Trade Remedy Measures: UK Interests

Debate between Andrew Murrison and Liam Fox

Monday 25th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Dr Fox]

It is impossible to give a date. The right hon. Gentleman’s colleagues in the other place, who have been so holding up the Trade Bill, have more effect on the date than I do. He might want to have a word with them.

[Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his statement. Its value for both business and consumers is plain. Does he agree that it underpins the importance of ensuring that we do not have a forever customs union of the sort that has been highlighted as a very bad thing, inter alia, by the Leader of the Opposition?

[Dr Fox]

Were we to have a customs union, we would forever have to apply to the UK the trade remedies decided by the European Union, which might apply remedies to areas where there is no production in the United Kingdom, carrying a cost for our consumers but no benefit to our producers. That would seem to me to be one of the strongest arguments for leaving in the first place.

Trade Policy

Debate between Andrew Murrison and Liam Fox

Monday 16th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his statement. What reassurance is he able to offer those who say that the inclusion of agri-food in the common rulebook is a sop to farmers in southern Europe and a snub to potential partners in places such as north Africa and Latin America?

[Dr Fox]

One of the most recent comments I have read is that this would stop Britain being able to import food of a standard that we do not currently find acceptable. I have said at the Dispatch Box many times that the Government have no interest whatsoever in reducing the quality of the food that we have in the United Kingdom nor the standards by which it is produced. In any case, if we reduced our standards, that would undermine the reputation of the goods that we sell abroad. It is because of our high standards that, according to Barclays, 57% of Chinese consumers, for example, are willing to pay more for goods made or produced in the UK.