Monday 28 January 2019

Nobody move or everybody starves to death!

From the BBC:

A no-deal Brexit threatens the UK's food security and will lead to higher prices and empty shelves, retailers are preparing to warn MPs...

If the UK were to revert to WTO rules, the retailers warn that would "greatly increase import costs that would in turn put upward pressure on food prices"...

The letter spells out the UK's food relationship with Europe, with nearly one third of the food in the UK coming from the EU.


*sigh*

I can't track down the actual wording of the letter, which was no doubt a bit more nuanced than the BBC claim.

1. At worst, one-third of shelves will be empty. let's not forget that Norway and Switzerland seem to manage somehow, it can't be insurmountable.

2. What retailers should have said (and quite possibly, did say) is "Dear Government, for the time being, whatever happens with Brexit, can you please exempt food imports from any sort of quotas and duties and ensure that Customs wave through anything that was clearly grown in an EU Member State?".

This in turn boils down to "Dear Government, please make sure that nothing changes post-Brexit".

"Do nothing" should always be first on the list of options to be considered, and in the circumstances, would clearly be the best for all concerned.

10 comments:

Lola said...

Of course. But I bet 'they've' been put up to it by 'them'.

Bayard said...

I was thinking about this. If there are queues at the border of incoming lorries, this can only be if the government decides that the same goods that were able to come in to the country without any form of checks on March 28th suddenly need to be checked on March 30th.

OTOH, this is exactly the sort of stupidity this government is capable of.

Bayard said...

Also, found this in the Graun:"as the French government has said it will enforce sanitary and customs checks on exports from the EU, which will cause long delays"

WTF? Why are the French suddenly worried about stuff leaving their country when it's the same stuff that they are happy to let go without any checks at the moment. This has either got to be French spite or complete bollocks.

mombers said...

Isn't the big problem here WTO most-favoured-nation rules? My understanding (hopefully I'm wrong!) is that in the absence of a formal trade deal, all nations get the same tariff. So if we say unilateral 0% on EU goods, any country can import to us at that tariff. A very good thing in my opinion - but vested interests will be howling. Non-tariff barriers could be used but pretty lame.

Mark Wadsworth said...

M, that is exactly how WTO mfn rules work, and a good thing too. The UK govt has got more important things to do than imposing tariffs.

Mark Wadsworth said...

B, the letter mentions french french customs being arseholes. Whether it's true or not, I don't know. Maybe macron will do it once he's sorted out les gilets jaunes.

George Carty said...

Wouldn't unilateral free trade just mean that ruthless East Asian mercantilists wipe out what's left of our industry, while cheap American imports wipe out most of our agriculture?

Mark Wadsworth said...

GC, time and again, free trade has shown itself to be of overall mutual benefit to consumers and producers in both countries. You can't argue "EU good because free trade" and then say "Free trade bad".

George Carty said...

My point is about unilateral free trade, not two-sided free trade.

We already tried unilateral free trade in the 1850s and it was a disaster (only somewhat mitigated at the expense of the colonies). The experience is why we sought free trade agreements, starting with the Cobden-Chevalier agreement with France in 1860.

It is notable that most of the big business names which are ardently pro-Brexit are firms which do lots of importing from outside the EU, but little or no exporting: Wetherspoons (pub chain), Next (retailer of clothes, almost all imported from third-world countries), Tate & Lyle (Caribbean cane sugar) and Dyson (electrical goods manufactured in Malaysia).

Why did the UK stop giving a toss about the balance of payments during the Thatcher era?

Mark Wadsworth said...

GC, unilateral free trade is like unilateral nuclear disarmament. Not as good as multi-lateral, but a step in the right direction.

Fair point about importers, but the supermarkets have just upset that logic.

I don't think Thatcher cared about anything apart from being re-elected. Any good things she did are entirely indicental.