What a lot of muddled thinking there is on the Brexit side. Nigel Adams, speaking in a Westminster hall debate on 25th November 2015 about UK Musicians performing rights (HERE Col 507WH ) said this about the trade agreement called TTIP then under negotiation with the USA:
"The discussions between the European Union and the US on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership present an opportunity to eliminate barriers to trade".
In February 2016 he then went on to recommend to us all in Selby and Ainsty that we should actually erect a few barriers to trade by voting to leave the EU, our largest export market because he thought "Britain would be stronger outside the EU". Now this is strange because economists are familiar with the concept of international trade using the gravity model which suggests that relative economic size attracts countries to trade with each other while greater distances weaken the attractiveness.
Although President Trump said he would scrap TTIP I read recently he is rethinking it after Angela Merkel told him Germany would not conclude a separate, bilateral deal with the US. It must make more sense for the Americans to first strike a deal with the EU since they are of similar economic size. We will then be at the back of the queue.
The EU is the largest, richest and closest market to us. Whatever happens in the future this will not change. Along with all the other stupid reasons given for exiting the EU, trade is the one whose effects will be felt soonest.
