Research

"Around half of the fiscal hole, and the political instability that comes with that, is down to Brexit," John Springford of the Centre for European Reform said on Twitter in October, in an exchange on the relationship of the UK's EU membership to its economic performance.In a CER report in June, he commented on a £29 billion (€33.2 billion) package of tax rises announced earlier in the year by Rishi Sunak, then finance minister -- up "to their highest share of GDP since the 1960s", he said.

The Chips for Europe Initiative's €11 billion focused on commercializing research "would still punch below its weight" even if it all materializes, said Zach Meyers, a senior research fellow at London-based think tank Centre for European Reform. Meyers estimates that the U.S.'s chips strategy promises $13.2 billion in research.

But this week shifted “the trajectory in an almost dramatic way,” said Luigi Scazzieri, a senior research fellow at the Centre for European Reform, adding that an escalation of the current disagreements could throw relations back into “the darkest phase in Italian-French relations” in recent memory.

It would be very surprising if this reduction in trade hadn’t reduced growth, and indeed John Springford, of the Centre for European Reform, estimates that if you look at the UK’s performance compared to a basket of “similar” countries, our growth shortfall is about 5 per cent.

“This is certainly the biggest increase in defence spending in Europe since the end of the Cold War,” Ian Bond, director of foreign policy at the Centre for European Reform, told Yahoo News. Russia’s war in Ukraine has shaken countries and “people who got used to peace for a generation,” said Bond.

The crisis was a “big shock to the UK’s broad economic model,” said John Springford, from the Centre for European Reform. Productivity took an immediate hit as exports of financial services plunged. It never fully recovered.