18 June 2024
Alasdair Smith is a UKTPO Research Fellow, a researcher within the Centre for Inclusive Trade Policy (CITP), Emeritus Professor of Economics and Former Vice-Chancellor at the University of Sussex.
The 2019 General Election focused on the one issue of Brexit, and Boris Johnson’s victory enabled the UK to leave the EU. The evidence analysed by UKTPO and many others since then has confirmed the general expectation among expert economists at the time that Brexit would have negative economic effects. And recent opinion poll evidence is that a majority of voters think Brexit was a mistake.
To say that Brexit was a mistake does not imply it could or should be simply reversed. Yet, it is reasonable to expect the political parties to address the issue in their current election campaigns.
The Labour Party’s ambition for the future EU-UK relationship is set out in two paragraphs in their manifesto published on 13 June:
“With Labour, Britain will stay outside of the EU. But to seize the opportunities ahead, we must make Brexit work. We will reset the relationship and seek to deepen ties with our European friends, neighbours and allies. That does not mean reopening the divisions of the past. There will be no return to the single market, the customs union, or freedom of movement.
Instead, Labour will work to improve the UK’s trade and investment relationship with the EU, by tearing down unnecessary [my emphasis] barriers to trade. We will seek to negotiate a veterinary agreement to prevent unnecessary border checks and help tackle the cost of food; will help our touring artists; and secure a mutual recognition agreement for professional qualifications to help open up markets for UK service exporters.”
A firm commitment to stay out of the EU for the next Parliament is surely wise. The UK-EU relationship has been bruised by the experience of the last 8 years. Rebuilding the relationship will take time and patience, and the opportunity to solidify the long-term relationship lies some way in the future. The incoming government faces formidable challenges in many areas and even a long-term plan to rejoin the EU would be a diversion from more immediate priorities.
Since there is no plan to rejoin, it follows that a new government must indeed seek to “make Brexit work”. It’s also right to aim for the removal of any unnecessary border checks and other barriers to trade that have damaged the UK economy.
This is a more positive and less dogmatic approach to the UK-EU relationship than the Conservative manifesto whose main concern is to rule out “dynamic alignment” to EU rules and “submission to the CJEU [the Court of Justice of the EU]”.
Dynamic alignment means sticking to EU rules even when they change. There’ s a strong case for dynamic alignment in many areas, to create a climate of regulatory predictability in place of the regulatory uncertainty and instability of recent years. In any case, firms have to satisfy EU regulations for products they sell in the EU. In many important sectors of the economy (like chemicals and motor vehicles) that means virtually all their production has to meet EU requirements, so separate UK regulations are a deadweight cost.
The Labour manifesto’s red lines are clearly drawn: “no return to the single market, the customs union, or freedom of movement”. The political pressure for such clear lines is understandable. However, they will constrain the objective of reducing border checks and other barriers to trade.
The European single market (which encompasses some non-EU countries like Norway) is the regulatory framework which removes barriers to trade within Europe. Members of the single market adopt common regulations, common processes for assessing conformity with these regulations, and a common legal framework under the umbrella of the CJEU. Members of the customs union similarly have a common policy towards goods imported from non-member countries. Checks on trade between EU countries are unnecessary.
However, if the UK remains outside the single market and the customs union, checks on UK exports to the EU are necessary to make sure that EU rules are satisfied. It’s not enough for UK producers to satisfy EU rules – their products still need to be checked for conformity. However much trust and goodwill are built up with our EU partners and no matter how much alignment there is with EU rules, the scope for removing “unnecessary” barriers to UK-EU trade may be frustratingly limited in practice.
The main political barrier to UK membership of the single market is, of course, the additional single market requirement for the free movement of labour. But post-Brexit restrictions on labour mobility between the EU and the UK has had adverse effects in many important UK sectors: including business services, agriculture, hospitality, social care, and the creative industries.
It’s understandable that the Labour manifesto rules out free movement, but notable that it is silent on the recent EU offer on youth mobility: proposals which emphatically do not imply freedom of movement (not least because they involve visa controls). These proposals would restore to young Europeans in the UK and the EU some of what they lost as a result of Brexit, and would also help address some of the problems of the sectors most affected by Brexit. Surely an incoming government should take a more positive approach to the EU offer.
Opinion poll evidence is that a clear majority of the UK electorate favour a return to EU-UK freedom of movement. A new government may find the political constraints changing quite quickly, so that rejoining the single market becomes thinkable.
A manifesto commitment not to rejoin the single market applies to the next Parliament but doesn’t stop the government from preparing to rejoin in the following Parliament. The path to re-entering the single market would in any case be a long one, probably via the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) into the European Economic Area (the EEA). This path requires preparation and negotiation.
That preparation should include addressing the fact that the single market requires free movement of labour not free movement of citizens. The UK could develop rules for a regime in which EEA citizens are not unconditionally free to come to the UK but are free to relocate to the UK (with their families) in order to work.
The Liberal Democrat manifesto, in contrast to the Labour manifesto’s red lines, makes a positive commitment to rejoining the single market:
“Finally, once ties of trust and friendship have been renewed, and the damage the Conservatives have caused to trade between the UK and EU has begun to be repaired, we would aim to place the UK-EU relationship on a more formal and stable footing by seeking to join the Single Market.”
Realistically, the timetable suggested by these words could well extend beyond the 4-5 years of the next Parliament. In this case, the difference between the Labour and LibDem manifestos may be presentational, rather than real. The single market issue will not go away, even if it cannot be settled before another general election at which a proposal to rejoin the single market could be put to the electorate.
Disclaimer:
The opinions expressed in this blog are those of the author alone and do not necessarily represent the opinions of the University of Sussex or UK Trade Policy Observatory.
Republishing guidelines:
The UK Trade Policy Observatory believes in the free flow of information and encourages readers to cite our materials, providing due acknowledgement. For online use, this should be a link to the original resource on our website. We do not publish under a Creative Commons license. This means you CANNOT republish our articles online or in print for free.
