In a speech in May 2016 (HERE) David Davis, with regard to whether or not we would still be able to access the Free Trade Agreements that the EU have negotiated, said, "The simple truth is that under state succession rules all existing trade deals with non-EU countries would stay in place until either side wanted to renegotiate them. Why on earth would any non-EU country behave differently?"
But in October 2015 the Treasury Select Committee heard evidence that they would all have to be renegotiated (HERE page 17). George Kerevan MP asked, "If we leave, do we have to renegotiate all of the existing free trade or trade agreements between the EU and the rest of the world as an individual country?"
Philippe Legrain: Yes.
Mr Legrain was the trade and economics correspondent for The Economist, special adviser to WTO director-general Mike Moore, and chief economist and director of policy for the pro-European pressure group, Britain in Europe. I would trust him over David Davis any day.
Even Roger Bootle, a keen Brexiteer from Capital Economics said, "I think this is a legal issue. My understanding was that in some cases they would need to be negotiated from scratch and in some cases they would not. It is an important question and I think we should try to nobble it".
After the vote, in December 2016, the House of Lords published a report Brexit: The options for trade and in it (paragraph 168) they conclude, "On the balance of evidence, we conclude that the UK is unlikely to be able to retain access to the EU’s FTAs with third countries following Brexit, whether they are mixed agreements or not. We urge the Government to confirm that this is the case.
As far as I can see the government, a year after Mr Davis' "simple truth" has not yet confirmed whether we keep access to these FTAs or not. How much faith can one have in the breezily confident, but usually wrong, idiot Davis?
After the vote, in December 2016, the House of Lords published a report Brexit: The options for trade and in it (paragraph 168) they conclude, "On the balance of evidence, we conclude that the UK is unlikely to be able to retain access to the EU’s FTAs with third countries following Brexit, whether they are mixed agreements or not. We urge the Government to confirm that this is the case.
As far as I can see the government, a year after Mr Davis' "simple truth" has not yet confirmed whether we keep access to these FTAs or not. How much faith can one have in the breezily confident, but usually wrong, idiot Davis?
