Author
Philip Rycroft
Abstract
On the cusp of the UK’s exit from the EU, Philip Rycroft reflected on his seven years at the centre of the UK Government to ask how we reached this point in the country’s history. In this lecture he examines the underlying causes of Brexit and the political response through the Coalition years and the Cameron and May Governments. He describes the challenges that will come in the next stages of Brexit and asks how the response to those challenges relates to the discontents that drove Brexit and what it means for the future of the United Kingdom – if, indeed, the United Kingdom has a future.
This lecture was delivered on 03 October 2019 in Cambridge by Philip Rycroft, in his inaugural public event as distinguished honorary researcher at the Bennett Institute for Public Policy and POLIS at the University of Cambridge.
The event was chaired by Professor Stephen Toope, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge.
It is the second of two lectures by Philip Rycroft published by the Bennett Institute – the first published in July 2019, entitled Place policy after Brexit.