Research

Spain's constitutional crisis raises concerns over polarization

Camino Mortera-Martinez
22 December 2022
Voice of America
Camino Mortera, of the Centre for European Reform, a research institution, said the Spanish government’s attempts to interfere in the composition of the judiciary had worrying overtones of events in Poland and Hungary.Warsaw and Budapest have muzzled the independent judiciary in moves which have concerned the European Commission and civil rights groups.“Given what is happening with Poland and Hungary, just a mere suspicion that a government is trying to intervene in any way in the composition of a court through emergency legislation raises suspicions,” she told VOA.

Rocks and hard places

22 December 2022
Politico London Playbook
With organizations like the Centre for European Reform painting stark pictures about the GDP hit from Brexit (5.5 percent, according to John Springford) the red flashing lights don’t appear on the verge of dimming. And that means the debate about whether Brexit was such a good idea will continue to rage, while public sentiment gurgles beneath the surface.

Le Brexit aurait déjà coûté 37 milliards d’euros au PIB britannique

21 December 2022
Liberation
D’après une estimation du Centre for European Reform, le Royaume-Uni aurait aujourd’hui un PIB 5,5 % supérieur à celui actuel si le pays n’avait pas quitté l’Union européenne.

Britain's GDP hammered by Brexit, analysts find

21 December 2022
The National
Brexit has cost Britain 5.5 per cent of its national GDP, estimates published on Wednesday indicated.Since the country left the EU, investment was down 11 per cent and goods trade 7 per cent lower, but services trade, for the first time, showed no change, analysis from the Centre for European Reform found.

The Tories and Labour are saying one thing on Brexit and doing another

21 December 2022
The Independent
So now we know. Brexit is proving even worse for the UK economy than the official forecast of a 4 per cent hit to GDP over 15 years. It’s already reached 5.5 per cent, according to a study by the Centre for European Reform (CER) think-tank....The CER calculates that Brexit is costing the government £40bn a year in lost revenue, which on ministers’ own figures would allow them to give all public sector workers an inflation-linked pay rise instead of a real-terms cut and still have £12bn to spare. The think tank also cites a very clear Brexit effect on business investment, which hits productivity and therefore the politicians’ holy grail of growth.

This is how much experts think Brexit has cost the UK government so far

21 December 2022
Huffpost
John Springford, deputy director for the Centre for European Reform (CER) has used a modelling system from 2018 to look at the difference between the current UK economy outside of the EU compares to a UK which may have stayed in the bloc.He believes the economy is now 5.5% smaller than it would have been if the UK had remained part of the EU.This means the UK’s economic output was £33 billion less than if we had stayed in the EU between April and June alone.

Brexit has left the UK economy 5.5% smaller, researcher says

21 December 2022
Bloomberg
The Centre for European Reform said that slower growth is also weighing on the Treasury’s revenue and that the tax increases announced in the autumn fiscal statement wouldn’t be necessary if the UK were still in the European Union’s common market.

Brexit reduced UK economy by 5.5% and led to tax rises

21 December 2022
The Irish Examiner
Brexit has left the UK economy 5.5% smaller than it would have been and added to the squeeze on public services that’s behind strikes crippling the railways and National Health Service, a prominent research group concluded.The Centre for European Reform said that slower growth is also weighing on the UK Treasury’s revenue and that the tax increases announced in the autumn fiscal statement wouldn’t be necessary if the UK were still in the European Union’s common market.

Britain's GDP now 5.5% smaller than it would have been without Brexit, think-tank claims

21 December 2022
The Guardian
Britain’s GDP was 5.5% smaller by the second quarter of this year than it would have been without Brexit, a think-tank claims.In his analysis for the Centre for European Reform, John Springford also says that almost all the tax increases announced by Rishi Sunak when he was chancellor in March would not have been needed if the UK had enjoyed the extra tax revenue it would have got from higher growth if it had stayed in the EU.

NHK News 7: Gas prices

21 December 2022
"So houses that were already more vulnerable to energy poverty to begin with are now going to be suffering even more. And I think for this reason, it is important to make sure that policies that aim at helping out consumers start out by targeting those that are in the most vulnerable positions", said Elisabetta Cornago, a senior research fellow at the Centre for European Reform.

If trade is a Cinderella indicator, the UK has stopped coming to the ball

21 December 2022
The Times
The Centre for European Reform’s latest assessment, to be published shortly, which compares the UK’s performance with a “doppelganger” UK of similar countries but unaffected by Brexit, is expected to report significant negative effects on both exports and business investment.

ITV News: Brexit costs government £40 billion a year in lost tax revenue

20 December 2022
The difference in performance between his “doppelgänger UK economy” and the real thing is stark. Mr Springford’s latest update estimates that Brexit reduced Britain’s GDP by 5.5% by the second quarter of 2022.

‘Worse than feared’: Brexit to blame for £33bn loss to UK economy, study shows

20 December 2022
The Independent
Research by the Centre for European Reform (CER), shared with The Independent, shows that Britain’s economy is 5.5 per cent smaller than it would have been if the country had remained inside the EU.The UK’s goods trade is 7 per cent lower and investment is 11 per cent lower than it would have been had the Remain campaign won the 2016 Brexit referendum, according to the think-tank’s analysis.

En wéér is de eurozone niet voorbereid op een crisis

Sander Tordoir, Jasper van Dijk
20 December 2022
Het Financieele Dagblad
De crisisbestendigheid van de eurozone wordt keer op keer op de proef gesteld. Dit brengt ook risico's voor de Nederlandse economie met zich mee.

Emprunts records pour Berlin en 2023 grâce à des tours de passe-passe sur la règle du frein à l’endettement

16 December 2022
Le Figaro
“Le gouvernement prétend faire une choise et en faire une autre grâce à une comptabilité créative” commente Sander Tordoir, économiste au Centre for European Reform a Berlin.

CER podcast: The implications of Russia's war against Ukraine

15 December 2022
In this year’s final episode of the CER podcast, our researchers unpack the most significant event of the past year, Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Feel free to talk to China about Ukraine, but don't expect miracles

15 December 2022
Encompass
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and President of the European Council Charles Michel have both taken the long flight to Beijing to meet Xi Jinping recently.

Respect de l’Etat de droit : l’UE divisée face au cas Orban

13 December 2022
Alternatives Economiques
« Les difficultés rencontrées par l’économie hongroise ne sont pas fondamentalement différentes de celles que connaissent ses homologues européens, mais elles sont fortement exacerbées par Orban », analyse Sander Tordoir, économiste du cercle de réflexion Centre for European Reform.

Europe may not find energy efficiency sexy — but it’s crucial

13 December 2022
Financial Times
EU leaders are right to try to protect consumers and keep business costs down, yet they have to do more.

Na druk van EU bindt Polen in, maar Orbán zoekt de confrontatie

Camino Mortera-Martinez
11 December 2022
NRC
„Na jaren van passief toekijken is in Brussel eindelijk een manier gevonden om met dwarse regeringen om te gaan”, zegt juriste Camino Mortera van de denktank Centre for European Reform. „Wat niet lukte met inbreukprocedures via het Europees Hof en de ‘nucleaire optie’ van Artikel 7, gebeurt nu alsnog via de Europese begroting.”