One of the City of London’s top lobby groups “The CityUK” has done a complete U-turn and now supports Brexit as an “unprecedented opportunity”. They obviously sniff the winds of change. Maybe they have observed, as we at Freenations have, that the list of positive news on the UK economy continues to accumulate.
The fourth qtr 2016 UK growth of 0.6% making 2% for the whole of 2016 made the UK the fastest growing of the western economies. The 3 months to January 2017 showed UK domestic manufacturing orders grew at their fastest pace since July 2014 while figures showed the biggest increase in UK competitiveness in non EU markets since 2000.
Mortgages in 2016 rose 7.2% while mortgages to first time buyers rose 13.5% to £53 bn in 2016. December was a record month for first time buyers – £4.8 bn was lent – always a critical signal of confidence in the housing market, certainly also stimulated by the very low unemployment rate of 4.8%. The employment rate hit a record high at 74.6% while pay rose at an annual rate of 2.6% – far more than the inflation rate.
The UK has £5.7 trillion of assets under management (pensions, savings etc) and the UK’s housing stock is worth £5.2 trillion.
Santander Executive Chairman Ana Botin (rather contradicting the threats from the eurofanatics about the City after Brexit) said that London’s financial status is secure: “London is still the hub, the talent, critical mass markets are there and so I think London will remain the most important centre in Europe”
And the “American thinker” blog took the time to add up the economic power of the UK and its natural historic allies in the USA and the Commonwealth, what we might call the “anglo saxon economy”:
The potential impact of America and Britain – the largest and the fifth largest economies in the world – acting in concert is hard to overstate. Canada is the tenth largest economy in the world, and Australia is the thirteenth largest. Combined, these economies have one third of the global GDP and more than twice that of China, the second largest economy in the world.
And one financial industry which is really looking forward to Brexit is the Insurance industry because it will be free of the EU’s “Solvency 2” regulations which have discriminated against UK insurers, raising their costs above that of other EU countries. The Chief Executive of Legal and General said:
“There is a greater chance of us entering the EU market post Brexit where bizarrely we will have much more of a level playing field than we have pre Brexit”
Britain will benefit most perhaps from the freeing of our agriculture and fishing industries from the sclerotic grip of the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy and the Common Agricultural Policy. We had 80% of Europe’s fishing grounds before Edward Heath and the Europe Minister Geoffrey Rippon gave them away (by lying to parliament) when we joined the EEC in 1973.
“Fishing for Leave” estimates that the country will benefit from a £6.3 bn economic boost by retrieving control of our international fishing grounds and the right to manage our own stocks. The UN recognised area of our fishing waters is three times the size of our land mass and yet inside the EU only 13% of fish catch in EU waters is by UK vessels and 59% of all catches inside UK waters are by EU vessels.
Yes it is only when you stop others controlling your life, land, sea and parliament that you realise how profitable Brexit will be! Only when the great weight is lifted from your back do you feel the full freedom of being a nation again.
