'Project Fear failed – but 10 years on, we've still yet to take back control'
Project Fear failed to scare voters – but 10 years on, we've yet to 'take back control'
OPINION - LEO MCKINSTRY: A decade after the momentous vote to Brexit the EU, the British people deserve better
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Add us as preferred source Comments By Leo McKinstry 06:28, Tue, Jun 23, 2026 Updated: 07:15, Tue, Jun 23, 2026 
The occasion was momentous, the verdict historic. Exactly ten years ago today the British people voted by a decisive margin for the return of our independence after more than four decades of rule by the unaccountable, unelected bureaucracy in Brussels. What the outcome of the EU Referendum in June 2016 clearly showed was a collective yearning for Britain to be a sovereign country once more, not a regional province of a sclerotic empire. It was a feeling captured in the Leave campaigners’ slogan, “Take Back Control”, which exuded an uplifting sense of confidence about Britain’s capacity for self-governance. The same patriotism shone through this paper, long renowned as a compelling voice in support of great national causes.
Guided by its brilliant political editor, the late Patrick O’Flynn, the Express became the first British paper to advocate withdrawal from the European Union. In contrast to this optimism, the Remain campaign was desperately negative, warning that Britain would struggle on its own outside the protective embrace of the EU. The Prime Minister David Cameron even claimed that Brexit would be like “putting a bomb under the economy”.
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Project Fear was a failure. With heroic defiance, the majority of voters refused to be intimidated. So when Boris Johnson declared on the eve of polling at the close of the final televised debate that “tomorrow will be our independence day”, he struck a chord with the public and helped to cement Leave’s remarkable triumph. But soon after the result disillusion began to set in, sedulously cultivated by the cynical Remain lobby, which has been determined to thwart the decision of the ballot box.
If the Remainers had acted like true democrats, accepted the vote and joined in a great national endeavour to exploit the new opportunities provided by Britain’s liberation, then Brexit could have been a roaring success. But the tragedy for our nation is that the pro-EU brigade has always refused to be reconciled to the outcome. A decade on, they still worship the power of Brussels.
Only last weekend, under the title “National March to Rejoin”, they held a major demonstration in central London, while Andy Burnham, soon to be Prime Minister, has spoken of his hope that Britain will return to the EU. The current leader Sir Keir Starmer and his entire Cabinet would leap at the chance to dump Brexit if they could. Indeed, Starmer has said that putting Britain at the heart of Europe “will be the defining act of my government”.
He was the key organiser of the attempted overthrow of the Referendum by Parliament in the three years after the vote, until he was outmanoeuvred by Boris, who won a stunning victory in the 2019 General Election and finally smashed the procedural obstructions erected by Remainers. Starner and his fellow Labour Europhiles know that they cannot make a direct assault on Brexit since such a move would both provoke public outrage and would boost Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party. So they have to proceed cautiously towards their cherished goal of renewed EU membership.
The key part of their strategy is to “reset” the relationship between the EU and Britain. Starmer’s Government is now engaged in a process called “dynamic realignment”, a euphemism for perpetual surrender, where Britain’s negotiators agree to keep accepting an ever greater number of EU rules and regulations.
As the process drags on, Britain will be a kind of associate member of the Customs Union and the Single Market, making large payments into Brussels’ coffers without having any say in the formulation of policy. This has already happened with fishing policy, and soon there are likely to be further batches of orders from Brussels demanding compliance on food standards, professional qualifications, free movement and genetically modified products.
Just as important to the Remain cause is propaganda, which paints Brexit as a disaster and its supporters as extremists. Indeed David Lammy, the Deputy Prime Minister, grotesquely compared Tory Eurosceptics to Nazis and supporters of South African apartheid, and was recently forced to apologise for his wild assertion that Farage had once “flirted” with the Hitler Youth.
More insidious is the alarmism which portrays all our economic ills as the fault of Brexit. That is more nonsense. Ill-judged Labour policies, like crippling tax rises, the expansion of welfare and the failure to curb public spending, are far more responsible.
Remainers also exaggerate greatly the gains from European integration. As the distinguished former Cabinet Minister Lord Lilley pointed out this week, during the 28 years that Britain was in the Single Market, “British goods exports to the EU grew less than 1% a year while our exports with the 111 countries with which we had no trade deal grew four times as much”.
