Explosive series starts
It’s the book that will set Westminster ablaze – Cameron’s right-hand man reveals in explosive detail what REALLY went on inside No 10 during the Brexit battle and how it descended into...
AS DAVID Cameron’s No 10 Director of Communications, Sir Craig Oliver had a unique insight into the EU referendum campaign. Former BBC news executive Oliver, 47, kept detailed diaries throughout. In this first part of today’s serialisation of his book, Unleashing Demons, Oliver describes the high drama inside No 10 on the night of June 23 as it dawns on shocked Cameron and his team that they are doomed to defeat.
THURSDAY, JUNE 23 REFERENDUM DAY. 7PM.
I ARRIVE at No 10 and walk upstairs to discover civil servants, special advisers and politicians mingling in the staterooms. The PM is there, looking relaxed in a casual shirt that isn’t tucked in. A long table is laden with moussaka and lasagne. Wine and elderflower cordial are served.
Bruised by a brutal campaign, I have felt confident of victory all day, but am beginning to feel uneasy now. However, the mood is good.
Two polls come through suggesting it’ll be about 52-48 for Remain. Close, but I’ll take that. There isn’t a single indicator suggesting we should be worried.
When the results are due to start coming in, I decide to watch by myself in my office. Newcastle isn’t as good for us as it should be. Sunderland was always expected to vote Leave, but 61 per cent to 39 per cent is far worse than predicted.
Sterling plummets. I feel a wave of sickness wash through me. A few more results trickle in.
I text Ryan Coetzee, the Remain campaign’s Director of Strategy: ‘What do you think?’
Ryan replies: ‘We’re just very slightly behind the curve. By a point, basically. It’s looking too close to call. In fact it’s very f****** close.’
It’s going to be a long night. I doze for a few minutes and wake up to see more results tumbling in. The lead is switching back and forth. Big London numbers pull us back – but then there are a series of smaller, bad results.
The BBC has designated Leave the colour blue and Remain yellow. A pattern begins to emerge as results flash on the screen: Blue. Blue. Blue. Then we are pulled back by a massive Remain result.
Blue. Blue. Blue. Blue. Blue. Yellow. Blue. Blue. Blue. Blue. Blue. Yellow.
I call Ryan. ‘We are just on course for a win,’ he says. ‘But it’s going to be tiny.’ ‘How tiny?’ ‘The model is currently predict- ing we will win by 32,000 votes.’ Christ… David Cameron texts me: ‘How worried should we be?’
I reply that it’s desperately close – we just have to see.
The results start piling in at 3am. The BBC says that it is precisely 50-50. The sensation is one of, having been sure of my path, stepping into quicksand and being slowly pulled under. I look around for something or someone to help pull me out. But there’s nothing and no one. I call Stephen Gilbert, the Conservative Party’s former campaign chief, who has played a key role at Stronger In. I try to make it easy for him. ‘It’s not looking good, is it?’ ‘I can’t see us doing it now – no.’ Lucy Thomas calls me from the Stronger In party, close to tears, as she tells me: ‘ITV is going to call it for Leave.’
It’s approaching 4am. DC’s press secretary, Graeme Wilson, slaps me on the back and says he’s going to bed. ‘It’s over.’ I borrow his coat. I need some fresh air. DC is standing outside his private office. He looks tired. Resigned in every sense. The Cabinet Office Minister, Matt Hancock, and the Prime Minister’s long-serving aide, Liz Sugg, are nearby. He waves us inside and slumps into the armchair he’s used to chair thousands of meetings over the past six years.
Yesterday [June 23], at a meeting of the PM, George [Osborne], Ed [Llewellyn, Downing Street chief of staff], Kate [Fall, deputy chief of staff], Oliver Letwin and me, we had talked through the options if we lost.
Option 1: Resign, hanging on until the party finds a new leader.
Option 2: Stay on to steady the ship, without giving a specific date for going.
I said: ‘We tell ourselves that a win is a win, allowing us to do what we want. But we also need to understand that a loss is a loss… If you lose and stay on, you will be fighting reality.’ DC nods. I know he has already made up his mind to go. George went next: ‘History is littered with examples of governments that have been through torrid times only to survive.’
DC had laughed, saying: ‘Prime Ministers also resign.’
There was some pushing back and forth. I felt tears welling in my eyes at one moment.
DC went out to the loo. I reminded everyone of the knight in Monty Python And The Holy Grail, taking hit after hit, having limbs sliced off – yet still urging people to try to beat him, claiming: ‘It’s only a flesh wound.’ In other words – he doesn’t know he’s beaten.
Oliver Letwin considered what would happen in a Conservative leadership election. He thought it would include Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Michael Gove in a competition on who could be the most ‘Leavist’, with Gove the only one who really believed it. Could Gove cope? DC says he is prone to ‘infarctions’ [seizures].
Kate had raised the prospect of us winning, only for them to still demand George’s head. DC’s view was that they could ‘get stuffed’. Everyone feels protective of George, who has given his all.
