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CNN Live Event/Special

United Kingdom Deciding Whether to Leave or Stay; "Leave" Has Momentum. Aired 11:15p-12a ET

Aired June 23, 2016 - 23:15   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[23:17:22] HALA GORANI, CNN ANCHOR: And the history of the United Kingdom. All right.

RICHARD QUEST, CNN ANCHOR: You're watching "CNN Around the World," as we cover the results from this evening's EU referendum. United Kingdom deciding whether to leave or whether to stay.

I'm Richard Quest.

GORANI: I'm Hala Gorani.

ITV news, our affiliate, predicting an 80 percent probability that the United Kingdom will exit the European Union. A referendum was held today. And as the results come in, it is looking clearer -- the picture is becoming clearer. And it looks as though the probability is increasing that the UK will no longer be a member of the European Union. Hugely significant moment in history.

QUEST: Very good evening to you, if you're watching around the world, or you're watching us in the United States.

History is being made. The UK will now have to forge new relationships. Not only with European partners, if the evening goes according as it seems to be, but also with the united states.

And look at the pound, which gives you the early indication of how the market is trading. Sterling table is now, it's off 10.3 percent. That's $1.36 and change.

GORANI: The pound has not been this weak against the dollar in decades, in 30 years. The currency markets are punishing the pound because of what they expect is going to happen. It's going to be officially announced that the UK will exit the European Union as a result of this referendum. The Dow Jones, as well, predicted to open lower.

QUEST: 2.8 percent is what we're expecting the Dow Jones to open. That's obviously in many hours from now. A good eight or nine hours. Predicted that the Dow will open up some 3 percent.

The London market itself is likely to open up. The best part of 9 percent lower and across 9.07 percent.

And across the world, we are seeing Hong Kong down 3 percent -- sorry, 2 percent, Tokyo down 3 percent. The markets are off very sharply at the moment.

And our affiliate, I believe, has just hasn't -- an updated analysis of how they expect the evening to run.

GORANI: ITV News results analysis indicating that they believe there is now an 85 percent probability of a "leave" win. An 85 percent probability that the referendum results will, in fact, constitute a win for the Brexit camp.

Let's go live to Downing Street.

Clearly, bad news for the Prime Minister David Cameron, who has been campaigning hard for the UK to remain in the EU.

Max Foster is there.

MAX FOSTER, CNN LONDON CORRESPONDENT: Yes. Lots of people in his own party and opposition parties already talking about his position being untenable. He was the figurehead of the "remain" campaign.

If the "remain" campaign loses, most people here in Westminster, see his position as untenable in the short term, not just the medium term. So we're waiting to hear from him.

[23:20:10] Of course, we need that result. But you need a massive turn around of events, a massive vote to remain in London, in Manchester, in Birmingham.

And all the analyst here, all the academics here are saying it seems very unlikely that they're going to be able to pull that one through. So it does look as though we're heading towards that leave vote, which is extraordinary, it's historic.

Vince Cable, by the way, former business secretary, telling a radio station, he is expecting a blood bath on the markets here in London. In about four hours time, they open.

A frightening scenario, already having international ramifications and also the shadow chancellor of the -- the shadow finance minister saying the Bank of England is going to have to intervene. I'm sure the Bank of England is preparing, had contingency plans in place.

But all eyes on the Bank of England in an extraordinary situation. We're not there yet. But already huge lessons to be learned from this and how those campaigns -- what carried out, Hala.

GORANI: Yes. And I wanted to ask about the Bank of England, because, Richard, if the Pound really takes a nose dive, and I mean more than 10 percent, the Bank of England will have no choice but to intervene here.

QUEST: They -- all right, Down 11 percent now. But the question is, do you intervene now or -- and intervene into a falling market, or do you wait until it finds just a little bit of a foothold and then start to claw back?

I think what they will do -- the one thing I am absolutely certain, the bank will be doing right now and in the hours ahead, will be getting ready to flood the London market with liquidity. The one thing they want to ensure doesn't happen is 2008, where the banks stopped trading with each other.

