Matthew Lynn

Goldman Sachs is still operating out of London. Airbus is still making wings in Broughton, even if the order book is not looking so healthy right now. Nissan has backed its Sunderland factory. Still, at least those who are clinging to the notion that leaving the European Union would lead to a mass exodus of multinational corporations always had one company they could rely on: Unilever. The Anglo-Dutch conglomerate would surely always champion the European Union cause. It had already tried once to flee the country as it plunges over the Brexit abyss and would no doubt try again as the transition period expired. Except, er, hold on. Not any more. Today the last bastion of Ultra-Remain, at least in business, appears to have crumbled.

Covid-19 has hit us harder than just about any country in the world. Lockdown has been eased chaotically, and no one has any idea what the rules are any more. And now, on top of everything else, it looks as if we are about to run out of medicines if the government doesn’t mange to reach a trade deal with the European Union by the end of the year. According to the Financial Times today, the UK is running dangerously low on stockpiles of essential pharmaceuticals, and might well run out just as a second wave of the coronavirus hits, probably next winter. We need to import lots of medicine from the rest of Europe, and the ‘crash out’ ideologues at Number 10 are putting us all at risk. There is a problem, however. It’s nonsense.

It would have to close down its factories. Thousands of job would be lost. Suppliers would be abandoned, and the local economy would be shattered for a generation. It was sometimes a little hard to work out why a few hardcore Remainers cared quite so much about Nissan. Its range of mid-market, family SUVs were not the kind of cars they would usually be seen dead in. But somehow the company became emblematic of the whole bitter debate about how the British economy would suffer if we left the European Union. If we weren’t in the Single Market, we were told again and again, the business was doomed. So today’s news from the company is, to put it mildly, slightly surprising.

It will receive €9 billion (£8 billion) in free money from the government. It will be protected from any threat of a takeover. And, with a restored balance sheet, it will be free to make predatory acquisitions across the continent. It is of course Lufthansa, the German airline, which has just been given a massive package of financial support by its government. But hold on. Isn't there meant to be a level playing field across Europe? Over the course of the negotiations on a trade deal with the European Union, we have had a series of high-handed lectures from Michel Barnier demanding the UK sign up to EU oversight of state aid and competition rules. Apparently, it would be intolerable to have a major competitor, especially one right next door, playing by different rules.

It is finally here. Die-hard European Union federalists have plotted for it for years. Economists and thinks tanks have argued for it. The Greeks and Italians have pleaded for it. And French presidents have made no end of grand speeches, full of references to solidarity and common visions, proposing it. The Germans have finally relented and agreed, at least in part, to share debt within the EU and the euro-zone, and bail-out the weaker members of the club. France’s president Macron and Germany’s chancellor Merkel last night agreed a 500 billion euro (£450bn) plan that will re-distribute fund from the stronger members to the weaker. There is a problem however. It will make a British exit without a deal a lot more likely.

So far, so good: the Oxford university trials on a potential vaccine for Covid-19 is reported to be going well. It has been tested on more than a thousand people, and it looks to be safe. There is another, more important question, however, and one where an answer might take a frustratingly long time. Does it work?  It is too early to say. Right now, not enough of the people vaccinated have been exposed to the virus for any reliable results. Now the team are planning to move it into hospitals where the chances of exposure are significantly higher. The chances are that will give them more of an idea. But hold on. That's crazy. In fact, what we need is a 'challenge vaccine'.

Who are we kidding? If you are still furloughed through July, August, and September, the chances are that your job isn’t on hold as you wait for lockdown to gradually be lifted or for your company to get back to normal levels of demand. In truth, you have probably been fired. It’s just that no one got around to telling you yet. Rishi Sunak's coronavirus job retention scheme, to give its full title, has in many ways been one of the most successful government projects we have seen for years. More than six million workers and half a million companies have taken it up. It has been brilliantly implemented by HMRC, who built the system in only a month, with hardly a hitch in the process (Who knew giving away free money was so easy? Maybe we should try it more often).