Before the war in Iran started, Britain had the fastest growing economy in the G7, hardly an indicator that Britain has been turned into a basketcase by Brexit. On the contrary, many of the benefits of our new freedom have been highlighted by our experiences of the last decade.
During the Covid pandemic, for example, the government’s own taskforce, led by the innovative entrepreneur Kate Bingham, devised the world’s first successful anti-coronavirus vaccine. Nor did the loudly predicted exodus of financial jobs from the City of London materialise. In fact in 2022 the number of positions in the UK’s financial sector went up by 87,000, an increase of 24.7% on the previous year’s rise.
Ministers from both the main parties have also concluded an array of trade agreements that reflect our own national interests rather than the needs of Brussels. But there should have been much more of this since 2016. The EU vote was a golden opportunity to rebuild our nationhood. The public especially wants to take back control of our justice, welfare and immigration systems but the authorities pathetically failed to do so.
Instead they allowed faith in the courts to collapse, pushed social security spending to unsustainable levels, fuelled anarchy on England’s southern coast, and drove annual net legal migration to over 906,000 in June 2023.
The truth is that our political elite – profoundly attached to the twin dogmas of diversity and federal unity and instinctively hostile to the concept of a strong English identity – largely has little enthusiasm for independence. The British people are therefore denied the invigorating Brexit that they backed ten years ago. They deserve better.
Badenoch blasts 'moaning' female Labour MPs over Burnham jobs 'quota'
Kemi Badenoch has told Labour women to earn a job in Andy Burnham's Cabinet instead of demanding they are handed jobs because of their gender.
The Tory leader lashed out today amid reports that female MPs are demanding the de-facto new prime minister introduce a 50:50 gender split 'quota' in his government.
Amid reports that former foreign secretary David Miliband is being lined up to return to the role, possibly with his brother Ed as Chancellor, one female minister also complained that Burnham could not have 'more Milibands than women' in the top posts.
But in a scathing article in the Times today Mrs Badenoch told them to 'stop moaning' and get chosen on merit instead of retreating into 'more of the failed identity politics that is holding back our country'.
'There are many, many reasons why you shouldn't have any Milibands in the cabinet,' she said.
'But complaining that the boys haven't given them the right jobs or that the boys are taking all the jobs, just shows that Labour's women still don't get it.'
The idea of quotas was also attacked by Baroness Jacqui Smith, Labour's Skills Minister.
Asked by Times Radio if Mr Burnham should reserve jobs for women, she said: 'No, I think what Andy Burnham should be doing is building the very best team around him to change this country.'
A letter written by the Women's Parliamentary Labour Party has called on Mr Burnham to ensure a 50:50 split between men and women in government jobs
Amid reports that former foreign secretary David Miliband (above, right, in 2010) is being lined up to return to the role, possibly with his brother Ed as Chancellor, one female minister complained that Burnham could not have 'more Milibands than women' in the top posts
But Mrs Badenoch told them to pipe down and get chosen on merit instead of retreating into 'more of the failed identity politics that is holding back our country'
A letter written by the Women's Parliamentary Labour Party and seen by the BBC has called on Mr Burnham to ensure a 50:50 split between men and women in government jobs after he succeeds Sir Keir Starmer.
'We are asking you to demonstrate this change from day one and address the toxicity and misogyny within our own party and government,' it said.
Labour has never had a female leader, while the Conservatives have had three, and Mrs Badenoch urged the government to follow its meritocratic example.
'If you run a meritocracy, then you do not have to worry about jobs for the boys,' she wrote.
'Every woman who is a Conservative MP, every woman who has ever won the leadership, has had to fight to get where she is.
'By contrast, Labour women are demanding guarantees from Burnham. But the truth is he doesn't have to give any guarantees.
'If none of Labour's women are prepared to get their hands dirty and challenge him for the leadership, their demands are toothless.'
'In fact, it's quite revealing that the women's parliamentary Labour Party has written to Burnham asking him to commit himself to at least 50 per cent female ministers.
'This has nothing to do with meritocracy. It is yet more of the failed identity politics that is holding back our country.'
