No deal is the most likely Brexit outcome, so what was the point of austerity?

What price democracy? What price freedom? Nine years of swingeing cuts rendered pointless by a project of the right

This year's Edinburgh Fringe has been graced nightly by LBC's Iain Dale interviewing political know-it-alls. On Thursday night polling behemoth Sir John Curtice was in the chair. He told Dale it was too late for the UK to leave the European Union with a deal "of any kind." On Friday it was confirmed the UK economy shrank for the first time in seven years. If it contracts again in the next quarter the country will officially be in recession. Global trends indicate we will. And we all remember what happened last time. In the wake of 2008's financial crisis an overhaul of the public finances was required, the burden need not have fallen so heavily on the shoulders of society's most vulnerable. Why, for instance, cut £1 billion from the legal aid budget and reduce its use by more than 80 per cent? Ideology. A teardrop in the Treasury's ocean, trickling down the cheek of our poorest countrymen. Conservative MP Nigel Evans said he regretted voting to cut legal aid after he spent his life savings (£130,000) defending himself in court against false accusations. One wonders how one would deal with such accusations without access to £130,000 of life savings. If Sir John Curtice is right, and I think he is, that the UK is most likely to leave the EU in autumn without negotiating some kind of agreement, the country could have to endure self-imposed austerity far worse than anything from the last decade. The culling of lambs and cattle, just-in-time supply chains for food, medicine and manufacturing ruptured as motorways are turned into lorry parks. All happening as the country sits on the precipice of recession. What then for the 2/3s of exporters who have not taken the most basic steps to prepare for no deal, as Sky News reported this week? What then were Cameron's cuts for? Nothing. Economic recovery betrayed and rendered useless by a colossal journey of self-harm. From recession to recession, with nine years of Conservative government in between.