I may need to change my descriptive noun for the leaders of the Brexit campaign from lemmings to ostriches. No matter what the provenance of an assessment which warns that the UK would suffer significant economic problems if it left the EU, the Brexit response is always to claim that the latest opinion is scaremongering; overly pessimistic; in league with the EU; based on faulty analysis; that the organisation has made mistaken analysis in the past or, fresh in, that the individual is just “drawing their own conclusions” neatly dismissing their experience.
The latest in the long line of conspirators colluding with virtually all of the UK’s mainstream politicians, leaders of industry, heads of state, and international bodies is Peter Sutherland. Mr Sutherland led the World Trade Organisation from 93 to 95 and was heavily involved in the establishment of the Single Market as a European Commissioner in the 1980s.
Mr Sutherland’s “conclusions” were: "The WTO would not give the right to provide services. At the moment the banking system of Britain provides services all over Europe because by being part of the European Union they have what's called a single passport and they can operate everywhere. If Britain left the European Union it would not have a single passport and many financial services companies might say 'we can't have our headquarters in a country that is outside the European Union' and they might well move. This would be a huge blow to the British economy. If you sell manufactured goods into the European Union under WTO rules, you have to be able to prove - and this means inspections at borders - that the component parts are from Britain. If, for example, you are exporting cars and the engines are made in another country, that will all have to be checked and different tariff rates might be applicable to some of the components. You're in a new ball game of appalling complexity and the prospect of that should be extremely worrying to everyone in Britain."
Gerard Lyons, one of the few economists who favours leaving the EU opined: “The reality is that the UK can leave the European Union and trade freely under World Trade Organisation rules”.
If Brexit campaigners are correct, then the chorus of those arguing vehemently and with apparent sincerity represents the greatest and most successful conspiracy in recorded history.