As I See It: Terry Murden
Our old friend Optimism paid us a visit at the end of last week and has been welcomed with open arms after months of being forced to endure that miserable blighter Pessimism.
With Boris Johnson lifted by unexpectedly positive responses from the Brexit negotiators and Donald Trump ready to sign a first phase trade deal with China, the mood music has suddenly begun to sound much sweeter.
Investors, economists and the public at large at last have a reason to iron a few more shirts ahead of the new working week, although there is one corner of the world where Optimism may not get such a big hug. SNP members gathering in Aberdeen for their annual festival of separation must be wondering how they are supposed to greet growing indications that Boris might actually pull it off.
The SNP leadership has repeatedly warned of the dangers to the economy of a Boris-led hard Brexit, while knowing that such an outcome would deliver the party a huge boost at the polls. The opening paragraph of a press release issued by the party today on the back of a new opinion poll from Survation states: “An overwhelming majority of voters in Scotland say they are more likely to vote for independence if the UK crashes out of the EU without a deal.”
So there you have it: an admission by the SNP that No Deal is in its own best interests. Indeed, while the doom-mongering Westminster leader Ian Blackford keeps warning about the dire impact of No Deal his party is rejoicing at the prospect.
Suppose, therefore, that Boris gets his deal, defying those who keep telling us he doesn’t want one, how will the SNP, as well as all other Opposition parties, respond? After campaigning to stop a No Deal, they are surely duty bound to support a deal that is offered to them. Or will they continue to play hard ball and argue that whatever deal is reached it won’t be good enough?
The prime minister will tell the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, and the European Commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, that they should get an agreement wrapped up this week, ahead of the European Summit.
The change in mood is already putting a spring in the step of investors and economists weighed down by months of impasse in Brussels and Washington. Sterling and UK-exposed stocks were sharply higher at the tail end of last week on hopes of a break through in both negotiations on both sides of the Atlantic.
The domestic-focused FTSE 250 index advanced more than 3% while the banks rose more than 11% and housebuilders saw gains of more than 10%.
Sterling enjoyed its best two days since 2017 and hit a three month high against the US dollar, up more than 1.7% .
The Dow Jones, S&P 500 and Nasdaq all rose by more than 1% in Friday’s session.
Data firm MSCI says stocks in London would rise 10% and the pound would claw back 8% against the dollar if a Brexit deal is reached.
At home, Tim Allan, president of the Scottish Chambers of Commerce, says a “wall of cash” is ready to be invested in the economy if a deal is agreed.
One thing is guaranteed. None of this will be mentioned by the SNP leadership this weekend. In his speech to conference, Mr Blackford makes no mention of a possible deal, instead repeating the same old mantra of not giving in to the “chaos and crisis” at Westminster.
The message will be repeated by successive speakers, delivered to a membership desperate to believe that going it alone is the answer. Not one speaker will be prepared to re-write their dread-filled speeches and welcome the prospect of any breakthrough in the Brexit talks, an uplift in the economy and the markets, and the chances of the year ending on a note of optimism.
Reading Andrew Wilson’s succinct post on the factual impact of leaving the Customs Union and Single Market, I am struck by how pro-Brexit supporters do not reply with a sound counter-argument to the message, rather than descend into ad-hominem attacks on the messenger, such as noted here in this comments section.
Whatever the merits of staying or leaving, the EU is a rules-based system.
If the UK leaves with no deal, it will become a Third Country overnight, unwinding decade of systems and processes, at every level of country / company / individual, with no transition deal, and all the chaos that implies.
So, a request to the posters – what is the Brexit argument for explaining how any form of leaving will not impact the UK’s huge international services economy?
How does leaving the CU & SM impact benefit our multi-national manufacturing base, and what will mitigate the impact to the logistics of supplying components and delivering goods?
These are not Project Fear questions – in the case of No-Deal we’re moving from a clearly defined legal and economics system to an undefined one. It will have consequences. It will not be ‘clean’.
Nonsense. A hard Brexit deal will fall short of staying in the EU single market and as such will also devastate the UK economy since it would mean the end of trade in services and the end of seamless borderless trade.
Around 80% of UK GDP comes from services and across the board 40% of the business of the UK service sector is in the EU27. We are talking of sectors as varied as advertising, accounting, architecture, engineering, education, IT, telecoms, transport, tourism and the big ones of banking, insurance and agriculture (the CAP is a single market function).
Overnight on leaving the SM they will be shut out of EU business. No FTA or CU anywhere in the world has trade in services – for that to happen requires a common legal system and courts. The only free trade in services occurs in true federal nations like the USA, Australia, Canada and uniquely also the EU where member states have pooled sovereignty to a certain degree. The primary, secondary and tertiary job losses from loss of free trade in services will be huge.
Then add in the end of seamless borderless trade which will kill off the participation of UK firms in EU wide high tech JIT networks such as exist in the car industry. Firms like Nissan will still fold up shop in the UK even with a Brexit deal – all that will be different is that they will have two extra years of time to do so.
The SNP need not worry too much. If it’s a hard Brexit Scotland will still be leaving the UK union.
Fanciful but false rhetoric Andrew. And you know it. Stop the rabble rousing scaremongering.
The SNP will not get their indy because there are enough Scots who see through them, they are twisted, vengeful reprobates. The SNP are an embarrassment to the majority of Scots.
Well said. As a Scot living in Scotland I cant stand the lying, hypocritical, deceiving SNP.
One of the bugbears of independence supporters (independence supporters, not the SNP hierarchy) has been the SNPs avoid a hard Brexit at all costs and at the expense of pushing for independence. If the SNP really did not want a Brexit deal they would not have been putting all of their energy into avoiding a no deal while alienating their own supporters.