European Union: Trade

Lord Fox Excerpts

Thursday 30th January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Twycross (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for raising the comments made by the leader of the Opposition. I understand she has criticised her predecessors for mishandling Brexit, saying that leaving the EU without a growth plan was a “mistake”. I hope this means that we can work on a cross-party basis on these issues, because resetting our relationship with the EU will be key to delivering our plan for change and our plan for growth. The Chancellor has been clear that removing barriers to trade with the EU is critical to support growth and help our businesses. As the Chancellor said recently in her Mansion House speech, our biggest trading partner is the EU. We must recognise that our markets are highly interconnected and ensure that our approach to the EU reset supports growth and delivers investment for the economy.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, the Government have said on many occasions that they want to reset our relationship, and this Minister is no exception. Largely speaking, that means ruling things out as far as ruling things in. I understand that negotiating in detail in public is not a good practice. However, a good practice is telling your counterparty what you want. So far, there have been no specific demands or requests from the UK to Brussels. When will that start, and when will this reset actually happen?

[Baroness Twycross (Lab)]

The noble Lord makes an interesting point. We are not going to give a running commentary on negotiations.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

I did not ask for that.

[Baroness Twycross (Lab)]

The noble Lord suggests that he did not ask for that. However, if we were to start putting demands in the media, I am not sure that is resetting the relationship with our European friends and neighbours; it sounds like more of the same that we saw from the previous Government.