The lack of ‘Brexit opportunities’ has been laid bare – good job Jacob Rees-Mogg is on the case

German figures show UK exports to the country slumped last year just a day after Rees-Mogg’s appointment as Brexit opportunities minister, says James Moore

Brexit opportunities: lorries queueing on the A20 to enter the port of Dover in Kent (PA Archive)

His premiership may have turned into what the Americans describe as a dumpster fire – and an increasingly sinister one at that – but at least Boris Johnson hasn’t lost his flair for comedy.

His appointment of Jacob Rees-Mogg to the post of “Brexit opportunities minister” is his best joke for some time. He might just as well have named his follow old Etonian minister for pink elephants, or secretary of state for sea serpents, yetis and the Loch Ness monster.

OK, maybe not the last of those. Rees-Mogg goes down like a cup of cold sick north of the border. Nessie might spontaneously pop into existence and chase him and his aides south of Hadrian’s Wall were he to venture into its supposed stomping ground.

But the creature is otherwise no less mythical than the “Brexit opportunities” Rees-Mogg is supposed to deliver.

The joke just got better, or worse, as the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee revealed the stark reality of Johnson’s project, and the body blows it is delivering to British companies and the British economy, in a report published just hours after the appointment was made.

The cross-party committee said border checks in place since the beginning of the year have burdened businesses with increased costs and suppressed trade with the EU, which, remember, remains our most important trading partner.

And, well, duh. If you withdraw from the world’s biggest free trade zone and replace it with a heavyweight burden of red tape – it’s naturally going to have an impact.

I don’t want to knock the work of the worthy members of the committee, which generally does fine work and has produced a worthwhile report. But it is also making a statement of the bleedin’ obvious.

The committee wants the government to work on the issue with the EU, and it should do so. Trouble is, it prefers to keep relations in the deep freeze for political purposes. Rees-Mogg, a minister with a reputation more for rudeness than for diplomacy, isn’t going to help much there.

Further evidence for the problems the government has created for British businesses, and the opportunities it has denied – rather than created for them – came courtesy of figures released by the German Federal Statistical Office. They showed imports from the UK into Germany tumbled by 8.5 per cent to €32.1bn (£27bn) during 2021. They cover the first year since Johnson’s post-Brexit trade and (lack of) co-operation deal was agreed in late December 2020.

The contrast with other countries is stark. Total goods imported into the continent’s economic powerhouse jumped by 17.1 per cent across the board during the same year, to €1.202bn in total.

As might be expected during a year of economic recovery driven by the easing of lockdown restrictions and vaccine rollouts, that included a 16.8 per cent rise in imports from other EU members. However, the figures also showed a 20.8 per cent rise in imports from China.

What of the “opportunities” that were supposed to offset, and overcome, such crippling injuries? There has been scant sign of them beyond a couple of lousy looking trade deals with countries like New Zealand and Australia, which look set to benefit them but are of questionable value to the UK at best. Some analyses have suggested the New Zealand deal will do more harm than good

The government has fallen back on promising the hardy perennial of “cutting red tape” as part of its “red meat” designed to prop up Johnson’s shaky position in Downing Street. But the real red tape comes from its own deal. The costs, in terms of lost trade with Germany alone, far outweigh any mythical benefits that might be realised in some dim and distant future.

Another statement of the bleedin’ obvious? Pretty much.

But figures like the ones from Germany, and reports like the committee’s, nonetheless demand a spotlight. They cut through the fog of government gaslighting on the subject.

We are told Johnson wanted Rees-Mogg to have an economic brief. Unless that means simply being economical with the truth – and past form suggests that’s what Johnson thinks is the main part of his own job – then he’s going to fall flat on his face.

The success of Jackass Forever has demonstrated the continuing power of slapstick on the silver screen so I suppose that’s going to be good for another laugh. Trouble is, Brexit is really no laughing matter when it comes to Britain’s future prospects.