Hi Dmitry, I can answer that… and I’m going to do so with the help of Greg Hands, ex-Minister of State in the Department for International Trade
Greg was given this position after Brexit, and shortly afterwards wrote an article with 3 “principled arguments” against the Customs Union.
You can probably tell how this is going to go...
You can probably tell how this is going to go...
Point 1, the only country that does it is Turkey and this shows the “huge” disadvantage.
To be fair, he goes on to say it’s the only ‘serious country’
I’m no Minister of State in the Department for International Trade, but I think that implying your trade partners aren’t serious countries can't be conducive to trade.
Point 2, we’d no longer have an independent trade policy including the ability have our own trade defences.
For anyone else reading this, here are some examples of trade defences at the website of Turkey’s independent trade policy.
trade.gov.tr/legislation/im…
trade.gov.tr/legislation/im…
Point 3, and here we get to the nub. The NHS could be at risk.
And when we look at the detail, he seems to be saying we access the government procurement agreement through the EU, and the EU could do deals which impact the NHS.
How, you ask? Well Greg has justified this by arguing the concern over TTIP when the EU had exclusive competence. Which of course, they won’t have.
And as Steve Peers was quick to point out, that’s not how Customs Unions work. A ‘minor’ error someone wouldn’t expect when reading an article dedicated to Customs Unions.
So that's why people think that, leaving me to just thank my assistant Greg Hands for explaining why people think that the NHS is at risk in a customs union.
Greg, like a lot of other MPs believes he is qualified to vote for the deal this afternoon.
(Which also explains how we are where we are generally)
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(Which also explains how we are where we are generally)
/End
