As the Guardian has reported:
Britain has a one in three chance of plunging into recession at the start of next year as the heightened uncertainty over Brexit drags down the economy, the Bank of England has warned.
But, and this is the key point, this is on the assumption that we have a Brexit deal.
Admittedly they then note that he said that:
Britain crashing out would cause an “instantaneous shock” to the economy that would be tough for the central bank to respond to. He warned the pound would be sold off sharply, inflation would rise, while GDP growth would slow further.
But he did not give a probability on that. And I think he should have done.
Rationally the odds of leaving without a deal are now near enough 100%. Johnson cannot get an alternative through parliament. I am quite convinced Corbyn still wants to leave - and am sure Emily Thornberry thinks so too from the comments she is now making.
In that case the instantaneous shock Carney talks about will happen. And recession will too, with 100% certainty.
Carney should have said 'Be afraid; be very afraid'. Because that would have been the right economic advice.
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I am not so sure that the offices of the Guardian or Mark Carney are that reliable. We were promised an instantaneous plague of locusts merely by voting leave and yet life goes on. Every single treasury forecast over the past 5 years, and possibly forever, has been completely wrong. Carney is a complete doom mongerer, possibly even more so than Hammond.
The forecasts are on the basis that the UK takes no action whatsoever to manage any issues and this is just not the case. They also seem to be predicated on people like Carney, Lib Dems etc completely running down the country and our abilities, including downplaying any positive and spinning any negative into some kind of nuclear disaster.
Frankly I am ashamed of people in this country that have no faith in our own country. There will be difficulties but we can manage them and come out in a better place. The EU just won’t be there in 10 years whatever, so the earlier we start to stand on our own two feet the better. It’s a dreadful institution the EU.
Cue the inevitable remoaner diatribe…
I feel very sorry for your clients if your ability to grasp tax facts is as poor as your ability to grasp economic and business reality.
And I spy Boosterism at work
It’s really very sad
I said nothing about tax. Just about the Guardianistas that are intent on remoaning us into doing what they want and not what we voted for.
As it happens, no deal would no doubt cause extra tax issues, but none that can’t be resolved. But that was not what I was saying.
Whatever ones personal view, the reason we are where we are is that Parliament was split so it voted by a large majority for a referendum and promised in writing to honour the result. Parliament again voted to trigger Article 50 and the main parties went into an election promising we would leave.
And now we have a major case of sellers remorse and frankly outrageous behaviour to reverse all of this because the ‘right’ result was not delivered, joining a long list of democratic votes the not-very-democratic EU has managed to reverse by this type of scaremongering, to protect the European project.
If we fall for this, we are fools.
Quite frankly, not doing what was promised is something we should all be deeply ashamed of. The people that lost their lives to allow us to have a Parliamentary process that certain parliamentarians choose to piss on must surely be turning in their graves.
Have you noticed the name under which you post? It does mention tax….
And no one promised hard Brexit. Quite categorically what was offered was a new deal. Not no deal
You should be ashamed for putting forward a blatant untruth about what was voted on
There is no shame in pointing out fabrication of the truth
No doubt I will be painted as a traitorous remoaner , but:
1/ Forecasts are almost always wrong, because they are predicting the future. If a forecast is always right, I would be worried that someone was fixing the results. The facts that the weather forecast is often wrong does not stop me carrying an umbrella on a rainy day.
2/ Life went on after the Brexit vote because most people thought there were adults in the government who would reach a deal. Many of those people are now reaching for their contingency plans because it looks like we have an “do or die” (or rather “do and die”) ideologue in charge, one who is prepared to sacrifice anything, including the wealth and wellbeing of his fellow citizens, to advance his own career.
3/ Faith and belief ? Is this what we have come to: praying that everything turns out alright in the end?