Jessie Madrigal-Fletcher June 18th, 2024
Posted In: Uncategorised
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31 May 2017
Compiled by Fellows of the UKTPO
Brexit will leave many areas of UK policy open to change. International trade policy is among the most important of these for UK prosperity and also among the most immediate because the status quo cannot simply be extended. This is the sixth in a series of blogs reporting what the major political parties say about trade policy in their 2017 manifestos, as they become available.
The UK Trade Policy Observatory (UKTPO) has set out a series of issues that it believes should be considered in any election manifesto that might form the basis of the UK’s future trade policy. The table below checks whether or not the SNP Manifesto mentions these important elements explicitly or implicitly. Following that, we offer a brief commentary on the treatment of trade policy in the manifesto. (more…)
Charlotte Humma May 31st, 2017
Posted In: UK - Non EU, UK- EU
Tags: ethical trade, Manifesto, Negotiations, Single Market, SNP, transparency
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26 May 2017
Compiled by Fellows of the UKTPO
Brexit will leave many areas of UK policy open to change. International trade policy is among the most important of these for UK prosperity and also among the most immediate because the status quo cannot simply be extended. This is the fifth in a series of blogs reporting what the major political parties say about trade policy in their 2017 manifestos, as they become available.
The UK Trade Policy Observatory (UKTPO) has set out a series of issues that it believes should be considered in any election manifesto that might form the basis of the UK’s future trade policy. The table below checks whether or not the UKIP Manifesto mentions these important elements explicitly or implicitly. Following that we offer a brief commentary on the treatment of trade policy in the manifesto. (more…)
Tina Perrett May 26th, 2017
Posted In: UK- EU
Tags: Brexit, Customs Union, Exports, FTA, General Election 2017, trade, Trade agreements, UKIP
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24 May 2017
Compiled by Fellows of UKTPO
Brexit will leave many areas of UK policy open to change. International trade policy is among the most important of these for UK prosperity and also among the most immediate because the status quo cannot simply be extended. This is the fourth in a series of blogs reporting what the major political parties say about trade policy in their 2017 manifestos, as they become available.
The UK Trade Policy Observatory (UKTPO) has set out a series of issues that it believes should be considered in any election manifesto that might form the basis of the UK’s future trade policy. The table below checks whether or not the Green Party Manifesto mentions these important elements explicitly or implicitly. Following that we offer a brief commentary on the treatment of trade policy in the manifesto.
A central aim of the Green Party is for the UK to remain in the EU, or at least in the single market. The former implies no change to current trade policies and hence little need to discuss them in the manifesto. Thus their coverage of trade policy beyond that with the EU is restricted to human rights and social and environmental conditions.
Katherine Davies May 24th, 2017
Posted In: UK - Non EU, UK- EU
Tags: Article 50, Brexit, Employment, Environment, freedom of movement, Green Party, human rights, Manifestos, Negotiations, Single Market
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19 May 2017
Compiled by Fellows of UKTPO
Brexit will leave many areas of UK policy open to change. International trade policy is among the most important of these for UK prosperity and also among the most immediate because the status quo cannot simply be extended. This is the third in a series of blogs reporting what the major political parties say about trade policy in their 2017 manifestos, as they become available.
The UK Trade Policy Observatory (UKTPO) has set out a series of issues that it believes should be considered in any election manifesto that might form the basis of the UK’s future trade policy. The table below checks whether or not the Conservative Manifesto mentions these important elements explicitly or implicitly. Following that we offer a brief commentary on the treatment of trade policy in the manifesto. (more…)
Charlotte Humma May 19th, 2017
Posted In: UK - Non EU, UK- EU
Tags: Article 50, Brexit, Conservatives, Customs Union, FTA, Immigration, Negotiations, Single Market
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18 May 2017
Compiled by Fellows of UKTPO
Brexit will leave many areas of UK policy open to change. International trade policy is among the most important of these for UK prosperity and also among the most immediate because the status quo cannot simply be extended. This is the second in a series of blogs reporting what the major political parties say about trade policy in their 2017 manifestos, as they become available.
The UK Trade Policy Observatory (UKTPO) has set out a series of issues that it believes should be considered in any election manifesto that might form the basis of the UK’s future trade policy. The table below checks whether or not the Liberal Democrats’ Manifesto mentions these important elements explicitly or implicitly. Following that we offer a brief commentary on the treatment of trade policy in the manifesto.
The central plank of the Liberal Democrats’ manifesto is remaining in the single market and the customs union. This implies no change to current trade policies and hence little need to discuss them in the manifesto. Thus their coverage of trade policy is rather sparse. (more…)
Charlotte Humma May 18th, 2017
Posted In: UK - Non EU, UK- EU
Tags: Brexit, Customs Union, FTA, Liberal Democrats, Negotiations, Single Market, tariffs, WTO
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16 May 2017
Compiled by Fellows of UKTPO
Brexit will leave many areas of UK policy open to change. International trade policy is among the most important of these for UK prosperity and also among the most immediate because the status quo cannot simply be extended. This is the first in a series of blogs reporting what the major political parties say about trade policy in their 2017 manifestos, as they become available.
The UK Trade Policy Observatory (UKTPO) has set out a series of issues that it believes should be considered in any election manifesto that might form the basis of the UK’s future trade policy. The table below checks whether or not the Labour Party Manifesto mentions these important elements explicitly or implicitly. Following that we offer a brief commentary on the treatment of trade policy in the manifesto.
Charlotte Humma May 16th, 2017
Posted In: UK - Non EU, UK- EU
Tags: Brexit, Environment, FTA, Labour, Manifesto, MRAs, social, Tarriff-free trade, Trade agreements, Transitional period, WTO
3 July 2024
Tom Arnold is a Researcher at the Heseltine Institute for Public Policy, Practice and Place at the University of Liverpool; Patrick Holden is a Reader in International Relations at the University of Plymouth; Peter Holmes is a Fellow of the UK Trade Policy Observatory and Emeritus Reader in Economics at the University of Sussex Business School; and Ioannis Papadakis is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Inclusive Trade based at the University of Sussex.