GORANI: That was a banking crisis.

QUEST: Yes.

GORANI: Here, they're going to have no choice but to raise interest rates at some point. That will affect everything in the economy, including the housing market.

QUEST: The first, most immediate crisis in this morning will not be the pound. I promise you.

The first, most immediate crisis will be to ensure that any bank that needs liquidity, to either cover a position, to alert counter parties that they're not going to go bust, how is that liquidity. They will flood the market.

GORANI: This was not expected. Bookies, book makers were predicting essentially with their odds a "remain" win. You had many of the economists we spoke to over the last several days, the currency markets were betting on a "remain" win.

This Brexit edge right now is a surprise. Perhaps not to all of the pollsters, as we might hear from some of them. But it is a surprise.

QUEST: Let us go to the markets that are open and doing business.

John Defterios is in Abu Dhabi.

John, first of all, tell us what time it is where you are, and what you're hearing and seeing.

JOHN DEFTERIOS, CNN EMERGING MARKETS EDITOR: Well, in fact, Richard, it's a very good point. It's nearly 7:30 in the morning here in the UAE. And I'm sitting right in the middle of where the action is, in the UK and the Asian markets that are open right now.

We've been seeing equity markets down sharply, some 3 percent. But I was thinking about it. Put myself in the seat of the global investor this morning in the broader Middle East and North Africa, and stretching to Asia.

And I turn on to CNN. And what I see flashing across the board here? Pound tumbles against the dollar. We see a huge trading range.

We've talked about the decline of some 10 percent. When the last 12 hours of trading, we've gone from 1.50 against the dollar, all the way down to 1.35. I'm looking at my screens here and see oil prices down nearly 5

percent. A correction of some $2.

And then I hear Nigel Farraj, basically, changing his tone, suggesting that we fought against the multinationals. We fought against the merge of banks. Let's dare to dream.

But will -- and Halla's point here, when talking to you about the economy, Richard, will this turn into a nightmare, economically, for the UK?

They've been enjoying an unemployment rate of about 5 percent, which is half of the European Union average. Economic growth for the last ten years has at least been double the European Union average.

This introduces a boatload of uncertainty. And if I'm waking up here in the Middle East or in Asia right now, and I had my expectations built up, I would be really concerned.

This is just the headline for the Gulf news. "Remain Camp Optimism Picked Up."

That's what they went to bed with last night. And, today, they're under shocked because it's turned the other way with a three-point spread as you can see from the results.

GORANI: All right, John Defterios, thank you very much.

Let's cross to the Houses of Parliament.

Christiane is there with her guest.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: You know, Hala, as we've been talking and as we're watching the pound tumble and who knows what is going to happen when all the markets open, going back again to Ryan Heath, correspondent for Politico, you know, we were talking about what might change in the -- well, it is the morning, but once the final result comes in.

Apart from the real volatility there that we've seen in the pound, et cetera. What is going to change in parliament? What is going to change with britain's relationship with Europe immediately?

RYAN HEATH, POLITICO CORRESPONDENT: Not an awful lot. There's around 100,000 pages of EU laws. And they stay on the books until Britain negotiates an exit deal.

And even when it does have an exit deal, maybe 80 percent, 90 percent of those rules will still be there in largely the same form that they are in there now. That's simply the price you pay for accessing the single market.

AMANPOUR: Except they say they're prepared not to access the single market if it means having to accept free movement of people. So then what happens? [23:25:30] HEATH: Yes. So then you have more flexibility. But what you also do is you pay a higher price in order to sell in and out of that market. And then the bigger problem that I'm worried about this morning as I look across the continent is that you have a situation where Germany, struggling to integrate 1 million refugees.

Francois Hollande, extremely unpopular, can't get through labour reforms. Spain, constitutional crisis and election on Sunday. Italy, bank rescues that will need to happen in the next couple of weeks. Poland, investors scared off because of the new rather extreme government there.

So it's a bit of a mess everywhere you look. And this development now feeds into that. It will settle down at some point, but it's going to be a rocky ride whichever way you look for the next few days.

