Is The UK Brexit Ready? Careering For Another Cliff Edge More Like
Are we Brexit ready? Nearly 40 months since the referendum, it is barely three months until the UK’s phony Brexit of the transition ends – and we finally leave not just the political institutions of the EU but the single market and the customs union.
This is a major change for the UK economy – and a major change for businesses and government.
The process of disentangling has been protracted and tortuous. It required the government to reinvent a third country border, ready itself for the repatriation of functions from the EU and persuade businesses and citizens to Get ready for Brexit.
We have been marched up this hill before – three times in 2019, a no-deal Brexit loomed. Now, despite last year’s agreement, a new report from UK in a Changing Europe shows, we are careering towards another cliff edge.
We should be much readier this time. Last year, there were real questions for business on whether it was worth preparing for no-deal. Some did. Others took a bet on parliament and the government blinking, conserved their cash and looked very smug when deadlines came and went and the UK moved into a “nothing has changed” transition on February 1 this year.
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But this time is for real. The good news for business is that a lot of the new processes they need to prepare for will be in place, deal or no-deal.
The Johnson vision of a skinny FTA means we move to a much more distant relationship with the EU – with customs formalities, regulatory checks at the border and the need for new EU approvals – and the UK needs to be ready to introduce them as well at the new border in the Irish Sea that the prime minister signed up for in his Withdrawal Agreement.
The bad news is that many may be less prepared than they were last year. One of the biggest...