Freeports have been a central part of the UK Government’s regional development policy over the last five years. The 2019 Conservative Party manifesto pledged to create “up to ten Freeports around the UK”,[1] emphasising their potential to create new jobs and additional income streams for local government. They were also promoted as key to improving the UK’s international trade prospects following its exit from the European Union. UK government has specified three economic objectives for Freeports: to establish them as hubs for global trade and investment; to promote regeneration and job creation; and to create hotbeds for innovation.[2]
Despite this, Freeports have not featured strongly in the current general election campaign. The 2024 Conservative manifesto includes a promise to “create more Freeports and Business Rates Retention zones”, emphasising their potential to create new jobs and provide additional income streams to local government.[3] While the opposition Labour Party pledges to develop Local Growth Plans aligned to national industrial strategy, there is no mention of Freeports.
The UK Freeport programme looks likely to continue in some form, regardless of the outcome of the election. The 2023 Autumn Statement extended tax relief funding for English Freeports from 2026 to 2031, meaning Freeport operators and occupiers will benefit from reliefs on stamp duty, business rates and employer national insurance until this ‘sunset date’. Nevertheless, several concerns will need to be addressed by the next government. This piece sets out the key issues for Freeports over the coming months and years, and suggestions for improving on the current model.
In April 2024, the House of Commons Business and Trade Committee published the findings of its inquiry into the performance of Freeports and investment zones in England, to which some authors of this article contributed evidence.[4] The report summarises the benefits and limitations of the UK Freeport model, highlighting evidence which suggests:
Despite these concerns, we argue that the UK Freeport experiment should not be abandoned, but may need modification. Given the limitations of the customs benefits associated with Freeports, the government should focus on the role they can play as part of an active, place-based industrial strategy. While Freeports have been portrayed as a central element of the government’s ‘Levelling Up’ regional development policy, the relationship with broader government objectives on key national issues such as net zero is unclear.
This confusion is partly a result of the dual purpose of the current UK Freeport model, which aims to both boost international trade and operate as traditional Special Economic Zones with a focus on attracting jobs and regenerating ‘left behind’ places. Aligning Freeports more closely with national policy targets and providing greater certainty about the purpose of regional policy could help to clarify their purpose. This could be particularly significant in places which continue to face acute socio-economic problems following the mass decline of industry in the second half of the 20th century.
To achieve this, we highlight five areas for improvement in the current government’s strategy for Freeports.
Align with other special economic zones. In addition to Freeports, there are two other main special economic zone (SEZ) programmes currently operational in the UK: Investment Zones (introduced in 2023, with 13 across the UK); and Enterprise Zones (introduced in 2011 and expanded in 2016, with 48 across England only). The presence of three different types of SEZ presents complexities for local government in attracting investment and developing industrial strategy, particularly in areas where all three are present (such as Liverpool City Region). As part of a broader industrial strategy, the government should be clear about the purpose of each SEZ and where possible align governance of SEZs under a single accountable body (such as a Mayoral Combined Authority. Where appropriate SEZs could be merged to create clusters with complementary activities – comprising universities, ports and dynamic SMEs. There is particular potential to align Freeport activity with national and local objectives to achieve net zero carbon emissions, particularly through decarbonisation of freight transport.
Assess the value of customs benefits. The government should review whether customs reliefs are worth retaining or should be wound down to save money and time for local authorities and to allow more focus on the place-based industrial policy elements of the programme. Policies and funding could be focused more narrowly on other Freeport priorities such as improving infrastructure and upskilling local workers. The UK Freeport model should be understood more accurately as a type of SEZ rather than a focus on international trade.
Enhance governance. The Business and Trade Committee report recommends that accountability for Freeports should be held by a single leader, in the form of an elected ‘metro mayor’. This can offer clarity for businesses, the public and other stakeholders. However, only three English Freeports are currently located in areas with a mayoral combined authority (East Midlands, Liverpool City Region and Teesside). For Freeports without an elected mayor, it is less clear who the single accountable figure should be, but local authority leaders may be most appropriate for this role. While Freeports should be enabled to exercise flexibility in shaping policies to align with local aims and objectives, the UK government should retain overall scrutiny of the Freeport programme in England.
Improve transparency. While fears about the disconnection of UK Freeports from democratic accountability are exaggerated, public concern is understandable given the shortage of publicly available information about their geographies and powers. Efforts should be made to ensure all Freeport bodies publish clear, accessible and easy to digest information about site locations, governance arrangements and mechanisms for allocating retained business rates.[10] Making this information publicly available will facilitate learning about the effectiveness of UK Freeports.
Improve evaluation. The government should work with Freeports to develop metrics tracking benefits to businesses, the effectiveness of Freeport policies, and the costs and benefits of tax reliefs. The current Freeport programme has a strong monitoring and evaluation system in place at the national level, but there are challenges in the provision of local data and developing sound counterfactuals.
While Freeports have not featured strongly in the 2024 general election campaign, the issues the current UK Government purports that they resolve – particularly improving economic prospects in ‘left behind’ places – will remain central to the success of the next government. We suggest not throwing the baby out with the bathwater but reassessing the UK Freeport model as part of a broader place-based industrial strategy, including due scepticism regarding the trade effects.
