Trade Bill (First sitting)

Anna McMorrin Excerpts

Committee Debate: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 23rd January 2018 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

May I move on finally to Anna McMorrin, because she has been waiting patiently, for probably the last question?

[Anna McMorrin (Cardiff North) (Lab)]

Q May I ask Nick Ashton-Hart a question? In order to continue with the same access for our companies and the same conditions for supply chains, will not these deals need to be trilateral rather than bilateral, with an aspect of co-operating with the EU?

Nick Ashton-Hart: It depends on the nature of the agreement. If it is a situation where a quota has to be split, then yes. We see this in Geneva now, where the quotas at WTO level are being split up, or even our closest trading partners are arguing over whether one plus one equals one. In other areas, it is not necessarily the case. It really depends on the way the original agreement was made, and who else might benefit from a change to it through an MFN clause, or the like.

[Anna McMorrin]

Q I was particularly thinking about rules of origin and diagonal cumulation.

Nick Ashton-Hart: Where there are rules that we are accepting from the EU, then of course we have less flexibility to make a change if it is asked for by the other side; that would conflict, of course.