Boris Johnson’s post-Brexit plan for Britain remains a puzzle

Brexit has long been billed by some of its supporters as a way to unleash new dynamism in Britain by giving up bureaucracy in Brussels to create a low-tax, “Singapore-on-Thames” bureaucracy. reduced – a phrase coined by a former head of the British Treasury, Philip Hammond – the sale of its goods and services worldwide.

But Mr Johnson is not a free market conservative in the form of Margaret Thatcher. He has so far promised the British more regulations, no less, with ambitious plans to raise the minimum wage and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. He promised more and less state spending to “raise the bar” of an economy he says is too dependent on London and the south of England.

Such policies have allowed him to win big in last year’s elections in traditional districts hostile to conservative government, while his persevering pursuit of Brexit has alienated many of his party’s traditional allies in corporate council chambers. All these tensions present a puzzle: If Mr Johnson does not want another Thatcher-style economic revolution, what does he want to do with Britain’s freedom from Brussels?

His first task is to deal with what could prove to be another difficult year. Disruption of new trade agreements with Britain’s largest export market risks hampering the economic recovery from the pandemic.

A 2019 election commitment to revive the lagging regions seems more complicated now that the virus has made a hole in the UK’s public finances.

The pandemic itself is not over: the country is heading into the new year, with a new variant of coronavirus on free and growing infections, which will bring an inevitable number of deaths. Even with a vaccination program underway, it will be months before Covid-19 is under sufficient control to lift economic restrictions, resistance to which it is likely to continue from the stable sections of its own party. Meanwhile, Scottish nationalists are eager for a new blow to independence.

However, although Brexit is over, Mr Johnson’s long-term vision for Britain is unclear, political observers say. “He had opportunities to articulate some kind of grand plan, but I don’t think he has one and I don’t think he feels he needs one,” said Simon Usherwood, a professor of politics at the University of Surrey.

The EU’s fear that Mr Johnson will try to create a low-tax, low-regulation economy has guided the bloc’s tough approach in the Brexit negotiations. The concern was that the UK would become a low-cost competitor to the EU door, able to undermine European companies because its standards were lower. The EU’s response was to build a trade agreement under which, if Britain were to drop its standards – say by amending the law to allow factories to pollute more – it would lose duty-free access to the bloc.

Mr Johnson sought in the negotiations to maximize the UK’s freedom to regulate the bloc. But in important areas of policy, its plans reflect or magnify those of the EU, rather than undermining them.

His big election victory in 2019 was on a manifesto that included promises to raise the minimum wage and reduce corporate tax avoidance. In its policy announcements on the environment and climate change, the United Kingdom has set ambitious targets that go beyond EU commitments. Meanwhile, the Bank of England has said it will not ease capital requirements and other banking regulations.

Mr Johnson, who was the main public face of the Brexit movement, welcomed Britain’s departure from the EU as a recovery of sovereignty. In his speeches, he trumpeted traditional conservative priorities, such as low taxes and deregulation, tougher policing and stricter immigration rules.

But he also spoke in favor of traditional center-left goals, such as lavish investment in infrastructure and state support for industry, including greater protection against foreign takeovers, marking a break from free market orthodoxy that ruling conservatives they supported it from Mrs. Thatcher’s prime minister. He is in favor of strict environmental rules and has banned the export of live animals for slaughter.

It is not clear which strain of political thought will dominate the rest of his time in office.

“Our plan to rebuild this country will not be scrapped,” Mr Johnson said at this year’s Conservative Party conference, committing more investment to health care, policing and education. But in the same speech, he warned that the state cannot act as “sugar uncle” forever.

The mixed political messages mean that his vision of how Britain will deviate from the EU after Brexit is blurred. The departure in November of Dominic Cummings, Mr Johnson’s chief adviser and one of the brains behind the Brexit referendum, adds to this uncertainty.

From Mr Johnson’s entourage, Mr Cummings presented the most detailed vision for post-Brexit Britain. He wrote extensively on how the UK could, without the constraints of EU regulations, be better able to manage issues such as climate change, immigration change, urbanization and the use of high technology.

The vision envisioned a new state that could move quickly to change regulations and thus strengthen investment and innovation. He argued that the UK would maintain its economic competitiveness by becoming a leading center for cutting-edge scientific research and industries such as artificial intelligence and green technology.

Becoming the first Western country to approve Pfizer Inc.

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The vaccine against Covid-19, Great Britain, made a demonstration signaled by the type of regulatory agility that Mr. Johnson and Mr. Cummings provide.

Aside from Brexit, Johnson’s electoral commitment was to revitalize the former industrial regions of the United Kingdom, left behind, with lavish taxpayer-funded investments in schools, hospitals and infrastructure. Rishi Sunak, head of Mr Johnson’s treasury, called for “free ports”, low-cost production areas that skeptics say encourages tax avoidance, as places for multinational companies to set up factories and create new jobs.

Internationally, the vision for post-Brexit Britain is better defined. Mr Johnson spoke of Britain becoming a global advocate for free trade, human rights and the fight against climate change, stressing London’s aspirations to act as a global remedial tool, putting its weight on forums such as the Seven and the United Nations. It has already increased military spending and officials say, for example, that it will use its financial influence to develop sanctions to punish human rights abuses.

A central goal of Brexit was to give the UK the ability to enter into EU-independent trade. Officials say the UK outside the EU can negotiate agreements with countries that are better suited to the British service-oriented economy.

To date, the new agreements in the UK with countries such as Japan and Mexico have largely replicated those already in place with the EU. A key target is the United States

Mr Johnson’s office was relieved when the prime minister was among the first European leaders to receive a call from President-elect Joe Biden after spending years courting Donald Trump. But the president-elect said he was in no hurry to offer a trade deal to anyone, given pressing domestic priorities.

Write to Jason Douglas at [email protected] and Max Colchester at [email protected]