Thread by @pmdfoster

🚨🚨🇬🇧🇦🇺🦘🥊🚜🐄🐑🇦🇺🇬🇧🚨🚨 Huge UK government split over Australia trade deal via @FT with ⁦@GeorgeWParker⁩
— Tl:dr the buccaneers are battling for soul #brexit. Stay with me. It’s a multi-dimensional play. /1 on.ft.com/3hwXlgE

@FT @GeorgeWParker As we report there is a "ferocious" fight going on in Whitehall over the terms of the Australia - UK trade deal, which is striking at the very heart of the #Brexit debate and what 'Global Britain means'...Truss+Frost v Eustice+Gove with Boris Johnson still to weigh in /2

@FT @GeorgeWParker The fight, in a nutshell is over @trussliz desire to give Australia a 'zero tariff' deal with UK -- like we have with EU -- which will be phased in over time. And she wants this ahead of G7 in June where Oz PM is being invited. That means decision time.../3

@FT @GeorgeWParker @trussliz But opposing are the Farmers union @NFUtweets, backed we hear by the Defra Sec @MPGeorgeEustice and @michaelgove a former defra sec has pledged in past to protect UK farmers interests and frets that screwing Welsh/Scottish farms could stoke devolution Q and hit rural agenda/4

@FT @GeorgeWParker @trussliz @NFUtweets @MPGeorgeEustice @michaelgove The argument played in two articles in the papers over the week....start wiht this one from @Minette_Batters in Mail over weekend-- warning that farmers are being "thrown under the bus" even if zero-tariff deal is phased in. It's an emotional appeal/5

dailymail.co.uk/debate/article…

@FT @GeorgeWParker @trussliz @NFUtweets @MPGeorgeEustice @michaelgove @Minette_Batters Recall that Mail spearheaded the campaign that garnered 1m+ signatures to force govt to set up a Trade and Agriculture Commission last August which reported in March and said standards need to be maintained in food imports to give UK farmers fair crack/6
gov.uk/government/pub…

@FT @GeorgeWParker @trussliz @NFUtweets @MPGeorgeEustice @michaelgove @Minette_Batters And on the other side, Dan Hannan @DanielJHannan in Telegraph saying that the “National Farmers’ Union officials, the Defra blob and a handful of Tory backwoodsmen” can't be allowed to stop progress /7

telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/1…

@FT @GeorgeWParker @trussliz @NFUtweets @MPGeorgeEustice @michaelgove @Minette_Batters @DanielJHannan He makes two solid points:

1) since we've paid high price for freedoms in doing v hard #brexit, now we have no choice but to be bold

2) Oz/NZ meet imports are low, and anyway beef fetches nearly double in Asia what it does in UK/EU...so UK farmers should export there /8

@FT @GeorgeWParker @trussliz @NFUtweets @MPGeorgeEustice @michaelgove @Minette_Batters @DanielJHannan But it's more complicated than that since, as the UK govt own estimates show, an Australia deal is worth just 0.02% of GDP uplift (£500m on 2018 levels).

Says one detractor "we’re...signing off the slow death of British farming so Liz Truss can score a quick political point”/9

@FT @GeorgeWParker @trussliz @NFUtweets @MPGeorgeEustice @michaelgove @Minette_Batters @DanielJHannan But what is #Brexit if it's not about politics over substance? It will be very hard, perhaps, for @BorisJohnson to resist siding with the bucanneers for a headline now over longer term domestic political fallout,/10

@FT @GeorgeWParker @trussliz @NFUtweets @MPGeorgeEustice @michaelgove @Minette_Batters @DanielJHannan @BorisJohnson Because if not, as @SamuelMarcLowe tells me: “If these deals with Australia and New Zealand don’t get done because of domestic opposition, that pretty much says the UK is not doing anything with global Britain."

The trouble is, Australia is not the end of the story /11

@FT @GeorgeWParker @trussliz @NFUtweets @MPGeorgeEustice @michaelgove @Minette_Batters @DanielJHannan @BorisJohnson @SamuelMarcLowe So while it is true export volumes to EU/UK are low and UK isn't gonna get swamped any time soon, it seems...what Oz/Nz want is 'resilience'...the spare capacity in their lockers in case, say China shuts them out. A zero/zero deal could leave UK farmers wide open/12

@FT @GeorgeWParker @trussliz @NFUtweets @MPGeorgeEustice @michaelgove @Minette_Batters @DanielJHannan @BorisJohnson @SamuelMarcLowe Also, an OZ-UK deal is a gateway to the Transpacific CPTPP grouping....where it is likely that UK accession will provide another point of leverage.

Then you have to worry that if you give this to Australian & NZ (minnows) what do you have to give to USA, or Mercosur? /13

@FT @GeorgeWParker @trussliz @NFUtweets @MPGeorgeEustice @michaelgove @Minette_Batters @DanielJHannan @BorisJohnson @SamuelMarcLowe EU farmers, I'm told, are already kicking back against the beef concessions in EU-Mercosur deal (Brazil massive producer) which has 99,000 tonnes of Mercosur beef at 7.5%, phased in over 5 years. Transpose that to UK, and beef industry is going to fight very hard./14

@FT @GeorgeWParker @trussliz @NFUtweets @MPGeorgeEustice @michaelgove @Minette_Batters @DanielJHannan @BorisJohnson @SamuelMarcLowe So as you can see, it's not just about Australia. It's where it all leads....it's not an exaggeration to say that the 'future of #Brexit' is on the Whitehall chopping block right now. Scrum down. All to play for. ENDS