The number of companies quitting Britain or slashing jobs can’t be attributed to bad luck any more. There are just too many.

Japanese carmaker Honda made a major announcement on Tuesday: It will close its plant in Swindon by 2022. That means cutting 3,500 jobs and a calamitous knock-on effect on all the smaller companies that supply and service Honda in southern England.

This is only the latest instalment of a snowballing disinvestment, which was never in the Brexiteers’ script. From the beginning of the Brexit battle, leading Conservatives always insisted that Remainers were stoking “Project Fear” by arguing that major companies would quit Britain if the U.K. left the single market.

But a trickle of departing businesses is now becoming a stream. Prime Minister Theresa May is gambling that she can win a game of high-stakes political brinkmanship with the EU, but the U.K.'s reputation as a safe destination for foreign direct investment has already taken a heavy knock.

The Dutch government this month gloated that it had helped 42 companies make the switch from the U.K. to the Netherlands in 2018 because of Brexit and is in talks with more than 250 others about making a move.

Britain must now contend with an unprecedented number of companies saying that they are packing their bags or warning that they will do so.

The Tories claim that the Honda announcement has nothing to do with Brexit. Justin Tomlinson, Conservative lawmaker for North Swindon, argued that the closure is all about “global trends and not Brexit.” Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt also suggested there is "economic uncertainty that's not related to Brexit."

But these arguments are not holding water with the opposition. Tom Brake, from the Liberal Democrats, said the announcement “is a shocking blow to the government's delusional belief that Brexit won't destroy British industries.” Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn also blamed the government's "disastrous handling of Brexit."

While Tory MPs said that Honda's decision to consolidate production in Japan is unrelated to Brexit, Japan has secured a landmark trade deal with the EU to slash tariffs on goods. Honda can be confident of being able to export to the EU, while Britain could face higher barriers for access to the EU market.

Britain must now contend with an unprecedented number of companies saying that they are packing their bags or warning that they will do so. POLITICO takes a look back at the past few weeks of bad news for Brexit Britain.

Honda’s exit: The long lead time on Honda’s closure reflects the industry’s cyclical investment pattern. Around 100,000 Civics are produced at the Swindon site and though the suggestion is that Honda will maintain a European headquarters in England, the closure notice raises the question of how government officials will deal with mass layoffs. Local MP Tomlinson tweeted that the government would set up a task force to manage unemployment.

Nissan’s U-turn: Nissan decided not to produce a new SUV model at its plant in Sunderland — the first English city to declare it wanted out of the EU on referendum night. Nissan opted to play it safe and build the new vehicle back home in Japan. The company employs 7,000 at the factory complex and had been given government assurances (and a commitment of £80 million in cash) to keep things ticking over at the Sunderland plant.

Airbus’ warnings: Airbus, which employs 14,000 people in Britain, has been sharpening the tone of its warnings as Brexit approaches. On Sunday, the company’s chief in Britain Katherine Bennett warned that a no-deal Brexit would be "catastrophic" for the industry, adding that “there is no such thing as a managed ‘no deal’” for producers.

“Some difficult decisions will have to be made if there’s no deal ... We will have to look at future investments," she said. "There's many other countries that dearly love aerospace."

Ford’s retreat: Company officials had already told POLITICO the EU’s latest car and van carbon dioxide emission targets up to 2030 are so ambitious that they could start looking for the exit. But in the U.K., officials warned May this month that operations would need to be relocated under a no-deal scenario. That’s not good news for the 13,000 people the American auto giant employs in Britain.

Jaguar’s rest: Jaguar Land Rover has scheduled extra maintenance down time at one of its English plants. The company employs 39,000 across the country and has already announced 4,500 layoffs as part of a massive cost saving plan. It’s also committed to carrying out some production in Slovakia at a new plant.

Flybmi’s bellyflop: British regional airline flybmi on Sunday filed for bankruptcy, blaming Brexit and fuel costs. "The uncertainty created by the Brexit process" has “led to our inability to secure valuable flying contracts in Europe," the company said.

Hitachi: Japanese manufacturer Hitachi announced last month that it would stop construction of a nuclear power station in Wales, only days after May’s Brexit deal was defeated in parliament. The company said it had failed to find sufficient private investors. The plant was expected to provide about 6 percent of Britain's electricity.

Who’s also issuing warnings? Toyota owns a plant in Derby from which 90 percent of output is exported to the rest of the EU. The Japanese carmaker warned last year that production would stall under a hard Brexit. Meanwhile, BMW has multiple facilities throughout the U.K. and has flirted with shifting production of its iconic Mini to the Netherlands. It has also previously said production would stop for a month at the site in Oxford.

Government waking up to the danger: Britain’s Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said Monday in a POLITICO interview that a solution to Brexit is needed quickly to avoid damage.

“We need to resolve this as quickly as we can,” Hunt said. “We need to resolve this for the sake of industry, actually for the sake of the sanity of the population of Britain and indeed of Europe.”

But still holding course toward no-deal Brexit: When asked for his plan to resolve the impasse, Hunt reiterated demands to renegotiate the withdrawal agreement and called for a time limit to the Irish backstop. The EU has consistently refused reopening the deal and argued that a time limit would defeat the purpose of the backstop. Unless one side makes a big compromise, the no-deal Brexit that industry fears could take place on March 29.

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