Brexit: Who’ll want to do a deal with UK after this?

Ministers have undermined Britain’s hard-earned reputation abroad by riding roughshod over conventions and the law.

Britain is still seeking a breakthrough as the Brexit deadline looms. Picture: AFP

There was always going to be an element of performance in the final stages of the Brexit talks. This is the political equivalent of professional wrestling, with both sides flexing their muscles to prove to different audiences how tough they are. It is to some extent a show fight – like Big Daddy and Giant Haystacks stepping into the ring for a carefully choreographed series of body slams and drop kicks in which the sense of conflict is deliberately exaggerated for effect. Boris Johnson’s high stakes last-minute dash to Brussels is all part of the production. But in wrestling, the outline of the fight is agreed in advance by both opponents. On Brexit there has been no co-ordination between the two sides so the danger is greater that someone will get hurt. “It’s definitely not all show,” says one close observer.

Whether or not there is a free trade deal, Britain has already been harmed by this bruising process. “We are walking away from certainty, status and allies straight into the unknown,” says one Tory peer. “And at the worst possible time.” The end of the transition period on December 31 should have ushered in a glorious new era in international relations but if “global Britain” has been auditioning for a leading role on the world stage the performance has not gone down well. At a time when the country needs to build new alliances, the damage done to Britain’s reputation since 2016 is enormous.

Lord Ricketts, former permanent secretary of the Foreign Office, keeps in touch with many ambassadors from around the world. Most of them are, he says, baffled by the British government’s chaotic and inconsistent approach since the EU referendum. “They say ‘What’s going on in your country? You seem to have lost your way. What has happened to the Britain we knew?’,” he told me. “We always had a reputation as a country that was pragmatic, hard-headed and full of common sense. We were seen as good negotiators who knew what we wanted. That’s been badly damaged if not destroyed by what looks from abroad like a long period of indecision and trying to pursue completely incompatible objectives.”

This was supposed to be the “easiest trade deal in history” that would deliver the “exact same benefits” as membership of the EU. But the Vote Leave mythology is about to hit reality and the trade-offs are going to have to be confronted. Far from being the last big negotiation that Britain is going to have to do, this is just the first of many – and other nations with which we want trade deals will have been watching and learning from our mistakes over the past four years.

Mr Johnson may think he looks strong when he plays hard ball with the EU but to many around the world he appears weak; a prime minister who is being pushed around by his backbenchers rather than leading from the front. According to Lord Ricketts: “It’s been pretty clear to observers abroad that this has been largely a psychodrama about the Conservative Party and its internal obsession with the EU. There’s a feeling that the government is in hock to a smallish group who are the hardest end of that spectrum and are prepared to ride roughshod over the usual parliamentary conventions.”

Instead of playing to Britain’s strengths – reliability, stability, respect for the rule of law – Mr Johnson has undermined the qualities that are most admired around the world. The prime minister threatened to break international law and tear up an agreement that he struck with the EU only a year ago, putting at risk the fragile peace in Northern Ireland. That will surely worry others who are considering entering into a free trade deal with Britain.

British institutions that are respected across the globe, such as parliament and the judiciary, have been trashed by the revolutionaries in No 10. The government even appears prepared to sacrifice the Union in the pursuit of ideological purity. The Department for International Development has been scrapped, and the aid budget, which has done so much to boost Britain’s “soft power” abroad, cut. To potential allies around the world, Britain under Mr Johnson seems untrustworthy, petty, confused and inward-looking. In US diplomatic circles, it is referred to disparagingly as the “Isle of White”.

Underlying everything is a misplaced belief in British exceptionalism. On Brexit, Mr Johnson has continued to insist that he can have his cake and eat it, refusing to accept that there is a balance to be struck between sovereignty and market access, as if this country alone can defy the laws of diplomatic gravity. In tackling the pandemic, the prime minister promised to create a “world-beating” test and trace system. Then, when the death rate soared to one of the highest in Europe, he blamed it on the unique qualities of this “great and freedom-loving country” as if no other nation values liberty as much. This sense of national superiority culminated in the claim by Gavin Williamson, the education secretary, that Britain had been first to roll out the Covid vaccine because “we’re a much better country” than France, Belgium or the US. This from the man who presided over the failure to keep state schools open and the U-turn on GCSE and A-level results.

“We have gone from punching above our weight to bragging above our weight,” says a former cabinet minister. “Serious people around the world don’t like braggarts. I get the feeling people are sad for Britain, not angry. They know there are wondrous institutions and people – many want their kids to go to university in the UK – but they view our politicians as lower grade hucksters. Everyone knows Covid has been handled badly; they see Boris Johnson as cut from the Trump cloth but without the power, they think Brexit is being done without a clue. All of them think Britain is in trouble and don’t see where the renewal is coming from.” As for Joe Biden’s incoming White House team, “they all think Johnson behaves like a cad”.

This year has revealed amazing things about this country: from the scientists who created a Covid-19 vaccine to the NHS that treated the sick and the businesses that adapted to lockdown rules. There has been a reinvigorated community spirit but that has not been reflected in the man who represents the nation abroad. “Boris Johnson has not established a reputation as a serious heavyweight player,” says Lord Ricketts. “Britain has been so absent from global diplomacy and obsessed with its own politics.” People voted to take back control but it is still not clear what they, or the prime minister, meant by that.

The Times