How is the British economy 10 years after the Brexit referendum? | economy

Ten years after the June 23, 2016 referendum that led to the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union in January 2020, how is the country’s situation in numbers in terms of the economy, trade and immigration, the three topics that were central to the campaign for Brexit?

The economy declined

Brexit supporters stressed that leaving the European Union would not affect the state of the British economy, while its opponents warned that leaving the common market would cause a crisis.

Gross domestic product figures issued by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development indicate that the British economy generally followed the path of other developed economies during the first years following the referendum, but it recorded a gradual decline relative to the United States and Canada as of 2020.

The UK’s economic performance was slightly lower than the EU after the referendum, and the consequences of the pandemic were more severe for it than for neighboring European countries.

However, the recovery that followed was stronger in the United Kingdom, as GDP growth was stronger in Britain than in the European Union immediately after its exit from the common market in 2021, but it returned and recorded a slight decline compared to Europe in 2023, 2024 and 2025.

In this context, Richard Partington, chief economic correspondent for the British newspaper The Guardian, said that most economic indicators indicate that the country has become poorer than it would have been if it had remained within the European bloc.

He pointed in An article published about a week ago to The value of the British pound has declined to only 1.15 euros today, after it was about 1.31 euros in June 2016, in addition to the decline in the value of the pound sterling.GDP per capita by between 6% and 8%, compared to the scenario of Britain remaining a member of the European Union.

He also pointed out that the volume of investment has become about 18% less than it would have been if it remained within the union, in addition to recording employment levels about 3% to 4% lower than the alternative scenario.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said in a press conference last May that he was working to “reset” the relationship between his country and Europe to become better and broader, and stressed that leaving the European Union had caused severe damage to the British economy.

But Starmer avoided – at the time – talking about completely reversing the referendum result and returning to the European Union for fear of angering a sector of voters who rejected this return, and feared that it would lead to opening Britain’s doors to European migrant workers.

It was announced earlier The British government’s Minister for Growth, Lord Spencer Livermore, supported reversing the referendum result, and saw a return to the European Union as “inevitable.”

Lord Livermore explained that the losses of Britain’s exit from the European Union are estimated at between 6% and 8% of GDP, according to a study by the Office for Budget Responsibility, a research body that conducts assessments of the impact of decisions taken by the government on economic activity.

Trade deficit

Supporters of separation asserted that Brexit would allow the United Kingdom to increase its trade exchanges with the rest of the world, while its opponents considered that severing its relations with its main market would lead to disaster.

In fact, exports of goods to the European Union declined from 205 billion pounds sterling (about 272 billion dollars) in 2016, according to data adjusted for inflation, to 185 billion pounds sterling (about 245.5 billion dollars) in 2025, despite a brief recovery after the pandemic.

During the same period, imports of goods coming from the European Union declined only slightly, which exacerbated the United Kingdom’s trade deficit towards the European Union at the goods level, rising from 113 billion pounds (about 150 billion dollars) to about 140 billion pounds (about 185.8 billion dollars), according to data from the National Office for Statistics.

Britain was unable to compensate for this deficit with its exports of goods to non-EU member states, as they remained stable between 2016 and 2025.

On the other hand, Britain achieved strong growth in terms of exports of services to all parts of the world, which resulted in a rise in its total exports from 765 billion pounds (about 1.01 trillion dollars) to 908 billion pounds (about 1.2 trillion dollars) during the same period.

However, total imports increased at a higher rate, raising the deficit in the British trade balance to about 65 billion pounds (about 86 billion dollars) in 2025, an increase of 3 billion from 2016.

Decline in immigration from the European Union

Brexit supporters promised to regain control of Britain’s borders while leaving the bloc’s freedom of movement system. Although immigration from within the European Union has declined since then, immigration from outside it has increased significantly.

Between 2012 and 2016, citizens of bloc countries constituted between 74% and 81% of the total net number of immigrants in the United Kingdom, at a rate of 250,000 immigrants per year during that period, according to the National Office for Statistics.

In contrast, net immigration from outside the Union was relatively weak, ranging between 61 and 90 thousand immigrants per year.

After the referendum, the net number of immigrants arriving from the Union declined from 253,000 in 2016 to 70,000 in 2020.

On the other hand, net migration from outside the bloc increased from 90,000 in 2016 to 186,000 in 2019, before declining again to 101,000 in 2020 during the Covid pandemic crisis.

This trend escalated as of 2021 with the entry into force of new immigration laws in the United Kingdom. The net number of immigrants from outside the Union reached one million people in 2023, while net immigration from the Union became negative, with the number of departing European nationals exceeding the number of those arriving.

Since then, Britain has recorded a decline in the total net number of immigrants, reaching 308,000 in 2025, all of them from outside the European Union.

The departure of Poles was the main factor in the decline in the number of European immigrants, and the economic prosperity in their home country prompted them to return.