Six months on, the real battles of Brexit are yet to come

Six months on from the referendum vote for Brexit and remarkably little has happened, in truth. Of course the decision was nothing less than momentous, and of course it will change the course of British and, very likely, European and even world history, if it leads to a longer-term unravelling of the EU. The economy has, in the short term, proved more resilient than the most apocalyptic forecasts of “Project Fear”; and the Government has not even published its Brexit plan, nor activated Article 50.

The court cases have, in their slow-mo way, been the most exciting aspect of the process so far.

Brexit is going slowly. With talk of a lengthy transition period and it taking up to a decade for any new UK-EU trade deal to be ratified by national and regional parliaments in the continuing EU, the UK may not have properly changed its relationship with the rest of the continent before the 2030s arrive. By which point, it is necessary to add, many of those who voted Leave will not be around to see the results.

So the consequences of it will be slow to grind their way through the political system and the bureaucracies of Europe and member states. The consequences of the Brexit vote on the economy will be equally gradual – but they inevitably will emerge, and will be much to the detriment of the British people. For that reason, and for the basic need for democratic endorsement, if and when the reality of the terms of exit are finalised there should be a vote in the Commons or across the wider electorate as to whether those terms really are superior to the position we have now.

The economic consequences of Brexit will, in many respects, be impossible to see. No one will be able to point to the new skyscraper in the City that was never built because an American investment bank chose to invest in New York or in Frankfurt instead. No one will be able to see the factory extension that a Japanese car maker decided to build in Slovakia rather than Sunderland. No one will see the phantom health service staff no longer able to come and work in the UK to support the NHS and other vital public services.

The effects on UK economic growth form lower investment will take many years to show up; as will the inevitable depression in wages and living standards compared to the situation where the UK had stayed in the EU, where it was so well-placed to exploit the single market while remaining outside the troubled single currency area. By the 2030s, the average household could quite easily have lost thousands of pounds in annual income as a result of Brexit, though there is no physical proof of that beyond economic modelling and common sense.

In terms of finding fast-growing, dynamic trade partners to replace the loss of some of the 50 per cent of British exports that go to the rest of the EU, the early signs are not encouraging. If ministers want to stay in the customs union, and then the possibilities of reaching independent third-party trade deals are remote. If ministers wish to stay in the single market then they should have realised by now that the European Union, barring some seismic political change, will not grant that special privilege. Thus far the British approach really has been that of “have your cake and eat it”, as the inadvertent release of some hapless adviser’s notes put it succinctly. At this point, with consumers mobbing the shops and businesses staying upbeat, the Brexit phenomenon has the feel of a phoney war about it. The real battles are yet to come.