UK Negotiating Priorities Show Little Flexibility on SPS Regime

The United Kingdom's Secretary of State of International Trade, Elizabeth Truss, told Parliament that the price the National Health Service pays for prescription drugs is not up for negotiation in free trade deals, and “we will not compromise on our high environmental protection, animal welfare and food standards.” She also added, according to her written statement, that “The UK will maintain its own autonomous sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) regime to protect public, animal and plant life and health and the environment, reflecting its existing high standards.”

In the American negotiating priorities published last year (see 1903010028), the U.S. said it will seek “enforceable rules to eliminate unjustified trade restrictions or unjustified commercial requirements (including unjustified labeling) that affect new technologies,” which seems like it could be on a collision course with what Truss wrote Feb. 6.

She said the U.K. will agree to “comprehensive, far-reaching and mutually beneficial tariff reductions (taking into account sensitive UK products).”

She also said that the U.K. will seek to support its “domestic climate ambition.” The current fast track authority prohibits language about climate change in a U.S. FTA.

Meanwhile, free-trade advocate Rep. Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., wrote an opinion piece published in The Wall Street Journal on Feb. 6 that said eliminating Huawei from the U.K.'s 5G network should be a prerequisite. He also said that the two countries should seek to eliminate tariffs, though the reductions could happen gradually, within a decade.

On autos, Gallagher suggested the tariff benefit be tied to a 75 percent rule of origin including U.S. and British parts. Unless the European Union joined the FTA -- which Gallagher said would be desirable -- that would not be possible, as European supply chains are based in Europe.

Gallagher said the FTA should make clear that autos do not count as a national security risk when “manufactured by like-minded and allied states.”