Exiting EU with no deal will be ‘catastrophic’, says Airbus chief

‘Difficult decisions will have to be made... We will have to look at future investment’

AIRBUS said yesterday it would have to make “difficult decisions” about investment if Britain crashes out of the EU without a deal, adding it had already spent tens of millions of euro in preparations.

“There is no such thing as a managed ‘no deal’, it’s absolutely catastrophic for us,” senior vice president Katherine Bennett told the BBC’s Andrew Marr.

“Some difficult decisions will have to made if there’s no deal (...) we will have to look at future investments.”

She said Airbus had already spent “tens of millions” on preparing for Brexit, for example on stockpiling parts and securing IT systems.

Chief executive Tom Enders stoked the ire of hard line Brexiteers with a stark warning three weeks ago.

“Please don’t listen to the Brexiteers’ madness, which asserts that because we have huge plants here we will not move and we will always be here. They are wrong,” Mr Enders said in a video which was criticised for “bullying” Britain by some Conservative MPs.