Trade Bill (First sitting)

Debate between Theo Clarke and Gareth Thomas

Tuesday 16th June 2020 Public Bill Committees

[Gareth Thomas]

Q One of the areas of the Bill that we may discuss is future free trade agreements. Have you any particular offensive interests, in terms of future free trade agreements?

Konrad Shek: There is obviously a lot of interest in future free trade agreements. There seems to be a lot of discussion about moving away from the current structures of free trade agreements and looking for these lighter, more flexible types of free trade agreements, which can be negotiated in a shorter time. That is something we welcome, but there is obviously a trade-off; the lighter and more flexible type of agreements mean there is a lot better detail.

We would welcome having these agreements—[Inaudible.] Also, it has an important information aspect. If the UK signs a free trade agreement with a country, that disseminates the information that it is okay, or encouraged, to do business with that country. It sends a very good signal in terms of promoting trade investment links.

There probably needs to be some thought as well about the consultation process and the understanding of what companies require in terms of the wider economy and understanding the trade-offs. By opening or liberalising one particular sector, do we lose out in other sectors? There needs to be a balance, and a lot of political decisions need to be taken there.

There is scope for more consultation and perhaps a feedback process, hopefully for constructive criticism. One issue I have found with the DIT consultation is that it was good that we were able to feed in information, but there was perhaps less information being fed back to help in understanding about how issues lay or were being prioritised in the whole agreement.

[Theo Clarke]

Q My question is about what would happen to the trade preferences given under the EU’s economic partnership agreements with developing world partners. I am thinking about countries such as Kenya, Ghana and those in the Caribbean.

Konrad Shek: I do not have that much information on them. I do not suspect that our advertising agencies have a huge amount of business with those types of country. I do not have a particular view on that. There may be some side projects, perhaps for market research, but I do not have any detail on that.