Back in 2016 when the UK voted to leave the European Union, a similar disaffection for Brussels was detectable in France.
A survey by the Pew Research Center in Washington, conducted in June 2016, the same month as the UK referendum, found that 61 per cent of French people held unfavourable views of the EU, markedly higher than among Britons (48 per cent).
The French anti-EU movement was spearheaded by National Rally leader Marine Le Pen, who, in the wake of the UK vote, commended “the courage of the British people who didn’t allow themselves to be intimidated by the threats, blackmail, and lies of the European elites”.
She described Brexit as “the most important moment since the fall of the Berlin Wall”, and launched her presidential campaign later that year, promising a similar in-out vote on French membership if elected. In one interview she referred to herself as “Madame Frexit”.
Euroscepticism had mushroomed in the wake of the EU’s botched handling of the financial crisis and amid a surge in migration. Brexit had triggered what some called a “secessionist contagion”.
Dutch far-right leader Geert Wilders agitated for a vote on Nexit. There was talk of Swexit. Support for an “Italeave” swelled. “Thank you UK, now it’s our turn,” the leader of Italy’s ascendant far right Matteo Salvini said.
The “burn the bondholders” movement in Ireland had a distinctly anti-EU flavour but support for a full-blown Irexit never gained traction here.
Euroscepticism across the Continent was, however, raging, and if France, one of the founder nations, had followed the UK it would have been cataclysmic, potentially fatal, for the bloc.
Then came four years of wrangling, political turmoil, a succession of prime ministers, trade barriers, port congestion, passport controls and an economic outlook in the UK that is currently worse than war-torn Russia’s. Even arch-Brexiteer Nigel Farage admits the project has “failed”.
Watching all this the continent’s Eurosceptic parties one by one dropped their leave campaigns and now advocate for change from within.
Le Pen never mentions Frexit. Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni now describes herself as Eurocritical rather than Eurosceptic, arguing for a leaner EU. Even Hungarian leader Viktor Orban’s open hostility to Brussels has been tamed. He now talks about making Europe great again.
There’s scarcely a party in Europe now advocating for a Brexit-style departure. Frexit and all the other hypothetical exits are yesterday’s bread.
According to the European Social Survey, conducted in 30 European nations every two years, support for leaving the EU has fallen significantly since Brexit, in some cases dramatically, with respondents less likely to vote leave in every EU member state for which data was available.
The largest decline in leave support was in Finland, where support fell from 28.6 per cent to 15.4 per cent between 2016/17 and the 2020/22 period.
But similar falls were recorded in the Netherlands (from 23 per cent to 13.5 per cent), Portugal (15.7 per cent to 6.6 per cent), Austria (26 per cent to 16.1 per cent) and France (24.3 per cent to 16 per cent).
Less dramatic but still significant falls were recorded in Hungary (16 per cent to 10.2 per cent), Spain (9.3 per cent to 4.7 per cent), Sweden (23.9 per cent to 19.3 per cent) and Germany (13.6 per cent to 11 per cent).
In an era defined by political and economic fragmentation being outside a bloc (with bargaining power) looks increasingly perilous. Instead of brokering a potentially transformative US trade deal (one of the chief carrots promised by Brexiteers), the UK now finds itself wondering how it might respond to US trade tariffs.
UK prime minister Keir Starmer says he wants an “ambitious” Brexit reset deal with Brussels but what that actually means is that five years after leaving the EU, the UK is still negotiating its Brexit deal.
British European affairs minister Nick Thomas-Symonds told the EU/UK Forum in Brussels last week that the UK prime minister will host a leaders' summit in May “where we hope we can deliver a balanced yet ambitious outcome to benefit all our citizens”.
“We can do better,” he said, highlighting “unnecessary barriers to trade” and inadequate co-operation on the migrant issue. If the diplomatic tone contrasts with the one taken by the former Tory administration, the same nagging issues remain.
Britain’s current economic malaise cannot simply be laid at the door of Brexit. The country has failed to ignite economically since the financial crisis, with growth hovering at very low levels for 15 years, a trend that economists link to inadequate levels of investment and low productivity. But Brexit has compounded the problem.
The Bank of England last week cut interest rates while halving its growth outlook for 2025, from 1.5 per cent to 0.75 per cent, because of weakness in household and business confidence. The central bank also warned that inflation was likely to accelerate again, to 3.7 per cent by the autumn.
Brexit seems to have served more as a warning to others than as a template for revamping your economy.
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