7 May 2020
Dr Anna Jerzewska is an independent customs and trade consultant, and Associate Fellow of the UKTPO.
While the world battles the Covid-19 pandemic, the UK Government’s decision not to request an extension to the transition period means that the UK and the EU have only eight months until 31st December 2020 to complete the talks on the future trading relationship. If a trade deal is not agreed by 1 January 2021 the Northern Ireland Protocol will take effect. The Protocol, which forms part of the Withdrawal Agreement, determines how the Irish border will work in the absence of agreement at the end of the transition period. A Joint Committee, a body established within the Withdrawal Agreement, is charged with, amongst other things, deciding how the Protocol will be implemented. The deadline for making these decisions is therefore fast approaching. (more…)
George Meredith May 7th, 2020
Posted In: UK- EU
Tags: border checks, Northern Ireland, tariffs
03 October 2019
L. Alan Winters CB is Professor of Economics and Director of the Observatory.
At last, a chink of clarity. Yesterday’s proposal for the treatment of the Irish economy admits, more or less for the first time officially, that there are trade-offs to Brexit. Suddenly the laws of political physics are restored. You cannot both have your cake and eat it.
The trade-off that has at last dawned on Boris Johnson is that if you want the whole of the UK to choose its own tariffs on goods, a customs border in Ireland is inevitable. And if you want Britain to be able to set its own regulations, then you need a border in the Irish Sea. (more…)
Charlotte Humma October 3rd, 2019
Posted In: UK- EU
Tags: border checks, Boris, Irish border
03 July 2019
L. Alan Winters CB is Professor of Economics and Director of the Observatory.
Last week I was challenged twice for using the term ‘no deal’. There is no such thing, I was told, because, even if the UK does not ratify the Withdrawal Agreement of 25th November 2018, there will still be plenty of deals. At the time I thought, for several reasons, that this was wrong in substance if not literally, but more recently I have concluded that it is also dangerous. Like we saw in the referendum campaign, it undermines informed debate by deliberately confusing the terminology.
‘The deal’ is an agreement between the EU and the UK ‘setting out the arrangements for its withdrawal, taking account of the framework for its future relationship with the Union’ (Article 50 – Treaty on European Union). ‘No deal’ is the absence of such a deal. For business and the economy, ‘no deal’ has come to mean the absence of a trade agreement under which the UK and the EU trade with each other on terms better than those provided for under the World Trade Organization. The former ‘no deal’ implies the latter – as I argue below – but the reverse is not true. (more…)
Charlotte Humma July 3rd, 2019
Posted In: UK- EU
Tags: border checks, Brexit, Customs, international trade, No deal, Tory leadership, withdrawal agreement
17 January 2019
Dr Peter Holmes, Reader in Economics at the University of Sussex, Director of Interanalysis and Fellow of the UK Trade Policy Observatory
Since the Government’s defeat in the House of Commons, there has been a flurry of comments, notably from Steve Baker arguing that Mrs May’s deal can be replaced by some form of Free Trade Agreement.
One must immediately point out that the treaty basis of the Withdrawal Agreement does not include a long-term trade agreement. This can only be negotiated after Brexit. But even if it could be negotiated now, it would not solve the problem of the Irish Border. The UK and the EU in both the Good Friday Agreement and the Dec 2017 joint statement committed themselves not merely to barrier-free trade in goods with no hard border in Ireland, but to the preservation of an All-Island Economy. (more…)
Charlotte Humma January 17th, 2019
Posted In: UK- EU
Tags: border checks, customs checks, Customs Union, Free Trade Agreement, Irish border, Single Market, withdrawal agreement
7 December 2017
Dr Emily Lydgate is a lecturer in Law at the University of Sussex and a fellow of the UK Trade Policy Observatory.
How can the UK uphold its commitment to leaving the EU Single Market and Customs Union while also preserving the invisible intra-Irish border? Leaving aside crucial questions of political feasibility, this post looks at some of the options and their trade and border implications. Notably, there are limits to ‘flexible and creative’ solutions that involve turning a blind eye to customs and regulatory checks solely on the intra-Irish border: trade rules leave little room for such ad hoc approaches. (more…)
Charlotte Humma December 7th, 2017
Posted In: UK- EU
Tags: border checks, Customs Union, Irish border, MFN, Northern Ireland, regulatory alignement, regulatory divergence, Single Market, tariffs, WTO