Let me make my own warning: in the event of no-deal Brexit, things are going to get very messy, and very nasty, very quickly, made worse because it is a self-inflicted wound. The shades of fascism are stalking the land, and this is just the sort of dislocation that an authoritarian could leap upon to justify taking “strong measures” in the national interest. Don’t assume it could never happen here.
I agree with all that
Thank you
Please stop saying we voted for no deal. We did indeed, not me, vote for leaving the EU, albeit by a small majority on the promise that there would be marginal change to our current relationship, that life would continue as normal and that it would be a happy thereafter. Facts and reality are proving otherwise.
We have a parliamentary democracy whereby those elected make considered decisions on behalf of the people they represent rather than being subjected to those who care nothing for our people or our institutions but their own self advantage.
Andrew,
Re. Your point 3: the trouble is we’re caught in a trap.
Leaving risks the rise of the far right (only if mishandled in my opinion but I certainly accept it’s a risk).
BUT there’s also a significant risk of same if we don’t leave.
Personally I think the far right is better neutered by some form of brexit with a deal or carefully managed no-deal (I.e government spending to support the economy through the transition) than by canceling brexit altogether.
Tax Norfolk,
While I agree with your sentiments about; the longevity of the EU, forecasts and their assumptions around UK government interventionism – I notice in you the mirror of the confrontational angst that colours remainder arguments on brexit.
I voted remain, I’m happy to brexit, I’d prefer a deal but I think it’s impossible so we better prepare as best we can for no-deal. I just want us all to pull together and make the best of this situation.
The reason I don’t think we will is the continuing division and antagonistic attitude among self identified remainers and brexiters. I guess most Brits are well passed caring and just want the situation resolved.
Fewer emotive statements from both sides would be a good start…
I reserve the right to be emotive about the choice to perpetrate economic, political and national disaster
If you imagine that crashing out of the EU is going to lead to a “resolved” situation rather than a blood bath you really are living in a fantasy land. Have you looked at who Johnson has appointed to his cabinet and who they have appointed as their special advisors? If they remain in Government for any time they really are going to condemn the majority of the population in this country to hell. Kiss goodbye to any welfare state.
https://www.desmog.co.uk/2019/08/01/boris-johnson-cabinet-tufton-street-ties-map
There is absolutely no reason for anyone of principle to work with these people to help them achieve their aims.
TFN
This is not about a lack ‘faith’ in the country – it has nothing to do with that in my view. Faith is best left to when we face disaster or upheaval of some kind, some sort of act of God or nature like the recent loss of my mother or my next door neighbour’s loss of his eldest son (31) to cancer. You need all sorts of faith for those things. BREXIT is neither – it is a stupid man-made calamity that is totally unnecessary, a confection of lies and stupidity cunningly put together by people with agenda’s seeking to mould the world to their liking and convenience and bugger everyone else.
Even if our economy had not been addled by equally stupid austerity, the effects of BREXIT would be the same. We are facing what can only be described as a slash and burn of the economy – it’s wilful destruction to remake it into the image of the Klondike where only the powerful can prosper.
And talking of faith, if you want to see what is happening in industry look at the figures – we are entering a form of economic depression right now – money for the real economy – goods and services – is reacting to many issues surrounding BREXIT – the uncertainty that is putting off growth investment, the worry about no deal meaning that resources are being allocated to stockpiling resources against that lack of certainty and the higher prices it attracts and the resources that is pulling from already depleted areas.
Why else would Rees-Mogg’s ‘Somserset Capital Management’ warn it’s investors of a rough ride from the UK during BREXIT but advocate BREXIT it for the poorer, non-investing hoi-polloi?
I’ve read all of your posts TFN and you are misled Sir. The anti-democratic element of BREXIT goes back to how it was devised and executed – not the valid and democratic attempts to stop it. But you refuse to see it. Open your eyes – it really is about time that you did. And quickly.
Well said
“KPMG has been fined for the fifth time in 15 months after it failed to adhere to rules of “very great importance to the financial system” in its preparation of client asset reports by BNY Mellon in 2011.”
