Bank of England Accidentally E-mails Top-Secret "Brexit" Plan To the Guardian

schwit1 writes: The first rule of "Project Bookend" is that you don't talk about "Project Bookend." In retrospect, maybe the first rule should have been "you don't accidentally e-mail 'Project Bookend' to a news agency," because as the Guardian reports, one of its editors opened his inbox and was surprised to find a message from the BOE's Head of Press Jeremy Harrison outlining the UK financial market equivalent of the Manhattan project. Project Bookend is a secret (or 'was' a secret) initiative undertaken by the BOE to study what the fallout might be from a potential 'Brexit', but if anyone asked what Sir Jon Cunliffe and a few senior staffers were up to, they were instructed to say that they were busy investigating "a broad range of European economic issues." And if you haven't heard the term before, "Brexit" refers to the possibility of Britain leaving the EU -- one of the possible outcomes of an upcoming referendum.

Comments

Re:Yes to Brexit

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Somebody has been attending UKP rallies, "...separate amicably..." that is has to be one of my favourite Nigel Farage quotes.

People have been talking about amicable separation from Europe since long before Farage had any significant influence in British politics.

In other words you want the UK to enjoy all the economic advantages of EU membership without any of the burdens and preferably outside the EU?

Yes. That's what we signed up for: economic and trade relations. Everything that has come after that has never been asked for or voted for here (or in many other EU member states, for that matter).

Why is this a problem? It worked fine for years, and good trade relations are mutually beneficial.

The Americans have a saying: "There is no such thing as free lunch".

So do a lot of other people. But the UK isn't asking for a free lunch. It's suggesting that if, say, Germany makes good bread and the UK farms good cows, they trade so everyone can enjoy a tasty burger-in-a-roll for lunch. Plenty of nations outside the EU have this kind of relationship with plenty of nations within the EU today. The UK has, and wants to develop, these kinds of relations with other global trading partners as well.

What motivation would the other EU nations have to give Britain all the economic advantages it used to enjoy once Britain leaves the EU without any of the perceived shortcomings such as political and economic integration?

The UK is a net importer with most of its major trading partners within the EU. Financially speaking, there is probably more benefit to those nations if they preserve good trade relations with the UK than the other way around, but both sides benefit greatly.