US Steel and Aluminium Tariffs

Chris Elmore Excerpts

Monday 4th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Dr Fox]

I would be happy to do so. I was in the United States and visited a number of our congressional colleagues just two weeks ago. It is worth pointing out that there are 142,000 steel workers in the United States, but there are 6.5 million workers who depend on steel as part of their business, so either reductions in supply or increases in cost are likely to have a domestic effect. Again, I hope our colleagues in Congress will see— I urge all Members of the House with links to either party in Congress to use those links to point this out—that history repeating itself would indeed be tragic for everybody concerned.

[Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab)]

At present, half of UK steel exports are sent to the EU. In the light of the US decision to impose tariffs, it is highly likely that the steel industry in the UK will become more reliant on the European Union. Will the Secretary of State make representations to Cabinet to agree that Britain should remain within a customs union? If he will not do so, why not? It is the best way to protect steel industry jobs, including in Port Talbot—many members of the workforce live in my constituency.

[Dr Fox]

No, I will not do that. I believe that a customs union gives us greater trading relationships with some at the expense of greater trading relationships with others. As the International Monetary Fund has pointed out, 95% of global growth in the next 10 to 15 years will be outside continental Europe, so to tie ourselves into a customs model with the slowest growing part of the global economy would be very unwise.