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Courtesy of the Times.
In the fable of the boy who cried wolf there are two obvious lessons, although one tends to be cited more frequently than the other. Aesop describes a shepherd boy raising a false alarm repeatedly. When a wolf does eventually turn up, the boy is not believed by the villagers and the sheep in his care get eaten. The moral is: don’t issue false warnings, because you might not be believed when it matters. The second, equally important lesson in the context of Brexit and the deplorable shambles at the heart of the British state, is that there was a wolf. And the sheep got eaten. The final warning of potential disaster was worth listening to after all. Aesop’s tale comes to mind when listening to the latest statements from British business about the government’s appalling lack of preparedness for this country’s departure from the EU, due to happen in only ten months’ time. Their bleak warnings are worth listening to. In recent days those pleas have moved from the generalised squealing and professional Remoaning of the past two years to much more precise criticisms that should make Brexiteers sit up and pay attention.
The Freight Transport Association declared this week that the government’s inaction has put Britain on a “road to nowhere” and that businesses are on the brink of being “destroyed”. Not a single one of eight demands for clarification and reassurance on keeping trade flowing has been dealt with properly by ministers, said James Hookham, deputy chief executive of the body representing an industry that is the logistical lifeblood of the economy. “We keep getting told that all food and agricultural exports to the Continent and Ireland will be checked at EU ports,” he said. “But there is nowhere to check them, and the system to check them does not exist.” Meanwhile, as The Times revealed, 39 IT projects designed to make government more efficient have had to be suspended because of Brexit overload. The bill in lost savings and tax revenue could be in the billions.
In the highly integrated European motor industry, lack of clarity about an agreement has meant that preparations for a no-deal Brexit have gone up a gear. The Dutch government has issued advice to suppliers to make arrangements in anticipation of the moment when they cannot use British manufactured components.
The temptation for my fellow Brexiteers might be to file all this in the bin marked Project Fear II. So entrenched has the Brexit debate become that hardline Leavers accuse anyone issuing a warning about an aspect of Brexit of displaying insufficient enthusiasm, and worse. On the contrary, business needs to make its voice heard even more loudly, because prime ministerial drift means the country is at a point where basic preparations have not been made. It is an unforgivable situation. The next European Council is in just three weeks’ time. It was supposed to bring clarity and progress, with the transition sorted and the two sides heading towards a final deal. Now, the line in London and Brussels is that June was never meant to be much of a big deal. The aim seems to be to push decisions back into October and December. There is still not even a settled British position on a customs deal.
When Theresa May is pressed on this and other matters, it is like “talking to a void”, says one minister. “She just shrugs.” “Theresa cannot make decisions,” says a cabinet minister.
Perhaps, but one decision she did make, it seems, was to agree with her lead mandarin Olly Robbins to delay yet again the publication of the Brexit white paper explaining the government’s position, because the EU might feel bounced. Attempts by David Davis, the Brexit secretary, to speed things up have so far got nowhere. The internal situation described by other ministers is as bad as anything I have ever heard, and that includes the 2003 Iraq war and the 2008 financial crisis. In the latter case there was at least an air of realism about the practicalities of the challenge and eventually a plan, whether you approved of it or not.