Trump rubbing hands over new UK trade deal

RICHARD Grant (Write Back, August 29) says the talk of a new great UK and US trade deal is farcical; in fact, it is tragic.

We already have massive trade with the US. According to the Office for National Statistics, in 2018 we exported goods worth £55bn, while importing £42bn. So, the US has a £13bn-a-year trade deficit with us.

Trump hates trade deficits and has met the one with China with a trade war.

This has led to China reducing its importation of US agri-products, causing a massive surplus in the US market and great problems for US farmers in the MidWest, who now need a new market for this produce.

So, Trump is doubly pleased at our current Brexit distress: he hates the EU and other multilateral bodies, because they have greater clout in negotiations compared to single countries, so he wants to break them up to the advantage of the US. He also needs to dump the agricultural surplus his trade war is creating before next year’s election.

This is why he is so delighted to do a deal. He expects we will take all this cheap food, which doesn’t meet EU regulations on GMO and animal welfare. This will undermine our own farming industry, but it will be popular if it reduces prices in the supermarket at just the time EU imports will become more expensive.

The true price we shall pay is partial destruction of our farmers and greater environmental damage due to long travel distances and lower standards in production of the food.

NAME AND ADDRESS WITH EDITOR