Forty-Fifth Report - Progress with trade negotiations

Select Committee
Public Accounts Committee HC 993 18 March 2022
Report Status Government responded
Conclusions & Recommendations 29 items (8 recs)
Source View on Parliament website
Government Response (AI assessment · 20 of 29 classified)
Accepted 8
Acknowledged 8
Deferred 1
Not Addressed 2
Rejected 1
Clear

Recommendations

6 results
3 Accepted
The Department is not doing enough to help businesses, particularly SMEs, to take advantage of...
Recommendation
The Department is not doing enough to help businesses, particularly SMEs, to take advantage of opportunities offered by new trade agreements. Businesses need to understand and take advantage of the opportunities arising from trade agreements if agreements are to deliver … Read more
Government Response Summary
The government agrees to write to the Committee within 12 months to set out how it has supported businesses, particularly SMEs, to take full advantage of existing and newly negotiated trade agreements, including measuring preference utilisation rates, reducing burdens for SMEs, and detailing progress on its export strategy; target implementation date: April 2023.
HM Treasury
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5 Accepted
Parliament and the public are not being provided with clear and transparent information to understand...
Recommendation
Parliament and the public are not being provided with clear and transparent information to understand the impact of trade agreements. Business associations and consumer groups are concerned that it is unclear how trade policy aligns with other policy objectives, and … Read more
Government Response Summary
The government agrees and says it publishes materials before negotiations, after they conclude, and is highly consultative, publishing explanatory information on the impact of agreements. It constantly reviews its economic analysis methodologies and seeks views of the public through tools including the Public Attitudes to Trade Tracker.
HM Treasury
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6 Accepted
The Department has not done enough to support effective Parliamentary scrutiny of trade agreements.
Recommendation
The Department has not done enough to support effective Parliamentary scrutiny of trade agreements. Despite the Department making additional commitments beyond the statutory framework, the International Trade Committee has not been provided with information from the Department in sufficient time … Read more
Government Response Summary
The government agrees and states that it publishes and provides its strategic approach to each new FTA at the outset of negotiations to relevant select committees, including negotiation objectives, and offers oral updates to the relevant select committees.
HM Treasury
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23 Accepted
When we asked the Department about its overarching trade strategy it told us that it...
Recommendation
When we asked the Department about its overarching trade strategy it told us that it aims to have “an open trade environment that promotes jobs and wages and reduces poverty”. The Department plans to achieve this through trade negotiations and … Read more
Government Response Summary
The government agrees and says it is committed to a high level of transparency, publishing materials before and after negotiations, consulting prior to and during, publishing explanatory information, reviewing economic analysis methodologies, and seeking public views through tools like the Public Attitudes to Trade Tracker.
HM Treasury
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27 Accepted
The Department has made additional commitments beyond the statutory framework under the Constitutional Reform and...
Recommendation
The Department has made additional commitments beyond the statutory framework under the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010 (CRAG) for Parliamentary scrutiny of trade agreements, but the Parliamentary committees responsible for trade agreements scrutiny have called for Parliament to have … Read more
Government Response Summary
The government publishes its strategic approach to each new FTA at the outset of negotiations, provides oral updates to the relevant select committees and will continue to review arrangements.
HM Treasury
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28 Accepted
The opportunity for Parliament to view negotiating objectives at the outset would aid its scrutiny...
Recommendation
The opportunity for Parliament to view negotiating objectives at the outset would aid its scrutiny of trade agreements.78 There is a precedent in Parliament to share privileged information between government and select committees. For example, this Committee routinely sees privileged … Read more
Government Response Summary
The government agrees and states that it publishes and provides its strategic approach to each new FTA at the outset of negotiations to relevant select committees, including negotiation objectives, and offers oral updates to the relevant select committees.
HM Treasury
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10 Conclusion Accepted
A deal with the US would contribute 16.8% towards achieving the 80% target as the US is the UK’s largest trading partner.21 However, negotiations with the US are not currently progressing. The Department told us that in the meantime it is concentrating 10 Q 31 11 Q 36 12 Q …
Government Response Summary
The UK is ready to progress with a UK-US FTA when the US is ready and continues to work with the US on state level MOUs, securing the removal of Section 232 tariffs.
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14 Conclusion Accepted
We asked what the Department was doing to measure the actual benefits of trade agreements. The Department told us that it is committed to monitoring and evaluating the impacts of agreements.33 For example, it has committed to publishing monitoring reports for the Australia and Japan agreements two years after they …
Government Response Summary
The department publishes detailed impact assessments and will publish monitoring reports to inform on progress and actual benefits of FTAs.
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