Nothing else has worked so Starmer and Reeves are finally telling the truth about Brexit | Rafael Behr

"The UK government is trying out a new Brexit stance, not to be mistaken for a change in policy. The shift is tonal. Previously, Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves talked about Britain's detachment from the rest of Europe as a feature of the natural landscape, awkward to navigate perhaps, but nobody's fault. Now they are prepared to say it is an affliction."

"Speaking at a regional investment conference on Tuesday, the chancellor listed Brexit alongside the pandemic and austerity as causes of persistent economic lethargy. She made the same point at a meeting of the International Monetary Fund in Washington last weekend, observing that the country's productivity challenge has been compounded by the way in which the UK left the European Union."

"It was a careful formula, diagnosing harm not in Brexit itself, but in the manner of its implementation; blaming the politicians who did it, not the ordinary people who willed it. Reeves needs that distinction to be clear when she delivers her budget next month. She wants to attribute some of her grim fiscal predicament to a bad deal that Boris Johnson negotiated, without appearing to denigrate the aspirations of leave voters."

"The Office for Budget Responsibility calculates that Britain's long-term productivity is 4% lower than it would have been if the country had retained EU membership. Alongside the cost of new trade friction, there was a sustained hit to business investment caused by political tumult and regulatory uncertainty. There was also the opportunity cost incurred by all the government's energy being spent on a task for which no one was prepared because none of the people who thought it was a good idea had seriously considered"

Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves have shifted from treating Britain's separation from Europe as an inevitable landscape feature to framing it as a damaging affliction. The chancellor has listed Brexit alongside the pandemic and austerity as drivers of persistent economic lethargy, and argued that the UK's productivity shortfall was compounded by the manner of leaving the EU. The Office for Budget Responsibility estimates long-term productivity is about 4% lower than it would have been with EU membership. New trade frictions, reduced business investment from political turmoil and regulatory uncertainty, and energy spent on unprepared implementation have all imposed costs.

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