[1] Conservative Party manifesto (2019) https://assets-global.website-files.com/5da42e2cae7ebd3f8bde353c/5dda924905da587992a064ba_Conservative%202019%20Manifesto.pdf (p.57)
[2] HM Treasury (2020) Freeports: bidding prospectus. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/935493/Freeports_Bidding_Prospectus_web_final.pdf
[3] Conservative Party manifesto (2024) https://public.conservatives.com/static/documents/GE2024/Conservative-Manifesto-GE2024.pdf
[4] House of Commons Business and Trade Committee (2024) Performance of investment zones and freeport in England. https://committees.parliament.uk/publications/44455/documents/221158/default/
[5] Peter Holmes and Guillermo Larbalestier (2021) Two key things to know about Freeports. https://blogs.sussex.ac.uk/uktpo/2021/02/25/two-key-things-to-know-about-Freeports/
[6] Peter Holmes, Anna Jerzewska and Gullermo Larbalestier (2022) ‘Exporting from UK Freeports: Duty Drawback, Origin and Subsidies.’ UKTPO Briefing Paper 69. https://blogs.sussex.ac.uk/uktpo/files/2022/09/BP-69-Freeports-FINAL-28.09.22.pdf
[7] House of Commons Business and Trade Committee (2024)
[8] Business and Trade Committee (2023) Oral evidence: the performance of investment zones and Freeports in England. https://committees.parliament.uk/oralevidence/13744/html/ (Q9)
[9] Tees Valley Review (2024) https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65ba58ec3be8ad0010a081a9/Tees_Valley_Review_Report.pdf
[10] Nichola Harmer, Patrick Holden and Guillermo Larbalestier (2023) Written evidence submitted to the Business and Trade Committee inquiry into the performance of investment zones and freeports in England. https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/124415/html/
Additional Information
The authors would like to thank Guillermo Larbalastier for earlier research input and advice. Guillermo is not responsible for any views expressed in this article. The opinions expressed in this blog are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily represent the opinions of the University of Sussex or the UK Trade Policy Observatory.
Republishing guidelines:
The UK Trade Policy Observatory believes in the free flow of information and encourages readers to cite our materials, providing due acknowledgement. For online use, this should be a link to the original resource on our website. We do not publish under a Creative Commons license. This means you CANNOT republish our articles online or in print for free.
Charlotte Humma July 3rd, 2024
Posted In: Uncategorised
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June 25 2024
Sahana Suraj is a UKTPO Research Fellow in International Trade.
With less than two weeks until the United Kingdom elects its 59th parliament, campaigning efforts by contesting political parties intensified with the recent publication of party manifestos.[1] The UK is the fourth largest exporter of goods and services, so it is particularly important to shine light on the next government’s stance for developing a robust trade policy that maximises the benefits of trade consistent with domestic policy objectives.
While clearly there is a degree of overlap, the approaches to trade (policy) by the main parties—Conservatives, Labour, Liberal Democrats, Green Party, Reform UK—can be broadly categorised into three different groups.
One group, consisting of the Labour Party and Liberal Democrats, appears to align trade policy with industrial strategy. Concerned with building a resilient and secure economic future, their proposed course of action aims at capitalising on the UK’s existing economic strengths, including in services trade. This approach entails a focus on the depth and quality of agreements, forging strategic partnerships to create a pro-business and pro-innovation environment, and making trade more accessible.
This orientation to trade policy can be characterised as going beyond a conventional focus on Free Trade Agreements (FTAs). Labour, for instance, also recognises the importance of Mutual Recognition Agreements (MRAs) and standalone agreements to promote services trade and digital trade. Agreements of this nature can have strong trade promotion effects and can be effective in reducing non-tariff barriers to trade. The Liberal Democrats have stressed the importance of human rights, labour rights, and environmental standards while negotiating trade deals. This indicates their commitment to using trade policy to achieve benefits in other areas of public policy. They propose renegotiating existing trade agreements with Australia and New Zealand to achieve more favourable outcomes for the UK in health, the environment, and in animal welfare.
Both parties are focused on promoting deeper cooperation in trade policy by expanding markets for British exporters and deepening trade partnerships. Labour also endorse the ongoing FTA negotiations with India and are open to negotiating agreements with the United States and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Moreover, they recognise the importance of African economies and multilateral institutions such as the World Trade Organisation (WTO).
Another group consists of manifestos whose approach to trade policy derives from their commitment to sovereignty above all. This includes the Conservatives and to a lesser extent Reform UK. They focus on the imperative for the UK to independently dictate its course on all trade policy matters, as well as protecting the UK’s internal market. The Conservatives propose heavy reliance on FTAs to extend ties to Switzerland, the Middle East (GCC, Israel), Asia (India, South Korea, Vietnam, Singapore, Indonesia) and the United States, the rationale being an expansion of trading relationships post-Brexit. The aim of these agreements is largely to increase cooperation in trade, technology, and defence that will eventually allow the UK to become the largest defence exporter in Europe by 2030. These strategies exemplify their strong emphasis on linking trade policy with economic security.
As part of the focus on sovereignty, the Conservatives and Reform UK both assign importance to agriculture. Ending UK quotas for EU fishers, creating opportunities for the domestic food and drink industry, and recognising the importance of farmers while negotiating FTAs are issues raised by the parties. There are also detailed plans to promote intra-UK trade. While Reform UK proposes a rather radical approach by abandoning the Windsor Framework, the Conservatives recommend the establishment of an Intertrade body to promote Scottish exports and partnerships with British Overseas Territories.
Lastly, the Green Party’s stance on trade policy incorporates elements found in the preceding two groups with policies that encourage trade agreements to take account of worker’s rights, consumer rights, animal protection, and environmental standards, and a traditional focus on agriculture. They advocate the ending of what the party perceives as unfair deals related to food and agriculture and rather place emphasis on encouraging domestic food production.
The question of the UK’s future relations with Europe is arguably of central importance from a trade perspective. On this aspect, the parties exhibit much greater divergence between each other, than their general stance on trade. Each of the parties proposes varying levels of engagement with the European Union as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Level of closeness to the EU as proposed by the parties’ manifestos.
