Brexit
Brexit has made the UK a global joke. How will we rebuild
our reputation?
John Kampfner
Britain used to be a talent magnet; now it’s a laughing
stock. Prepare for us once again to be the ‘sick man of Europe’
@johnkampfner
Tue 25 Dec 2018 12.00 GMT
Theresa May and Philip Hammond. ‘Americans and Europeans
used to tune in to our parliamentary antics to wonder at the jousting. Now they
are baffled that we continue to play banter games at a time like this.’
Photograph: House of Commons/PA
You know you’ve hit rock bottom when the Germans mock you on
primetime TV and the jokes are actually quite funny. Giving Britons this year’s
“golden dumbass” prize, Oliver Welke, the German equivalent of Dara Ó Briain,
describes how Theresa May “can’t get out of the EU and can’t even get out of
her bloody car”, over pictures of Angela Merkel waiting embarrassedly outside
her Berlin residency as the door of our prime minister’s limo fails to open.
“Just go!” the host yells. “Hard Brexit, soft Brexit, liquid Brexit, just fog
off!” Next, he shows a cartoon of a man in a bowler hat repeatedly burning his
hand on a hot stove, then stabbing his eye with a fork. The audience is falling
about laughing. Welke’s Heute Show on ZDF may not have the cachet of the US
equivalent, the Daily Show, but it is good at reflecting the moment.
Britain is now the butt of global mirth and cringe-making
sympathy. I spent most of this autumn on trips trying to link our creative
industries with those of other countries. From Mexico City to Montreal,
Amsterdam to Tallinn, the welcome starts with the avuncular hand on the
shoulder, a sigh and a reference to “our British friends”, followed by “I hope
you’re all right”.
Consternation over the original referendum decision long ago
gave way to bafflement over the chaos. “What on earth is Mrs May doing playing
pantomime host in the House of Commons at a time like this?” someone asked me
last week. “We used to think that you were serious, reliable people.” Americans
and Europeans used to tune in to our parliamentary antics to wonder at the
jousting. Now they are baffled that we continue to play games at a time like
this. I am constantly asked why we hark on about the second world war, as if we
are stuck in time and are not proud of our achievements since.
The gulf between those trying to sell the UK’s skills and
modernity and the poor calibre of our political culture is hitting hard.
Business groups, which had been surprisingly cowed, are now waking up to the
dangers of the brain drain. It is not just young, ambitious Europeans who are
moving home, apparently to our prime minister’s delight. The movement of
talented Britons to other countries is steady and will grow, as the reality of
Brexit sinks in. Why work in a country that regards economic self-harm as just
one of those things you have to get through? Why work in a country that permits
people to come rather than welcomes them?
The atmospherics are particularly important for those
working in, or planning to work in, the knowledge economy – the nexus between
science, technology and creativity. These three sectors have, since the
financial crash of a decade ago, been the growth engine for the United Kingdom.
People used to flock to us, as world leaders in these
fields. Perhaps they will again. But for the moment, the direction of travel is
in the opposite direction. The Germans are making a beeline for British talent.
The Dutch are marketing themselves as a new centre for the creative industries.
Lisbon is hot on tech. At its peak, London had so many French nationals working
in the capital, thanks to its entrepreneurial cachet, that it was somewhere
between the sixth- and ninth-largest French city (depending on how you count
the population). Brain drains become self-fulfilling. France, the old saying
went, is where you go to relax. Britain is where you go to work. No more.
Brexit has already deeply damaged the British brand. The
idea that we could compensate for the loss of European markets and political
influence by growing markets elsewhere was always a folly, driven by
ideological extremism. The view from countries outside the European Union about
the state of Britain is no different to those inside – apart perhaps from a few
rightwing thinktanks in Washington, which is one city that I haven’t
frequented.
We have been here before. I remember the 1970s as a young
boy. Britain was a laughing stock, the “sick man of Europe”. The UK’s
desperately poor productivity, terrible labour relations and propensity to
strike earned the tag “the British disease”. Our growth rates consistently
lagged behind those of the first members of the European Economic Community.
Indeed, their economic success, and our weakness, was a driving force behind us
joining the trade bloc. Trips to Europe were expensive – and exotic. Between
1939 and the early 1990s London lost a quarter of its population. Then it
became attractive and the reverse happened. These cycles occur for cities and
countries. The two peaks of “cool Britannia”, in the late 1990s and around the
London Olympics of 2012, feel a long time ago.
This is not zero-sum, not a blind eulogy to “the other”.
France is mired in protests as the Macron gloss wears off. Spain has handled
its constitutional bind with Catalonia with violence and heavy-handedness.
Germany frets about life after Mutti Merkel. Italy has a caricature far-right
and far-left government. Vladimir Putin is working his way through Europe,
fomenting extremism.
Whatever transpires with Brexit, the British brand is
tarnished. The mediocrity tag takes time to shake off. It is likely to take
somewhere between a decade and a generation for it to recover. Given that
politicians can’t be relied upon to remedy the mess of their own making, it
will be the lot of everyone else to rebuild our reputation as a go-getting,
open nation – one that is worthy of respect rather than cheap jokes.
• John Kampfner is former CEO of the Creative Industries
Federation
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