shortly afterwards to leave the UK altogether.
Jennie, who now lives in central Skåne, said she and her husband decided to move almost immediately after the referendum result came in.
"I woke up the morning after the referendum result and told my husband I didn't want to live in the UK any more - fortunately he agreed," she remembers. "We started making plans to leave immediately."
The couple visited Sweden on-and-off over the next few years and finally moved in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, with her husband's Irish passport and EU citizenship coming in handy to help with the move.
Eddie Storey, a dual national already living in Stockholm at the time of the vote, was by chance in the UK on the day, and then submitted his application for Swedish citizenship as soon as he returned home.
"The moment we got home to Sweden, I applied for Swedish citizenship, which I probably should have done years before, and became an enthusiastic Swede," he said. "I'd hung onto the concept of being 'British', due to the fact that my parents had forgotten to register me as a British citizen in my country of birth and the naturalisation process had taken a long time. Plus of course, we were all in the EU."
Michelle, a British woman married to a Swede, said the couple had left the UK a few years after the Brexit vote.
"We now live between Malta and Sweden. At the time, we thought that we'd be in the UK forever, but now maybe it was a positive thing we left, as it opened up new adventures," she said.
Neil resigned from his job in IT in the UK's National Health Service and moved to Sweden with his Finnish wife just a few weeks before Brexit came into force.
"I have never been back to Great Britain, and I have no intention to do so whilst they are still in this state of madness brought about by the likes of [Reform Party leader Nigel] Farage and his ilk," he wrote. "The government (whoever it may be) is too scared to admit it was a ridiculous decision, and that the majority of the population want to be back in the community."
A British pilot, now living on the island of Gotland, described Brexit as his "beginning point".
"It ended my British life forever and I moved to Sweden as a result," he said. "I became a Swedish citizen and celebrate midsummer, Christmas on the 24th and Walpurgis. My relationship with the UK is totally dented and I view Brexit as a life event - a divider and a beginning of a new life."
Emotional impact
Even respondents who were already living in Sweden at the time of the vote or who moved for other reasons said that the impact had been as much emotional as practical.
“Brexit was an absolute catastrophe which ruined our lives," wrote a retired British Canadian couple based in the Stockholm area.
"I find the whole thing deeply sad when I look at what a state the UK is in," said Pippa, a British arts manager based in Stockholm. "But it's a reckoning for their illusions of grandeur based on the pompous myths of empire."
"The impact has been small except for more complex tax affairs," said David. "But below the surface, there's a sadness that the UK has cut itself off from Europe for no discernible reason."
"It's really kneecapped the UK," agreed Jennie. "People are worse off, the economy is worse off. I'd argue the country is significantly culturally poorer too. I voted Remain in 2016, and I still think Brexit has got to be a top contender for most foolish decision (own goal!) that a country has ever made."
Malcolm, a remote tech worker based in Västernorrland, said the vote had shattered his faith in politics, not only in the UK but across the world.
"It was the first event that opened my eyes into directly seeing how lies, money and almost certainly foreign influence could be used to con people into voting against their own self interests," he said.
"Ultimately I was in a position to use my freedom of movement one last time, before it was pulled away. But many were not, and all had to pay the price, except the ones who inflicted it upon us. Ultimately, the effect on my day to day life is disappointment at how this came to be."
Octavia Randolph, a Visby-based American novelist, said that even as an American, the vote had been "chilling".
"Once it happened I knew Trump would very likely be elected. It was proof of growing isolationism worldwide, and the results have been disastrous for so many."
Post
Even if the emotional impact took precedent, many respondents also complained of difficulty sending and receiving post, more complicated tax affairs, and the increased cost and time at customs when travelling to and from the UK.
Elizabeth, who moved to Sweden with her computer programmer husband more than 20 years ago, said Brexit had made sending and receiving parcels and goods from the UK more difficult.
"We could order goods from UK without filling in forms and paying extra fees, we could travel to the UK on our Swedish passports once we were citizens, and we could receive and send parcels to our friends and family in the UK," she said. "That has all changed and I no longer order items from M&S or many other stores."
David complained that it had become almost impossible to receive post from the UK.
"Simple birthday pressies from my sisters, or copies of Private Eye reach Postterminalen in Rosersberg and are then returned to the UK," he moaned. "Last summer I resorted to driving to the UK in convoy with my son and returning wth both cars filled with UK goods - beer from my brother-in-law's brewery, Pears soap, Lemsip, Alka Seltzer, teabags from M&S etc."
Residency rights
Some respondents complained that their rights under the EU withdrawal agreement were significantly worse than those they had enjoyed as EU citizens.
"Living with legacy country-specific EU rights is a lot more limiting than having current EU rights," Malcolm said of his post-Brexit residency status. "The legacy ones can be removed if leaving the country for too long, and then that door is permanently closed. Only citizenship could restore a level of stability, but recent changes to Swedish citizenship requirements mean even the possibility of this has suddenly been pushed many years into the future."
Travel
Several said that travel had also become more difficult, particularly now that the UK has started demanding that all people with British citizenship travel on a British passport, even if they have a valid passport from another country.
"The UK government seems to be determined to make travel to Britain expensive," complained a Brit based in Stockholm. "My eldest daughter, who was born in UK, has had to apply for British passports for her children, in addition to Swedish passports, to travel to a wedding in UK this summer."
As the children have British citizenship, they cannot apply for ETA visas.
Several people also complained of the long queues faced by Brits at Copenhagen and Stockholm airport.
"I just last week spent an hour in passport queues on the way to the UK and then back in Copenhagen, while my daughter and her EU boyfriend breezed through the empty EU lanes," said Jennie.
The Danish border guard told her, she said, that the queues would be much smaller without all the Brits caught up in them.
"'Unfortunately', he said, 'that's where we are right now. Maybe things will change in future.' 'Fingers crossed,' I told him."