Dr Graham Gudgin: How the Economics Profession Got It Wrong on Brexit
Dr Graham Gudgin, an Honorary Research Associate at the Centre for Business Research, Judge Business School, University of Cambridge and a leading pro Brexit economist tells B4B listeners why he thinks the UK government will strike an eleventh hour deal with Brussels for the UK to Brexit the EU on Free Trade Deal terms at the end of the year.
Gudgin said:
We should be able to strike sensible deals with Brussels. Australians who have had a lot of experience in trade negotiations with the EU told me that you don’t listen to anything until the last three weeks of the negotiations. I am also rather more optimistic than other Brexiteers as it is not until late this year that we will see the signs of a deal.
No we won’t have a No Deal we will end up with a Free Trade Deal. The trouble is Brussels will not begin to discuss things like this trade deal until issues like the Northern Ireland Border are sorted out. The British Government says with impeccable logic that we can’t sort out the NI Border until we know what the trade deal is and Brussels has insisted on putting that cart before that horse. We will end up eventually with a free trade agreement similar to Canada’s but hopefully saying more about financial services which are important to us. That is how we will end up, but it is going to be pretty horrible until that point because we can see what the EU is doing.
Last week Brussels banned the European Civil Aviation Authority from talking at all, and having any discussions with the UK. What we want to talk about is the regulations and things that have to be signed to make sure the planes can land after we Brexit. Brussels say you can’t even talk about that. They are trying to put the squeeze on the negotiations to say if you don’t play it our way your planes may not be able to land. EasyJet may take off from Stansted but it may not be able to land in Europe. My reaction to that is: “Make my day punk!” That is not going to happen. Can you imagine that happening? And the publicity hit the EU would take if it stopped planes, people from all over the World coming here and not being able to land. They are not going to do it but they have threatened to do it. A deal depends on the backbone and spine of the UK government.