Both main parties—the Conservatives and Labour—are against Britain’s return to the European Union. However, they differ on future trade relations with Europe. Labour advocates closer ties with the EU and wants to take advantage of Britain’s geographical proximity to the region. It intends to negotiate a mutual recognition agreement with European counterparts on professional qualifications and services exports. Labour is also in agreement with the EU’s approach to transition to Net Zero by adopting a Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), and they aim at negotiating a veterinary agreement with the EU to reduce the burden of border checks.
In contrast, the Conservatives place legal sovereignty above other interests and accept a gradually growing regulatory distance from the EU as a result. They are keen to repeal EU laws that have been transposed into UK law since Brexit and ensure that the EU’s commitments are met under the Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA). They intend to dub the UK as the largest net exporter of electricity and implement a new carbon import pricing mechanism by 2027.
The position towards the EU of the other parties—Green, Reform, and Liberal Democrats—fall at either end of the spectrum. While Reform staunchly advocates for a complete renegotiation of the TCA and seeks to distance themselves completely from Europe, the Green Party and Liberal Democrats propose an eventual re-integration into the European Union. The Liberal Democrats especially want to align the UK’s and EU’s Emissions Trading System (ETS) and also align the UK’s food standards with that of Europe.
From the outset, trade policy does seem to be on the agenda of contesting parties, albeit still considered in conjunction with Brexit. That being said, there is a significant degree of uncertainty attached to the UK’s future trade policy, as the main parties present starkly opposite proposals on EU relations. And yet, the UK is an open economy that relies on international trade for economic prosperity and jobs. Therefore, the next government’s approach to trade policy and trade governance will matter a great deal, and the more clarity voters have over the parties’ intentions, the better.
[1] Party manifestos can be accessed by visiting the following links:
Disclaimer:
The opinions expressed in this blog are those of the author alone and do not necessarily represent the opinions of the University of Sussex or UK Trade Policy Observatory.
Republishing guidelines:
The UK Trade Policy Observatory believes in the free flow of information and encourages readers to cite our materials, providing due acknowledgement. For online use, this should be a link to the original resource on our website. We do not publish under a Creative Commons license. This means you CANNOT republish our articles online or in print for free.
Jessie Madrigal-Fletcher June 25th, 2024
Posted In: Uncategorised
Briefing Paper 81 – June 2024
Michael Gasiorek, Justyna A. Robinson, Rhys Sandow
Results of responses to the LPF questions
Policy formulation is complex. To some extent this is because most policy options are complicated, but also because politicians need to consider how the policies will land with their voters. Increasingly, too, there is pressure in the making of policies to ensure that there is ‘appropriate consultation’ particularly with those who may be affected by the policy. In turn, how to do and use consultative processes is not straightforward. To put it simply: hypothetically you could ask 100 people their views on a topic, get 100 different responses, choose the responses you wanted in the first place, and then claim that you undertook appropriate consultation. You could also get five very long detailed responses, and 95 short one-sentence responses, so there needs to be a way to balance such variety.
In this Briefing Paper we assess the views expressed by those who responded to the Labour Party’s 2023 national consultation on UK trade policy. Given the forthcoming general election such an analysis is very timely. To date, and with the general election just over four weeks away, there has been a disappointing amount of discussion by the main political parties on international trade and trade policy. In fact, there has been no discussion other than in the recently released manifestos, and this is interesting. Focussing on the two main parties, clearly both the Conservative and the Labour party have a range of views on trade. This can be seen in their current manifestos[1] and in those from the 2019 election campaign. In 2019, the Conservatives talked about negotiating a free trade agreement with the EU, freeports, and the aim for 80% of UK trade to be covered by free trade agreements within three years. Labour talked about a better Brexit deal and closer alignment with the EU, and the importance of trade deals upholding standards regarding the climate, environment, food and agriculture, as well as labour standards. In the Labour Party recently released manifesto we again see discussion of a closer relationship with the EU, a desire for ‘targeted’ new free trade agreements, and stand-alone sectoral deals, a role for multilateral cooperation and the promotion of high food standards.
In 2023 the Labour Party engaged in a National Policy Forum consultation on a range of themes which were open both to Labour party members and the general public[2]. The aim of the Forum was to collate views to inform the formation of Labour Party policy. One of the themes focused on “Britain in the World”, and within that, there were specifically seven questions concerning international trade. These were:
In this Briefing Paper, we analyse the responses to the Labour Party’s 2023 National Policy Forum consultation on what was called ‘progressive trade policy’. In addition to the difficulties outlined earlier regarding the use of consultative processes, it is also necessary to decide how to undertake the analysis of the responses received. Advances in computational techniques increasingly allow for more sophisticated analyses of texts than was previously possible. In this briefing paper, we use corpus linguistic techniques (McEnery & Hardie 2011; Kilgarriff et al. 2014) together with close reading to analyse the responses. There were 302 written responses to the Labour Policy Forum (hereafter, LPF), split between Labour Party members and non-members, such as businesses or charities, totalling 244,894 words. We identify the key themes within the responses both overall and in relation to each of the seven questions that the respondents were asked.
First, in Section 2, we present the overview of the themes that stand out across the entire set of responses; before outlining the key issues respondents raised in relation to each of the seven questions in Section 2. In the final section we reflect on the interface between these responses and the Labour Party 2024 manifesto.
In this section we provide an overview of the key themes captured across all of the responses to the LPF. First, and to assess what the respondents thought regarding overall priorities, we identify which activities/outcomes they think should be either promoted or reduced. In practise, we contrast the types of grammatical objects the verbs to promote and to reduce take. Figure 1 presents objects of verbs to promote and to reduce according to the typicality score[3]of each collocation.[4] The further a word is to the left of the figure, the stronger its collocation with to reduce, while greater proximity to the right demonstrates a stronger collocation with to promote. Hence, we see that respondents feel principally that trade policy should aim to reduce inequality, poverty and emissions, while it should promote economic growth, rights, and values.
Figure 1: Objects of verbs to promote and to reduce in LPF responses.
