George Osborne said Britain should rejoin the EU customs union, arguing that Brexit has damaged trade and left the economy poorer. The former chancellor told the Independent that rejoining would be the fastest route to recovery, and he described the move as “a quite simple thing to do.”
Osborne’s Brexit case
Osborne said Brexit has been a mess and that Britain has “basically gone off a cliff.” He added: “It has had a huge impact on the British economy. It is clearly poorer than it would otherwise be.”
He tied that argument to trade and investment, saying Britain’s growth problem cannot be separated from efforts to revive trade with the continent and get investment. In his view, rejoining the customs union would be a practical way to repair part of that damage without forcing a wider political reset.
Customs union versus single market
Osborne drew a line between rejoining the customs union and rejoining the single market. He said rejoining the customs union is more straightforward and would not require acceptance of the free movement of people, which he described as a complicated issue to sell to people in Britain at the moment.
He also said leaving the customs union was never part of the Brexit debate and that no one knew Britain was leaving it. On his telling, that decision has had a “devastating impact on trade,” because businesses lost the frictionless framework that had been assumed when voters went to the Brexit referendum in 2016.
Britain and Europe
Osborne said closer ties with Europe could boost the economy, but he also said rejoining the European Union itself would be difficult a decade on from the Brexit referendum. That leaves his argument in a narrower lane: customs union membership, not full return to the European Union, as the route he sees as realistic.
He also said the trade deals Brexiteers expected with America now look “pretty fanciful.” For readers in Britain, the practical effect is that Osborne is pressing for a policy shift that would change the rules shaping trade with the European Union before any broader debate about full reintegration can move anywhere.
