Britain, Brexit, Burnham: how was it for EU?

Summary

Podcast Summary:

Today in Focus — Britain, Brexit, Burnham: how was it for EU?
Host: Nosheen Iqbal | Guest: Heather Stewart, The Guardian
Date: June 24, 2026

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Episode Overview

Marking the 10-year anniversary of Britain’s Brexit referendum, this episode unpacks the dramatic legacy of the Leave vote on British society, economics, politics, migration, and international standing. Host Nosheen Iqbal is joined by former Guardian Politics Editor and current Economics Editor Heather Stewart for a candid, insight-rich conversation about what’s changed since 2016 — and what an era defined by Brexit, division, and the tantalizing possibility of “rejoining” means for the country as Andy Burnham potentially heads for No. 10.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

The Shock and Immediate Consequences of the Brexit Vote

• Unprecedented Political Shock
  • The “Leave” outcome took both public and establishment by surprise.
  • Leadership on both sides had campaigned to “Remain.”
  • David Cameron quickly resigned as prime minister.
  • Quote (Heather Stewart, 03:53):

    “It was an extraordinary moment, really... a real jolt to the establishment. Lots of people who felt that they knew what they were doing, they knew how to do politics, they knew what the public wanted were proved completely wrong.”

• Uncertainty and Leadership Chaos
  • No clear blueprint for post-Brexit Britain existed.
  • Both main parties thrown into disarray — Labour Party infighting intensified, Conservative splits deepened.

The Economic Impacts of Brexit

• Lost Growth and Revenue
  • UK economy is 4–8% smaller than it would have been inside the EU.
  • Persistent lower tax revenues mean less for public services.
  • Quote (Heather Stewart, 07:30):

    “There is a consensus, really, that it’s not gone that well, that the economy is maybe 4% to 8% smaller than it would have been if we’d stayed in the EU.”

• Trade and Investment
  • Prolonged uncertainty discouraged investors; companies faced complex new trading requirements.
  • Trade deals outside the EU have not compensated for lost EU trade.
• The City of London
  • Has not collapsed but may have underperformed versus a “Remain” scenario.
• Labour Shortages
  • Loss of EU workforce exacerbated staffing shortages in hospitality, health, social care, and other sectors.

Migration and the “Taking Back Control” Narrative

• Unexpected Migration Outcomes
  • Despite Brexit rhetoric, migration levels initially rose as government recognized economic need for workers.
  • Demographics shifted: more arrivals from Nigeria, India, the Philippines; fewer from Poland, Romania, Czech Republic.
  • The “Australian points system” was more slogan than reality.
• Political Irony and Backlash
  • Anti-migrant sentiment fueled Leave campaigning, but post-Brexit policy reversed expectations.
  • Quote (Heather Stewart, 11:46):

    “It is ironic that we had a campaign that absolutely... had kind of racist undertones... and so it’s ironic that then that handed the reins of government to a bunch of people who decided the right thing ... was to let a large number of people in.”

• Recent Developments
  • Migration has dramatically decreased in the last two years due to tighter controls under both Conservatives and Labour.
    • Tightened visa rules, higher salary thresholds, and closing care worker routes (14:00+)
  • Could be heading for negative net migration soon.

Polarization, Politics, and National Debate

• Ever-Present, Toxic Conversation
  • Brexit has intensified polarization and the toxic tone of debates around sovereignty, migration, and more.
  • Fueled a sense that “taboos were broken” in politics, especially around immigration (12:56).
• Conservative Party Fallout
  • Tories, dominant since 2010, are now fractured and out of power.

Britain’s International Standing

• Little Gained, Much Lost
  • The UK has not found new “freedom” on the global stage post-Brexit.
  • Seat at the WTO and other bodies no substitute for EU membership.
  • Relations cooled post-Boris Johnson’s hard Brexit strategy.

Where Do We Stand Now? Polls, Public Sentiment, Rejoining?

