No Second Chances

Between 2016and 2019, a unique coalition assembled within British politics. CombiningCorbynite campaigners and Conservative Cabinet ministers, celebrities andgrassroots activists, seasoned political veterans and novice politicalamateurs, this disparate assemblage of forces was brought together by one aim:stopping Brexit. What began as the unfocused, often deeply emotional beliefthat Britain must not leave the EU morphed, fleetingly, into a mass movement:the People’s Vote campaign, a mess of organisations united by the call for asecond referendum on Europe.From thestunts of youth campaigners and the online antics of new pro-EU influencers tothe million-person marches of 2019 and the launch of new centrist parties, manypeople, serious and unserious alike, dedicated themselves to securing a newvote. A campaign premised on telling the nation that they had gotten itcatastrophically wrong was always going to be hard, and it was only made moreso by parliamentary maths that never seemed to quite add up. Based oninterviews with the people who were there, No Second Chances tellsthe dramatic, bizarre, and (at times) embarrassing story of one of recentBritish history’s most feted roads not taken.