A fine each trimester.
Doth damage the Jester.
The thing is there’s also a 100% chance that Boris is going to spend whatever needs to be spent to ameliorate/avoid a no-deal-Brexit induced recession.
This is their plan
So they’re going to buy £500 million of sheep – but have no idea what to do with them
Interesting you use our impending sheep mountain as an example of just one of the problems Boris faces. Bill Mitchell’s early work on the jobs guarantee was inspired by the postwar Australian government’s buffer stock system of wool warehouses which they used to even out the randomness in the wool trade.
Obviously those buffer stock systems were designed and modified over many years to deal with ongoing issues. No deal is going to be very much more sudden and the potential solutions only have one shot at working so it’s a much more perilous situation.
However, in the first instance all government needs to do is provide the money to bail out the businesses that find their paths to market blocked. They’ll then gain some breathing space to figure out what to do next. Businesses will obviously be putting in a lot of effort to fix their own no-deal related issues too. Government can help businesses achieve new connections to new suppliers and new customers.
Yes there are going to be some unavoidable real economic losses in this age of just in time deliveries, particularly for rapidly perishing items. But I am sure with some thought the worst losses can be avoided and real resources eventually redirected and put to good use.
There surely comes a point where even the most diehard remainders recognise brexit is inevitable and start lending their assistance to making as good a job of it as possible. I reckon that time swiftly approaches.
You do realise how much money we are talking about, don’t you?
And that wool is dead and sheep aren’t?
And no, I do not think Remainers will change their minds
Some of us have principles and I strongly suspect that most of the country will understand why remarkably soon
Just watch what happens as fuel prices skyrocket
I suggest that you have a thoughtful read here: https://chrisgreybrexitblog.blogspot.com/.
Come back and let us know how you will debunk those points.
Thanks.
Excellent stuff
As a ‘die-hard’ remainer’ I find the optimism and rhetoric on the ‘positives’ of a no deal exit from the EU deeply depressing. In a negotiation, a no deal means a return to the status quo should talks fail, not to abandon everything built up over the last 46 years in our partnership with the EU and have to start again from scratch.
As a retiree I have seen so many changes in my life, some good and some bad, but nothing that compares to this act of self harm to the country and its people. OK, so we will muddle through, but at what cost, especially, to those with the least resilience to absorb them.
We can scoff at ‘experts’ but what do we now see? A falling currency, investment and this government wasting billions of pounds EVEN BEFORE WE HAVE LEFT.
Ian,
I assume you intended me to read the latest post on that blog so that’s what I’ve done – though not with the intention of debunking anything.
I don’t consider myself a remainer or a brexiter and I certainly have no influence on brexit nor have I ever had any so I don’t fit in your self identifying in-group or your imagined out-group.
That said, from my perspective and with far from perfect information: I’m inclined to agree with a great deal of what Chris Grey says.
In particular:
– there’s now too little time to fully prepare for no-deal (though I don’t know how much has already been done)
– brexiter MPs and other high profile personalities have always been playing politics with this issue and are continuing to do so (though I think exactly the same of many remainer MPs and personalities)
Where I disagree with Chris is that the rest of us outside government can only expect to sit here and await whatever disaster is inflicted upon us because there’s no chance of influencing government or the EU. Yes there’s no chance of me influencing anything but people like Richard and Chris Grey could certainly put forward their expert opinions on how to ameliorate no-deal.
Overall my impression as an interested bystander is that brexiters and remainers have both failed the country in their continuous inability to come together and put their combined skills towards getting the best deal possible from the EU.
I voted remain but clearly brexit won the referendum and as far as I’ve been concerned from the moment the results were known the democratic and social norms I grew up with dictated unequivocally that I should personally accept the decision to leave and do what small part I can to make the most of it.
Since then I have been entirely bewildered and disgusted by the attitude on both sides of these needlessly ongoing Brexit debates. I have slowly come to question my ongoing participation in the political processes of this country because of the horribly devisive nature they have assumed of late.