AMANPOUR: And do you think that the leavers, the leaders of the leave campaign were prepared for this kind of blood on the floor, so to speak, in the currency and potentially in the markets?

HEATH: No. And I think they've got a lot of mixed interests and motives, as it were. Clearly, the overriding interest is to achieve a sense of independence.

So, it's very strange when you see people at one of the "leave" parties, for example, really cheering when you see those cliff edge movements in the currency. You see the pound dropping.

AMANPOUR: And people cheering.

HEATH: People cheering.

AMANPOUR: Because it's going to hit them in the pocketbook, isn't it?

HEATH: Eventually, it is, yeah.

AMANPOUR: And the immigration thing -- somebody was telling me a moment ago that most of the "leave" areas barely have any immigration. There's barely any immigrants in a lot of these towns.

HEATH: I think you're really looking at people who feel they've been left behind by globalisation. So if you --

(CROSSTALK)

AMANPOUR: And they're mixing that up with immigration?

HEATH: If you feel that you have been cut out, that you're not moving forward with all of the people having fabulous lives on social media and on the new sort of global entertainment complex that you can have access to, then the most rational thing you can do is to vote "leave," or to vote for Donald Trump. So it's not irrational to do it. But it doesn't solve the problems that those people feel they have.

AMANPOUR: Ryan Heath, Politico, thank you very much, indeed.

And we're going to take a break now and be back with much more.

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[23:30:04] GORANI: Well, welcome back, everyone. We are probably going to all be waking up to a very different world.

This is CNN's special coverage of the UK's E.U. referendum. I'm Hala Gorani.

QUEST: I'm Richard Quest with you throughout the night and into the night in the United States. A very good evening to you if you're joining us where (inaudible) living on the East upper state, on the West as we look like the campaign and -- a night that's many had feared, some had forecast, but now appears to be turning into a reality.

GORANI: OK. Here's what's going on. It looks like the Leave campaign, the Brexit camp, has gained an almost unstoppable momentum. CNN affiliate, ITV News, says there is now an 85 percent probability of a Leave win, that the U.K. will exit the European Union.

News that has made U.K. Independence Party leader, Nigel Farage, the anti-immigration party leader jubilant, making a victory speech just hours after making one that hinted of concession. The Leave camp has been performing better than expected in a lot of regions across England and Wales with remains success strong in London and Scotland winning roughly 75 percent of the vote. In Edinburgh, however, not gaining much momentum elsewhere.

QUEST: I want to show you what the pound sterling is doing at the moment as it's trading against the dollar. Do forgive me if I'm looking at the charts and screens while I'm talking to you. But the pound is now off 11.25 percent. It is the sharpest and single day fall in sterling's history. We started the day around 1.47, 1.46. We went up to 1.50. And now, it has just basically tumbled off a cliff. The worst -- you got the number of the worse?

GORANI: Well, it's not, it's -- first of all, it's worse than the level that it hit in 2008, 2009 after the banking crisis of 2008. It has not broken 1.36 in 30 years. So, this is an 11 percent drop off a cliff for the pound. And London has not woken up yet. It's 4:30 in the morning here.

QUEST: All right. I need to show you some of the important seats that have been happening and how the night. Join me at the battle board and you will see exactly what's taken place throughout the course of the night.

This is where we stand at the moment. On the national level. Remain in the E.U, 10,700,000, which is 48 percent. Leave, 11.5 million, 51.78 percent. And throughout the course of the night, it has literally ping-ponged backwards and forwards.

Now, unlike a British parliamentary election and certainly, unlike a U.S. presidential election where it matters where the votes are, the Electoral College, which states are significant, which constituencies and parliamentary seats.

In this referendum, it's totally different. Every seat is the same. Every vote counts towards this national total. That's the only number that matters. How many votes you have got across the whole of the country?

So, for example, you end up with places like Liverpool on the northwest of the country, where Remain at 58 percent to 41 percent. But that wasn't a big enough wide gap. You ended up with place like Sheffield in the middle of the country, in the north, 50 -- 49-50. That should have been much more toward the opposite direction. It simply wasn't enough. And any idea that this country is unified in its view, just look at the national perspective.

