Why Brexit hasn't saved us from Trump's tariffs

Independent

03-04-2025

Within minutes of Donald Trump's announcement on so-called 'reciprocal tariffs' around the world, Brexiteers were claiming victory because the UK escaped with half the rate imposed on the EU.
But if the UK's 10 per cent import tariffs to the American market compared to the EU's 20 per cent, is the best economic justification for Brexit that can be made, then supporters of leaving the EU are clutching at straws.
The first and most obvious point is that Brexit has not spared the UK from having tariffs imposed on it by the one world leader who was the biggest cheerleader outside Britain for the UK leaving the EU.
Far from the trade deal that Brexiteers promised would follow with the US, there is still none in place nine years after the referendum. And even if Keir Starmer lands one, it is likely to be highly focussed on specific areas and may not avoid tariffs altogether.
Even Tory Brexit supporter Mark Wallace, now chief executive of the Total Politics magazine, cautioned his fellow Leavers from 'cheering' tariffs this morning, even if 10 per cent is better than 20 per cent.
Even with half the rate of tariffs compared with those imposed on the EU, the difference barely goes anywhere near undoing the economic harm that Brexit has done to the UK economy.
The Cambridge Econometrics report commissioned by London Mayor Sadiq Khan last year found that the UK economy was £140bn smaller as a result of Brexit. London alone had lost £30bn as a result, with 300,000 fewer jobs, the report found.
Its economists concluded the average Briton was nearly £2,000 worse off in 2023, while the average Londoner was nearly £3,400 worse off last year as a result of Brexit.
It is a long way from the £350m a week extra for the NHS promised on the side of the Vote Leave bus by Boris Johnson and Dominic Cummings in 2016.
In its latest report, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), whose job it is to scrutinise public finances, estimates that exports by the UK will be 15 per cent lower in the long run than if the UK had remained in the EU.
In January, the National Institute of Economic and Social Research think tank noted that 'at least 30 per cent of firms have consistently identified Brexit as one of their top three concerns' every year since 2016.
It also concluded that 'UK business investment could have been about 12.4 per cent higher in 2023 if Brexit did not happen'.
The Independent 's own research was even more damning - revealing that the cost of leaving the EU was £30.2bn alone.
The food industry has seen a £2.8bn annual drop in exports, including 118,000 less tonnes of seafood exported and 56 per cent of dairy producers now struggling to make ends meet.
Across all sectors around 16,400 businesses stopped exporting altogether as a result of Brexit.
And things are set to be even worse when the new border checks are finally operational later this year.
Meanwhile, the claims that it would end uncontrolled immigration have also proven to be false with an average of 3.6m people entering the country legally since Brexit - far higher than when free movement was in place.
No wonder two thirds of Britons think Brexit has gone badly in the latest polling.
Donald Trump may have been slightly less nasty to Britain than the EU with his tariffs but it goes nowhere near fixing the economic damage that Brexit has already done.