Four European countries reject ‘generous’ Brexit deal with UK, poll finds

Germany, France, Sweden and Finland think the UK should not receive any favours when negotiating a post-Brexit trade deal

Friday 08 July 2016 18:29 BST

Germans and the French were the most opposed to offering Britain a 'generous deal'

(AFP/Getty Images)

Voters in four European countries have said they do not think Britain should be given a generous deal when it attempts to renegotiate its ties with the European Union following the Brexit vote.

An opinion poll published on Friday, found the majority of voters in Germany, France, Sweden and Finland think the UK should not receive any favours when negotiating a post-Brexit trade deal.

Germans and the French were the most opposed to offering Britain a "generous deal" that pays tribute to Britain's role as a neighbour and "important trading partner", according to the YouGov survey.

In both countries, 53 per cent of respondents said it should not expect any favours, compared to 27 per cent who said the EU should offer Britain a "generous deal".

6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

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1/66 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

More expensive foreign holidays

The first practical effect of a vote to Leave is that the pound will be worth less abroad, meaning foreign holidays will cost us more

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6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

No immediate change in immigration status

The Prime Minister will have to address other immediate concerns. He is likely to reassure nationals of other EU countries living in the UK that their status is unchanged. That is what the Leave campaign has said, so, even after the Brexit negotiations are complete, those who are already in the UK would be allowed to stay

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6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

Higher inflation

A lower pound means that imports would become more expensive. This is likely to mean the return of inflation – a phenomenon with which many of us are unfamiliar because prices have been stable for so long, rising at no more than about 2 per cent a year. The effect may probably not be particularly noticeable in the first few months. At first price rises would be confined to imported goods – food and clothes being the most obvious – but inflation has a tendency to spread and to gain its own momentum

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6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

Interest rates might rise

The trouble with inflation is that the Bank of England has a legal obligation to keep it as close to 2 per cent a year as possible. If a fall in the pound threatens to push prices up faster than this, the Bank will raise interest rates. This acts against inflation in three ways. First, it makes the pound more attractive, because deposits in pounds will earn higher interest. Second, it reduces demand by putting up the cost of borrowing, and especially by taking larger mortgage payments out of the economy. Third, it makes it more expensive for businesses to borrow to expand output

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6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

Did somebody say recession?

Mr Carney, the Treasury and a range of international economists have warned about this. Many Leave voters appear not to have believed them, or to think that they are exaggerating small, long-term effects. But there is no doubt that the Leave vote is a negative shock to the economy. This is because it changes expectations about the economy’s future performance. Even though Britain is not actually be leaving the EU for at least two years, companies and investors will start to move money out of Britain, or to scale back plans for expansion, because they are less confident about what would happen after 2018

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6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

And we wouldn’t even get our money back

All this will be happening while the Prime Minister, whoever he or she is, is negotiating the terms of our future access to the EU single market. In the meantime, our trade with the EU would be unaffected, except that companies elsewhere in the EU may be less interested in buying from us or selling to us, expecting tariff barriers to go up in two years’ time. Whoever the Chancellor is, he or she may feel the need to bring in a new Budget

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Nearly half of voters in the two EU countries said they would support a free trade deal with Britain only if they agreed to continue to allow EU citizens to live and work in the country.

Opposition to the EU’s free movement of workers principle was one of the main messages of the Leave campaign, which was narrowly backed by voters in the referendum on 23 June.

Britain has yet to trigger Article 50 – initiating the formal two-year procedure for withdrawing from the EU. After resigning as Prime Minister, David Cameron said this will be a task for the next leader, who will not be in place until the Conservative leadership election has concluded.

There are now two candidates left in the Conservative party leadership contest – Home Secretary Theresa May and junior environment minister Andrea Leadsom - who will go forward in a vote of around 150,000 Conservative members to elect a new leader - and prime minister - on 9 September.

Home Secretary Theresa May and junior environment minister Andrea Leadsom

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Ms May supported Britain remaining in the EU, but now says she will accept the result. She has promised to get the “best possible” settlement for the UK, saying controlling EU immigration must be a part of the Brexit deal, but single market access is a “priority”.

Ms Leadsom campaigned for Leave and appeared in a television debate at Wembley Arena in support of quitting the EU. She has said “freedom of movement will end” – and that she’ll propose some kind of “third way” to retain EU free trade.

Of the five continental countries covered in YouGov’s poll, only voters in Denmark favoured offering Britain a "generous" EU deal.

YouGov interviewed 2,045 people in Germany, 1,008 people in France and around 1,000 people in Sweden, Finland and Denmark between 30 June and 5 July.

Additional reporting by Reuters

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