Let's zoom in to Scotland, at the top here. You've got England and Wales with large waves of Leave. You look at Scotland from the Orkney Islands to the Western Islands, to Glasgow, across the country of Scotland, absolutely, no Leave votes winning there.

And so, not only tonight does it seem highly likely that the United Kingdom is going to leave the European Union. In short order, Hala, there will be no doubt, a call from Scotland for a vote on Scottish independence. 51 to 48 percent. The experts are saying it's pretty much ...

GORANI: Indeed. Indeed. If England votes to leave, but Scotland votes to remain and there's another referendum in Scotland to break away from the United Kingdom. We could see the beginning of the end of Great Britain.

We'll have reaction from the Leave campaign in just a moment, but for now, Christiane is at the Houses of Parliament.

AMANPOUR: And indeed. We have Liam Fox with us.

[23:35:00] He's a conservative M.P. who supports leaving the E.U. He's also a former Defense Secretary and has held many ministerial jobs in cabinets in the past. Welcome.

LIAM FOX, BRITISH MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT, CONSERVATIVE PARTY: Thank you.

AMANPOUR: You're happy. But what can you say when you see the market tumbling and all sorts of insecurity ahead certainly on the economic front for the short term at least?

FOX: Well, there's bound to be some dislocation as the result sinks in. That's not unexpected. We've been having that narrative for some time. And -- but this is a question of the United Kingdom and who governs the United Kingdom and who makes our laws, who controls our borders. And of course, in the longer term, who actually controls our economic destiny. And I think voters looked at the economic catastrophe of the Europe and that was such a strong influence on how people voted.

AMANPOUR: But, I mean, you've been in that parliament. You know who makes the laws. The vast majority of your law is you're a Defense Secretary. All those big laws, all those big powers that Britain has are made in the building behind us. And you do control your border because you're not in Schengen.

So, you know, in a way, do you think people are going to wake up tomorrow and wonder, "What on earth have we done," particularly, with the division, as you yourself pointed out, between metropolitan and the rest of England?

FOX: Well, there's been a big difference between metropolitan Britain and non-metropolitan Britain. And it sort of amplifies that message of there's a march of anti-establishment politics and the elites are not listened to in the way that they were before.

AMANPOUR: Is that a good thing because you are one of the elite?

FOX: Well, I think it's -- I think, this has been a great celebration of our democracy, the fact that the British people have been able to give an instruction to the parliament about how to deal with this in the future.

But I don't incidentally believe you're correct because we don't have control of our law making because we can be overruled by the European court, and unelected court even to overrule the Democratic parliament. We don't have control of our borders because we have complete free movement inside the European Union. So, however, many people choose to settle in the U.K. They are entitled to do so. I don't know of any other country, certainly not the United States, who would accept such a position. And we've taken control of that today.

AMANPOUR: I don't think back control was the mantra, but basically, all the experts say that in fact, your laws are made here, those that really matter. The single market laws are made in Brussels and other such things. But you want to now leave the single market in order not to have free flow of people from the E.U.

Most of the experts say that is going to give Britain's economy a short term punch at the very least and maybe a longer term punch as well. What do you think people are going to think tomorrow, next week, or not tomorrow, but whenever this is implemented?

FOX: Well, it's going to take some time for that to happen. And of course, I've been listening all night to people saying if we leave tomorrow, we're not leaving today or any time soon. We're probably talking about the beginning of 2019 as the time that we would actually leave the European Union, which gives us quite a lot of time to sort out the issues that we have in terms of at what point we pass legislation to remove the European Communities Act, which is the central piece that links us to the European Union. What we do in with -- in terms of our trade, what we do in terms of security and intelligence sharing, all those things get sorted out. And they will get sorted out because they're in our mutual interest to do so.

AMANPOUR: You say that, but, as you know, many European nations have expressed horror at this eventuality because they don't want that to be a contagion in Europe. So, they're not going to make it easy for you.

