Euro entry would have cost UK jobs
BRITAIN’S unemployment rate would be twice as high as it is now if former prime minister Tony Blair had taken Britain into the euro, a leading think tank has claimed.
The Centre for Economic and Business Research (CEBR) has used its economic model to calculate what might have happened if Blair had signed up to join the euro.
It says that growth would have been very slightly stronger between 1998 and 2006 but so would have inflation, probably as interest rates would have been kept lower.
But after 2006, the slump would have been much greater, the CEBR said. “GDP last year might have fallen by seven per cent instead of five per cent and unemployment now would be around 15 per cent,” it said.