The analysis also includes less frequent terms that did not meet the frequency threshold for the figure, but nonetheless speak to themes in the responses. In the lists below we consider other emerging issues. One the one hand, respondents wish trade policy to promote the following areas, i.e.
On the other hand, respondents wish trade policy to reduce problems associated with the following areas, i.e.
Another approach to identifying key concerns, is to compare the frequency of words/terms used in the responses relative to a baseline measure.[5] Hence, in Table 1 we see that environmental appears top of the list – this is because that word (including variants) appeared more significantly in the consultation responses than would be expected from its use in the baseline. We identified 300 most distinctive words and phrases (measured by something called the LogDice score), relative to the baseline. We then order the results on the Average Reduced Frequency (ARF). The ARF is a measure which essentially rebalances the frequency by considering how many documents the term appears in, and how often it may appear in a single document[6]. This ensures the data is not skewed by a small number of responses that frequently use particular words/phrases. For completeness, we also present the data for the raw frequency and the frequency of documents in which the word/phrase occurs (DOCF).
Tables 1 and 2 present the top 20 words and phrases, respectively, that are used both frequently and widely in the responses to the LPF, and which help us identify the most salient themes in the data[7].
Table 1: The top 20 most common words in the 2023 Labour Policy Forum responses, in relation to a baseline
|
Rank |
Item |
Frequency |
DOCF |
ARF |
|
1 |
environmental |
452 |
97 |
175.4 |
|
2 |
EU |
494 |
118 |
175.0 |
|
3 |
chain |
445 |
84 |
162.8 |
|
4 |
climate |
406 |
81 |
143.7 |
|
5 |
sustainable |
224 |
66 |
96.0 |
|
6 |
consultation |
132 |
72 |
66.4 |
|
7 |
poverty |
153 |
46 |
54.6 |
|
8 |
rights |
138 |
32 |
42.1 |
|
9 |
Brexit |
99 |
58 |
41.8 |
|
10 |
transparency |
91 |
38 |
39.9 |
|
11 |
inequality |
106 |
37 |
38.6 |
|
12 |
resilience |
103 |
38 |
38.3 |
|
13 |
devolve |
88 |
34 |
31.5 |
|
14 |
diligence |
144 |
17 |
28.7 |
|
15 |
ftas |
92 |
24 |
28.1 |
|
16 |
wto |
85 |
25 |
27.5 |
|
17 |
multilateral |
56 |
28 |
27.4 |
|
18 |
scrutiny |
61 |
27 |
24.8 |
|
19 |
fossil |
111 |
21 |
23.8 |
|
20 |
Equitable |
37 |
20 |
16.9 |
Table 2: The top 20 most common phrases in the 2023 Labour Policy Forum responses, in relation to a baseline
|
Rank |
Item |
Frequency |
DOCF |
ARF |
|
1 |
human right |
605 |
84 |
184.8 |
|
2 |
supply chain |
357 |
80 |
132.4 |
|
3 |
trade agreement |
236 |
58 |
87.2 |
|
4 |
trade deal |
185 |
58 |
69.1 |
|
5 |
economic growth |
84 |
47 |
41.3 |
|
6 |
international development |
91 |
33 |
34.8 |
|
7 |
due diligence |
142 |
17 |
28.4 |
|
8 |
workers” right |
61 |
30 |
27.9 |
|
9 |
developing country |
68 |
27 |
27.5 |
|
10 |
environmental standard |
64 |
30 |
24.8 |
|
11 |
net zero |
51 |
30 |
24.5 |
|
12 |
global supply chain |
40 |
24 |
23.1 |
|
13 |
fossil fuel |
108 |
19 |
21.6 |
|
14 |
value chain |
64 |
18 |
20.8 |
|
15 |
development goal |
40 |
22 |
19.3 |
|
16 |
environmental protection |
36 |
26 |
18.6 |
|
17 |
free trade |
40 |
20 |
18.4 |
|
18 |
trade strategy |
43 |
16 |
15.7 |
|
19 |
animal welfare |
54 |
18 |
15.2 |
|
20 |
impact assessment |
40 |
15 |
15.1 |
Clearly, some of the terms in Tables 1 and 2 are a function of the wording of the seven questions in the LPF (e.g. resilience and to devolve), others speak to the key issues that the respondents raise in their responses. There are five key themes which emerge. These are concerned with the following areas WELFARE AND RIGHTS, THE ENVIRONMENT, SUPPLY CHAINS, (FREE) TRADE AGREEMENTS, and the PROCESSES underpinning the negotiation of trade deals. The theme of WELFARE AND RIGHTS is evident through human rights, animal welfare, workers’ right, and rights. Terms environmental standard, net zero, environmental protection, environmental, climate, and fossil illustrate the ENVIRONMENT theme. The theme of SUPPLY CHAINS is evident through terms global supply chain, value chains, chain, sustainable, and resilience. The theme of (FREE) TRADE AGREEMENTS is exemplified by terms trade agreement, trade deal, free trade, EU, Brexit, and ftas [free trade agreements]. Lastly, the terms impact assessment, consultation, transparency, to devolve, and scrutiny speak to the theme of processes of trade deals.
We discuss SUPPLY CHAINS in the overview of Question 3, which addresses this topic specifically. Likewise, we consider WELFARE AND RIGHTS specifically in our analysis of Question 4. We also discuss PROCESSES of trade deals with reference to Questions 2 and 7. In the current section, we consider the way in which LPF respondents conceptualise the issues of (FREE) TRADE AGREEMENTS and the ENVIRONMENT.
