Many said their warnings about the impact of a so-called hard Brexit – where they lose their access to the European single market – were being met with scepticism by the government and accusations from some eurosceptic lawmakers that they were undermining the message that Britain can thrive outside the EU.
“It’s almost as if we were back in the 1940s and we were looking for fifth columnists all over the place because people are trying to do Britain down,” said Ronald Kent of the British Bankers’ Association (BBA). The term “fifth column” refers to a group of people that acts secretly against the state to assist an external enemy.
The head of the BBA, Anthony Browne, said on Sunday that the public and political debate was “taking us in the wrong direction” and that big international banks were preparing to move some operations out of Britain in early 2017.
The government has pledged to execute Brexit following a vote to leave the European Union that was driven in part by a desire to curb immigration and was regarded as a repudiation of a London elite, including a banking sector still the subject of lingering public anger over its role in the financial crisis.
While finance minister Philip Hammond and his ministerial colleagues have been keen to assert the financial industry is of great importance, officials say privately the Brexit deal will have to work for the country as a whole – and means the banking industry cannot expect special treatment.
