EU Withdrawal — House of Lords, 2019-02-13
Topic: Foreign Trade
Martin Callanan (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken today, and for the many insightful and considered contributions. Indeed, I am particularly grateful to those noble Lords who sought to rise to the challenge of making points that the House had not previously considered. Sadly, many failed in that task, probably including myself, but I particularly enjoyed the contribution of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, and his holding pattern analogy, which was particularly novel and amusing, although I do not agree with it. I also enjoyed my noble friend Lady Meyer’s spirited speech, despite many interventions. She made some excellent new points about the realities of some of the failings of the EU, which, of course, we do not often get to hear in this House During the debate, many noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Taverne, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, drew attention to the Prime Minister’s letter to the leader of the Opposition. In particular, a number of noble Lords spoke about the Government’s position on the customs union. As my noble friend Lord Howell pointed out in his speech, the political declaration that we have debated at length in this House explicitly provides for the benefits of a customs union. However, it also recognises the development of the UK’s independent trade policy beyond our economic partnership with the EU. Let me be clear: we are not considering staying in the customs union. We want to play a full and active role on trade policy on the global stage, working closely with friends new and old. From trade remedies to trade promotion and bilateral to multilateral negotiations, the UK will be able to tailor its trade policy to the strengths and requirements of the UK economy and in support of our industrial strategy While I am on the subject of trade, I pay tribute to the excellent speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, on the importance of trade in services. While I again did not agree with every point she made, I can tell her that the UK services sector is a global success story. Our internationally competitive sector plays host to world-leading firms, as well as thriving small and medium-sized businesses. The political declaration includes a commitment to conclude an ambitious arrangement for services and investment that goes well beyond WTO commitments, alongside new arrangements on financial services. But leaving the EU will give the UK regulatory flexibility where it matters most for its service-based economy and where the potential trading opportunities outside the EU are the largest. Globally, services trade is growing rapidly and UK services trade with non-EU countries grew by 73% between 2007 and 2017 My noble friend Lord Cope asked me quite a technical question about whether the UK’s customs declaration process is on track. We will have a functioning customs system on exit. HMRC continues to progress dual running of the customs declaration system and CHIEF, the current customs declaration system. It can process sufficient numbers of customs declarations anticipated in a no-deal scenario. This capability will be deployed alongside the CDS, ensuring we will have a functioning customs system on exit The noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, asked whether I was aware of the number of Americans professing to have Irish roots. The answer is yes, I am, because many of them are indeed my relatives. I also have Irish roots. Indeed, I have discussed Brexit with many in the Irish American community. He might find that not all opinion is uniform on that matter.