The attitudes to the theme of (FREE) TRADE AGREEMENTS are identifiable by analysing the words which co-occur with words in that theme, such as EU, which is the UK’s most significant free trade agreement. Consistent with the dictum of John Firth, ‘you shall know a word by the company it keeps’, an analysis of the words that co-occur with EU can provide an insight into respondents’ conceptualisation of the EU and, in this context, and its relevance to recommendations for the direction of Labour’s trade policy. Figure 32 presents actions associated with the EU (top of Figure 2) and actions done towards the EU (bottom of Figure 2). This is achieved through extracting verbs that co-occur with the term EU functioning as a subject (e.g. ‘The value of food exports to the EU reportedly dropped by £2.4bn in the first 15 months after Brexit) and an object (e.g. Rejoining the EU is the only way to drag ourselves out of this mess).
When interpreting visualisations such as in Figure 2, the different colours correspond to the different grammatical relations with the target word, the size of the text represents the raw frequency of the times the word co-occurs with the target word, and the closer the position to the centre of the circle, the stronger the association between that word and the target word.[8] Some words, such as have and be in Figure 2, are very frequent and thus occur within the context of EU often, but as they occur with EU little more than they occur with any given noun, the strength of association is low, hence they appear towards the perimeter of Figure 2.
Close reading of data from Figure 2 data reveals conceptualisation of the EU held by LPF respondents. Contexts of the word drop refer to the value of exports to the EU decreasing, and the uses of implement refer to recommendations for the Labour party to adopt existing EU legislation. Some uses of rejoin/re-join advocate for rejoining the EU, while others stop short of full membership but do argue for closer alignment.
Figure 2: Verbs used with the term EU.
Clearer attitudes towards Britain’s exit from the EU are evident through verbs used alongside Brexit (see Figure 3). LPF respondents conceptualise Brexit as damaging, harming, and shrinking. These examples highlight a belief that the economic effects of Brexit are adverse. A desire to align more closely with the EU is also clear through verbs to undo, to reopen, and to remove. While the use of the verb to support may seem to suggest a positive framing of Brexit, close reading of the examples such as ‘young people did not support Brexit’ adds to the general negative sentiment regarding Brexit. Within the LPF responses, Brexit is also described as a bonfire and a barrier.
Figure 3: Verbs used with the term Brexit.
While environmental protection and net zero are foregrounded in the wording of Question 5 to the LPF, the theme of the ENVIRONMENT is discussed well beyond the specific answers to this question (for example, see the analysis of Questions 1, 2 and 3 and see Figures 5-7). The key message regarding the ENVIRONMENT is the desire for trade deals to facilitate sustainability by minimising climate change. In particular, the term climate is used 406 times in the data across 81 documents (see Table 1). Respondents’ sentiment towards climate emerges from the of the typical nouns which are modified by the term climate, see Figure 4. Climate change is considered an urgent and pressing issue. This is evident through the co-occurrences with crisis, emergency, disaster, breakdown, and imperative. Ambition, obligation, commitment, goal, and objective also speak to the ways in which trade deals are considered a mechanism through which to initiate climate action.
Figure 4: Nouns modified by the term climate.
In this section we present findings the specific responses to the seven questions posed by the 2023 Labour Policy Forum on progressive trade policy. Note that only relatively small percentages of the 302 submissions responded in such a way that made clear distinctions between the questions. For example, some did not address some or all of the questions in any way. Others collated their general thoughts relating to some or all the questions into a singular narrative.
26 submissions directly answered the question. The responses to this question are categorised into the response types shown in Figure 5. Note that some submissions contained multiple suggestions. Figure 5 shows that as well as the role of trade deals in the context of boosting jobs and promoting growth, the importance of environmental standards is regularly mentioned, as well as a range of other qualifications, such as job security, food standard, economic security, that appear in fewer responses. This suggests that while jobs and growth seem important, respondents would like other factors to be considered.
Figure 5: The suggestions provided in relation to Question 1.
30 documents responded directly to this question. An overview of the responses can be seen in Figure 6. The clear message emerging from this is that regional and devolved government should be involved in the making of trade policy to a greater extent, that transport infrastructure should be strengthened, and that ties with the EU should be developed. There is also a range of specific suggestions including the role of communications or green infrastructure, investment assistance or regional support for SMEs.
Figure 6: The suggestions provided in response to Question 2.
The key themes in these responses (29 in total) are expressed in Figure 7. Specifically, the most common suggestions are to ensure the security of essential supply chains by more closely aligning with the EU, through protecting the environment, and by increasing domestic production.
Figure 7: The suggestions provided in response to Question 3.
Figure 8 provides an overview of the 30 responses. The most common suggestions are that the promotion of the four areas mentioned in the question can be best addressed by engaging with multilateral/international organisations, restricting the UK’s involvement in the arms trade, and developing Overseas Development Aid.
Figure 8: The suggestions provided in response to Question 4.
Beyond the specific answers to Question 4, one of the ways in which the relative salience of the four topics mentioned in the question can be determined is by identifying the frequency of documents containing these terms (when the use of these words in the questions has been removed from the data, see Table 3).
Table 3: The frequency of documents containing the four topics in Question 4
|
Term |
DOCF |
|
human rights |
92 |
|
workers’ rights[9] |
40 |
|
fair trade |
19 |
|
global peace and security |
10 |
Table 3 shows that human rights is the most pressing of the four issues mentioned in Question 4. We identify the role that human rights play for LPF respondents, through the verbs that are used before the phrase (see Figure 9). The importance of human rights broadly speaks to the need for trade deals to promote them. This is highlighted through the co-occurrence of human rights with the verbs to respect, to defend, to prioritise, to address, to promote, to champion, to enhance, and to protect. Another role of trade deals lies in managing human rights, such as to mandate, to ensure, to monitor, and to assess.
Figure 9: Verbs used with the term human rights.
An overview of the 27 responses can be found in Figure 10. LPF respondents suggest that binding commitments to the environment should be embedded in trade deals, that international cooperation is imperative, and that the green economy should be further incentivised.
Figure 10: The suggestions provided in response to Question 5.
