Asked by: Jack Brereton (Conservative - Stoke-on-Trent South)
Question to the Department for International Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade, what steps she is taking to improve access for UK exporters to high growth global markets.
Answered by Graham Stuart
As an independent trading nation, we are building strong trading relationships across the world and removing market access barriers for British businesses. We have secured trade agreements with 66 non-EU countries, worth £217bn in 2019. We have formally applied to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership, an agreement which removes tariffs on 95% of goods between members and will deepen UK access to key markets around the world, from Mexico to Malaysia.
Asked by: Jack Brereton (Conservative - Stoke-on-Trent South)
Question to the Department for International Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade, how the Government plans to calculate dumping margins in situations where state interventions and other distortions mean that a standard anti-dumping methodology is not an appropriate way to establish normal value after the UK leaves the EU.
Answered by George Hollingbery
We are committed to protecting UK industry where it is suffering injury as a result of dumped imports. Secondary legislation will introduce provisions to tackle those cases concerning countries where there are particular market situations. Those situations occur when it is not possible to use the domestic prices in the exporting country to calculate the dumping margin, because prices and input costs do not reflect competitive market conditions. In such cases the Trade Remedies Authority (TRA) will be able to use alternative methodologies. These alternative methodologies will include the use of export prices to an appropriate third country, provided they are representative, and will enable the TRA to construct the prices on the basis of cost of production, selling, general and admin costs and profit. Secondary legislation will also provide that the exporter’s cost data may be adjusted, where justified on a case by case basis, based on among other things prices from a representative country.
We will set out in secondary legislation examples of situations, such as where prices are artificially low, for example as a result of government intervention, where significant barter trade exists, or where non-commercial processing arrangements occur. Other economies, such as the EU and the US, have similar mechanisms in place to protect the domestic industry from unfair trade practices and the UK will be no different.