WPP boss Sir Martin Sorrell tells Government to get on with Brexit. Here’s why it won’t listen

The Government simply can’t afford to get Brexit wrong, and that’s why it is sitting on its hands

The advertising head has accused the government of drawing out the process (Reuters)

Sir Martin Sorrell, one of the many businessmen to vigorously campaign for Britain to remain in the EU, now wants the Government to hurry up and get on with Brexit.

The chief executive of advertising group WPP has complained that while businesses want “certainty and resolution” the Government just “wants to string it out”.

He is far from alone. The current impasse is, in many respects, the worst of all worlds for business leaders. It’s hard to make decisions about investment, strategy, hiring, firing and every thing else they have to about when they don’t have the faintest idea about how Britain will look after Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty has been triggered.

They don’t know what rules they will be operating under, what trade terms they will have to deal with, how best to operate in a UK plc potentially left outside of the world’s biggest market.

So their natural inclination is to sit on their hands and grind their teeth while venting their unhappiness in public and sending their lobbyists out to bang on ministers’ doors so they can do the same in private.

This is damaging, and not only to their businesses. It hurts the country and its economy. The UK was suffering from a dearth of investment long before a small majority of its citizens opted to shoot themselves and their countrymen in the foot.

The problem faced by Theresa May’s Government is that rushing things and getting it wrong could make a bad situation much, much worse. And they know it.

They put a binary question to the British public: In or Out. In would have kept things simple. The UK would have continued as an EU member under the terms negotiated by David Cameron. Out means, what? It isn’t all clear that even Out voters are agreed on that.

Some want to retain access to the European single market. But that means accepting lots of EU rules and making a contribution to the EU budget; what has come to be known as Brexit-lite.

Others have been puffing out their chests and calling for “real Brexit”. Among them are the hardcore UKIP-ers along with some of the crazies that backed Andrea Leadsom as Tory leader, despite her rather obvious deficiencies.

The trouble with “real Brexit” is that it means cutting off the country’s nose to spite its face. There will be no more passport rules allowing banks to sell serious across the EU. So bye bye City of London. Britain companies will have to trade under WTO rules, with all the tariffs and vexations that come with that. And so it goes.

There may yet emerge something in between these two options. What is patently obvious, however, is that all of them will be bad for Britain. Theresa May’s Government has a Hobson’s choice in front of it.

Those that voted "out" to register protests are probably the only ones who are happy right now.

Of course, there is the looming legal challenge to the referendum that might just throw another spanner into the works.

Hey, this is fun. No wonder ministers are sitting back in the hope that the disaster their party has plunged us into will somehow go away. It won’t.

Sir Martin has less reason to worry than most. WPP turned in a 12 per cent jump in first half revenues to £6.5bn with headline profits up 16 per cent to £690m. Both numbers were well ahead of analysts forecasts. As a global business with global operations WPP will manage whatever emerges from the mess.

Hundreds, even thousands of other businesses wish they could say the same. They’re just going to have to put up with twiddling their thumbs and sitting on the cash because the Government isn’t going to listen to Sir Martin’s urgings. It can’t afford to.