• Regret and “Bregret”
  • Growing majority say Brexit was a mistake:
    • 57% think leaving was wrong, including 23% of original Leave voters (17:58).
    • 55% would vote to rejoin — but only 35% if it meant full EU membership (Euro, Schengen, no rebate).
• Demographic Divides
  • Young people much more pro-Remain/Rejoin.
  • “67% of 18 to 24-year-olds would say they want to rejoin. 35% of over 65s.” (19:46)
• Political Prospects for Rejoining
  • Andy Burnham openly pro-European but cautious in the short term.
  • EU’s response: Some hurt remains, but 2/3 of EU citizens would welcome Britain back, according to the European Council of Foreign Relations.
  • Michel Barnier has floated flexible return terms (keep the pound, remain outside Schengen).
  • EU would require clear sign of UK stability and intention before serious talks.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the shock of Brexit:

  “It was a real jolt to the establishment. Lots of people who felt that they knew what they were doing… were proved completely wrong. And it was a real shock.”
  (Heather Stewart, 03:53)

• On the economic impact:

  “It’s hard to find an economist who disagrees with that, put it that way.”
  (Heather Stewart, 07:46)

• On the migration reversals:

  “It is ironic that we had a campaign that absolutely, as you said, had kind of racist undertones to it… and so it’s ironic that then that handed the reins… to people who decided… the right thing… was to let a large number of people in.”
  (Heather Stewart, 11:46)

• On the Conservative Party:

  “You can argue… [it] has been kind of broken by Brexit. Right. They were riding high… and they're now seen as not posing any kind of challenge.”
  (Heather Stewart, 27:50)

• On rejoining the EU:

  “If you're the EU… Why would you spend a single nanosecond, really, doing a deal with the UK that you would know that a right wing government might unpick as soon as it could?”
  (Heather Stewart, 21:13)

• Farage’s line on Brexit:

  “Where Brexit has been a failure and where people are upset is not because of Brexit, but because the Conservative Party's total failure to implement it.”
  (Nigel Farage, 25:18)

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Important Timestamps for Key Segments

• Brexit shock and political aftermath: 03:28–07:05
• Economic impact of Brexit: 07:05–09:26
• Migration, “taking back control,” and its ironies: 09:26–14:39
• International standing post-Brexit: 15:04–16:21
• Evolving UK-EU relations (Labour’s shift, negotiation points): 16:21–17:50
• Public opinion, polling, and generational divides: 17:50–20:34
• Prospects and obstacles for rejoining the EU: 20:34–22:25
• Campaign leaders reflect on Brexit (Boris, Farage): 24:39–25:54
• Seeking the positives: 26:18–27:45
• Brexit’s lasting legacy: 27:45–28:42

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Final Reflections

Brexit, for all its promised clarity and “control,” continues to cast a long shadow over Britain. From economic shortfalls to a roiling migration debate, from diminished global clout to a fractured political landscape and persistently divided public, the country finds itself in a state of “Bregret”—searching for a way forward even as the old wounds and new debates remain raw.

Whether, how soon, and on what terms Britain might ever “rejoin Europe” is less a question of sentiment than of political will, demographic change, and the EU’s own faith in the UK’s reliability—leaving the “other B word” as unresolved as ever.

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Recommended related reading:

• Heather Stewart’s long read: “From bendy buses to £350m for the NHS: How many Brexit promises actually came true?”
  Find it at theguardian.com

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Produced by: Natalie Hattena & Iva Manley
Sound design: Rudy Zagadlo
Executive producer: Eli Block

Transcript

[Guardian Advertiser/Announcer]

This is the Guardian.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Today. It's not eu, it's me.

[Guardian Advertiser/Announcer]

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[Noshi Nikbal]

Brexit. I know what you're thinking. No thanks. Let me out. But stay with me.

[Heather Stewart]

The total number of votes cast in favour of leave was 17 million.

[Noshi Nikbal]

This week marks 10 years since half the UK decided that the best direction the country could take would be to leave the European Union.

[Heather Stewart]

This means that the UK has voted to leave the European Union.