British Airways is laying off 12,000 staff. Virgin Atlantic is desperately looking for a buyer. Air France-KLM is being bailed out by the French and Dutch governments, Lufthansa is getting rid of planes, and Airbus is furloughing workers. The once mighty airline industry is in terminal trouble, with massive state support now required to keep it alive. Rishi Sunak hasn’t stepped in with his chequebook yet, but, heck, it is only Wednesday and it is probably somewhere on his ‘to-do’ list for the week. But hold on. Sure, we want to rescue most industries and bring them back to life as soon as practically possible.

You can get 80 per cent of your salary, and sometimes even 100 per cent, without actually working. Companies are getting virtually free loans, and can dump their often troublesome staff on the Treasury payroll, and entrepreneurs can get direct injections of cash from the state without actually having to launch any products. Sure we can understand why the Government has stepped in with so much cash. It needs to stop the economy collapsing, and a lot of businesses would have gone under already if that support was not available. But there's a catch. We’ve just created the biggest free lunch in history, and we shouldn’t be surprised if some people start to enjoy it.

Solidarity will be strengthened. Countries will find new ways to co-operate. And Brussels will support the economy, making sure the strong support the weak. European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen is set to unveil the EU's response to the coronavirus crisis, promising a ‘new Marshall Plan’ to prevent the continent plunging into deep recession. It is a nice idea. The financial help offered by Harry Truman’s secretary of state George C. Marshall to rebuild Europe after World War II is rightly credited with salvaging its shattered economy and laying the foundations for half-a-century of peace and prosperity. The trouble is, the reality is nothing close to the rhetoric.

Ten billion here. Twenty billion there. At least we now know where Rishi Sunak is getting all the money from. As of today, the Bank of England has quietly started directly financing the government. Instead of selling gilts to fund the difference between what it raises in taxes and what it spends the Bank is simply going to increase the government's account, normally a relatively trivial £370 million, to what it discreetly describes as an 'unlimited amount'. How much might that be? No one knows, but the final number could easily have ten zeros at the end of it. What is known in the economics textbooks by the rather dramatic name of 'helicopter money' – where the government simply prints lots of cash and chucks it out of helicopters onto grateful citizens – has begun.

In some ways we will miss John McDonnell. His reheated 1970s student union Trotskyism was always an easy target for a column. From free broadband, to nationalising great swathes of industry, to raising taxes to punitive levels, and banning just abut anything he disapproved of, he managed to come up with a constant stream of terrible ideas. But, hey, never mind. Now there is Anneliese Dodds. The new shadow chancellor may be painted in some places as representing a shift back towards the moderate centre. And yet while she may have endeared herself to working parents on lockdown everywhere with her daughter’s impromptu appearance on Sky News this morning, we should also get real about her very limited abilities.

Rising death rates. Economies closing down. People forced to stay at home. The coronavirus is a health, social and economic emergency for every country where it hits. But in Europe it has also mutated very quickly into something else as well, and which, while it may not be quite so threatening in the short-term, could well do even more damage in the years ahead. A currency crisis. Over the last couple of weeks the eurozone has been engulfed by a furious argument over ‘coronabonds’ – a joint eurozone financial instrument that could raise money to help deal with the crisis. The highly-indebted Southern economies, along with France, are in favour. Predictably, Germany and the Netherlands are against. You can argue about the rights and wrongs of that proposal.

Ten billion? Twenty billion? Thirty billion? To borrow a phrase from the American senator Everett Dirksen when scrutinising the escalating costs of the military, ‘pretty soon you are talking about real money.’ Chancellor Rishi Sunak has already thrown huge sums of money at rescuing the economy. He may well spend a lot more over the next few weeks. You can argue about the rights and wrongs of that. But one thing is already becoming clear, and the more you pause to think about it the more worrying it becomes. It is already looking like he has hugely miscalculated the cost.

It will be impossible to calculate. There will be widespread fraud. And there is no mechanism for sending out the money. As the Chancellor Rishi Sunak scratches around for ways to bail out the UK’s five million self-employed in the same way he has done for employees he faces plenty of obstacles. No doubt his Treasury officials have come up with a list of reasons why any scheme he comes up with won’t work in practise, will prove too expensive, will break the IT system, or can’t be implemented until 2029 at the earliest. But hold on. That's crazy. In fact, the self-employed deserve their bail-out more than anyone. Sure, it is difficult. The self-employed don't have regular salaries in the way employees do.