Brexit | The Guardian

Britain is a swamp of lies and disinformation – and we got here on the Brexit bus | Jonathan Freedland

Jonathan Freedland — Fri, 05 Jun 2026 16:10:52 GMT

Ten years after the vote, our economy is battered – and our national conversation darkens by the day. Still, there is reason for hope

When the anniversary comes, later this month, few will be in the mood to look back. All the political talk will be of the Makerfield byelection, of the future of this government and this prime minister. And yet, it would be wise to reflect on what happened on 23 June 2016 – if only because the choices Keir Starmer and his would-be successors face, indeed the entire political and cultural landscape we now inhabit, are informed or were shaped by that event. We are living in Brexit Britain.

A useful prompt comes from the upcoming two-part BBC series Brexit: A Very British Civil War, made by the master documentarian Norma Percy. Speaking to (nearly) every key player, it brings it all back – the red bus, “take back control”, the pantomime river battle of Nigel Farage v Bob Geldof.

Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist

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