Brexit Britain launches talks to join Trans-Pacific Partnership as UK looks beyond Europe
BRITAIN has had informal talks with a Pacific trade group in an urgent bid to bolster UK trade, it has been revealed.
The Department for International Trade, led by Liam Fox, has reportedly discussed a future relationship with the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) after Britain leaves the European Union in March 2019.
Trade minister Greg Hands insisted the group holds no geographical restrictions despite all its members bordering either the Pacific Ocean or the South China Sea.
He told the Financial Times: “Nothing is excluded in all of this.
“With these kinds of plurilateral relationships, there doesn’t have to be any geographical restriction.”
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One of Donald Trump’s first acts as President was to withdraw the US from the partnership that includes Japan, Australia and Canada.
Following the move from the Republican firebrand, the 11 remaining countries in the group are seeking to create a revised deal dubbed the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership that is expected to be signed early this year.
A UK International Trade spokeswoman stated: "We have set up 14 trade 'working groups' across 21 countries to explore the best ways of progressing our trade and investment relationships across the world.
"It is early days, but as our Trade Policy Minister has pointed out, we are not excluding future talks on plurilateral relationships.”
Joining the TPP could see numerous tariffs cut for a range of goods.
Former Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron slammed the Government’s desire to bolster trade relationships after declaring the move “smacks of desperation”.
He went on: “These people want us to leave a market on our doorstep and join a different, smaller one on the other side of the world.
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“It’s all pie in the sky thinking.”
Labour also criticised the Government’s decision to look ahead after Brexit with the party’s Barry Gardiner claiming Britain should focus on its “key future trading arrangement” with Brussels.
He went on: “Of course [TPP] could be helpful but it is not the main event, and at the moment the government is making a hash of that.”
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The UK is not legally allowed to sign trade deals before it leaves the EU.
Mr Fox, the UK’s Secretary of State for International Trade, is currently on a three-day trip to China that will see him travel to Beijing and Shenzhen in a bit to boost trade after Britain leaves the EU.
China is the UK’s fifth largest trading partner with relations between the two accounting for an estimated £59.1billion.
