THE Euro-referendum campaign seemed all about the Tory Party tearing itself apart, writes Lancashire Telegraph Political Reporter Bill Jacobs.


The end result was actually a case of the Labour vote falling apart.


At breakfast yesterday it was the Conservatives once again in the spotlight as Prime Minister David Cameron announced he was resigning in time for a new leader and Prime Minister by the party conference in October.


With a Brexit leader on the way, the failure of Labour’s high command to make the ‘Remain’ case to their supporters faded into the background.


It was clear that in the heartlands in the North of England, not least East Lancashire which voted 61 per cent for ‘Brexit’, the endorsements of the EU by Jeremy Corbyn and his lieutenants did not resonate.


Nor did the pleas of the party’s MPs in Blackburn, Burnley, and Hyndburn.


Ironically this act of rebellion by traditional Labour voters finally achieved what their party’s leaders could not do: got Mr Cameron on the way out of 10 Downing Street.


Immigration was clearly a big issue and his dire economic warnings fell on deaf ears.


In Burnley, almost 80 per cent of those in Labour stronghold Bank Hall voted to quit the EU.


If the ‘Remain’ vote did not come out, the working class, Labour ‘Leavers’ did in their droves.


If the party under Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband had lost touch with their natural supporters, Mr Corbyn’s new ’Red Dawn’ does not seem to have reconnected the party high command with its traditional foot soldiers.


The Liberal Democrats, the most pro-EU part in the mainstream, can take no comfort from this result.


The Scottish Nationalists are eyeing up a second independence referendum and UKIP is looking to do to Labour in England what the SNP did North of the Border in the 2015 General Election.


Now someone new, probably Boris Johnson, can faces the tricky negotiations to get the UK out of the EU.


As both major parties face months of recriminations, what happens to thousands of Labour voters who opted for leave yesterday.


At the moment a soon to be leaderless Tory Party and shell-shocked Labour both seems totally out of touch with their desires and needs.


Blackburn Labour MP Kate Hollern and Rossendale and Darwen’s Jake Berry, both Remain supporters, said they would fight to get something out of the now inevitable departure from the EU for the people of East Lancashire.


With both their parties in turmoil, the question is will they, or anyone else, be able to get that good deal for tens of thousands of voters who feel deserted by the political establishment and system.