Leaving the EU: Impact on the UK

Deidre Brock Excerpts

Wednesday 17th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

I am old enough to remember the days when we were told that, post-Brexit, the UK would hold all the cards and the trade deal would be the easiest in human history; that the EU needed the UK more than the UK needed the EU and there was no downside to Brexit, only a considerable upside; and that trade would boom immediately after we left.

The Office for National Statistics told us what actually happened immediately after we left. Exports to the EU were down by more than 40%, the largest monthly fall since records began. Imports were down as well, by just under 29%, mainly in transport equipment and chemicals. The transport equipment is mainly cars; the chemicals are mainly medical and pharmaceutical products, which some of us might think are pretty important. Also included, of course, are agricultural products such as fertiliser, which we might also think are important. Food imports from the EU dropped by a quarter in January, falling below £2 billion in a month for the first time since 2014.

Far worse from our point of view in Scotland are the figures for exports of food to the EU, which dropped by two thirds: fish and shellfish down by 83%, an industry wiped out; meat exports down by 59%; dairy down by half. Lord Frost, that wisest of Brexiters, suggested that the drop in exports was down to stockpiling ahead of the end of transition; I am not sure whether he has thought through the stockpiling of fresh fish—perhaps happy British fish do not rot.

Small businesses offering mail order have been hit hard. Macbeth’s Butcher in Moray and the Ethical Dairy in Castle Douglas both announced in January that they had to stop sending consignments to Northern Ireland. The Cheshire Cheese Company cannot send its products to EU customers. It, like other businesses, was advised by the UK Government to set up shop in the EU to get around the problems caused by the Government’s own failure adequately to negotiate that easiest deal in human history.

It is not just about trade barriers, either. The world’s largest daffodil grower is Varfell Farms at Longrock in Penzance, but its crop is rotting in the fields because it cannot get the workforce in from the EU. Scottish fruit and vegetable growers face the same problem. The loss of freedom of movement means the loss of seasonal workforces as well as the loss of our rights across the other 27 nations.

Brexit has been and continues to be an utter galloping disaster. Scotland is ill-served once again by this den of inadequacy, and so are Wales and great chunks of England. Northern Ireland has a category of pain all of its own.

In the midst of that, we have Tory Ministers who struggle to understand the EU rules that were laid out in simple language and that many, many voices warned about in advance. Scotland will see the back of this nonsense soon enough. Independence is coming for us, and we can then start to repair the harm that these witless Brexiters have thrust upon us.