But -- on your -- in your particular area of expertise, which is security, which is defense, or which is foreign policy, you know, people are saying, "Why should the Chinese listen to Britain if it's not part of a big group, which might even have influence on the United States?" What -- where is your heft internationally now if you're away from a big group that, you know, increases your throw weight?

FOX: Well, we can cooperate with who we like. We've still the world ...

AMANPOUR: But the influence.

FOX: Well, the influence comes from real things. We're the world's fifth biggest economy, the world's fifth biggest defense budget, and with a seats at the U.N. Security Council, in the G-7, in the G-20, with a seats in the IMF and the World Bank. We're hardly being pressed throughout (ph) darkness. And we're not really Slovenia or Luxembourg. So, this is a big country with a lot of weight which comes with a big economy.

AMANPOUR: Liam Fox, thank you very much, indeed. Sending it back to you, Hala and Richard in the studio now.

CHRISTIANE: Christiane, thank you very much. Let's get some context on this unprecedented decision.

First of all, let's bring our viewers this breaking news, ITV News, our affiliate, is calling the referendum result for the Leave camp to win, 52 to 48. 52 percent to 48 percent nationwide in favor of Brexit.

QUEST: Now, that's the first time, I mean, ITV News has gone from 80 percent probability to 85 percent. And the BBC, the British Broadcasting Corporation, is also now formally calling the referendum in favor of Leave, Brexit.

[23:40:09] So, the two national broadcasters, ITV and the BBC in the United Kingdom are now saying that they believe that Brexit has won.

GORANI: So, this is happening. The United Kingdom has voted to leave the European Union. It's been a member in some way, shape or form of the European economics community first, then what morphed into the European Union since the early '70s.

Freddie Sayers is here. First of all, reaction?

FREDDIE SAYERS, YOUGOV EDITOR IN CHIEF: Well, you know, this has been -- in terms of forecasting and in terms of expectation, a historic mispricing by the markets and by the commentators and by so many people. United polls were close all along and people despaired of the polls. There have been previous mistakes and everyone presumed that the instinct of the British people would go one way and basically everything would be all right on the night. And now we see that hasn't happened. QUEST: At what point during the night -- because we were 54 percent for Leave at one point but they've ping-ponged backwards and forwards, up and down? At what point during the night did you think, "Hang on, this is actually going to be leave?"

SAYERS: When you went on that map of yours and looked at Sheffield. Now, Sheffield, is a university town and it has one of the highest concentrations of young people. It was formally the constituency of Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democrat leader, and this was the place that should have been strongly remain. The young people were expected to turn out and yet, it went leave. And when I saw that ...

GORANI: Yeah.

SAYERS: ... I realized they had not turned out.

GORANI: Freddie, explain to our viewers in the U.S., around the world, what does it means really? What does it mean for the U.K.? I mean, the pound's taking a beating, future -- the stock futures are also sharply down. Markets didn't want this to happen. What's going to change now?

SAYERS: Well, what you're seeing is a very divided country. All of the forces of international business, all of the large political parties, we even had David Beckham coming out for Remain. All of the establishment, all of the celebrities, all of the institutions were on one side of this argument and yet still they lost it. And I think there are lessons there for all countries, in particular, the United States with its presidential election coming up.

GORANI: But this is interesting because you talked about the establishment. We've hear that word over and over again in the U.S. election, presidential election.

QUEST: Yeah.

GORANI: And this mistrust of experts and of the establishment, it also was mirrored here, wasn't it?

SAYERS: Absolutely.

QUEST: How significant is it that -- Sky News, which is a 24-hour news network in the United Kingdom has also just called the referendum in favor of Leave, Brexit. So, all three, the BBC, ITV.

One quick question to you, though, and how significant is it that it's a referendum where it's a totality of votes, not a constituency basis like parliament or, indeed, like the Electoral College in the United States where it matters where the votes are, not the number that you get?

SAYERS: I think, we heard of it from Nigel Farage, the leader of the United Kingdom Independence Party. You know, that's a party that polled 12 percent in the last elections and has even won European elections and yet they have one Member of Parliament. And no doubt in the coming days, they will present this as real democracy, a real representation of the views of the country in a way where they can't be suppressed.

