Liam Fox has written an article on Brexit Central (one of the last, the website closes on 31st) arguing that alignment with future EU regulations would be incompatible with Brexit. Several people have commented about its inaccuracies on Twitter. It's painfully clear the former trade secretary doesn't understand even the fundamentals of international trade.
David Henig and Sam Lowe, both experts in the field, pick him up on his assertion that there is some model, other than the EU, to eliminate barriers to cross border trade. He is just plain wrong:
Yes, this idea that the rest of the world operates on the basis of equivalence and mutual recognition whereas only the strange EU prefers harmonisation is entirely unsupported by evidence. It’s not a thing. https://t.co/6DDStNnx9z— Sam Lowe (@SamuelMarcLowe) January 21, 2020
Brexiteers salivate over this idea don't they? Steve Baker was proposing the same thing just a few days ago. It is perhaps the elemental difference between Brexiteers and the EU. Brexiteers think everything can be done with goodwill, flexibility and mutual recognition, something for which there is zero evidence. The EU think harmonisation and laws are needed.
The slides from the recent EU seminar by the EU on the UK FTA makes this perfectly clear on page 6. EU membership provides mutual recognition of standards by default. After Brexit "Access to market requires full compliance with host state rules". I don't think Fox gets this at all or the impact this is going to have on our future trade with the EU.
"Within this new dynamic it will be up to the UK to decide how similar or dissimilar our regulations are compared to those operated by the EU. The more similar the regulations, i.e. the more aligned they are to the EU’s, the less friction there will be at trading borders in terms of inspection and paperwork, but as a consequence there will be less freedom to innovate or pursue an independent trade policy."
"Even if there is voluntary similarity in regulations, the key will be that the UK must have the freedom to diverge at any point."
As Sam Lowe himself pointed out recently, even if we choose to voluntarily follow EU regulations the EU will treat us as if we don't, as it does any other third country, precisely because we could "diverge at any point." The friction will be the same whatever we do. We could be in the mad position of abiding by rules set by others with zero benefit to us in reducing trade friction and barriers.
He then goes on to say:
"At the last World Trade Organisation ministerial meeting in Buenos Aires, it became increasingly clear that while other countries wanted global standards to be maintained, they did not want to be locked into a highly legalistic system based on how the EU has done business and regulated in the past. They want to see a system of “equivalence” where the outcomes are agreed, but different parties to an agreement can find their own ways of achieving them.
The EU rules I am most familiar with are those in The Machinery Directive 2006/42. It is not 'highly legalistic' and is a model of clarity. It does describe outcomes and isn't prescriptive. In fact it replaced a lot of British Standards that were detailed and far too prescriptive. For example the first principle of safety integration (section 1.1.2) is:
(a) Machinery must be designed and constructed so that it is fitted for its function, and can be operated, adjusted and maintained without putting persons at risk when these operations are carried out under the conditions foreseen but also taking into account any reasonably foreseeable misuse thereof. The aim of measures taken must be to eliminate any risk throughout the foreseeable lifetime of the machinery including the phases of transport, assembly, dismantling, disabling and scrapping.
Manufacturers have to carry out a risk assessment and then design machines which take it all into account. This surely is agreeing outcomes which you then find your own ways of achieving. Directives do exactly this. They are implemented in whatever way the member state wishes. Regulations apply directly but I think most EU law is implemented by directives anyway.
What Fox presumably wants is a very loose description of an outcome - something like the machine "must be safe to use" - and leave it at that. The problem is that everybody will have a different idea about what's safe. One man's safe is another man's dangerous.The EU directive explains what the objectives are in detail, that's the difference.
And what about this from the former GP:
"There are those who persist in talking about frictionless trade in our new relationship with the Single Market, but this is simply not possible. Once you are outside the Single Market, you are out – no “cherry picking” as the EU like to say, and the UK accepts that. However, the EU cannot “cherry pick” itself by trying to control a state outside the Single Market and the Customs Union."
I won't comment on how many times Brexiteers told us we would get frictionless trade before the referendum, but Fox thinks the EU can't control a state which is not in the SM or the CU. He may be surprised to know how wrong he is on this one.
I have been reading "The Brussels Effect" an academic paper written by Anu Bradford, a Professor of Law at Columbia Law School, in 2012 about just how much Brussels does control states outside the EU. Ms Bradford does not write from an ideological standpoint and this is the end of the final paragraph of her conclusions:
"For the critics, the discussion has shown that to portray the EU as powerless focuses on a narrow and outdated vision of what power and influence mean. For the defenders, the discussion has shown that the need to move towards a federation is probably not as pressing given the extent to which the EU is already able to advance its interests, within and beyond its borders. The EU is already a superpower and, importantly, a superpower of a meaningful kind."
Dr Richard North at the EU Referendum blog posted a link to this paper recently and it's so fascinating I'll do a longer post on it tomorrow.
Finally, to show how after Brexit there will be a sword of Damocles hanging over us in perpetuity, the Politico website are reporting that the EU are prepared to levy fines and impose trade sanctions if we fail to comply with the terms of the WA or the future trade deal - assuming there is one.
Finally, to show how after Brexit there will be a sword of Damocles hanging over us in perpetuity, the Politico website are reporting that the EU are prepared to levy fines and impose trade sanctions if we fail to comply with the terms of the WA or the future trade deal - assuming there is one.
As usual there is a nice graphic to explain it:
Who said we would be taking back control?
