Piddington has only about 350 residents, yet 285 voted to secede while just 26 voted against it. Parish chairman Tim McNally declared that the community would henceforth call itself the "Principality of Piddington," saying residents had sent a message not merely to the region or country but "to the world." Obviously, Piddington has not legally left Britain, but anyone laughing at this as some village publicity stunt is missing what the vote actually represents.

The government is proposing an asylum facility capable of housing more than three times the population of the village beside a community of roughly 350 people. Residents have raised concerns about safety, crime, property values, and the impact on local services, while the government insists the site will be largely self-sufficient to minimize the effect on the surrounding community. Refugee organizations have criticized the plan from the opposite direction, arguing that remote military facilities are also inappropriate places for asylum seekers and can damage social cohesion. Yet Westminster still expects everyone involved to accept a decision imposed from above.

The timing could not be more remarkable. Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland have just seen their nationalist leaders gather in Cardiff and declare that "Westminster's time is coming to an end." Scotland continues debating independence, Northern Ireland has a legal mechanism for eventual reunification with Ireland, and Welsh nationalism is gaining support among younger generations. Now, inside England itself, a village has overwhelmingly voted to symbolically withdraw from the United Kingdom because residents believe Westminster is imposing policies upon them without meaningful local consent.