What I read here on this blog is just one of the echo chambers into which Britons have descended (albeit a relatively polite and well informed one!).
I long for a day when people recognise the madness of our current divisions and haul themselves out into the real world where they’ll see that our common interests and similarities far outweigh our differences.
Until that day comes I guess I’m going to continue to stare in slack jawed disbelief at the car crash that is British politics and occasionally attempt to convey my feelings to those involved.
Ok let me put it another way – given the UK government is not revenue constrained and assuming a no-deal bexit is unavailable:
What would your advice be to the government to help us minimise the economic dislocations likely to be caused by no-deal brexit?
On a related note: lot of the economic modeling of the outcomes of brexit assume UK government does nothing fiscally beyond the automatic stabilisers. Do you think that’s a likely scenario?
Simple
Cancel Article 50
Job done
No chaos at all
“Cancel Article 50”
Sanity at last. All the rest is in the vein of estimating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin………..
……. and for those who think they can ‘plan’ their way out of the impending problems – Guys, forget it! It’s away beyond your abilities as non-numerate graduates of the school of wool-headedness. Learn a little humility and admit you haven’t the first inkling of what’s to be done for the best. You are relying totally on the common sense of the bulk of people (whom you despise as being of the ‘lower orders’) to save your useless skins.
Phil McGlass,
Except that counting how many angels can dance on the head of a pin is pure fantasy while no deal brexit may well come to pass.
Richard currently thinks it’s near 100% we leave with no-deal.
If that’s the case there surely must come a point where everyone with the knowledge/skills to help make the best of the situation lends a hand?
Other progressive economists believe the dislocations likely to be caused by no-deal can be ameliorated to at least some extent. I understand why remainers don’t want to engage with those ideas while ever they believe there’s a chance of avoiding brexit altogether.
However, there’s a significant danger in this strategy: it leaves the likes of Boris Johnson to run no-deal however they see fit in the event no-deal does happen and actually this strategy helped create this situation in the first place by refusing any compromise brexit deal.
Note: I’m just an interested bystander who voted remain so please don’t blame me for any of this or vent any more of your pent up frustrations in my direction. Thank you 🙂
I am sorry Adam, but there is no duty on anyone to lend a hand with what is fundamentally the wrong thing to do
That is moral relativism gone crazy
Richard,
There’s nothing morally relativistic about it. If we leave with no deal we’re all going to be in the same boat as a nation regardless which way we voted in the referendum.
It’s fine to keep saying “let’s just not leave” up to the point we actually leave.
It’s not fine to stand by as we leave when you could provide useful expert advice on how to leave with less pain.
You can do both things without compromising your principles.
There are also likely to be opportunities to highlight the realities of the government’s lack of financial constraints when the government opens the fiscal taps. You’ve got to challenge the narrative of “government can do this because of the money they ‘saved’ during austerity”.
It’s not immoral to try to make the best of a bad situation – it’s just life.
No, life is about righting the wrong
That is it – right there! The Alexandrian path – Article 50 – the Gordian knot of out times!
Do it – now!
And as I have said previously, if the Leave ultras kick off – well then we will employ the Thatcherite text book that was used against the miners but this time make sure that it is ex-public school bottoms that sting and whose lives are destroyed for white collar treason and sedition.
Fine buy that doesn’t answer either question.
Sorry: original question should read “no deal brexit is unavoidable”
Anybody who uses the term “Remoaner” in a comment loses any validity, at least in my book. It smacks of emotion, lack of thought and is at best, tedious.
I for one am very afraid of what Johnson’s puppeteers are up to. We only have an inkling of who they are and what they want.
My thoughts exactly.
