[Catfish]

"The hard reality of Brexit is hitting Britain. It's costing everyone but Boris Johnson"

" [...] While food shortages have been common in many countries over the course of the pandemic, Brown believes that one issue unique to the UK is making life extra painful: Brexit.

[...]
First, a lack of truck drivers, who take fresh items like cauliflowers to and from freezing facilities, meant that the ESG cooperative at one stage had to throw away a week's worth of production, at an estimated cost of £1 million ($1.4 million).
Second, Brown says that many of the seasonal workers, who would come from countries like Romania and Bulgaria for a few months to harvest vegetables, are now in short supply.

It seems that the consequences of Brexit are finally being felt up and down the UK. And far from the sunlit uplands promised by members of Prime Minister Boris Johnson's government, a shortage of European workers in these vital areas means financial losses for businesses and empty shelves as the UK hurtles towards Christmas.

[...]
The current driver shortage is estimated to be between 90,000 to 120,000, according to a spokesperson for Logistics UK. While Brexit is not entirely to blame, the fact that the UK no longer has easy access to European drivers has created a headache for the industry.

The government, critics say, failed to adequately prepare for the inevitable consequences of Brexit and mitigate its initial impact.

Despite this, Brexit's fallout is not being used by Johnson's political opponents, who are instead whacking him over domestic issues. But why?

"The problem with these sorts of stories is they happen incrementally," says Rob Ford, professor of politics at the University of Manchester.

"One of the very tragic things about these stories is that in order for the public to really pay attention to them, something really dramatic has to happen. Unfortunately, that might be an overworked lorry driver crashing into a family car or children falling ill through malnourishment."

Until that point, Johnson can largely deflect the blame for these problems onto the pandemic. Ford notes this goes down well with his base of "Leave" voters, many of whom are sick of being told that Brexit was a disaster, and often willing to believe other explanations.

But Brexit really is starting to bite. It was never going to be the case that the UK would immediately fall apart. But little by little, many of the assurances made in 2016 and during years of negotiations are cracking."

https://edition.cnn.com/2021/09/12/b...cmd/index.html



"Britain no longer in top 10 for trade with Germany as Brexit bites"

"A December 2020 survey of Germany's BGA trade association showed one in five companies were reorganizing supply chains to swap out British suppliers for others in the EU.
That trend was becoming more marked, though British businesses were even worse off, said Michael Schmidt, President of the British Chamber of Commerce in Germany, making any turnaround before the end of this year unlikely.

"More and more small and medium-sized companies are ceasing to trade (in Britain) because of these (Brexit-related) hurdles," Schmidt told Reuters.
The sharp first-half decline was also driven by pull-forward effects before the new hurdles, such as customs controls, kicked in in January."


"For many small British firms, Brexit meant losing access to their most important export market... It's like shooting yourself in the foot. And this explains why German imports from Britain are in free-fall now."
He voiced hope that some of the decline might be temporary. "Companies are normally always in a good position to adapt quickly – but this needs time."


https://www.reuters.com/world/europe...es-2021-09-08/