[Noshi Nikbal]

A four decade project terminated by the public. But how did that actually go? And how has the last decade shaped the way we live now?

[Heather Stewart]

I think the political and the economic world we're living in is hugely shaped by Brexit. It's cast a really long shadow over both the major political parties in this country, which are now at risk of not being the major political parties for much longer over the sort of general tenor of debate, I think, and the extent to which we're polarized. So I think it's been really, really significant and we're still feeling the impact of it 10 years on.

[Noshi Nikbal]

With the departure of yet another Prime Minister and the likely arrival of Andy BURNHAM in number 10, the heat is back in the relationship between the EU and the UK. 58% of Britons now say they would vote to rejoin given the chance. If you ask Gen Z, that goes up to three in five. Are we really going there again? And what lessons have been learned from one of the most brilliant, bitter referendums in recent political history? From the guardian, I'm noshi neqbal, today in focus britain. Burnham and the other b word. Heather Stewart, welcome back to Today in Focus.

[Heather Stewart]

Thanks.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Now, you're the Guardian's Economics editor and crucially you were Politics editor at the time of the Brexit report referendum. I don't really want to go back,

[Heather Stewart]

none of us do.

[Noshi Nikbal]

But, you know, we're here. It's been 10 years. Can you just give me a quick reminder of just how consequential that result, the country voting to leave the eu, how consequential it felt at the time?

[Heather Stewart]

It was an extraordinary moment, really. And not to reminisce too much, as you say, but I was on the early shift, the 4am shift, and I sort of arrived in the office to this turmoil because it was not what was expected and it was a huge blow to the sitting government. The leadership of both parties had said to the public, we really, really want you to do this.

[Guardian Advertiser/Announcer]

Our economic security is paramount. It is stronger if we stay. If we leave, we put it at risk. I've been the country's Chancellor for six years. I think it would be a very big mistake for us to leave. If we as a country decide to quit, we then we're out for good, there's no going back.

[Heather Stewart]

And the public had sort of shrugged and said, we are not going to listen to you. We want to do something different. And so it wasn't clear on that first morning quite what the changes would be, and particularly it wasn't clear how long it would take to extricate ourselves from the EU and to decide what sort of relationship we were going to have with them. But it was really, really clear that it was a real jolt to the establishment. Lots of people who felt that they knew what they were doing, they knew how to do politics, they knew what the public wanted were proved completely wrong. And it was a real shock.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Also, I remember it being a real. You remember where you were kind of moment. And, well, in my case, waking up in Glastonbury, everyone was just like what

[Heather Stewart]

I vividly remember sitting in front of my computer, waiting for David Cameron to come out onto Downing Street. And of course, he had said, I'm not going to resign.

[Guardian Advertiser/Announcer]

If we vote to leave, will we carry out that instruction? Yes. Will I carry on as Prime Minister? Yes. Will I construct a government that includes all of the talents of the Conservative Party?

[Heather Stewart]

Yes. And then shortly thereafter, off he goes.

[Guardian Advertiser/Announcer]

I was absolutely clear about my belief that Britain is stronger inside the European Union, but the British people have made a very clear decision to take a different path. And as such, I think the country requires fresh leadership to take it in

[Heather Stewart]

this direction, you know, And I really remember thinking, gosh, this is an extraordinary moment.

[Noshi Nikbal]

And from your perspective, what were Your hopes, or rather even your fears of how the next 10 years would pan out.

[Heather Stewart]

