Great Britain after three years of Brexit: policy paralysis

LONDON — The third anniversary of Britain’s departure from the European Union passed without fanfare on January 31, and why not? Brexit has faded from the political limelight, unmentioned by politicians who don’t want to touch it and overlooked by a public that cares more about the country’s economic crisis.

The severity of that crisis was underscored by the International Monetary Fund, which predicted last month that Britain would be the only major economy in the world to contract in 2023, performing even worse than Russia, which is on so many blacklists. .

The IMF only indirectly attributed some of Britain’s problems to Brexit, noting that it suffered from a very tight labor market, which had restricted production. Brexit has exacerbated those shortages by choking the flow of workers from the European Union — from waiters in London restaurants to pickers of fruits and vegetables in the fields.

In a country grappling with the same energy crises and inflationary pressures that afflict the rest of Europe, Brexit is the dark thread that some critics say explains why Britain is suffering more than its neighbors.

“One of the reasons for our current economic weakness is Brexit,” said Anand Menon, a professor of Western European politics at King’s College London. “Everything has become so politicized.”

Years of debate over Brexit, he said, had contributed to a kind of policy paralysis. “It’s amazing how little actual governance has taken place since 2016,” Menon said.

Inflation, although it has eased slightly, remains at a double-digit rate. Britain’s National Health Service is facing the most serious crisis in its history, with hospitals overcrowded and waiting hours for ambulances. On February 1, Britain faced its biggest coordinated strikes in a decade, with teachers, railway workers and civil servants walking off the job.

Not all of these problems are the result of Brexit. But tackling any of them, experts said, will require bolder solutions than those proposed by the government of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. Due in large part to Brexit, Sunak’s Conservative Party remains divided by factions frustrating action on issues from urban planning to a new relationship with the European Union.

Part of the problem, experts said, is that neither the government nor the opposition Labor Party are prepared to acknowledge the negative effects of Brexit.

Public opinion has turned strongly against Brexit: 56 percent of those polled thought leaving the European Union was a mistake, a November poll found, while just 32 percent thought it was a good idea.

Britain’s problems are made worse by the fact that the only leader to propose radical remedies, Liz Truss, provoked such a reaction in the financial markets that she was forced to resign in 45 days. To restore the country’s reputation among investors, Sunak eliminated his tax cuts and adopted a fiscally austere program of higher taxes and spending cuts.

The IMF’s assessment was not entirely grim. Britain, he estimated, grew faster than Germany or France last year. After inflation cools and the burden of higher taxes eases, he said, Britain should return to modest growth by 2024.

By: MARK LANDLER