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29 March 2018

Dr Ingo Borchert is Senior Lecturer in Economics and a fellow of the UK Trade Policy Observatory and Julia Magntorn is Research Assistant in Economics at the Observatory.

With one year to go until the UK will leave the European Union (EU), sorting out Britain’s trade relation with the EU is the most important task.  Yet the design of the future UK-EU agreement has implications for trade policy towards non-EU countries.  On account of this, the British Prime Minister in her Mansion House speech ruled out forming a new customs union with the EU because this “would not be compatible with a meaningful independent trade policy.”  Indeed, having sovereignty over its external trade policy post-Brexit has been at the forefront of the UK’s negotiation agenda, and consequently, the provision in the current draft Withdrawal Agreement that the UK may commence Free Trade Agreement (FTA) negotiations with other countries during the transition period was perceived as an important concession won. (more…)

March 29th, 2018

Posted In: UK - Non EU, UK- EU

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image of Ilona26 March 2018

Ilona Serwicka is Research Fellow in the economics of Brexit at the UKTPO

The UK economy will be worse off after Brexit regardless of the terms of departure from the EU: this is (with a small number of exceptions) a consensus reached by previous analyses of the impact of Brexit. Anything that differs from the status quo of EU membership – ranging from a ‘soft’ Brexit that involves staying within the Customs Union and/or the Single Market to a ‘hard’ scenario of leaving the EU with no deal – will hurt growth prospects for the UK economy. (more…)

March 26th, 2018

Posted In: UK - Non EU, UK- EU

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Image of Alan Winters22 March 2018

Julia Magntorn is Research Assistant in Economics at the UKTPO and L. Alan Winters CB is Professor of Economics and Director of the Observatory.

The European Union is likely to reject a significantly enhanced version of its Canada trade deal for the UK after Brexit.

Our in-depth analysis of the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) between the EU and Canada concludes that the EU’s commitment to the Single Market is so deeply ingrained that a substantial loosening of the rules for the UK would be politically impossible.

The EU may agree to some exceptions but these would fall far short of a bespoke deal and would be a poor substitute for the Single Market, say the report’s authors Julia Magntorn and L. Alan Winters. (more…)

March 22nd, 2018

Posted In: UK - Non EU, UK- EU

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2 March 2018

Alasdair Smith is an Emeritus Professor of Economics at the University of Sussex, and is a member of the UK Trade Policy Observatory.

The European Commission has this week published its controversial draft of the withdrawal treaty for the UK’s exit from the EU. The draft includes the EU’s proposal for dealing with the issue of the border in Ireland – Northern Ireland to remain in a customs union with the EU and to retain all the elements of the Single Market that support free movement of goods. (more…)

March 2nd, 2018

Posted In: UK- EU

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2 March 2018

Dr Michael Gasiorek is Senior Lecturer in Economics at the University of Sussex and Director and  Managing Director of InterAnalysis respectively. He is a Fellow of the UKTPO.

There is much talk about the UK not being able to “cherry-pick” and “have its cake and eat it” with regards to post-Brexit trade policy with the EU. There are a couple of issues here. First, all EU agreements are different and hence by definition bespoke. Cherries are picked by both sides. This will also be true of a future UK-EU agreement. The question, therefore, really is to do with the extent to which the EU will grant the UK a bespoke deal in serious and substantive ways. The second issue is that it is far from clear that the UK government currently knows what all the ingredients are and what the recipe is for the cake it is hoping to share with the EU. (more…)

March 2nd, 2018

Posted In: UK- EU

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