I think it was so unclear during the campaign what approach to Brexit the Leavers wanted to take. You know, Vote Leave worked really hard not to be pinned down, really, on any of the details about what kind of trading relationship did they want with the eu, what kind of migration policy did they want? How did they want this to work? I don't know if you remember that press conference on the morning after with Boris Johnson and Michael Gove, who were of course victorious, and being around the country on their big red battle bus and they'd stood up and the whole vibe was of shock and bewilderment and, you know, it wasn't a kind of confidence about this glorious new future we were going to march towards. And so there was this real sense of kind of unknown. Not only were you going to have a new Prime Minister, the civil war in the Labour Party that was already sort of humming away really started to sort of run red hot after that. It kick started the divide in the Conservative Party and it was incredibly unclear. We knew it would be a wrangle, it would take quite a long time. The details of it were a mystery. Yeah, I don't think anyone, including Vote Leave themselves, had a very clear picture of how it was going to look.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Well, Heather, let's take a look at how that decision 10 years ago has shaped the country that we're living in. Leave Campaign has made this series of promises that were based on sovereignty, governance, immigration, the pressures of economic globalization, all these sort of big ideas. But let's start with the economy. How has that gone, specifically when it comes to looking at the impact of Brexit?

[Heather Stewart]

There is a consensus, really, that it's not gone that well, that the economy is maybe 4% to 8% smaller than it would have been if we'd stayed in the eu. You know, that's looking at sort of similar countries and what's happened to them since and so on.

[Noshi Nikbal]

So it sounds small, but that's actually.

[Heather Stewart]

But it's really significant. It's really significant. And then that means much less tax revenue. Right. And therefore less to spend on public services. So it doesn't account for all of it because we've had problems with sickly growth for a very long time, since the global financial crisis. But it means that we're in a worse economic and fiscal position than we would be had we not left. It's hard to find an economist who disagrees with that, put it that way. And there's at least a couple of things in play there. The first one is there was a very long period of uncertainty. So there's quite a long period where if you were an investor or someone of the thinking, you're sort of putting money into the UK economy, it felt like maybe now wasn't the moment because you weren't quite clear what relationship we were going to have with the eu. If I'm a big multinational, will I be able to sell my products into the EU tariff free or not? I don't know. Well, maybe I'll just wait. So there was quite a long period of uncertainty while we sort of railed amongst ourselves. And then with Brussels, there's lots of

[Noshi Nikbal]

talk about banks leaving and lots of big companies moving their HQs from London.

[Heather Stewart]

Yeah, I mean, do you know what? I don't think the city has suffered as there were fears it might. I think, you know, if you go down to Canary Wharf or whatever, there's not much sign of a downturn, although there's an argument that perhaps it would have done even better had we not had Brexit. But the other impact is exports. You know, lots of companies small to large will tell you it's just become more difficult. You know, there are more checks, there is tariff free trade, but only if you can comply with particular rules. There are complexities about VAT and so on. And so it just isn't as easy to export to the EU as it was. It's not as frictionless as it once was. And it's our biggest market because it's right on our doorstep. And we've done some other trade deals, but there's no evidence so far in the data that those have by any stretch of the imagination started to offset the weakness in trade with the eu.

[Noshi Nikbal]

And I guess that doesn't even take into account the European workforce. The number of people who lived here and worked here in hospitality and all kinds of different parts of the sectors have since left. And all you constantly hear is that there's not enough workers, we don't have

[Heather Stewart]

enough people to those jobs. Migration is a really interesting one. Right. Because migration was one of the key issues on which the campaign was fought.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Right.

[Heather Stewart]

And not only by vote. Leave, who talked about an Australian style points migration system, which I'm not even sure anyone knew what that was, but Australians, it sounded good, right?

[Noshi Nikbal]

I mean, we've just taken their social media ban. So, you know.

[Heather Stewart]

Right, exactly, exactly. Standard, good and leave eu, which of course was the more extreme Nigel Farage's version of the Brexit campaign, which was not attached to Vote Leave, which was the formal campaign. Farage had those grim kind of breaking point posters which had these sort of cues of refugees and this idea that people were flooding in and so on. So I think if you vote to

[Noshi Nikbal]

remain, you're going to be letting in Turkey and you're gonna be letting in all these asylum seekers, all these brown men.

[Heather Stewart]

That was.

[Noshi Nikbal]

That was what the.