GORANI: A referendum is the simplest exercise in democracy. One person, one vote. Yes, no. Leave, remain.

By the way, we are able to go now to the Leave campaign party in Westminster. It's 4:43 a.m.

Fred Pleitgen is there. Reaction, Fred?

FRED PLEITGEN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, I mean, it's been absolutely ecstatic, Hala. The moment that the screens came on when it said that ITV and some others were projected that Leave was going to win, there was a huge roar that went through this room.

And even before that, Nigel Farage, came back here once again, first of all, gave a big speech where he was now saying he was daring to dream. And then after all of that, he made a round here through this hall where this party is taking place, went outside, raised both arms toward the sky and screamed again and again "Dare to Dream."

So, certainly, the people here are definitely very much on a high. There's been a lot of cheering going on every time a district was called that was in favor of leaving. A roar went through this room. And that certainly something that is continuing right now.

Nigel Farage also saying that he believed that now was a huge moment for this country. Let's listen to what Nigel Farage said when he was here earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NIGEL FARAGE, U.K. INDEPENDENCE PARTY LEADER: Ladies and gentlemen, dare to dream, that the dawn is breaking on an independent United Kingdom.

[23:45: 07] If the predictions now are right, this will be a victory for real people. A victory for ordinary people. A victory for decent people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PLEITGEN: And it's so interesting, Hala, because you were mentioning some of the highs and lows that all of this has gone through. The first thing that we heard from Nigel Farage right after the polls buzz (ph) was that he believed that Remain had edged out a victory.

The first time I spoke to him tonight, he was till quite pessimistic. He said -- he thought it would be 50/50 at best that Leave could pull this off. And a couple of minutes ago, when we spoke to him, he said at that point, he realized that all of it was real. And I flat out asked him, "Did you think this was going to happen today?" And he said, "Absolutely not."

But then again, he said what he then screamed to the sky here later. He said he had always dared to dream. And now it seems as though his dream is coming true. We'll wait and see how some others in this country feel about that. But certainly at this point in time, at this rally, it's absolutely an ecstatic mood even in these early morning hours here, Hala.

GORANI: Hey, Fred Pleitgen at the Leave campaign.

QUEST: We have one of the biggest and most important results of the night, Birmingham, which is in the West Midlands. It's actually, some would say, the UK's second largest city. It's the largest voting area of metropolitan council. 750,000 people in Birmingham, three-quarters of a million.

Birmingham, look at the number. Birmingham has voted on a turnout of 63 percent, which is low. We've seen 75 up to 80 percent. But it's voted 50 percent to leave, 49 percent to remain.

GORANI: So close, but clearly not enough for the Remain camp. Christiane Amanpour is at Westminster. I mean, there were some polls that suggested that this would be close, others that suggested that it could be a win for Brexit, now that it appears confirmed. This country is going to wake up to a very different -- I mean, to a very -- actually, to a very uncertain future. We don't know how things are going to shake out at this stage.

AMANPOUR: Well, you know, you use that word uncertain and it's really important. Because one of the accusations and complaints by the Remain camp to the Leave camp was that they'd never spelled out the uncertainty ahead. They had never even admitted there was going to be uncertainty ahead. And of course there's going to be uncertainty because the status quo has just been upended. It is the first time any country has left the E.U. Therefore, there are no rules to this, despite all the things that we've heard about trying to renegotiate dozens of trade deals, about this, that and the other. There are simply no rules. We know that things aren't going to change overnight because this is going to take a long process.

But the most important visual thing right now is that Nigel Farage is the face of this victory. Now, Nigel Farage was not the official Leave campaign. That was Boris Johnson, that was Michael Gove, these other British politicians. Because they thought Nigel Farage was too toxic.

And in fact, they have been lived at his posters, and the xenophobia, and the anti-immigrations and the sort of poisonous divisions in this regard that Nigel Farage has brought.

