24/06/2026
10 years ago today we woke up to the devastating news that the UK had decided to leave the EU. This was not a landslide victory but a narrow win for Leave at 52% with Remain at 48%. Leave didn’t even represent half the country as the 52% figure came from only 37% of eligible voters. While British citizens living overseas, along with members of the Commonwealth, could vote, the 3 million EU citizens living and working over here, arguably among those most affected, were ineligible and their voices were never heard. Additionally, the vote was won through a litany of lies (epitomised by the £350 million going to the EU weekly emblazoned on the big red bus - in fact, it was a gross figure and ignored the money coming back from the EU in terms of subsidies and a further lie included Farage’s doctored ‘Breaking Point’ poster. While Leave ran an emotive campaign - remember ‘Take Back Control’, the ‘Stronger In’ campaign was lacklustre and people had no real idea what was going on. The morning after the election the most googled phrase was , ‘What is the EU’? A decade later, it’s certainly time, and not undemocratic, to reflect whether Brexit has enriched us. It has not: in every sector, such as the economy, defence and security, cultural, science and technology, we have lost so much. We are losing £90bn a year; defence has been compromised by limits on intelligence sharing and scientific research has also suffered (although our re-entry into Horizon could mitigate some of those effects). Culturally, our musicians have encountered huge problems in performing in Europe, as have other artists. The farming and fishing sectors have felt they were sold a lie. Our young people have lost out on all the opportunities that previous generations e joyed with free movement to live and work in other EU countries - and nobody born this century voted for Brexit. There is as some hope as the re-introduction of Erasmus in 2027 will allow study, including apprenticeships across the EU sector. So it’s small steps. When I woke up in the early hours of the 24th to David Dimbleby announcing the terrible news, I was unbelievably upset and angry. I have been angry ever since for what might have been. Personally, it’s been a hard time: my German husband Klaus was forced to go through an expensive legal process to get his settlement status assured, followed by citizenship - just as well with Reform/Restore planning to allow the deportation of those with ‘settled status’. But, on a more positive note, my anger lit a political fuse and the only discernible Brexit benefit for me has been making so many new friends and meeting like-minded people. A group of us, including Wera Hobhouse who would later become the MP for Bath, founded Bath for Europe and we campaigned strongly, especially in the immediate years following the vote and leading to the implementation of Brexit, for a rethink. At one point, our movement was so large we chartered a train and eight coaches to go to the People’s Vote march for a Second Referendum in March 2019. We held events with inspiring speakers, such as the initial one with Professor Michael Dougan who branded Brexit as dishonesty on an industrial scale and packed out the Forum in Bath. Later, when we turned to Zoom through the Covid years, I interviewed Peter Oborne, the former political editor of the Telegraph, who wrote a revelatory book and set up a website in the lies of Boris Johnson, Trump and with other politicians included later. I also travelled to Brussels in April 2018 for , David Nicholas Wilkinson’s remarkable film about the impact of Brexit, in which Klaus had a ‘blink and you’ll miss it role. In recent years, the street stalls and leafleting have become less frequent but the conviction that Britain needs to be more closely aligned with the EU remains. I attended the European Movement conference in London last week and am optimistic that we will one day be back with our closest friends and neighbours. After all these years of political instability (soon to be seven prime ministers in the past decade; global turmoil; an unreliable ally in Trump’s US) it’s never been clearer that our future lies, not as a mid-sized isolationist economy but back in the heart of Europe. We will get our star back.
