Week in Business: Will Donald Trump’s trade war blow up the UK economy? April 3, 2025 Liberation Day, Independence Day, the greatest day in American history? Or the end of the global economic order and the start of a dangerous new world? In the end it was classic Trump, sometimes reading from an autocue as if for the first time, sometimes veering off script in erratic directions, calling out supporters in [...]
US tariffs: UK in ‘better position’ than some but still ‘a challenge’ – Reynolds April 3, 2025 The UK is in a “better position than a lot of other countries” after Donald Trump imposed a 10 per cent rate of tariffs on exports to the US, Jonathan Reynolds has said. The US President imposed a rate of 20 per cent on the European Union (EU), 24 per cent on Japan and 34 [...]
Do we need to rethink Brexit’s impact on UK-EU trade? March 20, 2025 With the weekend approaching, allow me to furnish you with a classic conversation starter for the pub or a dinner party; have you heard that the OBR might have overstated the impact of Brexit on the UK’s trade with the EU? In my experience this kind of line serves as a perfect icebreaker or an [...]
Jeremy Hunt: OBR ‘overly exaggerated’ Brexit impact March 19, 2025 Former Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has criticised the Office of Budget Responsibility (OBR) for making “overly exaggerated” claims about Brexit’s impact on the economy. The OBR released a series of gloomy predictions in recent years claiming that Brexit had stifled growth and wrecked trade. But Hunt has claimed that leaving the European Union has in fact [...]
Axe the EU’s import tax to save consumers money February 25, 2025 More than five years on from Brexit we are still sticking to EU rules that see Brits paying over the odds for branded goods that manufacturers are happy to sell cheaper elsewhere, says Martin Howe KC This month we have seen rising inflation and the threat that the Bank of England will have to defer [...]
Checkatrade CEO: ‘My plan to get Britain growing again’ February 20, 2025 The chief executive of Checkatrade has revealed what he would like the government to change in order to boost British businesses and get the country growing again. Speaking during an up-coming episode of City AM’s Boardroom Uncovered interview series, Jambu Palaniappan argued Labour should reform the rules around planning permission to made it easier for [...]
America first means Britain needs a customs union with Europe February 18, 2025 Whatever one thinks of Brexit, industrial goods were always the area where it made least sense for Britain to go it alone. And now that it’s clear Europe can no longer rely on America, deepening cooperation on defence production is a no-brainer, says Will Cooling It has only been four weeks since Donald Trump’s second [...]
Post-Brexit immigration wave could cost Brits £234bn February 11, 2025 The City of London is an immigration success story, but most of those who have entered the country since we ‘took back control’ of our borders will never pay enough tax to cover the cost of the public services and welfare they consume, representing a net fiscal cost of £8,200 for every UK household, says [...]
Better relations with America could be the biggest Brexit benefit yet February 5, 2025 Brexit allowed Britain to lead the West in support for Ukraine. Now we must use that freedom to dodge tariffs by convincing Trump we are a reliable partner in defence, says James Price Having served in government through some of the Brexit negotiations, and seen up close how completely bonkers everyone was driven by it, [...]
Trade war: Trump’s tariffs pose ‘age-old question’ for Starmer February 3, 2025 President Trump imposed 25 per cent tariffs on goods imports coming from Mexico and Canada, as well as an extra 10 per cent duty on Chinese goods.