Brexit, lies and the power of prophecy | thearticle

Amid so much uncertainty about Brexit — what it means, what it ought to mean, and what will happen afterwards — there is one thing that many people are sure they know about it. For those who

voted against it in 2016, and those who now wish they had not voted for it, the Leave campaign was built on lies. Indeed, for supporters of a People’s Vote, Brexit was and is just one big

lie. That view, while controversial in the UK and especially in London, is practically a consensus on the Continent. This week the French President, Emmanuel Macron, went further, claiming

that the EU was now threatened by the “lies and irresponsibility” that had marred the Brexit referendum. In a manifesto for the European parliamentary elections in May, Macron asked a series

of rhetorical questions: “Who told the British the truth about their future after Brexit? Who talked to them about losing their access to the European market? Who mentioned the risks for

peace in Ireland of returning to the border of the past?”   Calling for a “European renaissance”, the French President drew the sharpest possible contrast between the honesty of the EU and

the mendacity of politics across the Channel: “In the face of these manipulations, we should stand upright, proud and lucid,” he declared. Hindsight is a marvellous thing. At the time of the

referendum, Macron was still Minister for the Economy under President François Hollande. So he can blame his predecessor for somehow failing to warn the British that if they voted to leave,

the EU would punish them by threatening to cripple trade and re-opening the Irish border question. Few people in Britain, even on the Remain side, foresaw these threats, for the simple

reason that their use as negotiation tactics by Michel Barnier then lay in the future. Would the result have been different if the EU’s stance had been made clear in advance? Given that 17.4

million people voted Leave despite an elaborate “Project Fear” masterminded by their own Treasury and Bank of England, it seems unlikely that yet another warning from abroad would have

swung the vote. What about the notorious “lies” that misled voters? Let’s talk Turkey. Boris Johnson now denies that he ever mentioned Turkey joining the EU during the campaign. His memory

is, to put it politely, at fault. But the recent “Inside Europe” documentary by Norma Percy reminded us that in early 2016 Turkey exploited its success in ending the migration crisis by

closing the Greek border in order to extract promises from Angela Merkel to accelerate Turkish EU membership. It was only after the attempted coup in Turkey — which took place on July 16,

three weeks after the referendum — that the prospect of Turkey joining the EU was taken off the table, mainly because of human rights violations during the brutal crackdown by President

Erdogan. At the time the British went to the polls, they could not have anticipated such a dramatic turn of events. Not all warnings prove to be justified. This week the Governor of the Bank

of England, Mark Carney, has revised his forecast about the catastrophic impact of a no-deal Brexit. Last November, the Bank warned that after three years the UK economy would be either

4.75 per cent smaller after a “disruptive” hard Brexit, or 7.75 per cent smaller after a “disorderly” one. Yesterday Carney told the economic affairs committee of the House of Lords that he

now expected the figures to be 2 per cent under the disruptive model and 3.5 per cent under his worst case scenario. That is a big shift in four months. The assumptions in both models

include serious disruption of trade, a stock market crash and a sterling crisis. All these are contingencies that can be anticipated, but that does not mean they will happen. Who knows what

Carney will predict if they do not in fact take place? So the most basic assumptions we all make about Brexit may prove fallible. When asked why he had changed his mind, John Maynard Keynes

is supposed to have replied: “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?” In fact, the quotation is probably apocryphal. But in his _General Theory _Keynes certainly did

write this: “Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back.” We are properly sceptical of politicians, however

authoritative they may seem, whenever they claim to be prophets.