NB too that @ShankerASingham argues that lowering trade barriers (in undefined ways) with the US etc. will dramatically assist in creating new supply chains, while ignoring disruption to existing chains entailed by increasing barriers with the EU (in very defined ways).
There is, to put it gently, a bit of a contradiction there.
NB too Singham’s sleight of hand reference to the UK economy “having to look every bit as entrepreneurial as the US”: code for “cutting red tape” (as always, without fronting up to what that actually is supposed to mean).
NB too his emphasis on making concessions on food standards/animal welfare: unrealistic given lack of UK support (which will fall away even further after Covid-19 pushes health concerns from farming practices up the agenda). Makes a meaningful FTA with the US rather hard.
Finally, his concern about being at the wrong end of erratic US trade policy while in the EU assumes (a) that US policy won’t get less erratic after Jan 21; & (b) that an erratic policy will treat the UK less erratically just because it isn’t in the EU. Little evidence for that.
Nor is there evidence for his claim that UK approach to tariffs and trade restrictions will be “very different” from the EU’s (or sufficiently different to generate very different treatment by eg the US): see the point above about food standards.
Two points in @ShankerASingham’s piece which I do agree with, though. One is that transition is not a satisfactory position on democratic grounds. It isn’t sustainable, and could lead to a serious crisis. Those advocating extension have to acknowledge that.
Indeed I argued ages ago that it raised problems under the ECHR. prospectmagazine.co.uk/politics/the-b….
Second, he interestingly concedes on State aid that “The UK has already agreed it will have its own anti-subsidy regime, and if the EU wants to specify what should be in that regime at a high level that would not be objectionable.”
That concession by a leading outrider for the current Government points towards a solution of the sort I point to here. uksala.org/is-there-any-s…
PS: @ShankerASingham’s confidence that UK/EU fisheries can be solved easily and swiftly looks a bit premature. ft.com/content/44651f…
