Halleluiah! At last the Brexit deal seems to be done. If it gets through the various hurdles, then we could be due for a Brexit bounce and not a moment too soon.
After two tortuous years of clowning around in the Brussels three ring circus, we finally have a deal. And not just any deal. It’s a deal that our former European partners can agree to (shock, horror) and one that May feels able to navigate through the labyrinthine parliamentary process.
Theresa-The-Appeaser
Anyone with two neurons to rub together realised that those dastardly, transitional arrangements that kept us shackled to the Customs Union could only be dribbled down the road for so long. In fact, May has achieved a sort of uneasy equilibrium, since it’s likely that hardcore Europhiles and fulsome Brexiteers will both be unhappy with certain terms. Although ‘you can’t please ’em all’, Theresa-The-Appeaser seems to have the rare talent of not pleasing anyone. Certainly not the 17.4 million voters who gave her the mandate to escape the suffocating clutches of the Euro-monster.
Multinational corporates, financial markets and sovereign nations hate uncertainty. As always, the volatile situation here has been exacerbated by a cacophony of negative press comment. Although the Deal is littered with compromises, it ties up many disparate ends.
Rather than the Ealing comedy spectacle that we’ve witnessed so far, I have been insistent that these negotiations should have been conducted ‘n’en parle à personne’, as they don’t say in Slough. I’m glad to report that the proverbial seems to have dropped – the commentariat have been denied information up until the last few nanoseconds of the Deal’s completion. What a difference this makes. Had common sense broken out earlier, maybe the tone of debate would have been more reasonable and we would have saved ourselves countless gallons of stomach acid?
I’m sure that once the European ministers have convened and Parliament has sanctioned the Deal in December (not an easy hurdle to overcome), Brexit will no longer be the febrile, divisive matter that it has been to date. Collective memory of the uglier parts of the negotiation will disappear and be replaced by pride, as the great British sovereign nation starts to make headway in the world under its own impetus. After a 45-year wait, it’s not a moment too soon.
The scare stories about passports for financial services and the resultant banking exodus will be dismissed as fairy tales, as will the ludicrous visions of goods lorries parked up at our ports.
‘Brexit bounce’
Meanwhile, as the great Euro-federalist experiment trudges to a halt, burdened under the weight of its stagnant economies, subject to the restrictions of the bespoke customs union agreement, we will be free to sell our financial – and other – services throughout the world. And this time round, it’ll be far more dynamic and independent than in the past.
I firmly believe that with all the negative sentiment, particularly in regard to the UK Residential Property Market, there will be a ‘Brexit bounce’. Positivity and joy will fill the dark void created by those who stoked the fears of a ‘no-deal’, as if little Britain couldn’t survive without our grown-up European (unelected) overlords.
There may be a fractional rise in interest and mortgage rates, but as the Bank of England is as concerned about UK growth as they are about inflation, we will be spared American-style interest rate hikes.
Frankly, there should be nothing on the horizon to worry homeowners, other than the frightening thought of how a Corbyn-led rabble would destroy this country if they were ever to grab power. This will only be an issue in two years’ time or nine months before the General Election in 2022. That’s assuming that a sizeable part of the population wants to live in a colder version of Venezuela (sadly, those voters do exist).
You have to admit that the Maybot, in rather tricky circumstances, is trying to finish the job that Dumb and Dumber (aka Cameron and Osborne) were unwilling to do, let alone anyone else in her Cabinet. Even BOJO didn’t want to get his chubby paws on the toxic job before the Brexit deal was concluded; presumably he wanted to be able to blame the Maybot for anything in there that wasn’t to his liking.
Looking forward to rosier times
My belief is that once the Deal has ‘bedded in’, consumers can look forward to rosier times. In terms of residential property, the rot will be stemmed and sentiments will harden. An increased demand for property will soak up any over-supply.
Although the impenetrable wall of Stamp Duty will cast its omnipresent shadow over the market, it won’t diminish property buyers’ enthusiasm.
The sales and rental markets, which have taken such a beating in the past year, will recover their composure. Ergo, the number of deals done will proliferate between now and the end of the year, despite it being a seasonally torpid time for market activity.
So congrats to all those who kept the faith and believed that the UK government would break on through to the other side. As for those dismal creatures who lectured us about the ignominious fate of a no-deal Brexit – how wrong were you?
“We have our dream and our own task. We are with Europe but not of it. We are linked, but not combined. We are interested and associated, but not absorbed. If Britain must choose between Europe and the open sea, she must always choose the open sea.” Winston Churchill.