Now, in the early hours after the defeat, the PM says he’s been thinking about whether he should be less specific about when he goes, but doesn’t think it will work. I say: ‘I may be wrong but I can’t see how you can stay.’ DC says: ‘The trouble with all options other than going immediately is they collapse like a concertina.
And the truth is, I wouldn’t believe in it.’ Liz asks if, given that he told people he would stay on, resigning now will be seen as a betrayal of trust. Both DC and I are touched by this – everyone knew it was a question he had to answer that way but no one will really be shocked at the change.
The simple fact is that he couldn’t be responsible for delivering Brexit when he doesn’t believe in it.
The PM says: ‘It would be miserable. Every moment I was here, I’d be being prepared for the slaughterhouse – just waiting for the tap on the shoulder.
‘I’d be saying, “Come and punch me as hard as you like.” And then I’d have to go.’ He starts to move to the door. I can’t think of anything to do other than slap him on the back. He says: ‘Don’t worry…’ I watch him disappear down the corridor. I walk out on to Whitehall. The street is deserted. My mind feels calm but as I approach the memorial opposite the entrance to the Ministry of Defence, my body seems to go into spasm. I suddenly retch harder than I have done in my life. Nothing comes up. I retch again – so hard, it feels as if I’ll turn inside out.
Dots of light dance before my eyes. And then it is over. I spit. Tears are streaming down my face – not from sadness, but from the sheer physical exertion.
At 4.39am, I’m back in No 10 to watch David Dimbleby call it formally on the BBC. The pound is dropping to its lowest level since 1985. A small voice inside me is saying: They broke it, they own it.
I walk into No11. George is sitting alone, watching a tiny television. I put my hand on his shoulder and ask him how he thinks Michael Gove and Boris Johnson feel.
My hope is that they feel real pain, wondering what on earth they have done. George pricks that bubble, simply saying: ‘Cock-a-hoop. In politics you always believe you’ll be better than those who went before you.’
DC arrives in No10 at about 7am, trying to have a sense of humour about it all. ‘Well, that didn’t go to plan!’ he says.
He calls Gove and takes charge immediately: ‘I wanted to call you to formally concede and to congratulate you on a stunning victory.’ ‘Thank you, PM.’ ‘From here on, I’m keen to provide stability.’
‘There are some particular things we should talk about regarding how the negotiations proceed.’
DC cuts him off at the pass. ‘I’ll make a statement shortly. It’ll really just say: Result received and accepted and it must be delivered.’
He sounds friendly, though I detect some cold brutality. ‘All right, take care.’ I can hear uncertainty in Gove’s voice – what is DC planning?
Others who listened to the call are incensed. ‘Did you hear him – as if he was the PM dictating terms?’
Just after 8am, DC goes out.
I turn up the TV. The office is full of people. George stands next to me. Kate Fall is in tears. It’s obvious from the moment he walks out of the front door that he is resigning. Sam wouldn’t be there if he wasn’t going.
He gets to the final sentences about loving his country and begins to choke up, just about getting to the end without crying.
Thirty seconds later Sam and he are back in the office. A spontane- ous round of applause goes on for well over a minute.
DC makes a short speech about this being the best team he could hope to have. He gives me a big hug and I feel the tears well up in my eyes. Sam hugs me too. ‘Craig…’ she says, and there’s no need to fill in the blank.
Later, I am in a pub in Smithfield with some of the Stronger In team when Boris and Gove hold a press conference and it comes on the television. It looks more like a funeral to me than a celebration. I walk out before Gove speaks. I don’t think I can stand his fatuous nonsense.
When the Cabinet meets on Monday [June 27], I look across at Gove. His face is crimson, looking like he may be about to have a coronary. He seems to be engaged in the most elaborate performance.
He grabs his pen with excessive vigour, scribbles and underlines ferociously. When he turns the page, he takes the fabric bookmark and lays it down along the spine of the notebook with excessive care. Occasionally he places his elbows on the desk, his palms pressed against each other and drums his fingers together, varying the tempo. No one else is so fidgety.
DC rattles through some points about this being a clear instruction from people and there being no Brexiters or Remainers any more, just one Government.
He adds that people think the party conference is a natural break for the new leader to be in place – some think longer, some shorter – but says: ‘I’m not particularly fussed!’
Various people contribute. Theresa May notably does not pay tribute to the PM. She speaks in her usual no-nonsense way about the need to ‘competently and practically’ get the best result.
Gove gives an effusive tribute, saying history will be generous to DC. He says: ‘We need to be unified in stopping those who seek hate and division.’
There’s then some guff about needing to work together.
He looks like a seagull holding a fish in its beak that is too big to swallow – eager to keep hold of it, but also not sure it can carry the burden…
Stay on as PM? It would be miserable. Every moment I was here I’d be being prepared for the slaughterhouse
Results come in – it’s like stepping into quicksand and being slowly pulled under with no one to help me