Brexit is a failure: but, to remainers’ frustration, it’s not a spectacular one

Britain was not expelled from the European Union, although some of the dismay at the consequences of Brexit would make more sense in that scenario. Customs checks at the border are likened to a blockade. Rules that apply to all nonEU countries are described as punishment beatings. The expectation that Boris Johnson uphold the treaty he signed is cast as unreasonable spite.

This is all consistent with the sacred rule of English Euroscepticism, according to which “Europe” must always be understood in terms of things done to us by them; never things we do to ourselves.

The triumphalist phase, where Britain had mastered its own destiny, did not last long. Its peak was Johnson’s election victory. Its last hurrah came earlier this year, when ministers boasted that Covid vaccinations were the dividend of restored sovereignty (many EU states have since caught up). The rhetoric of taking back control is still in the air, especially when new trade deals are touted, but those are mostly fumes from an engine being revved in a stationary car.

Immovable facts of geography and economics are making Britain’s reliance on the rest of Europe impossible to ignore, and the Conservative party is slinking back to its happy place: selfrighteous victimhood, with Brussels as the forever enemy.

It is not all the way there yet. The economic picture is clouded by the pandemic, which disrupted flows of goods and people in ways that are not easy to disaggregate from Brexit. Ministers can explain labour shortages, broken supply chains and sparsely stocked supermarket shelves exclusively as ravages of Covid. Hauliers, logistics companies and exporters are quicker to cite bureaucracy at borders that were frictionless when Britain was part of the single market.

There is a margin where economists can haggle over the cost of Brexit, but none dispute that raising barriers to trade reduces trade. And the barriers are not yet fully erected. The regulatory pain is dulled by anaesthetic waivers and grace periods. Those expire in the coming months.

There are signs of reality penetrating government. Plans to impose a UK-only quality mark have been postponed by a year. Keeping the European CE certification would be more practical for manufacturers, and rejecting it deters investment.

But in Eurosceptic theology, recognising a Brussels standard would be an act of submission unworthy of a sovereign state. Since that is an article of faith for this government, these problems can only be deferred, never resolved. That pattern won’t change soon. It is also likely to deprive pro-Europeans of the vindication they crave. The syndrome is chronic, but the problems can usually be attributed to something else, or someone foreign. And there is a receptive audience for that interpretation. If poultry farmers argue