'Agrifood has been hit hardest and the smaller the business the greater the impact of red tape, forcing many to decide business with the EU is no longer worth pursuing'

Sometimes when your brain is in neutral you speculate about what exam questions might surface in ten years time for those studying politics or economics.

A good example would be whether Brexit was the breaking or making of UK agriculture – an opportunity seized or an opportunity wasted. Further out might be whether the Labour party in government grabbed or funked the R word over the EU.

The R word being rejoin, or at least to put the UK in a position, via better relations with Brussels and member states, where that might be possible via a future referendum.

Borth are star-gazing questions. Brexit has not broken UK agriculture, but it has not done anything to improve it. On a strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) analysis the negatives outweigh any positives.

What is clear to all now is that the promises from Brexit supporters in 2016 were at best hopelessly optimistic and at worst lies on a par with the millions promised for the health service on the side of the Boris Johnson battle bus.

That essay question answer for future students will have to include a debate around whether Covid, hyper-inflation and global conflicts blew any possible gains off course. In reality they were never there to be had, as the government then and now remained committed to the same green policies and bureaucracy the industry lived with in the EU.

The difference now is that funding is less certain and the UK is not having the debate happening in the EU about how to make the CAP more farmer friendly and less bureaucratic, with better risk management tools built into it.

Agriculture is not alone in lacking a Brexit dividend, but it has lost more than others from limits on market opportunities and the cost and frustration of red tape. A report from the Aston Business School this week showed that exports to the EU since Brexit are down by 27% and imports by 32%.

Agrifood, along with textiles, has been hit hardest and the smaller the business the greater the impact of red tape, forcing many to decide business with the EU is no longer worth pursuing.

This is not just down to the red tape Brexit forced onto the industry, but to external factors that have made all trade more difficult and costly. The loss of EU markets has not been offset by sales to markets outside Europe. This is particularly true for food, since like the EU the UK is a high standards, high cost producer not suited to commodity sales into lower value markets.

A big contrast with the present government to the Conservatives is that it no longer defends Brexit and has accepted this and other reports are cause for concern. It has asked businesses to list what could be done to improve the situation as part of 'small R' discussions with the EU – the reset of the damaged relationship, rather than the bigger political debate around rejoining the EU or even entering the European Economic Area with its free trading relationship with the EU.

A reset is coming and hopefully it will tackle the fundamental mistakes of the Brexit negotiations. The government is talking about a new deal on food and agriculture around mutual recognition of standards. This should be easy, given that UK standards are the same now as they were as an EU member state.

The bigger R – rejoining – is a long way down the road. The government is terrified of even discussing this, having won back its Red Wall pro-Brexit seats. It is also committed for the term of this parliament to stick by the Brexit deal. However with a massive majority and an appetite for change to distance itself from what went before, there is no reason not to have a mature debate about how rejoining might look, and whether there is a future case for a referendum based on honesty rather than rhetoric and personal ambition.

Part of that would be a recognition that the EU we would be rejoining would be a very different, less politically settled bloc than the one we left.

Brussels officials now admit privately that in this turmoil they miss the steadying diplomatic presence of the UK far beyond trade issues - and regret now they did so little for David Cameron in 2016 to strengthen his hand before the vote.