Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what assessment his Department has made of the (a) level of tariffs which UK businesses would operate in the event of the UK leaving the EU and negotiating a free trade deal with the EU equivalent to the Comprehensive Economic and Trade agreement between the EU and Canada and (b) costs of customs checks and rules of origin requirements for UK businesses in the event of the UK leaving the EU; and what the annual value to the UK economy is of the EU's trade agreements with third parties.

At the February European Council, the Government negotiated a new settlement, giving the United Kingdom a special status in a reformed European Union. The Government's position, as set out by the Prime Minister to the House on 22 February, is that the UK will be stronger, safer and better off remaining in a reformed EU.

The document “Alternatives to membership: possible models for the United Kingdom, outside the European Union”, published on 2 March, looks at the potential models for the UK’s relationship with the European Union, including negotiated bilateral agreements, such as the recent EU-Canada Free Trade Agreement. It concludes that such an agreement would bring significantly less advantageous terms for UK trade than those we currently enjoy, with particular issues for UK services losing access to the Single Market.

The estimated value to the UK of EU FTA negotiations that have already been concluded is around £ 2.5 billion.