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Hello and welcome to Coffeehouse Shots, the Spectator's Daily Politics Podcast. I'm Cindy

U and I'm joined by James Forsy. So today the ONS has released the first numbers out since Brexit

about exports and

imports between the UK and the EU. James, what are these numbers saying? They suggest that UK exports

to the EU have dropped by 40%. Now, the question is, how much is this the new training relationship?

This is the future? And how much is this a product of all those

factors in January? So you had stop piling beforehand back in December because people knew

that this disruption was coming and this change in the nature of the trading relationship

was coming. You've obviously also had lockdown or various economic restrictions in place in lots of Europe and in the UK.

And so you're trying to look at these figures and trying to disaggregate out.

What is the Brexit effect?

What's the stockpiling effect and what's the COVID effect?

But I think it's quite clear.

And I think to be fair, we'll have to wait a few months to get a clear

review of what's going on.

But I think it is a sign that obviously the nature, the change the UK leaving the single market

and the customs union has hit UK-EU trade.

Now, that isn't that greater surprise.

And I think the kind of the question about Brexit was whether the other economic benefits of it could compensate for the fact that it will make trade

more difficult than it was before between the UK and the EU. Because yes, there aren't tariffs in

place on the goods but there are

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