2016 United Kingdom political crisis

The 2016 United Kingdom political crisis, sometimes known as the Brexit crisis, was a political crisis in the United Kingdom that lasted from June to August 2016.

The crisis began when shortly after the end of the 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, which ended in a Remain victory with 58.6% of the vote, then-Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, David Cameron, whom, after initially offering a largely conciliatory and neutral tone in response to the outcome of the referendum, proceeded to sack approximately five of his cabinet members, all of whom had voted for the United Kingdom to leave the European Union during the referendum, and were henceforth replaced by new Conservative MPs whom are otherwise in favour of the United Kingdom remaining in the European Union. In response, the loudest of the five cabinet members whom were sacked, former Secretary of State for Justice, Michael Gove, promptly criticised Cameron for his alleged "backstabbing", as well as calling the latter "two-faced". Subsequently, Gove also threatened to leave the Conservative Party entirely along with the other party MPs whom had voted in favour of the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the European Union, thereby effectively reducing the current number of Conservative seats in the House of Commons by nearly half. In the midst of this, the crisis also led to a brief but rare moment of royal intervention in the country's national politics, when King Thomas openly called for "unity and togetherness in favour of the people and the nation as a whole".

Ultimately, such a move never came about, and after a leadership challenge against Cameron also ended in failure, both Gove and fellow Brexit ally, Boris Johnson, were subsequently expelled from the Conservative Party, a move which Cameron then described as a "measure of last resort", whilst stating that the two men were "disrupting party unity in favour of its enemies". Later, in June 2022, following Cameron's resignation and his subsequent replacement by Justine Greening, it was initially speculated that both men would be allowed to return to the party, given that Cameron, during his premiership, had strongly prohibited against their return to the party following their expulsion. Ultimately, Greening herself later affirmed her predecessor's prohibition on the two men's potential return to the party, stating, "In the past, they have done enough to almost split the party and easily hand over control of the House of Commons to our opponents, and so, in times of crisis such as this one, it is uniters who we require, not dividers". Consequently, Gove, together with Johnson, subsequently founded the right-wing political party, Bruges UK, which was later joined by approximately sixty-four Conservative MPs, along with ten more from the Labour Party.

Prelude

Roughly six years prior to the crisis, as a result of the 2010 United Kingdom general election, sitting Labour prime minister, Gordon Brown, was unseated by the Conservatives led by David Cameron, thereby ending nearly a thirteen-year-long period of uninterrupted Labour rule. Then, for the first few years or so, as a response to an ongoing economic crisis plaguing the country, the Cameron administration opted to pursue austerity measures, which were intended to reduce the government's huge deficit at the time.

At the same time, the Cameron administration also oversaw two important referendums, namely the 2011 United Kingdom Alternative Vote referendum and the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, both of which had ended up in the government's overall favour.

2016 European Union membership referendum

On 23 June 2016, with the intent to officially end the growing debate over the United Kingdom's continued membership of the European Union, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, David Cameron launched a nationwide referendum, which after a day of polling, saw roughly 58.6% of voters in favour of the country remaining within the European Union to the remaining 43% preferring for its withdrawal from the organisation. Soon afterwards, in a speech to the public outside of 10 Downing Street, Cameron called for "immediate unity and reconciliation" between the two opposing sides, stating, "As many have demanded, we have allowed the people themselves to vote on the country's future with the European Union, and a majority of them decided that we should stay, and that is a decision that those who might not necessarily agree with should respect on the basis of democracy".

Cabinet reshuffle

However, in just a few days after the referendum concluded, on 27 June 2016, Cameron subsequently announced a surprise cabinet reshuffle, which primarily affected members of his cabinet that had voted against the United Kingdom's continued membership of the European Union, namely Chris Grayling, John Whittingdale, and Michael Gove, along with a few others. Consequently, Michael Gove for instance, was effectively sacked from his position as Secretary of State for Justice, in which he was replaced by the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, Amber Rudd, whom, like the other members that would replace those fired by Cameron, had voted in favour of the United Kingdom remaining with the European Union.

