Post-Brexit the UK will look like a huge tax haven!

The UK is already a tax haven! The proof: Roman Abramovich, the Russian oligarch, can sell the Chelsea club he bought with black money from the plunder of the USSR without being asked any questions.

With its network of offshore areas in the British Overseas Territories and former Crown colonies, it is already the biggest tax haven and the City makes its fat cows from the trading and processing of funds repatriated from these areas . A third of the tax havens in the world are British.

Marc Roche: "The UK is already a tax haven!" The proof: Roman Abramovich, the Russian oligarch, can sell the Chelsea club he bought with black money from the plunder of the USSR without being asked any questions. With its network of offshore areas in the British Overseas Territories and former Crown colonies, it is already the biggest tax haven and the City makes its fat cows from the trading and processing of funds repatriated from these areas . A third of the tax havens in the world are British.

What will change with Brexit? Getting rid of European regulations - but not the international regulations of the OECD, the G20, the Bank for International Settlements - London's place can only prosper. The limitations of bankers' bonuses will be lifted. There will be few transfers of activity in Paris and Frankfurt. No bank, other than HSBC in Paris, has relocated a lot of jobs. We are talking about tens, hundreds at most. And, above all, emerging countries, especially China, will feel very comfortable in the post-Brexit UK. London will become the financial center and the Trojan horse of Chinese funds. Since David Cameron in 2010, the United Kingdom plays the Chinese card. It is the only country that sells its nuclear power to China. [...] Since 2010, the UK has welcomed Chinese banks by bypassing the prudential supervision of the Bank of England, so much so that "the Financial Times" was moved by the systemic risks this could create. The City is the only true European center involved in the internationalization of the Chinese currency, the yuan. And London is lending gilt passports to all wealthy Chinese who want to settle in the UK without asking any questions about the source of funds.

New referendum?

In case of failure of the negotiations, and faced with the deep political divisions in London, can we envisage a new referendum?

I do not see any willingness, either by the Labor Party or the Conservatives, to go back and replay the battle. And even if we would: so why not a third referendum, in a year or two? No, the only sensible thing to do is to accept the verdict of democracy, whether we like it or not. And to gather us.

Marc Roche: There was a referendum whose result was very clear: 52% against 48%, with 12 points difference between Leave vote and Remain vote in England itself, which is the most important part of the country (82 % Population).

It is therefore out of the question to have a second referendum. Those who demand it are either hashes like Tony Blair or politicians cut off from the provincial electorate and the pro-Brexit electorate that is still in the majority, despite the opinion polls. Many Britons say, "Let's give Brexit a chance".

Correspondent in London for the French press, Marc Roche, Belgian by birth, has requested British nationality. His book "Brexit will succeed" is published by Albin Michel.

It should be remembered that the United Kingdom is a mammoth compared to Europe (population 508 millions). The Commonwealth of Nations is a voluntary association of 53 sovereign states. Nearly all of them are former British colonies or dependencies of those colonies with a population of nearly 2.5 billions.