Sir Bernard Jenkin

Sir Bernard Jenkin

Conservative — Harwich and North Essex

Speaking in the House of Commons on 22 May 2025

Debate

EU-UK Summit

Contribution

We were told by the Office for Budget Responsibility that there might be a 4% reduction in what our GDP would otherwise have been. That has not occurred—the OBR was wrong. Our economy has continued to grow at roughly the same rate as the other EU economies. Of course, there have been adjustments because the economy has a different trading relationship with the EU. We now have a very deep and comprehensive trading relationship with the EU, as opposed to being in the single market, but there are swings and roundabouts. There have been gains in other areas. The other big advantage is that our contribution to the European Union, which used to be very substantial, pushing up to £20 billion a year, is now right down, which is a huge advantage. Given all the exaggeration about how bad Brexit was going to be and how bad Brexit is, how seriously should we take what the Government are now saying about the huge benefits of this so-called reset?

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