But in the last five, six, seven hours or so since these polls have closed it's only been Nigel Farage out there giving his victory speech.

So, one of the Remain campaigns big slogans, trying to get people on to the polls was, "Do not let Nigel Farage speak for you." Well, now he is speaking and he is acting like the victor. And he is saying, you know -- earlier he said we may not win this battle, but we will win this war. And now, he's going to claim that he's won this war.

That is also going to cause massive ripples as we've heard from our guests and people we've been talking to from European entities and the like. They are very, very worried about this. This is exactly the nightmare scenario, because they have their own Nigel Farage is even further hard right, further xenophobic, further populist, further nationalist, further demagogic who also want to break a way their countries from Europe.

So, this was the entire European project at risk in worst cases scenario. And also, obviously, compromise the UK's relationship in terms of strength and heft and shoulder to shoulder with the United States. Hala?

GORANI: All right. Christiane Amanpour at Westminster. We'll get back to Christiane shortly.

But Freddie, we want to analyze and break these numbers down further with you. Richard, you had a question?

QUEST: I mean, I'm just trying to understand the dynamic of the night. There's the national map behind you.

[23:50:01] Scotland goes completely blue. Large sways of England are red. London -- I mean, just look at London, London is almost like Scotland except for those few on the east side, Basildon, and a couple of years. What happened here tonight?

SAYERS: What seems to have happened is the enthusiasm gap. We knew geographically that it would look a little bit like this. London would be blue on your map. Scotland would be blue. Most of England would look red with little dots in the larger cities. But the turnout on the side of the Brexit, on the side of the Lead campaign was higher. And the degree of the victories in those places were higher than the degree in the Remain areas. So there seems to have been an enthusiasm gap. It was the hard campaign to run for the Remain side because it's the status quo. It's basically trying to infuse people about carrying on, and they didn't quite get it.

GORANI: There is this sort of a -- when Nigel Farage said -- leader of the U.K. party, he said this is a victory for the people. I mean, there he's appealing. This is a populist message. He's appealing to a certain electorate, right?

SAYERS: That's right. We ...

GORANI: There is a big divide there as well, not just age, not just, you know, region, but that.

SAYERS: There is a -- we looked at the geographical split. There is a class divide. Well, you know, the fact is that the polling shows very clearly that more affluent, more educated people voted strongly to remain ...

GORANI: Yeah.

SAYERS: ... and less affluent, less educated people voted strongly to leave the European Union and they were came out in greater number today. QUEST: We need to show you what's happening on the markets in Asia.

The Nikkei, reports are that circuit breakers have been -- have kicked in for the Nikkei because it is down more than with 8 percent by that number. I can't remember what the Nikkei's circuit breaker (inaudible) is. But trading will halt for a certain amount of time to allow for cooler heads. Hang Seng down 4.5 percent. Australia's ASX down nearly 4 percent. Shanghai, it wasn't -- that's a close market. I mean, the China market doesn't surprise me. It's only off 1 percent. It's not an open market in the same way that the others are.

Quick, look at the pound and the Dow futures before we go to Max Foster. And the pound which when I last looked at it, forgive me, I'm just going to call -- they are down now 12 percent ...

GORANI: Hang on. Let me get you the pound, Richard.

QUEST: No, I've said.

GORANI: I want the exact live figure. 1.3326.

QUEST: 1.3326

GORANI: It hasn't been this low in 30 years.

QUEST: Which is down some 12.6 percent. The London futures will -- were off about 9 percent a short while ago. I'm going to guess now that's -- I mean, we've seen the worst of it now.

GORANI: Yes.

QUEST: The three major networks in the United Kingdom have called it for Brexit. We now pretty much know how this is going to pan out for the rest of the night.

Let's look at the Dow futures which were down 2.7 percent a couple of hours ago. I'm suspecting that -- there we are. That's the FTSE futures down 9 percent. The London -- the Dow, I think that Dow -- I think the Dow future is now 3.5 percent. Somebody described it as a blood bath. I never use that word when we talk about financial markets. But I think it might be opposite for tonight.

