emergence of this referendum can be put down to various symptoms of our FPTP electoral system - our lack of PR has allowed for tensions to rise and anti-government sentiment to grow, with neither sentiment finding valid political output. From this perspective, the very existence of the referendum is only made possible through a lack of effective democracy in this country.

So, we have a referendum called by a guy with a tiny mandate, caused by a lack of democracy, held contrary to our democratic ideals, with an unclear proposition, presented to an ill-informed and deliberately misled populace, who voted for a lumped-together variety of contradictory reasons, to win by a majority that only just took them past the half-way point.

To rub salt into that wound, as things stand, we'll have the decision on whether, when and how to leave the EU taken by an unelected PM, facing an 'opposition' who will likely soon be bringing in unpaid interns to act as front benchers.

And I've not even mentioned the fact that two of the countries in this union voted decisively to Remain, yet will likely be dragged out by the other two countries.

BUT! It's not binding. The referendum could have been legally binding, like the AV vote or the Scottish independence referendum were, forcing the government to act on the result. It wasn't - it's an advisory referendum. It is wholly legal, and entirely within the 'rules of the game' of representative democracy, for the government to ignore the vote, hold off on acting on it, choose its own terms for a forward path, hold a second referendum, and so on. This is how the vote was set up, within the democracy. It's not undemocratic to recognise that and call on parliament to act to represent your views, as it its role.

If you voted Remain and believe that the Leave vote, if carried out, would be a Bad Thing for the UK, then it would be absurd to avoid using any and all legal means to push government not to act on the result of an advisory referendum.

So it could be argued that even though the public have voted to leave, government is still within its rights to ignore the result if they decide it is not in the best interests of the country

It was not in the best interests of the country to not have the vote in first place. We have elected officials to deal with what is and what is not.