[Heather Stewart]

Absolutely. And that was the picture on the posters, essentially. But interestingly, when Boris Johnson got his hands on migration policy, when we did actually leave, we actually had quite a liberal migration policy. We had a big increase of people. Now the nature of those people switched. So the big nationalities coming in became Nigerians, Indians, Filipinos. Absolutely, instead of Poles and Romanians and Czechs. But. But the numbers were very, very big. And of course, now we have this backlash against that, partly because I think people were imagining migration was going to fall quite quickly. Boris Johnson's government decided actually that would be really damaging for the economy if we let migration fall really quickly. So we better let companies bring people in and indeed we better bring people in to fill up the big gaps in the social care and the health system. So it was a bit odd because it didn't have the impact that it was expected to on migration. But then that in turn has had a massive impact on our politics. I think you can argue, Heather, I

[Noshi Nikbal]

don't think it's a secret to say that a lot of the campaign or a lot of the feeling around it was essentially about racism. There was a lot of anti foreigner feeling and some people did vote thinking that it would mean migrants, foreigners out. Now, of course, the irony is, as you said, more migrants, more foreigners were needed. Not to be facetious, but have we taken back control of our borders? And what does that even mean? And what impact has Brexit had on migration?

[Heather Stewart]

2026 so I would say we are taking back control of our borders. I get frustrated with the idea that the sort of influx, the surge we had in 2022, 23, 24, there's an idea that that was kind of uncontrolled. It wasn't. It was a deliberate decision. The conscious decision made was to let a lot of people in. I mean, I think it is ironic that we had a campaign that absolutely, as you said, had kind of racist undertones to it. It wasn't the only reason. It's unfair to say it was the only reason. There was also a sort of sovereignty argument, wasn't there about we don't want our rules to be made in Brussels. We want to make our own decisions, all of that. But there was that strand of anti migration, quite definitely feeling. And so it's ironic that then that handed the reins of government to a bunch of people who decided the right thing for the economy and for the health service was to let a large number of people in.

[Noshi Nikbal]

I guess the other irony is that when we talk about how Brexit has affected our current political landscape, it feels like the conversation around immigration is sort of cyclical and the debate, the, you know, you can't say anything anymore stuff, comes around every few years and right now it's at fever pitch. How do you think Brexit and the decision to vote Leave has shaped some of the attitudes and feelings that we're seeing today?

[Heather Stewart]

Well, it's difficult, right, because you can't lay all of it on Brexit. You know, if you think about J.D. vance and Donald Trump and the, you know, alternative for Deutschland in Germany and some of these questions about migration and how you deal with it and how you integrate people or don't, and what it means culturally are very, very strong in lots of countries, unfortunately. But I do think it was a moment where some of those thinking about those Breaking Point posters, which actually would probably look quite tame compared to some of the really toxic stuff that we're drowned in now, but covering some of that stuff at the time, that felt to me like taboos were being broken in the UK debate and that there was a line in the UK debate that maybe it started to be crossed in Brexit and it continued to be crossed. Although, as I say, we are far from the only country where there is a very polarised and toxic debate about migration.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Heather, we've talked about the Boris wave and how net migration hit almost a million, but those numbers have dramatically come down now. Right.

[Heather Stewart]

They've absolutely plunged. So some controls were put in place in 2024 by the conservatives. More tightening took place under Labour when Yvette Cooper was Home Secretary. And that involved, for example, shutting down the route by which social care workers could come into country from overseas. That's just. Just not a thing now. And tightening quite a few other aspects of the regime. So lifting salary thresholds, making it harder to bring in family members, lots and lots of changes that mean that, you know, if you look at net migration figures, it's like a child's version of drawing of a mountain. You know, it goes. It goes up very, very sharply and it comes down very, very sharply. And looking ahead, the way that visa applications are Falling suggests that it's going to continue falling very, very sharply. And some experts think we might even have negative net migration in coming years.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Wow.

[Heather Stewart]

So it's kind of extraordinary that we're still having.

[Noshi Nikbal]

That's the tenor of debate right now.

[Heather Stewart]

Yeah. And we're still having this very hot debate about it. Right. And yet numbers coming into the country are falling, but we certainly have, in inverted commas, taken back control of migration in recent years, and it's fallen very sharply.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Heather, how do you think Brexit has shaped Britain's standing on the international stage?

