EU prefers its UK forecast of growth to its EU one

The Spring 2021 official EU forecasts show the EU growing at 4.2% in 2021 and 4.4% in 2022, compared to their UK forecast of 5% in 2021 and 5.3% in 2022.  Yet when they put the detailed forecasts for each member state and for the EU as a whole in an appendix you open up the EU one and discover they have used the  numbers from the UK forecast instead. Not surprising they prefer the UK forecast, even though their version still  looks a bit low.

18 Comments

  1. David Brown
    May 17, 2021

    British holiday makers will boost the EU economy because over 20 million Brits holiday around the med inc me. We are all awaiting to exchange £ to Euros and get spending in the EU.
    As an Architect I am commissioned to work on large multi million regeneration or restoration projects, clients often want specific designs and materials. Most of which are traditionally sourced in Spain Italy and prepacked buildings in Holland and Germany. The UK construction industry has no real supply chains for specific materials within the UK all are in the EU.
    This does create massive problems and I see no alternatives but importation for years to come, so a significant part of UK infrastructure economy is dependent on EU imports. I note that most new trams are imported from Spain.

    1. steve
      May 17, 2021

      “We are all awaiting to exchange £ to Euros and get spending in the EU.”

      Why not spend it in Britain ?

      Personally I can’t see why anyone would want to aid the EU economy after the way the EU has treated us.

    2. lojolondon
      May 18, 2021

      Who cares about a tram? I haven’t seen one in years!

    3. Margaret Brandreth-
      May 18, 2021

      Thanks David, I would like to spend Euros for leisure and pounds for day to day living and until covid dreamed of having property in Spain to keep warmer in the cold months here which is proving to be until june.

  2. MiC
    May 17, 2021

    Yet more curtain-twitching – I suppose that while watching the neighbours you can forget about your own rising damp, dry rot, and leaky roof.

    1. steve
      May 17, 2021

      MiC

      Yep, agreed, we have enough of our own problems to deal with. For example: people living on the streets going hungry – completely unacceptable in any so-called civilised nation.

    2. Peter2
      May 17, 2021

      Yeah…keep ignoring facts and figures eh MiC

    3. No Longer Anonymous
      May 17, 2021

      Carry on as you are, Martin.

      Is it any wonder that Labour is as dead as a door nail ?

      You’re not nice. It’s easy for anyone outside of your own head to see it.

      1. MiC
        May 18, 2021

        Labour are doing very nicely here, thanks.

        1. Peter2
          May 18, 2021

          MiC
          Its only equivalent to a county council.
          Look at real polls for the whole of the UK.
          Labour are really struggling.
          Mid term and their leader is way behind compared to the PM with polls giving the Conservatives over a ten point lead.
          With an eighty seat majority to overturn they are in an hopeless position.

    4. Fred.H
      May 17, 2021

      What a bundle of laughs you are – try standup on the stage.

    5. Fred.H
      May 17, 2021

      how about using wet lettuce again – – always a good laugh.

    6. jon livesey
      May 18, 2021

      We took notice of what was going on in continental Europe long before we even joined the Common Market. I suppose you would dismiss that as “curtain-twitching” but in fact it was simply a normal form of awareness that all responsible countries engage in.

      Today, we have to keep an eye on the EU because their situation affects us even after we have left. Their disastrous vaccine roll-out needs watching because it tells us when it will be safe to allow EU visitors back into the UK.

      And in this case their slow growth needs to be noted because it warns us that their growth as an export market for the UK is going to remain very slow, perhaps even zero growth, and the rest of the World is going to be growing much faster, meaning that export markets outside the Eu will also be growing faster, so the Civil Service needs to redirect more of its export-support efforts away from the EU towards other markets.

      These are all perfectly normal technical measures to align our export support efforts with relative growth in export markets. It’s the sort of stuff any normal Government does. So what’s your problem?

      1. SM
        May 18, 2021

        +1

    7. Mitchel
      May 18, 2021

      MiC,

      O/T but I am going to take you to task over your vehement denial a few days ago that it was the EU that encouraged Croatia to break up Yugoslavia-you claimed it was the US.I am no supporter of the USA-far from it-but at that time-before the neo-con and PNAC nutjobs and Clinton interventionists took control-they weren’t interested;it was very much the EU,or more precisely Germany acting through the EU,that was responsible:-

      “War in Yugoslavia broke out in early Jun 1991…….as the fighting intensified in the Summer and Autumn,Croatia convinced the German govt that it’s cause was just by presenting itself as an integral part of civilised Catholic,central European culture while denigrating it’s Serb neighbour as a representative of the barbaric,despotic Orient………By the Autumn of 1991 Hans-Dietrich Genscher had made the recognition of Slovenia and Croatia his personal crusade…….The US reserved judgement-this was a European affair-and was reluctant to encourage the break up of a complicated federation.In the event,the Germans won the battle in the EU.””

      Quotes from Misha Glenny’s “Balkans 1804-1999.Nationalism,War & the Great Powers” which I have found to be the best compendium history of the modern-ish Balkans.

      The US,of course,became very engaged in the later phases,in Bosnia and Kosovo.

  3. graham1946
    May 17, 2021

    Well, it seems our leaky roof is doing quite well. According to ONS for March 2021:-
    1) UK Exports to EU exceed average levels for 2020
    2)Exports and Imports to/from EU increased by £1 billion and precious metals by £0.8 billion
    3)Imports from Non EU countries increased by 1.5 billion and exports to Non EU countries by £1.3 billion
    4) Imports from R.O.W. overtaken imports from the EU in 2021 for first time since records began. We are buying less from the EU and buying more from R.o.W. whilst exporting the same.

    Remainer lies obliterated by figures.

    1. Mark B
      May 18, 2021

      This is my dream – We buy and sell more from others than them and so make them an irrelevance. No more Treasure Island.

  4. XY
    May 18, 2021

    I didn’t really undertand this post – I got thye gist: that the EU has been inconsistent in some document, in some way… the rest is a bit opaque.

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