No sooner had Theresa May promised a Trump-sized “Brexit dividend” for the NHS than the wheels came flying off her metaphorical big red bus. The Institute for Fiscal Studies rubbished the lie, and polling shows voters don’t believe it either. Brexit will cost us money, not save it.
Regardless of the lie, the policy has been announced, and now Philip Hammond must find a way to pay for it. He will say his bit later today, but there is no mention of a Brexit dividend in early copies of his speech; only tax rises. At least someone in government is being honest.
Brexit is set to blow a £15 billion hole in the government’s finances, according to official forecasts, before we worry about replicating functions currently performed by EU bodies. If the Chancellor is truly set against borrowing, carving out special funding for the NHS will either mean socking tax rises, or cutting other spending.
This might explain why the prime minister is asking the defence secretary to “justify Britain’s role as a ‘tier one’ military power”, according to the FT. That will be music to Vladimir Putin’s ears. Vote Leave, slash defence spending, become an international irrelevance.
Demand a vote on the Brexit deal
Click here to find out moreThis is not, of course, what Brexiters promised two years ago. Leaving was supposed to make us safer.
But then, almost nothing has worked out how Vote Leave said it would. We were promised a Brexit bonanza for public services, not just the NHS. More money for farmers, more money for scientists, scrapping VAT on fuel, replacing lost EU grants for universities, rebalancing the economy so that it worked for everyone.
What are we getting? The NHS is being promised a carve-out, but everything else is still upon the block.
Defence could be cut. New plans for farming subsidies could see a quarter of English farms go bankrupt. Rather than healing regional inequality, Brexit is exacerbating it. Jaguar Land Rover is merely the latest company to announce job cuts and a shift of focus to the continent.
Nobody voted for this Brexit – except possibly Moscow.