This question was directly engaged with by the fewest (7) respondents. Within these responses, three suggested that commitments to inclusivity be enshrined in trade agreements. Only one response provided a clear suggestion for how to better support groups protected by the 2010 Equality Act. They suggest cultivating an environment that supports business founders from groups with protected characteristics.
This question was directly answered by 17 submissions. An overview of the response to Question 7 is presented in Figure 11. As a result of the low response rate for this question, there are fewer clear themes. Most notably, it is suggested that devolved governments should be consulted more.
Figure 11: The suggestions provided in response to Question 7.
The Labour Party’s 2023 National Policy Forum on progressive trade generated a range of recommendations for the direction of Labour’s trade policy. There are views on broad policy stances, such as aligning more closely with the EU; overlapping with procedural and administrative recommendations, such as working more closely with the devolved administrations, as well as with international partners and multilateral fora. There are also economic considerations put forward, centring around economic growth, and job boosting and reducing poverty and inequality. In addition to these broader objectives there are also a variety of ‘trade and…’ recommendations that speak to the ways in which trade deals can be a mechanism by which further goals can be met. For example, these relate to the role of trade with regard to the climate, environmental and food standards, supply chain resilience and economic security, job security and workers’ rights, and human rights, as well as support for international development. It is worth noting that in these responses there is little sense of the trade-offs that may by involved across the policy choices. For example, raising food standards is likely to increase costs and prices, which may impact on poverty and inequality.
Given these responses it is interesting to see the extent to which they are reflected in the Labour Party election manifesto recently released (13th June 2024). From the manifesto we see that international trade is explicitly mentioned 16 times in the document. Analogously to the analysis in Tables 1 and 2, the frequency with which trade appears is four times higher than would be expected in normal usage, i.e.in comparison to the baseline data set. Similarly,[10] the use of free trade agreements and the EU appears in the manifesto with a higher relative frequency than the baseline. The explicit discussion of trade is to be welcomed, but overall, the space devoted to trade is not very extensive.
It is clear from the manifesto that some of the key issues identified in the consultation documents do form part of the proposed policy agenda should the Labour Party be successful in the general election. We can see this regarding the commitments to greater representation and involvement of the devolved administrations in trade negotiations, in the desire for closer relations with the EU, and in the recognition of the overall importance of trade for UK economic growth, and regarding maintaining food standards. However, we note that there is no explicit discussion or linkage of trade and trade policy to the range of additional ‘trade and…’ recommendations that were in the consultation process – be this, for example, regarding environmental standards, human rights or economic security. This is not to say that concerns about the environment, rights, security are absent from the rest of manifesto. Indeed, the reverse is the case. It is the link with trade and trade policy which is absent.
We do see in the manifesto an explicit commitment to a statutory ‘Industrial Strategy Council’ and to the publication of a trade strategy, which is to be aligned with the industrial strategy. This is also to be welcomed because such initiatives are (hopefully) more likely to lead to greater transparency and stability in domestic policy and trade policy and thus more likely to result in productive investment and economic growth. Of course, whether or not policies consistent with the preceding are introduced will ultimately depend on the outcome of the election, and the subsequent decisions taken – by whoever is the next government.
Overall, our assessment[11] is that the recently released Labour Party manifesto is consistent with the 2023 Labour National Policy Forum consultation in some of the direct trade related commitments made, and potentially implicitly consistent regarding some of the ‘trade and…’ issues. However, the extent of this will depend on the promised trade strategy should the Labour Party be elected.
All this suggests that perhaps, consultative process can be genuinely useful and inform policy making.
[1] https://labour.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Labour-Party-manifesto-2024.pdf ; and https://public.conservatives.com/static/documents/GE2024/Conservative-Manifesto-GE2024.pdf
[2] https://policyforum.labour.org.uk/commissions
[3] Typicality score measured by LogDice, indicates the strength of the collocation. The higher the score, the stronger the collocation.
[4] Collocation is a pair of terms which co-occur more often than would be expected by chance.
[5] We use the Ententen21 corpus, which is a collection of more than 52 billion words scraped from the web between October 2021-January 2022. The corpus is available via SketchEngine.
[6] See Savický & Hlavácová (2002).
[7] We also remove self-evident words and phrases, such as UK, trade, and Labour Party which, given the nature of the LPF, do not provide insight into respondents’ beliefs or wishes regarding trade policy.
[8] The left/right and up/down dimensions (within each grammatical category) are not meaningful.
[9] This includes 31 responses with an apostrophe and nine without the apostrophe.
[10] Interestingly the relative frequency of all of these three terms is higher in the Conservative Party 2024 manifesto, than that of the Labour party. However, any detailed discussion of this finding is beyond the scope of this Briefing Paper.
[11] References used in this Briefing Paper include: Kilgarriff, Adam., Vít Baisa, Jan Bušta, Miloš Jakubíček, Vojtěch Kovář, Jan Michelfeit, Pavel Rychlý, Vít Suchomel. (2014). The Sketch Engine: Ten years on. Lexicography, 1 (1), 7-36.
Labour Party Manifesto. (2024). Available via https://labour.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Labour-Party-manifesto-2024.pdf. Accessed 13th June 2024.
Conservative Party Manifesto. (2024). Available via https://public.conservatives.com/static/documents/GE2024/Conservative-Manifesto-GE2024.pdf. Accessed 13th June 2024.
McEnery, Tony. & Andrew Hardie. (2011). Corpus Linguistics: Method, Theory and Practice. Cambridge University Press.
Neame, Katie (2023) “Revealed: Full final policy platform set to shape next Labour manifesto”. Labourlist. Published 5th October 2023. Available via https://labourlist.org/2023/10/labour-national-policy-forum-final-document-summary-policy-manifesto-party-conference/#six
Savický, Petr. & Jaroslava Hlavácová. (2002). Measures of word commonness. Journal of Quantitative Linguistics, 9 (3), 215-231.
SketchEngine. Available via http://www.sketchengine.eu/
Jessie Madrigal-Fletcher June 14th, 2024
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