The post-Brexit economic crisis never materialised – Labour is right to move on
The unpopular truth is that leaving the EU has not magically transformed Britain, but nor has it been calamitous, says Larry Elliott, the Guardian’s economics editor
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Extract:
The unpopular truth is that leaving the EU has not magically transformed Britain, but nor has it been calamitous.
Plenty of people – on the left as well as the right – believed George Osborne when he conjured up a dystopian vision of Britain after a vote for Brexit during the final weeks of the referendum campaign. The then chancellor said victory for leave would result in a “DIY recession”, the loss of 800,000 jobs, a weaker housing market and a stock market crash. Two years on from our date of departure from the EU, none of it has happened.
Unemployment is lower than it was in 2016 and, although this is very much a mixed blessing, house prices are higher. Share prices have risen and until Covid-19 arrived there was no recession.
That hasn’t halted the flow of gloomy predictions: Nissan would quit the UK, tens of thousands of City jobs would be lost to Paris, Frankfurt and Amsterdam.
More recently, Brexit supply chain problems would mean a turkey-less Christmas and empty high street shelves in December. None of that happened either, and the wait for economic meltdown goes on.
Far from quitting the UK, Nissan last year announced it was investing £1bn in electric vehicle production at its Sunderland plant. Children didn’t wake up to empty Christmas stockings. A study by the consultancy EY found almost nine out of 10 global financial services firms plan to establish or expand operations in the UK this year.
Confirmation bias is where people latch on to evidence that suits their argument while zoning out things that don’t. Opponents of Brexit, for example, filter out the success of the UK’s go-it-alone vaccine procurement strategy and the freedom the government now has to cut VAT on domestic energy bills.
