Memories of Brexit Day - five years on
The magic moment when Sky News presenter Adam Boulton announced, at 4.42am, that Britain had voted Leave.
By Robert J Davies
As the sun rose early on Referendum Day, Thursday, June 23rd, 2016, I did not dare hope that the “dawn was breaking on an independent Britain” as Nigel Farage was to jubilantly proclaim, some 20 hours later.
The sun’s rays lit up the half-timbered buildings on the other side of the high street as I walked down it, polling card in hand. I was the first person in our village to vote in the EU referendum. I’d been up since about 5am, so it made sense to get down to the polling station in the village hall sooner rather than later. Shortly after I got there at 6.45am, two or three other residents arrived. They were keen to vote too. This was, after all, a democratic exercise like none other in our lifetimes. We were playing our part in history.
Having got the Leave campaign off to a good start in our neck of the woods, I returned home, restless and ill at ease. I knew that if Leave lost it would be agonisingly close. I pondered what effect the tragic murder of Jo Cox MP might have on the outcome; or allowing Gibraltar (almost unanimously a Remain camp) to take part. Much as I love Gibraltar’s Britishness –my wife and I spent our honeymoon there – I didn’t exactly relish their contribution on that occasion!
To win the referendum seemed, by any standards, an all but impossible task. The Remain camp had an in-built advantage, just as they had in the 1975 referendum – of representing the status quo. That skewed things massively in their favour. It’s often forgotten that the British people were never given the chance to vote on joining the then Common Market by a popular vote –that was cannily delayed until after Ted Heath had taken us in.
To vote Remain, not out of passion for the EU but through passionately wanting to avoid disruption, was obviously going to be the default setting for many. Voting Leave, on the other hand, was a shot in the dark, unleashing all kinds of unpredictable outcomes and complications. We had, of course, all been warned darkly of the perils of voting out, not only by our own Prime Minister but by the President of the United States, no less. Nearly all the media and big business were against us quitting – the entire establishment was bearing down hard on us to remain.
When the polls closed at 10pm, there was no exit poll to give us an immediate pointer as to who the victors were. Yet within a minute or so, Nigel Farage appeared, making a concession speech, accepting that Remain had narrowly clinched it. It was a gut-wrenching moment. Then relatively speedily, came two vitally important results which gave hope: Newcastle and Sunderland.
Newcastle had voted to stay in, but it had been expected and the margin of victory was far narrower than predicted. Sunderland had voted Leave – also widely expected but the scale of the victory was astonishingly huge.
I can’t tell you how nail-biting the next few hours were. For a good while, the steady flow of declarations had Remain in the lead but from areas where they had been expected to do well and encouragingly, their majorities were slim. I watched, hypnotised, as Leave won in the shires again and again and again. Yet there was no reason to relax let alone celebrate until gone 3am because there was always the danger that a massive vote for Remain in the London boroughs would hand victory to the other side.
But Professor of Politics Michael Thrasher, Sky News’ election analyst, offered welcome reassurance. He matter of factly called it correctly early on, pointing out that there weren’t enough strong Remain areas left for Leave to be caught. By around 4.30am Adam Boulton formally announced that Sky was calling it for Leave.
I can’t easily put into words how I felt at that moment. After decades of despairing at the direction of this country and fearing our ever-deeper enmeshment inside the inner vaults of the European Union, it was hard to take in. I can honestly say that it was one of the most euphoric yet emotionally-draining experiences of my life.
The magic moment when Nigel Farage addressed the nation to declare that Brexit had been won. What a particularly proud day it must have been for him.
Up to that point that night, I had been drinking tea, by the gallon. But right then, I needed something stronger. I poured myself a stiff gin and tonic and watched in dazed disbelief as Nigel Farage reappeared on the screen, this time in more cheerful mood, to proclaim that the “dawn was breaking on an independent Britain.”
There were tears in my eyes as I sipped my G&T in quiet but joyful shock. There are tears in my eyes now, as I recall that moment. After he had finished speaking, I got up from the sofa, opened the patio doors and stepped out into the back garden. The dawn was indeed breaking. A golden glow had appeared in the east, heralding the imminent rise of the sun. It was a beautiful moment. It’s always special, in midsummer, to go outdoors before 5am and enjoy the pale, diffused daylight of an early morning when no-one else is about and all is calm. Imagine how it felt just then! History was in the making.
Little did I know, of course, how devilishly difficult the process of achieving Brexit would become over the next five years and how close the Establishment would come to trampling on that incredible insurrection by 17 million ordinary, decent Britons. Right then, I felt alive with hope for the future and excited to the extent that I didn’t feel remotely tired, despite a sleep-free night.
I wasn’t due to get any rest for a good many hours. At 11.30am friends of mine called to take me with them to The Gathering – a huge Christian camp for men held on farmland in Wiltshire, organised by Christian Vision for Men. That Friday afternoon I was helping pitch tents and set up campfires ahead of the opening evening session when over 2,000 of us gathered in a Big Top for worship, singing, prayer and inspirational speeches.
Bizarrely perhaps, the word that was to be on everyone’s lips for the rest of the decade, Brexit, was barely mentioned. The political earthquake which had forced the resignation of the Prime Minister that morning and which was now set to convulse our democracy for years to come was not talked about. Probably that was just as well. By around 9pm I was feeling weary but exultant. As we worshipped God and raised our voices and sang along with well-known gospel singer Graham Kendrick – at the back of my mind was the fact that one of my greatest prayers of all time had unexpectedly been answered.
The day nearly ended in disaster, however. It had rained heavily the previous week and the entire camping field quickly turned into a soggy mud bath. After one celebratory beer too many around the campfire later that night, inwardly toasting Brexit with every tug of the bottle opener - and also dog tired by now - I staggered off for a wee. The camping toilets were surrounded by a soup of thick mud so I headed for the field margins, not realising that a viciously deep gully ran along the side I had chosen. In the dark I failed to see it and tumbled down, straight into a quagmire of liquid mud. It was sufficiently deep and I was sufficiently stuck to have huge difficulty wrenching myself out. At first I didn’t think I was going to be able to. I felt a momentary panic and wondered what the organisers, who were running a competition for who could end up with the most impressive injury over the festival, would make of it if I were to meet a sticky end down there.
I literally prayed that the God that we had come to worship would give me strength to haul myself out to safety. And I was darned sure I wasn’t going to perish on such a happy day! I managed it, only just, covered from head to toe in brown slime. The toilet block had definitely been a better option. The Gathering still meets in that same field near Swindon, Wiltshire, but the gully, identified as a significant danger, has long since been fenced off.
Perhaps that experience was a metaphor for the many pitfalls which have been strewn across the path of establishing ourselves as a strong, independent nation subsequently. If the hard work has already been accomplished, the unbelievably hard work is yet to begin. The obvious elephant in the room remains uncontrolled immigration. If only we could also have a referendum on what to do about that.
But when at times I despair at our prospects and the enormity of the task ahead, I will look back fondly on June 23rd, 2016, and remember what success felt like and why it is always worth striving for. Brexit was a precious get-out-of-gaol card. Now we must grab our freedom with both hands and enjoy the victory we have waited so long for.
