Compromise comes at a cost – but trade deal is best for Britain
IT did not take long for the doubts to be raised about Britain’s trade deal with the EU. From fishermen in Scotland complaining Boris Johnson had “bottled it” over fishing rights to environmentalists and employment specialists warning of the potential for falling levels of protection for wildlife and workers rights, the naysayers, who have now had a chance to analyse the 1,500 pages of detail, have come up with their conclusions.
Predictably, it is those who are the unhappiest who have the most to say. Initial relief at a deal being done at all has been replaced, at least in certain quarters, with disappointment that it is not a better one. It was always likely to end this way – at least in the immediate aftermath of the deal – euphoria turning to doubt as the small print was analysed.
Some were never going to be satisfied, in any event. Special interest groups were always gauging the deal through the prism of their own interests without a full view of the bigger picture. A trade deal as massive as the one between Britain and the 27 remaining nations of the EU was always a jigsaw puzzle of parts. Compromise in one area was always going to be necessary in order to achieve agreement in another.
And there were always some pro
Brexit campaigners for whom any deal would be a compromise too far. They backed no deal to maintain what they saw as the purest of all Brexits and saw the pain that would have caused as something akin to pleasure. Yet they would have been largely unaffected; it would have been the ordinary people – both as businesses and as consumers – who would have suffered the most under no deal. The broad benefits of maintaining largely open markets between the UK and its biggest single trading partner prevents that suffering and sets the scene for a steadily improving relationship between the two sides.
And if there is to be a ‘Brexit bounce’ for British businesses, then it is likely to take months, if not longer, to start to be felt. There are bumps in the road aplenty to come, because after 47 years as EU members and a further 12 months in transition there is no pain-free way to re-set our relationship. People voted for change; change always comes with some disruption.
Five-and-a-half more years of access for EU boats to UK fishing grounds is the most high-profile compromise and the one that has caused anger among many fishermen. Yet on the plus side tariff-free access for UK-landed fish is retained; that is worth a great deal. Whether it is worth the compromise on EU access and continuing quotas is for the fishing industry to decide – and the best way to judge that will be in future investments in UK fishing. We predict there will be growth.
Farmers, too, have cause for a small celebration. Free from the Common Agricultural Policy but still with full access to EU markets, they can build a new future with sales secure. There will be much debate in the days ahead and the small matter of a parliamentary vote on the deal this week. But the die is cast, the deal the best we are likely to get. It’s up to all involved now to make it work.