About-turn on Brexit

WAS it only last week when the boss of Goldman Sachs – the world’s most rapacious and amoral bank and a cheerleader for Project Fear – hinted at plans to shift European operations from London to Frankfurt because of Brexit?

What a very different note his economists struck yesterday, when they grudgingly acknowledged this country’s ‘resilient’ response to Brexit, suggesting that prospects in general look bright.

Nor is Goldman Sachs alone in seeing the light. Yesterday, UBS juddered into reverse over its plans to slash 1,000 City jobs, as its boss admitted relocations are looking ‘more and more unlikely’.

Other banks, too – including JP Morgan – have backpedalled on their threat to move jobs from London, whose status as the world’s leading financial centre looks increasingly assured.

Meanwhile, British Airways has issued a blunt rebuttal of Mr Hammond’s ludicrous claim that all flights in and out of Britain could be grounded the day after Brexit.

Confident of a deal, the airline points out 900million fliers a year benefit from Europe’s open skies. Brussels would be certifiably mad to put so much commerce at risk.

It may be too much to hope that those in the Remain camp will open their eyes to what’s happening on the Continent, where nationalism and separatism are tearing the EU apart (witness yesterday’s frightening scenes in Catalonia). But with business brimming with confidence in post-Brexit Britain, can’t they at least silence their bellyaching – and stop talking our country down?