Introduction

Post 6.1 was written on the day the Prime Minister announced that he would hold a referendum on EU membership, and I think its concerns have come to pass. Post 6.2 outlines my concerns about how the media would handle the referendum, all of which came to pass.

The Leave campaign focused on the economy. For my own part I helped organise a letter from academic economists expressing similar economic concerns: as a later poll would confirm, economists were almost unanimous in thinking Brexit would reduce living standards. However the broadcast media, as I had feared they would, treated this view not as an expression of knowledge, but as just another opinion, always to be balanced by an opinion from the other side (Post 6.3). Post 6.4 argues that this failure to get across the overwhelming view of economists might be critical in deciding the result. Equally important, suggests Post 6.6, is the failure to get across economists’ equally universal view that immigration improves the public finances.

These failures were critical in part because most of the tabloid press was far from balanced. Indeed it seems fair to argue that the right-wing press had been running the Brexit campaign for years (Post 6.5). On the day after the vote I published Post 6.7, which remains the most widely read post I have ever written. Post 6.8 draws some lessons from what I regard as a disastrous decision. Of course I have continued to write about Brexit as the negotiations unfold, but until we know what Brexit actually means, if anything, it is difficult to know which of those posts will be of any lasting interest.

6.1

When National Interest and Party Advantage Conflict

Wednesday, 23 January 2013

I would not be the first to observe that there is a potential conflict between George Osborne’s role as Chancellor and his deep involvement in Conservative Party election strategy. The fact that this is often said does not mean it is real: it could just be a story told by those commentators who are themselves fixated by the battle between political parties. However there are two major areas where the Conservative part of the coalition government seems to be putting perceived election advantage ahead of prospects for the UK economy: immigration and Europe.