France is suffering from Brexit derangement syndrome 

The French media has been busy marking the third anniversary of Britain’s official departure from the EU by gleefully reporting the sorry state of perfidious Albion. ‘The shipwreck of Brexit’ was the headline in Le Figaro, while France’s business paper, Les Echos, declared that the majority of Britons believe leaving the EU has been a ‘failure’. A radio station broadcast a segment on ‘Bregret’, hearing from disenchanted Britons about how wretched life was without Brussels. ‘With Brexit, the country was supposed to slow down immigration, which is now at record levels,’ the broadcaster stated. ‘Public health services are short of money and manpower, despite being promised unprecedented resources.’ 

There is a of course a small flaw in all this Gallic Schadenfreude, which is the state of the 27 countries still in the EU. As one leading economic advisor told Reuters in November: ‘The European economy has been flat on its back for a year (and) the monetary and fiscal policy plans for 2024 seem to accept the high probability of another lost year.