George Osborne, speaking to the BBC in Davos, says a delay to Brexit is the 'most likely option' - something that has been blindingly obvious for months - but is now front page news as if it comes as a surprise (HERE). He also said the prospect of no deal meant 'the gun is held to the British economy's head' which is exactly my view, as I said yesterday. Bizarrely, the gun is held by our own prime minister but Osborne doesn't mention that.
To give you some idea of the scale of the problem and why we should expect delays, not only to March 29th but to the end of the transition period in December 2020 you have only to look at the report released by The Institute for Government - the 2019 Whitehall Monitor (HERE). In it, one of the UK’s top public servants describes Brexit as “the biggest, most challenging peacetime task the civil service has faced”.
The report essentially summarised the impact of Brexit on the ability of government to get anything else done. As entirely expected it is weighing heavily on virtually everything and will continue to do so for a very long time.
There is a summary of the main points, some of which are:
- The demands of Brexit have reversed the recent shrinking of the civil service, from a post-war low of 384,260 in June 2016 to 404,160 in September 2018.
- Minority government and Brexit have constrained the Government’s ability to pass legislation. Only five of the 13 bills which the Government has said it needs to pass ahead of Brexit have made it through Parliament.
- There have been an unprecedented number of ministerial resignations (21 in total from the election to the end of 2018), many of which can be attributed to Brexit.
- Civil servants across Whitehall have been redeployed to focus on Brexit, with a third of Treasury staff working on Brexit.
- The risk of major projects – of which there are currently 133 – not being delivered on time and on budget is growing.
However, the most stunning thing is a chart in the overview (HERE) comparing the length of time various other large government projects have taken with the time allowed to prepare for Brexit - not a no deal Brexit but a 'smooth and orderly' one as planned - during the 21 month transition period. In other words it's the time allowed after the Withdrawal Agreement is settled.
The chart is reproduced below:
The chart is reproduced below:
The Automatic Enrolment is enrolling people into their workplace pension schemes by the way which has taken, or is expected to take, over 11 years. Universal Credit is expected to take over 10 years and may well be delayed further. The London Olympics took 11 years. These are all relatively easy (I would have thought) compared to Brexit. The Customs Declaration Service alone took 5 years.
For Brexit we have 21 months. If we exit on March 29th without a deal we won't even have this. It will effectively have to be done overnight.
If Brexit is completed in the lifetime of any person over the age of 60 today, I would be amazed.
Now let us go over to that parallel world known as Brexit Central where Bill Cash and John Longworth have both been busy writing articles extolling the benefits of leaving without a deal and trading on WTO terms. They're worth preserving just in case I'm wrong and we do actually leave without a deal so we can test their predictions. Anyone who thinks crashing out will boost our GDP by £140 billion - a forecast made by arch Brexiteer and Economist for Free Trader Patrick Minford and repeated by Cash - is a deranged charlatan in my opinion.
Cash writes (HERE):
"With our dynamic skilled workforce, the English language, and our global opportunities under WTO rules, a rejuvenating atmosphere of freedom – both democratic and economic – means an exit without a deal is what Britain can now embrace".
Longworth talks about GATT 24 again, describing it as a Plan B (HERE) and thinks trading on WTO terms from March 30th is no problem at all
This is in the same week the Business minister Richard Harrington described leaving without a deal as an 'absolute disaster' and 'fanciful nonsense' (HERE) and warns it could shut Jaguar and Mini plants, while two leading Brexiteers explain on Brexit Central what a glorious thing it will be. They sound a bit like your Dad as he throws you in the deep end to help you learn to swim when he can barely manage a stroke himself.
For Cash and Longworth of course the closure of car manufacturing, as Harrington fears, would be a bargain to achieve Brexit. It is all total madness.
Now let us go over to that parallel world known as Brexit Central where Bill Cash and John Longworth have both been busy writing articles extolling the benefits of leaving without a deal and trading on WTO terms. They're worth preserving just in case I'm wrong and we do actually leave without a deal so we can test their predictions. Anyone who thinks crashing out will boost our GDP by £140 billion - a forecast made by arch Brexiteer and Economist for Free Trader Patrick Minford and repeated by Cash - is a deranged charlatan in my opinion.
Cash writes (HERE):
"With our dynamic skilled workforce, the English language, and our global opportunities under WTO rules, a rejuvenating atmosphere of freedom – both democratic and economic – means an exit without a deal is what Britain can now embrace".
Longworth talks about GATT 24 again, describing it as a Plan B (HERE) and thinks trading on WTO terms from March 30th is no problem at all
This is in the same week the Business minister Richard Harrington described leaving without a deal as an 'absolute disaster' and 'fanciful nonsense' (HERE) and warns it could shut Jaguar and Mini plants, while two leading Brexiteers explain on Brexit Central what a glorious thing it will be. They sound a bit like your Dad as he throws you in the deep end to help you learn to swim when he can barely manage a stroke himself.
For Cash and Longworth of course the closure of car manufacturing, as Harrington fears, would be a bargain to achieve Brexit. It is all total madness.