Almost immediately, the move was met with immediate backlash, with the response being led by Michael Gove himself whom, along with fellow Brexit campaigner and then-Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, led the so-called "Brexit resistance" against Cameron's cabinet reshuffle, which was seen by critics as a direct contradiction of his previously seemingly conciliatory demeanour. Then, on July 1st, Gove publicly appeared on Sky News, in which he, with the apparent backing of other Conservative MPs whom had voted in favour of the country's withdrawal from the European Union, threatened to "defect and leave the party for good", citing a "damaging and toxic civil war" within the party. In response, David Cameron himself promptly labelled Gove a "fake Tory" and a "traitor to the entire party". A further series of exchanges of heated messages between the two men followed throughout the next few days, before Gove, in a July 7th posting on Twitter, appeared to backtrack on his initial threat.

Gove & Johnson's expulsion from the party

However, on 12 July 2016, Sir Graham Brady, the chairman of the Conservative Party's 1922 committee, announced that enough number of letters by the party's MPs have been collected to trigger a vote of no confidence against the prime minister. Ultimately, the attempt, which was believed to be mostly spearheaded by Michael Gove himself in a bid to oust David Cameron and therefore replace him with a friendlier and politically aligned new prime minister, decisively ended in failure, thereby allowing Cameron to continue as prime minister and leader of the Conservative Party. Nonetheless, in response to the attempt, Cameron, in a brief interview with journalists outside of Westminster Palace, announced that it was "the final straw for some particular people", leading many to rumour whether Cameron would seek to further "punish" his party rival, Michael Gove and the latter's allies for their involvement in the no-confidence vote, a rumour that was later confirmed when just two days later, the BBC first reported that both Michael Gove and Boris Johnson, both of whom had been influential in the unsuccessful campaign for the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the European Union, were "no longer members of the Conservative Party", with the expulsion itself said to have taken into effect immediately.

Given the rarity of a sitting prime minister sacking his or her own cabinet members and afterwards removing them from the party entirely, the move was quickly met with varying responses and enormous media coverage, although most media outlets largely saw it as an attempt by David Cameron to consolidate his power by thereby removing the "biggest voices" of his critics, them being none other than Michael Gove and fellow ally, Boris Johnson. Meanwhile, following a few hours long period of silence following the announcement, Gove later announced on Twitter that he was "absolutely glad to serve the Conservative Party", before subsequently criticising Cameron's actions as "saddening" and "treacherous to the party's esteemed values". Otherwise, Cameron himself promptly defended his decision to sack the two men, stating that with the recent vote of no confidence in him, the two men had "gone too far", before later publicly stating that he had chosen not to sack the other pro-Brexit Conservative MPs aligned with Gove and Boris Johnson on the basis that they "should have learned by now the costs and consequences of being a party rebel and a traitor to the party itself".

Aftermath

On 6 June 2022, David Cameron officially stepped down as prime minister and was replaced in his position by Justine Greening, whom had previously served as Secretary of State for International Development under her predecessor. Following this, The Guardian then reported that Gove, in an apparent last-ditch attempt at finally re-entering the party following David Cameron's resignation, had sent a letter to Justine Greening, asking for his and his ally, Boris Johnson's readmittance into the Conservative Party. Ultimately, the offer was squarely rejected by Greening, whom then said, "In the past, they have done enough to almost split the party and easily hand over control of the House of Commons to our opponents and so, in times of crisis such as this one, it is uniters who we require, not dividers".

In response to this, just a day later, Gove, along with Johnson, subsequently announced the formation of a new right-wing political party, named Bruges UK, which, not long after its founding, saw approximately sixty-four MPs from the Conservative Party and ten from the Labour Party officially joining the party. In turn, Leader of the Opposition, Keir Starmer announced that his Labour Party, on the grounds of "preserving mainstream politics" and "delivering what is best for the people together", would be forming an "unofficial partnership" with the Conservative Party under Justine Greening, given the two leaders' largely similar moderate to liberal brand of politics, whilst stressing that it does not necessarily amount to an official government coalition between the two traditionally rival parties.