GORANI: Well, I don't know about a blood bath. I mean, we'll see. Do we have Max at Downing Street or?

QUEST: Your choice. John or Max?

GORANI: Listen, we have both, but I'm curious to go to Downing Street. Oh, well, there is John. John, tell us more about what the expectations are on the markets.

DEFTERIOS: Well, it's interesting because you've been talking about the U.S. dollar, British pound rate which is the primary source right now that we should be focusing on. But it's also interesting to note you guys what's happening to the Euro against other currencies.

Now, it is strengthening against the British pound by some 6 percent. So the British pound is down 6 percent against the Euro. But against other currencies right now, the Euros down sharply, a better than 4 percent against the U.S. dollar. And the poor Japanese yen, we've been talking about this, Richard, in our business programs. The Euro is down 7.5 percent against the Japanese yen. So, we have a major sell-off in the British pound, but also a sell off in the Euro.

So, we always have to say what are the financial markets telling us when they wake up today and see the news of better than a three-point spread with the Brexit actually taking place? It is suggesting that the European framework, perhaps, is under threats today. It's not a European Union of 28, but certainly it's going to be one of 27. Then it brings into question, the very weak economies of Southern Europe. It's Italy, Greece, Portugal, Spain, Cypress, all those that have been under pressure. We know that the banking sector, for example, in Italy is under pressure.

And then the political question is coming to the four. I know Max Foster is going to deal with this, but investors don't like uncertainty. This question's the viability of David Cameron and his cabinet right now. It does question the European Union framework. Can the Euro withstand this going forward?

And also, I think we have to go back to the tone of Nigel Farage.

[23:55:00] One of the first things he said beyond, "Dare to Dream" is that we've now tackled or fought against the multi nationals and the merchant banks. This is not an open U.K. going forward. That's a huge question mark on the country that's built its reputation as a major trading player in near $3 trillion economy.

GORANI: All right, John Defterios, thanks very much. That's the reaction on the markets. Politically, though, David Cameron, the prime minister campaigned for Remain, promised this referendum, a big defeat for him.

Max Foster is at Downing Street.

FOSTER: I mean, ahead of this, everyone said that if he lost this, if the Remain campaign lost this, then his position was untenable. We'll wait to see what he says when he comes out here in Downing Street. But this is unprecedented. So, how do you handle this situation?

And we're talking off the back of what John Defterios was just talking about there, and Richard was intimating was a blood bath. We've heard the former business secretary describing it just as that on the financial markets. If you have that sort of situation unfolding, do you really need a change in leadership in the country? Yes, he's lost authority, but no leader of a country with financial markets and absolutely turmoil absolutely uncertainty, that's not good either, could make the situation even worse.

So, very difficult question for David Cameron today in Downing Street and how they're going to handle this. And politicians are going to have to come together to try to bring some political and financial stability to the country today, is a huge pressure, unprecedented. We don't know how it's going to go. And just talking to John Defterios' points, a currency trader telling me that the fall in Euro against the dollar is, because they're now questioning the whole European projects.

So, the Brexit, if that is what we're going to get, looks like we're going to get it, not just the U.K. story, not just the European stories, but international stories can affect the whole world today, politically and financially.

QUEST: No one can say that they weren't warned of the consequences, whatever they may be. They were certainly wit (ph) large by economist, by George Soros, by the prime minister, by the Bank of England, by the Fed. But now, it seems that the people have spoken in Britain.

GORANI: Right. And the pound again, as we were mentioning, more than a 10 percent nose dive. The FTSE is forecast to open a whole lot lower. Will circuit breakers kick in? Will the Bank of England have to intervene to support the pound? ITV News and the two other main broadcasters in this country are calling the referendum result for Leave to win. ITV, 52-48 in favor of Brexit.

QUEST: Whichever way you look at it, tonight history is being made, not only for the European Union, for the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland if that is be what it will survive after tonight, but also for the (inaudible) alliance as the U.K. has to work out its relationship with the rest of the world.

GORANI: Right. We are going to very soon get reaction from all over the world as Europe wakes up. We'll be right back.

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