Last night I watched ‘The Great Hack’. As far as I know it is only on Netflix but worth a 1 month free trial if only to see this. It was chilling to see the backstory to the Cambridge Analytica, some of the main players who have come out (Brittany Kaiser who had some very interesting insights) and the suggestion made that these people actually want to break society so it can be rebuilt in a way more suitable for the rich.
Not much of this information is new but it is presented in one package (albeit a bit long at 2 hours and too much American centric for my liking). CA had practice runs in Trinidad & Tobago where for example they discouraged one ethnic group of youths not to vote knowing CA’s client’s group would encourage their coming of age youth to vote. CA’s client party won of course.
Just thinking about what is happening now with Brexit ‘do or die’ come what may. That is exactly what they are hoping for, notice how over the past few years we have had the government pushing the boundaries, they are already in contempt of parliament, May formed a government without a majority, the Queen’s speech is delayed, their compliant media push out outrageous lies on a daily basis (and so do the ministers!).
So far they have got away with it, the Overton window (regarding previously unthinkable ideas becoming mainstream) shifts ever rightward so no one notices.
Adam, thank you for taking the time to read that blog and to respond.
I would agree with you about making the best of a bad ‘deal’ if and only if I was convinced that the result was fair. Quite simply it was not won fair and square. The documentary I referenced (if you have a couple of hours to spare of course) shows just how bent the vote leave and sundry organisations were. Cambridge Analytica targeted that small minority of ‘fence sitters’ who could be influenced either way with targeted adverts, mainly plain falsehoods. Notice how ever more exaggerated claims and statements are coming out that are never challenged and therefore become part of the narrative. In the USA it was only 70, 000 that needed to be nudged to get the Trump win in the bag. Similar thing happened here with the harvesting of Facebook data (5000 data points on each individual!) and using all those individuals connections as well.
As for saying each side has not behaved well, I must disagree. remaining voters are simply asking for the status quo and anyway, saying (like is done to defend accusations of BBC bias) if both sides complain then they must be neutral. This is simply false equivalence. The editorship of BBC current affairs is stuffed with placemen/women appointed by Cameron such as past editors of Times/Mail etc. I no longer listen to Radio 4 but from my twitter feed I am glad I don’t.
Good thing I hang out on Facebook under an alias as well.
If and when the no-deal event comes to pass (and recall this is ‘THE PLAN’) working to make this ‘work’ just means we will hasten our own subjection to the new regime.
Welsh farmers will engage in civil disobedience when they find export tariffs kick in and many many more sections will find themselves totally clobbered.
No, I’m not going to help these crooks get it working thank you very much and nor do I expect to make one iota of difference discussing this on the internet.
Agreed about the fence sitters phenomenon Ian. And this sort of tactic has been used before – oh yes!
If you watch the PBS documentary by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick ‘The Vietnam War, you will see how an under-pressure but sneaky, duplicitous Richard Nixon utilised the ‘silent majority’ to create a Government made counter balance to the anti-war movement during the conflict to buy him time to get of ‘Nam.
This group can still be seen in America today – as Trump supporters perhaps?. They can be described as nationalistic and a bit gung-ho – ‘My country right or wrong’. This group actually pushed up the Nixon regimes approval ratings after the Kent State Ohio shootings of 4 students by the national guard!!
The message is enduring: perhaps all societies have a reactionary element that can be described as hard right in them that is ever present waiting to be activated by dodgy political operators like – say – Lynton Crosby with our own ‘silent majority’.
These operators are prepared to play with the devil and then when they’ve done their damage, talk about bringing us to together again like Mrs May did on her way out of No. 10.
It’s sickening really, the way the public can be manipulated – it gives Government a bad name. BREXIT too is straight forward manipulation in order to artificially make the concerns of a small cabal in our Establishment, the concerns of the common man. Result: stupidity like BREXIT.
So, there is nothing new about this phenomenon except that this time the internet makes it even easier to manipulate matters. That is a frightening prospect, and still Parliament and administrations everywhere seem stymied in dealing with online abuse. It really makes me angry.