Brexit will hit UK economy like a ‘slow puncture’

Brexit will hit UK economy like a ‘slow puncture’

Brexit will hit the British economy like a "slow puncture“, a leading industrialist has warned, with disruption to business to last at least six months even if a trade deal is reached.

Juergen Maier, the former chief executive of German electronics giant Siemens, warned that businesses were starting to shift parts of their operations to other countries in the EU while at the same time decrying the "nationalist“ headlines over the weekend claiming Angela Merkel wanted the UK to "walk on broken glass“ to secure a Brexit deal.

He said many people were under the illusion that a deal would be a panacea not realising that the mountain of red tape cross-border suppliers face will kick in whether there is a deal or not.

Hopes that cross-border supply chains will quickly recover from the pre-Christmas stockpiling that has resulted in gridlock in Dover and Calais are wide of the mark.

"It's going to be a pretty tough for the first six months,“ he said. "That is what I am hearing from the groups that I am on,“ he said.

A member of government's industrial strategy council and the Northern Powerhouse Partnership, Maier is a leading business commentator with the ear of the government, Whitehall and