The vote that fractured politics | 10 Years of Brexit Part 1
Electoral Dysfunction
Sky News
4.4 • 764 Ratings
🗓️ 1 January 2026
⏱️ 54 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This is the first episode of our two-part New Year special. Ten years on from the referendum that rewired British politics, Beth, Ruth and Harriet are joined by one of the architects of Brexit, Michael Gove, to rewind through some of the biggest moments.
From David Cameron's surprise 2015 decision to take a gamble and call the referendum, to the brutal tribalism of a campaign that forced the country into a choice between two tick boxes.
Ruth and Harriet take us through the Remain campaign and give their takes on why it didn't always cut through – while Michael Gove reveals why he first thought a referendum was a mistake, the friendships it fractured, the high-stakes calculations that pulled key figures into the Leave campaign, Boris Johnson’s “star signing” and the effort to keep Nigel Farage off the biggest stages.
And he tells the ladies he regrets pulling the rug from under Boris Johnson when he was trying to become Prime Minister after the Brexit vote.
You can WhatsApp the podcast at 07934 200 444 or email electoraldysfunction@sky.uk.
And if you didn't know, you can also watch Beth, Harriet and Ruth on YouTube.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Sky News, the full story first. |
| 0:08.7 | Are you strapped in for this Brexit roller coaster? |
| 0:25.0 | Hello and welcome to electoral dysfunction with me, Beth Rigby. |
| 0:27.0 | Me Ruth Davidson and me Harriet Harmon. |
| 0:31.3 | And a very happy new year to you all. It's 2026. |
| 0:35.2 | Sorry in advance for making you all feel very old, but it is now officially a decade, 10 years since this. |
| 0:44.4 | And Sky News is projecting that the UK has voted out. |
| 0:49.8 | The UK electorate has taken the historic decision |
| 0:53.3 | to withdraw from the European Union after more than |
| 0:56.6 | 40 years of membership. |
| 1:00.2 | We're going to get to that night, the night of the Brexit referendum. |
| 1:04.1 | But first, we're going to rewind back to more than 10 years ago. |
| 1:07.8 | It's 2015. |
| 1:09.2 | The Conservatives under David Cameron have just unexpectedly won |
| 1:13.6 | a majority small, but big enough to go into the manifesto pledge and pave the way for that |
| 1:22.1 | promised Cameron made in the general election for an in-out referendum on Europe and membership of the European Union. |
| 1:31.2 | So we're going to take you behind the scenes in this episode. We're going to rewind. We're going to go |
| 1:35.9 | back to Brexit. And I've got Ruth and Harriet with me. They were both part of the Remain campaign. |
| 1:42.6 | I've got me with me. I was reporting on it. I was literally a young television cub at this point. I just started at Sky News. I mean, fishing 40, but all right. Well, I was 40, but I was a broadcasting cup. Right, you're a broadcasting. I was a more mature lady, but I was a broadcasting cub. I just moved to Sky News, so I literally didn't know what I was doing. I'm not sure if I still do, but anyway, they've kept me on, so I must be going okay. And we have someone else here. It is the delightable, the delectable. I mean, how do I do a big build-up for Mr. Michael Gove? Or I think as I called you at the time, an arsonist that was guilty at the scene of the crime. |
| 2:21.6 | And even now, with a whiff of sulphur. |
| 2:24.8 | And brimstone, Michael. |
| 2:26.5 | That was our nice, gentrural intro there, just easing Michael into it there. |
... |
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