Top Barclays Banker: Brexit Deal is Acceptable

A leading banker has said that Boris Johnson’s new Brexit deal is ‘acceptable’.

Sir Ian Cheshire, chairman of Barclays’ UK operations, has advised that the country move forward with the deal as it is “extremely unlikely” for there to be a different outcome from further negotiating with the EU.

Speaking to the BBC, Cheshire said that business leaders wanted certainty, and argues that this deal goes some way to providing it. Despite this, one business group in the UK has called it “a step backwards for frictionless trade”.

Sir Ian told the BBC’s Today programme that "No deal is perfect, but this deal is actually doable.

"It is, I think, very frustrating to see what appears to be a protracted process when most business leaders would like to see some certainty and get on.

"The chances of yet another round of negotiations are extremely unlikely to yield anything significantly different and now the delay is beginning to affect consumer confidence, particularly investment confidence, and I think we have to push ahead and make the best of what we've got coming down the track."

The chief executive of the Food and Drink Federation, Ian Wright, was more sceptical - saying that their members needed more time before they passed judgment on the Brexit deal:

"What our members want most of all is the chance to scrutinise it. You wouldn't buy a house having only one week's notice of what the terms look like. You'd want a survey, you'd want to send in the experts, you'd want to know what the structure was and we think that's important now.

"We want to see the government's economic impacts and then we'll make a proper judgement."

Mr Wright also highlighted members’ concerns about how the deal would affect the situation in Northern Ireland:

"Many of my members already think that the changes in Northern Ireland will make it too expensive for them to do business between Great Britain and Northern Ireland under the terms that may come.

"And the political declaration has all sorts in it which is aspirational, but we need to know what we're going to look at in terms of trade deals and in terms of regulatory alignment and we're worried on both those counts."

Stephen Phipson, chief executive of the manufacturer’s association Make UK, described Johnson’s deal as being "inferior in many respects to the deal we had with Theresa May's withdrawal agreement", further adding that "This problem of uncertainty is really quite critical now”.

"We're seeing about 70% of manufacturers in the country not investing at the moment and critically, those European customers not coming to us for new orders."

Stirling fluctuated in the first trading session since Saturday’s vote in Parliament to delay approval of the Brexit deal. The pound initially fell by 0.6% against the dollar, but then hit a high of $1.30.

Analysts are expecting there to be another big movement in the value of the pound after the Brexit deal is voted on in Parliament.