Contractors face both risks and benefits as a result of the UK’s historic vote to leave the European Union (EU) in the Brexit referendum.
“Contractors get hired during times of uncertainty, and that’s certainly what we are facing now the UK has voted to leave the EU,” highlights ContractorCalculator CEO Dave Chaplin.
“However, that same uncertainty can also result in cancelled projects and lost contracts, so for contractors the Brexit scenario represents a double edged sword.”
With all results declared, the leave vote is 17,410,742 against 16,141,241 voting to remain, representing 51.9% voting to leave and 48.1% voting to remain. The results show that London and Scotland voted strongly to remain, whereas the North and English countryside voted to leave.
The 2009 Lisbon Treaty allows countries choosing to leave the EU at least two years to negotiate their exit, and commentators are suggesting the UK should aim to exit in time for the next election in 2020. The strong remain vote in Scotland has already sparked demands for a second Scottish referendum.
“It is during this time of uncertainty that contractors will benefit from businesses hiring contingent workers in order that they can manage risk,” continues Chaplin, “but this could also be when contractors are at their most vulnerable to cancelled and postponed projects.”
There are already some signs for hope for contractors. The response from London’s financial sector, one of the UK’s largest consumers of contractor services, has been swift and positive.
“The City of London has thrived as a financial and trading centre for more than a thousand years and will continue to do so,” Mark Boleat, policy chairman of the City of London Corporation, told the BBC.
“There will be no mass exit of banks and financial institutions from the Square Mile. While there will be uncertainty as Brexit negotiations go on, we are still the financial centre of the fifth-largest economy in the world.”
Jonathan Isaby of the TaxPayers' Alliance has called for calm following the result, saying: “Nothing has actually changed overnight: the sun still rose in the east this morning, British businesses will still be trading today with their counterparts both inside and outside the EU and at the end of the day the sun will still set in the west.”
Chaplin concludes: “Whatever the feeling about the outcome, the fact is that it has happened and the UK will be leaving the EU. The challenge for contractors and the contracting sector will be to turn this challenge into an opportunity.”