Future Free Trade Agreements — House of Commons, 2019-02-21
Topic: Foreign Trade
Barry Strachan Gardiner (Labour, Centre-left): I will make a little progress The Government’s primary focus must be securing a deal with the EU, which accounts for 44% of all our exports. The Department for International Trade’s primary focus must be to secure the so-called roll-over agreements—a promise repeatedly made by the Secretary of State, which he has now only 35 more days to deliver. Thousands of businesses depend on the ability to continue to operate their just-in-time supply chains, and thousands of jobs in this country depend upon the same Questions have repeatedly been asked of the Government’s capacity to handle even the volume of work required to get these deals over the line—more so given the UK’s relative lack of trade negotiation experience after some 40 years of not being able so to do under the EU’s common commercial policy—yet today’s debate is to consider a number of potential new free trade agreements with Australia, New Zealand and the United States, and the potential accession of the UK to the comprehensive and progressive agreement for trans-Pacific partnership The Opposition want to see progressive, positive trade agreements that benefit the UK, help to grow our export potential and further enhance the UK’s attractiveness as a destination for investment, but we have been clear from the outset that the priority must be securing a deal with the EU and ensuring continuity of trade for British business, including with respect to trade agreements that the EU has with third countries. There is a good reason for that, which is that any major trading partner will want to know what trading arrangements we have with the EU before concluding a trade agreement with us in future. That seems self-evident. If we are not able to conclude the free trade agreement with the EU, perhaps right into the transition period, that will substantially impair our ability to secure a new trade agreement with any of the three countries that we are considering today The Secretary of State is like a general who fails to secure his rear before charging off in search of a new enemy to fight, but that is not his only embarrassment. The letter written to the Prime Minister this week by the chief executive of the British Ceramic Confederation is excoriating about the total lack of understanding displayed by the Secretary of State of the impact of the proposals he favours for a move to zero tariffs in as many areas as possible. The chief executive sets it out in surgical detail: "Removing import tariffs gives a leg up to foreign competitors, thus threatening British manufacturing jobs." She continues: "Our manufacturers would still be paying other countries’ import tariffs including, in the event of no deal, EU MFNs and other countries’ MFNs where we will have just lost our preferential access. The net effect across all sectors could be to increase imports at the same time as exports are being put under pressure with a resulting adverse effect on balance of payments No tariffs makes the UK’s emerging trade remedies system ineffective from the outset by lowering the cumulative duty paid on the distorted imports, for example, by 12% in the case of dumped Chinese tableware It would weaken the UK’s hand in making free trade deals with other countries. If we give away access to Britain for free, why would anyone need to do a trade deal with us?"