EU trade ‘doesn’t work’ for UK businesses, pressure group warns

The next UK government must stop “walking on eggshells” when it comes to improving trade relations with the EU, the head of the UK’s biggest trade organization has warned.

Shevaun Haviland, chief executive of the British Chambers of Commerce, on Thursday urged the winner of next week’s election to deepen the current EU-UK trade and cooperation agreement to boost economic growth.

“We need to stop walking on eggshells and start telling it like it is. The current plan is not working for our members,” she told the group’s annual international conference in London.

Haviland’s intervention comes as opinion polls put Labor on course to secure a large majority on July 4 on a program that promises to lead Britain out of a decade of economic stagnation.

The Office for Budget Responsibility, the budget watchdog, said Brexit would result in a 4 per cent long-term impact on UK GDP, as well as a 15 per cent reduction in UK trade.

An analysis published this month by the London School of Economics found that 20,000 small businesses had stopped exporting to the EU due to red tape created by the UK’s exit from the bloc’s single market.

The BCC, which represents more than 50,000 businesses employing 6 million people in the UK, has published a trade manifesto calling for a series of measures to improve trade between the EU and the UK. They include a youth mobility deal to allow young people to live and work in each other’s countries – a policy Labour has already ruled out.

Haviland said the BCC was ready to work with the next government on a long-term trade strategy. “After six weeks of election campaigning, businesses will look to the next government and determine who keeps their word,” she added.

Labor has been cautious about its plans to cut the costs of Brexit, which have been strongly supported by voters in “red wall” constituencies in the north of England, which it hopes to win back from the hands of the conservatives next week.

The main opposition party has ruled out a return to the European single market or a customs union with Brussels, while promising in its election platform to improve ties by “removing unnecessary trade barriers”.

However, the only concrete measures proposed by Labor are a veterinary agreement with Brussels to help exports of food and plant products, a visa agreement for touring musicians and improved conditions for professionals such as engineers and architects. .

An analysis this month by the think tank UK in a Changing Europe said Labor’s stated plans would have a “minimal” impact on reducing the economic costs of Brexit.

Starmer’s party has sought to play down Conservative accusations that he would seek to reverse Brexit if elected, with the two sides clashing over the issue in a televised election debate on Monday.

Shadow Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said it was “ridiculous” to suggest Brexit had not affected British trade. “The most important thing a Labor government will deliver is that our relationship with the European Union will not be governed by internal Conservative party politics,” he said.

Reynolds added that he wanted to reduce controls on food and agricultural products, but refused to say whether Labor would accept a role for the European Court of Justice as part of a veterinary deal, saying he “wouldn’t was not going to give up our hand in the negotiations.

Business Secretary Kemi Badenoch retorted that the Conservatives had already tried to secure a veterinary deal and that Labour’s plan to reopen negotiations “will just take us back into the EU without saying it”.