The UK’s trade deals with Australia and New Zealand came into force at midnight, with special shipments of British goods such as signed Beano comics among the first to be sent under the new arrangements.
The agreements are the first trade deals negotiated post-Brexit to enter into force and come after the UK, Australia and New Zealand completed their domestic ratification processes.
Under the deals’ terms, from Wednesday tariffs on all UK goods exports to Australia and New Zealand will be removed, access to these markets for services unlocked and red tape slashed for digital trade and work visas.
Business and Trade Secretary Kemi Badenoch said: “Today is a historic moment as our first trade deals to be negotiated post-Brexit come into effect.
“Businesses up and down the country will now be able to reap the rewards of our status as an independent trading nation and seize new opportunities, driving economic growth, innovation and higher wages.”
But there are big question marks over whether the deals will actually benefit Britain in any way.
Late last year, former environment secretary George Eustice said Britain’s flagship post-Brexit trade agreement with Australia “does not represent good value for the British public” – and he was among the ministers who pushed it through!
In a series of stinging remarks in the Commons, Eustice urged the government to recognise the Department for International Trade’s “failures” while negotiating what it hailed in 2021 as a “historic” deal.
He said that the UK “did not actually need” to give Australia full liberalisation in beef and sheep, and “it was not in our economic interest to do so” – echoing reports of his involvement in a “ferocious row” with Liz Truss over the matter at the time.
Similar concerns over British farming were flagged with the New Zealand trade deal, but they proved to be the least of our concerns in this case.
According to the government’s own statistics, while the deal may boost New Zealand’s GDP by $970 million or around 0.3 per cent, it is likely to add no value to the UK’s gross domestic product – and could actually shrink the UK economy.
Emily Thornberry said: “It is a deal whose only major winners are the mega-corporations who run New Zealand’s meat and dairy farms, all at the expense of British farmers who are already struggling to compete.
“But for British jobs, growth and exports, this deal is yet another massive failure.”
Oh well!
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