Brexit has cost every UK household £250 in food bills, experts claim — Inflation for what Britons consume would have been nearly a third lower had the UK stayed in the EU, study finds

27 comments

  1. From the linked summary^1 of a discussion paper:^2

    >Brexit red tape has cost each household £250 in higher food bills alone since the UK left the EU, according to new research.

    >The analysis suggests that food price rises would have been 8 percentage points lower – nearly a third – without Brexit, at 17 per cent, rather than the actual rise of almost 25 per cent.

    >The overall extra cost of Brexit red tape to UK households is £6.95 billion, according to the experts at the Centre for Economic Performance at the London School of Economics, who looked at the effect of trade barriers on food prices.

    >The price rises of products more exposed to Brexit are not linked to other factors such as Covid lockdowns or Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

    >Non-tariff barriers in force since Brexit include customs checks, rules-of-origin requirements and health paperwork for animals and plants.

    > 

    >“The fact that the results are driven entirely by products with high non-tariff barriers imported from the EU offers strong evidence that Brexit is the driving force behind these effects,” the researchers say.

    >Annual food price inflation in the UK is near historic highs, with some basic goods rising by up to 46 per cent in a year, official figures show, exacerbating the cost-of-living crisis.

    >Latest figures from the Office for National Statistics show food CPI inflation at 19.3 per cent – down only slightly on March’s 19.6 per cent – and consumers continue to face budget-breaking price rises on basics such as olive oil, up 49 per cent on a year ago, and baked beans up 39 per cent.

    >Brexit has cost the UK £33bn in lost trade and investment, according to a new study by the Centre for European Reform, which found that the economic damage is even worse than previously feared.

    ^1 Jane Dalton (25 May 2023), “Brexit has cost every UK household £250 in food bills, experts claim”, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-news-food-bills-uk-b2345465.html

    ^2 Jan David Bakker, Nikhil Datta, Richard Davies, and Josh De Lyon (2023), *Brexit and consumer food prices: May 2023 update*, CEP Brexit Analysis No. 18, London, https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/brexit18.pdf

  3. In my budget i was always save moving £400 a month to my “food” account last month i put 650 in and its still gone into overdraft so a touch more for me

  6. It pisses me off no end that my right to live and work in the EU has been taken away, and my countries economy is worse, based on a referendum built on lies and Russian interference.

  7. A: Nobody could have predicted this.

    B: Experts did predict this.

    A: What do experts know? We don’t like experts. They shouldn’t tell us what we can’t do.

  10. Look, we’ve all had enough of these experts, with their expertise. Our bills would be much lower if we just believed in Britain a bit more.

    /s

  12. It’s the gift that keeps on giving.

    And yet there are still fools out there who will insist it was the right thing to do despite literally NONE of the results promised to get people to vote for it being delivered.

    Biggest con in the history of our country.

  13. In terms of sovereignty, many people thought we were taking back control.

    My analogy is that we went from being a senior partner (of the EU) to being an employee.

    They are our biggest trading partner and much bigger than us so, in effect, we have to do as we are told. Unless of course we want to decrease our wealth much more than we already have.

  15. It’s a pity covid happened around the same time in terms of aftermath so it’s difficult to hold Brexit solely to account for this. Such a convenient excuse for pro Brexiteers who will never concede the argument.

  16. I’m American but even I knew voting leave was going to be disastrous. I was rooting for you all to remain in the EU.

  19. While I don’t deny the impact, how does one decouple the impact of Brexit alone on inflation from the impact of government’s COVID response?

    I’m struggling to see how you can do this to conclusively make this claim.

  20. In total? Before Brexit I was typically spending £70-ish per week on groceries, and now I’m lucky to get the week’s shop in below £100. I’m losing £250 every 2 months.

  23. Brexit start to finish has been a complete failure. We are now in wild frontier mode as the rich take advantage of complete freedom to bleed us dry and wreck everyone.

    ​

    You voted for this shit.

  24. The increase in the cost of basically everything has meant that, to survive, my parents have had to systematically go through their house for things to sell. They voted for Brexit and still stand by their decision.

    They rant about it regularly, but if I ever reply with actual facts, suddenly politics shouldn’t be brought up in a family. 🙄

  25. It’s all bs, it’s to make us believe we have a choice…. England is being destroyed, plain and simple. Those who choose not to see it are part of the problem

  26. Im interested in why it would have been 30% lower. I live in Ireland, that is part of the EU and we have had insane inflation. Germany has just entered an official recession as well. I know brexit was a cluster fuck but it seems like every country has had huge inflation

  27. If this is true, how comes EU countries are experiencing extremely bad inflation e.g. Germany? I’m genuinely asking as a laymen btw, not trying to imply anything

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