ANYONE who thought that the UK’s relationship with the European Union was settled once and for all on 23 June 2016 might ponder two new facts that emerged last week. First, the BBC reported that new Bank of England data about the financial results of thousands of British companies showed that the UK economy had taken a six-per-cent hit in growth since Brexit. Separate studies have concluded that leaving the EU has reduced UK trade in goods by between 13 and 15 per cent; travel-industry exports have dropped by 39 per cent; and financial services by 24 per cent. Second, Michel Barnier, a former Brexit negotiator, told The Guardian that Britain could regain its special terms — keeping the pound and remaining outside the Schengen travel area — if it rejoined the EU, directly contradicting other European leaders who say that the EU has moved on. In other words, Brexit may have inflicted a devastating economic blow, but remedy is still possible.

It was always about more than money. True, as a recent BBC documentary showed, the then Chancellor, George Osborne, used crude fiscal arguments to create “Project Fear”, warning of a fictitious emergency budget that would raise taxes in the wake of Brexit. True, too, that the slogan “We send the EU £350 million a week, let’s fund our NHS instead” was painted on the side of the Vote Leave battle bus. The figure was misleading: it represented the gross contribution the UK made to the EU, but failed to account for the UK’s rebate or the EU spending that came back to the UK.

In 2016, Eurosceptics argued, as they do now, that Britain needed to make the break so that it could “take back control” from an EU political system that was heading towards ever closer union. On the other side, pro-Europeans imagined that Britain could be a leader in the EU, with the result that the country would thrive in economic terms. What was missing on the Remain side of the campaign was enough emphasis on the political case for union and the cause of peace. Yet, the deteriorating state of international affairs over the past decade makes that more important than ever: the conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East and the presence of a capricious US President have combined to leave the UK looking increasingly exposed and isolated.

British politics has been subject to a degree of chaos since the Brexit referendum. Its result — unwelcome to a PM who believed that Britain would be stronger in Europe — led directly to David Cameron’s resignation. For a whole host of reasons, this country now faces the prospect of a seventh prime minister in a decade — as many as in the previous 40 years, resulting in painful jibes about Britain as “the new Italy”. Perhaps both sides were, in their own ways, misguided ten years ago. But what is clear now is that the love-hate relationship between the UK and the EU is no more settled today than it was a decade ago.