[Heather Stewart]

I mean, it's not been good, has it? There have been moments, I suppose, where you could say we've slightly been able to plow our own furrow a little bit. So Keir Starmer has, at some points, peeled away from the EU in the way that he's handled Donald Trump. Although, you know, I'm not quite sure

[Noshi Nikbal]

that's better or worse.

[Heather Stewart]

I'm not sure that's gained us very much, but it's quite hard to see that it's increased our standing. I think part of the Brexit argument, I think, was that we were sort of neutered on the world stage a little bit. We weren't able to take our own individual place because institutions like the World Trade Organisation, for example, we were spoken for by the EU because we were, you know, there was an EU seat at the table, there wasn't a UK seat at the table, and that this was sort of bad. But I think it's quite hard to think of moments where we have exerted our influence or made our voice heard on the global stage since Brexit, and in a way that we weren't able to before.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Well, after Brexit, we had, you know, years of Conservative rule shaped by the turmoil and debates over Brexit, which, again, I don't need to remind you about, but, you know, don't trigger me. Hard versus, versus soft. Brexit, Norway style. Norway plus Canada style. Half in, half out, no deal. Brexit, all of it ended with Boris Johnson's hard Brexit.

[Heather Stewart]

Very hard. Yeah, yeah.

[Noshi Nikbal]

And relations with the EU cooling. Then have the election of a Labour government, which signaled something of a shift in Britain's approach to the eu. Heather, what happened?

[Heather Stewart]

So there has definitely been a sort of quiet rapprochement. There is more warmth than there has been in a long time.

[Guardian Advertiser/Announcer]

We want to work with all of you to reset relationships and renew the bonds of trust and friendship that brighten the fabric of European life.

[Heather Stewart]

And Labour has this specific but fairly narrow list of things that it's trying to negotiate or well on the way with negotiating, but nothing signed yet. Like what, for example, a veterinary deal. So the UK's food exporters very frustrated that their products face checks at the border. You do this deal and you say, okay, we'll abide by all of your rules on that particular sector. And in exchange, could you wave through our lovely products, please? You know, it's fairly narrow things and the EU in exchange wants a youth mobility scheme, which will mean a certain number of young people going backwards and forwards each year. Details to be determined. But Labour set itself these, what it called red lines, they constrain themselves quite a lot in the manifesto. But the truth is that then boxes you in quite significantly in terms of what you can negotiate and you end up negotiating the sort of little details about specific sectors rather than anything. Broad brush.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Heather, how do British people feel about Brexit now? I mean, what did the polls say a decade on, you know, does the country stand by its decision?

[Heather Stewart]

So the latest YouGov poll says 57% of the public think it was the wrong thing to do to leave, including 23% of leavers.

[Noshi Nikbal]

That's a big portion of people who regret what they chose.

[Heather Stewart]

Yeah, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. What we have to remember is that is a different question from would you like to reopen it all and go back in? Right. So of course, 55% do say rejoin, but then if you say to them, would you like to rejoin fully without the sort of opt outs that we had before, so you remember, we weren't members of the euro, we weren't part of the Schengen area, we had a significant rebate. Once you say to people, if we had to go back in, but join the euro and full fat membership, that goes down to 35% when we join, apparently. So I think it feels like there is a growing consensus that it's not gone that well and a small but growing proportion of leavers who aren't happy. But then you might not necessarily want to sort of pull the lever to rejoin. You know, I think politicians probably need to be slightly cautious in looking at the fact that people feel unhappy about Brexit and don't think it's gone well. Doesn't necessarily take you all the way to let's go back in. Although that obviously is increasingly bubbling up as a discussion point in the Labour Party.

[Noshi Nikbal]

It was interesting you talk about it bubbling up in the Labour Party because from everything we understand about him, Andy Burnham, if he's to become Prime Minister is especially pro Europe and he has said before that he wants Britain to rejoin the EU in his lifetime.

