People who voted Brexit were the unwitting victims of the worst confidence trick in British political history - Andrew Vine
Exactly 10 years ago, we were all heading to our local polling station to vote on whether to stay in the EU or leave and nobody could be sure which way it would go.
We found out at 10pm, when the exit polls predicted a narrow majority for leaving, confirmed the following morning when the result was revealed as 52 per cent in favour and 48 per cent against.
That day, June 23 2016, not only gave birth to the most divisive term in Britain’s everyday conversation – Brexit – but threw the country into a ferment of bitter argument and uncertainty that has not abated a decade on, poisoning our politics and hovering over almost every major decision.
Express an opinion one way or the other on Brexit being a triumph or a disaster, and you’re still likely to get into a furious argument of the sort that set friends and even families falling out in the run up to the vote.
That has certainly happened to me in the years since as an unrepentant Remainer who thought then – and still thinks – that Brexit was one of the worst decisions ever taken by a British electorate manipulated into an act of enormous self-harm by plausible-sounding claims which turned out to be lies.
No other poll in my lifetime has provoked anything like the same propensity to make people angry with each other. And no other electoral result has produced such lasting turmoil.
Enough time has elapsed since Britain voted for Brexit to offer a firm answer to questions raised by leaving the EU.
Are we a happier country? Better off? More optimistic? Able to offer a brighter future to the young? In control of our borders to prevent illegal migration?
To all, the answer is a resounding ‘No’. Instead, we’ve had 10 years of ineffective and hamstrung governments hobbled by the implications of Brexit, led by Prime Ministers unable to make any real progress, while the world has looked on and wondered how on earth good old Britain, traditionally a beacon of stability and common sense, got itself into such an appalling mess.
Here in the cities and towns of Yorkshire, where so many constituencies voted for Brexit, it’s impossible to see any benefits. It hasn’t delivered new jobs, or any economic boost as a result of a supposedly invigorated and entrepreneurial Britain striking trade deals around the world.
Look to Yorkshire’s countryside, and matters are even worse. Badly thought-out and hopelessly skewed trade deals with Australia and New Zealand over meat imports are going to undercut our farmers and put them out of business. The Conservative minister who agreed those deals was called Liz Truss.
And the most eye-catching promise of the campaign – leaving the EU would provide an additional £350m a week for the NHS – rings especially hollow in those Yorkshire communities where people still wait months for hospital treatment, struggle to get a GP appointment and simply cannot access an NHS dentist.
The half-truths and downright lies peddled to the electorate by the anti-EU camp, with the former Prime Minister Boris Johnson its most prominently exuberant salesman, has produced outcomes not foreseen a decade ago.
They have undermined trust in politics as a whole, fostering a corrosive cynicism about the ability of mainstream parties to get things done, which leads large parts of the adult population alienated from the political process and not bothering to vote.
And the seismic after-shocks have introduced instability into our political system, with nobody able to lead decisively amid the rancour.
It is really no surprise that in recent years, Britain has suffered a severe case of buyer’s remorse over Brexit.
Opinion polls have consistently shown leavers wish they had voted remain instead as the supposed bright new dawn of Brexit has been revealed as a mirage.
The notion that things have not turned out as promised will be reinforced for many this summer when they are queuing for hours at airport border checks all over Europe to begin their holidays, watching EU citizens sail through in minutes.
Yet the lingering bitterness over what happened 10 years ago means that politicians tiptoe round the subject of whether rejoining the EU is ever possible, and exhibit extreme nervousness about even suggesting closer ties with Europe.
A decade on, Brexit stands revealed as a disaster which has seriously harmed our country, and the people who voted for it were the unwitting victims of the worst confidence trick in British political history.