Yesterday was very interesting. The huge fall in the PMI index prepared by Markit, which said in the accompanying report, "July saw a dramatic deterioration in the economy," marked a turning point. The index, a measure of sentiment rather than hard data as the chancellor was quick to point out is the first real measure of business activity since the referendum. It is usually a good indicator of what is happening in the real economy and it seems to presage a 0.4% contraction in the third quarter.
This in itself was not remarkable since the experts (known as scaremongers during the campaign) had all forecast such an event. No, what was remarkable was the reaction of the press. Newspapers who were cheerleaders for Brexit had a difficult time. Reuters (HERE) carried a report about the UK economy "wilting" which said this about the Daily Express:
The darkening outlook jars with the resolute optimism of newspapers that backed Brexit: "Britain BOOMS after EU vote: Ignore the doom-mongers...it's good news all round," the Daily Express has trumpeted in a raft of bullish headlines this week.
The Daily Mail did not seem to carry the story at all as far as I could see and is literally in a state of denial, determined to keep its readers in the dark - as usual. Liam Halligan writing in The Spectator (HERE) said just before the PMI index came out:
It has been a month since the UK voted to leave the European Union — but something is missing. Where is the economic collapse? What of EUpocalypse Now? Where is the Brexageddon that we were promised? To the shock of many — not least business titans who bankrolled the Remain campaign — the instant collapse doesn’t seem to be happening. The UK economy is, for now at least, taking Brexit in its stride.
The Telegraph had the very embarrassing juxtaposing of the relentlessly upbeat column of Alastair Heath and the Live Blog (HERE) and later in the afternoon the Live Blog (at 3:26) said, sheepishly, "The pro-Remain camp must also feel fairly vindicated this Friday; a month after the referendum the impact of the Brexit is beginning to materialise, a trend that is only likely to continue in the coming weeks."
The Independent (HERE) and The Guardian both remainers carried the story prominently as did the BBC (HERE) where it was the lead story for some time.
So the reaction to the first indicator that the economy was headed in the wrong direction varied from The Express' bearing headlines completely opposite to the truth, The Daily Mail studiously ignoring it altogether and The Telegraph grudging admission that maybe the scaremongers were no such thing. Meanwhile, the remain newspapers and media outlets, including Sky (HERE) carried the PMI index figures as the lead story.
Some people are now living with soviet era journalism where readers are routinely misled. The question now is how will those parts of the media which called for Brexit and dismissed all the experts as scaremongers react as the bad news piles up. Do they admit they were wrong? These are people with massive egos who are congenitally incapable of seeing their own errors so I expect they will continue to ignore it for as long as possible and then blame it on the government.
Liam Halligan is already preparing the ground with this, "Planning to leave the EU isn’t destroying our economy; a hysterical policy response just might". In other words they will say it wasn't Brexit but the government's response to it.
I also noted Ian Duncan Smith, in a TV interview still clinging to the notion that both sides lied in the referendum campaign. We know the Brexit camp did but the pro-remain camps warnings were mainly about the future health of the economy and we won't know that for sure for a few years but the omens are that they will be vindicated. I wonder what he will say then?
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