[Guardian Advertiser/Announcer]

Are you in favour of rejoining the European Union? I've said in the long term there is a case for that, but I'm not advocating that in this biology.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Heather, how realistic is that?

[Heather Stewart]

I mean, in his lifetime may well be realistic in the next Parliament. Difficult. So there is a real demographic divide. So 67% of 18 to 24 year olds would say they want to rejoin. 35% of over 65s.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Wow.

[Heather Stewart]

You know, we're very divided on this, but in a way that seems to favor, you know, an incarceration increasing weight behind the idea of rejoining over time. I suspect it will take quite a long time. I don't think we're talking about the next two, three, five years. I could be wrong. I think it's a longer term project than that. There was an interview with Jean Claude Juncker, the former president of the European Commission that the Financial Times did recently, and he said that there's still a feeling in the EU that people were kind of, the phrase he used was wounded by Brexit, you know, that there was a feeling that we'd sort of done some damage to the whole project by leaving. And if you're the eu, do you want to sit down and expend a lot of time, a lot of energy, a lot of political capital on drawing up a deal with the uk, a notoriously sort of fractious and unreliable part? You know, we've not been a great negotiating partner.

[Noshi Nikbal]

It takes me to my next question because I was going to say, like, you know, I would have assumed that even if the UK wanted to, the EU might not be into us anymore, they might not want to take us back. And yet there's this new polling by the European Council of Foreign Relations which suggests that two thirds of EU citizens would back us being back in the bloc. In fact, Michel Barnier, that total blast from the past, the former Brexit negotiator has said recently he thought it could be done with us still keeping the pound and still keeping out of the passport free Schengen zone. Heather, how likely do you think it is that we would be welcomed back again with open arms?

[Heather Stewart]

Well, I think that it would be a publicity coup for the project. Right. To say, you know, I think it was a sadness that we left. I think you'd also have to confront, you'd have to say to the public, well, we're going back to free movement which we've talked about how toxic the migration debate. It feels like we're quite a long way to go. I mean, you have to wonder why the EU would sit down with us. Because if you're them, you're looking at the opinion polls in Britain and you're thinking, well, it looks like there might be a Farage government. Why would you spend a single nanosecond really, doing a deal with the UK that you would know that a right wing government might unpick as soon as it could? So I think there would have to be a really settled opinion in the UK that we wanted to go back. You could have a Labour manifesto that said we will open negotiations to rejoin, I suppose. And then if there was a ringing endorsement of that, maybe you start tiptoeing towards it. But again, if you're a Labour government, how much of your time and energy do you want to put into that? If you feel that Brussels isn't really ready to engage because they think we're a load of, you know, short termist, kind of indecisive, you know, whatever minds. Exactly.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Coming up, the one that Got away Will we ever Get Over Brexit?

[Guardian Advertiser/Announcer]

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[Noshi Nikbal]

Heather. I don't think we're the only ones taking stock and assessing the last 10 years. I'm curious to know if any of the big players of those two campaigns have you heard anything about what they're saying about Brexit now?

[Heather Stewart]

So Boris Johnson is completely unrepentant in the sort of Boris Johnson way.

[Guardian Advertiser/Announcer]

Ten years ago, the people of this country voted to leave the eu, EU in the biggest expression of popular will in art history. And of course, I believe more passionately than ever that we were right. And to those who say we should now go back in, I say, do you really want to give up about 15 billion pounds a year to Brussels when we're struggling to spend enough on it?

[Heather Stewart]

Nigel Farage's line, I think, is that the politicians mess it up. You know, that it hasn't been tried properly, as people sort of sometimes say, about kind of Marxism or whatever. You know, it wasn't. It wasn't, you know, great idea. Shame about the executioner.

[Guardian Advertiser/Announcer]

Where Brexit has been a failure and where people are upset is not because of Brexit, but because the Conservative Party's total failure to implement it.

[Heather Stewart]

Imagine the hideousness of this. I saw Nigel Farage giving a talk over Brexit at Davos.

