CPTPP (International Agreements Committee Report)

Lord Oates Excerpts

Tuesday 1st February 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Oates (LD)]

My Lords, I am pleased to follow the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. I very much welcome the introduction of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter; I am particularly pleased about the emphasis on how our committee can work and properly help to inform the House. It is really important that the Government give us some clarity on that and do not simply reserve it such that they decide what and when they will tell us whenever they feel like it.

I very much agree with the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, that the negotiating objectives are one of the most crucial points in our work in the committee, and for the House as well. By the time an agreement is signed, it is too late. This is the moment where we get to put our views. I hope the Minister will not only listen and respond but take on board some, if not all, of the points—if not mine, perhaps at least those of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley.

I will focus on the climate aspects, but the issue about medicines is critical; it goes back to the role of Parliament in the process. I would much prefer that Parliament, particularly the House of Commons, had to agree the negotiating objectives, because it would be very clear to our negotiating partners what they were. In the absence of that, on an issue as critical as this it is essential that the Government speak clearly and categorically, so that there is no doubt in the minds of our negotiating partners.

As I said, I want to speak principally on the climate-related aspects of the negotiating objectives set out in The UK’s Strategic Approach. I am afraid that the document seems to lack any positive ambition to combat climate change and to protect nature. There are just nine references to climate change in the whole document. Two of those simply state that, as a significant collection of nations, CPTPP has a potentially important role in tackling climate; I am sure that is true. In another reference the Government say that

“the UK will work with partners to support our mutual objectives to tackle climate change”—

I hope that was not in doubt. Another reference says that

“the UK will advocate for clean growth and cooperation in the global fight against climate change”.

Again, there are no details of how and there is no specific reference to the CPTPP. The fifth and sixth references, on page 60, simply state the generalised overall commitment of the Government to their climate change commitments and the statement that

“Climate change is a threat that requires an urgent global response”.


The urgent response is definitely not found in these negotiating objectives. The final references simply refer to the impacts of climate in this regard.

Nowhere—not once in the whole of this 67-page document, as far as I can find out—is there a single concrete negotiating objective. As our report points out at paragraph 140:

“The Negotiating Objectives … do not include any commitments or red lines to ensure that the UK’s right to regulate is maintained in support of climate commitments and environmental standards.”


Nowhere in the document will you find an indication of the overall approach that the UK will take to ensuring that membership of the CPTPP leads not only to regression in our climate ambitions, but actually to some ambition for a net-positive outcome in tackling climate change and driving down carbon emissions. Indeed, far from tackling emissions, the document concedes that UK greenhouse gas emissions will rise as a result of the agreement, according to the impact statement. Even then, the real impact of UK accession on greenhouse gas emissions is of course likely to be in partner countries, not in the UK. Regrettably, The UK’s Strategic Approach cannot give us any useful information about that at all. It says that it is all too complicated, and it may well be. Nevertheless, as the carbon intensity of production in almost all those countries is greater than in the UK, it is likely that any significant increase in trade will result in a significant increase in emissions. We noted, in particular at paragraph 141 of our report, that there is a danger that the CPTPP will incentivise

“greenhouse gas intensive agricultural practices in CPTPP member countries with lower environmental production standards.”

That has the potential to undermine the UK agricultural sector’s commitment to net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2040.

The Department for International Trade needs to step up to the plate here and recognise that UK trade policy has to factor in our climate ambitions, otherwise it will simply end up exporting jobs to countries with higher carbon-intensive production, causing economic damage at home and climate damage abroad. Regrettably, however, the Government seem to lack coherence on climate and trade. BEIS, Defra, the Treasury and the Department for International Trade all seem to be pulling in different directions, and it seems that there is confusion even within the department, between the department and the Board of Trade and within the Board of Trade about what this is all about.

The Board of Trade’s report last July stated:

“Climate change and nature loss are among the most complex issues of our time—they will touch every aspect of life and require all the tools at our disposal to resolve them, including trade tools.”


Yet this document on the strategic approach to one of the most important partnerships that we are likely to form in the coming years, if we go ahead, has nothing at all to say about our ambitions. I really think that the Department for Trade needs to start internalising; if we are serious about the Paris targets and serious about those commitments, they have to be taken into account in our trade negotiations.

Personally, I think we need a few rules about this. First, we could start prioritising trade agreements with countries that are willing to take ambitious steps with us on carbon emissions and wider issues of biodiversity and nature loss. We could insist that all trade agreements that we are prepared to sign up to will have to include zero tariffs and the removal of non-tariff barriers for certified green products and services. We could say that we do not intend to sign any trade agreements unless the overall impact from them can demonstrate a net reduction in greenhouse gas emissions and a net increase in biodiversity.

The challenges we face in reaching the Paris climate targets are already herculean; we cannot go on adding to them, however modest the Government may argue this is. Whatever the scale of the greenhouse gas emission increases arising from accession to the CPTPP, the Australia FTA or any other trade agreement that there turns out to be, they are too much. Trade policy is one of the tools that we have to drive down greenhouse gas emissions and drive up biodiversity. The strategic approach suggests that the Government are unwilling to use that tool. I really hope that the Minister can go back to his department and reinforce how important this aspect of trade policy is.