[Noshi Nikbal]

What a party that is.

[Heather Stewart]

Yeah, right. But he was very much, we're not doing things differently enough, we're not taking advantage enough. Because there was lots of talk, wasn't there, of we would kind of cut loads of regulations and change lots of rules. And when it came to it, actually, the government decided most of these rules and regulations. Well, you need some kind of set of rules.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Well, they're fine and they're needed. Right.

[Heather Stewart]

And business, lots of industries also say, right. Businesses that want to sell into the EU kind of want to stick to those rules anyway. So we have not done this thing of, you know, let's just sweep away loads of regulation and do things completely.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Bonfire of Red tape.

[Heather Stewart]

The Bonfire of Red Tape was a damp squib or whatever, you know, never really caught light. And I think Farage's approach is we would do much more of that kind of stuff. Brexit wasn't really tried properly. We will do a sort of proper Brexit.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Some people listening might think, you know, we've taken a very typically Guardian approach to talking about Brexit in terms of its sort of doom and the woes that it's presented. However, have there been any wins? Could you cast any positive light on the last 10 years and what Brexit has meant for Britain.

[Heather Stewart]

So I think it has meant that we've had to think about some things that we didn't have to think about for a long time. So, for example, we were members of the Common Agricultural Policy, a widely agreed to be pretty ridiculous subsidy scheme for EU farmers. We are no longer members of that and farmers will complain about this, but the government designed a scheme which now pays farmers for doing things that are good for the environment, whether it's planting crops that help bees or setting aside land. That is one of the areas where we've had to step back and have a rethink about something that we didn't think about for a long time because it was all subcontracted to Brussels. You know, I was asking someone else the other day about potential advantages and they were talking about the fact that we have labs doing great work on innovative food, so genetic modification of food, because that is one of the areas where we have slightly weaker regulations now than the eu because we felt this was a sector we could be good at, where the good UK scientists doing interesting work. So I'm told that's a sector where we're sort of pushing ahead. So there are some areas in which we have being able to go our own way. It just hasn't quite been as broad based, I think, as the Brexiters imagined.

[Noshi Nikbal]

Heather, how do you think Brexit will continue to shape the country for better or for worse?

[Heather Stewart]

I think it inevitably will because it is determining the shape of our economy, really. It has had a massive influence on our, as we've discussed, on our migration debate, which is still running very hot and will continue to do so. And it has changed the shape of our political parties, in particular the Conservative Party, which you, in some ways, you can argue, has been kind of broken by Brexit. Right. They were riding high, they were governing party and they're now seen as not posing any kind of. So I just think it is. I think it's changed the makeup of our politics and our sort of establishment in the broadest sense. It's still shaping lots and lots of little daily decisions in the way that the economy and the public sector work, but it's also still shaping national debate in a way that isn't going to go away. And as we were discussing, if we do have a coronation of Andy Byrne and Brexit is going to play very, very heavily in that debate too, that's

[Noshi Nikbal]

something to look forward to. Heather, thank you so much for your time.

[Heather Stewart]

Thanks, Rashid.

[Noshi Nikbal]

That was Economics editor Heather Stewart. You can and should find her long read from bendy buses to 350 million pounds for the NHS, how many Brexit promises actually came true? At theguardian.com, where you can also find a lot more coverage on that referendum. And that's it for today. This episode was produced by Natalie Hattena and Iva Manley. It was presented by me, Noshi Nikbal, sound design is by Rudy Zagadlo and the Executive producer was Eli Block. We'll be back this afternoon with the latest.

[Guardian Advertiser/Announcer]

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A History of the United States in 100 Objects is a brand new podcast from 99% Invisible and BBC Studios. Each week we're looking at a different object from across American history with a unique story to tell about who we've been, what we've built, and what we've allowed ourselves to forget. Some of these objects are well known, many are not. But all of them carry the story of how we got to this moment. Find a history of the United States and 100 objects on the 99% invisible feed. Wherever you get your podcasts.