News and analysis on trade policy in Europe
Saturday, April 26, 2025
Today, the UK released slides on the Framework for the Future EU UK Economic Partnership. How much of it will fly with the EU is an open question. A novelty is emerging with Brexit in the world of international trade negotiations: the exchange of published PowerPoint slides. The advantage …
The EU is doing its homework to prepare for a political agreement with the United Kingdom in October on the bloc’s future relationship with its departing member: today it came up with a structure on how it aims to approach the matter. A powerpoint slide released today by EU …
The United Kingdom’s civil service is trying to increase its ability to grapple with trade policy matters across its various ministries. In the aftermath of the Brexit referendum, the UK’s state machinery found itself unprepared to tackle the challenges of a policy area that permeates all layers of government …
It’s hard not to wonder if Article 50 negotiations are progressing at all. The EU and Britain are trying to accelerate the pace of the UK’s withdrawal talks from the bloc. But they are digging in on the issue of Northern Ireland as the British political establishment tears itself apart …
With Northern Ireland without a government for months and the pro-independence governing party SNP in Scotland weakened after the last general elections, devolution issues have been politically on the backburner. Yet Brexit date is approaching. The question of how to avoid policy gridlock and fragmentation of the United Kingdom’s …
The EU and the UK have agreed in principle on a transition period that would last from late March 2019 to late December 2020. During that period, in principle the whole EU acquis communautaire applies to Britain. That period will be used to negotiate the terms of the future EU-UK …
Japanese business groups want the EU and the UK to start working on rolling over the yet-to-be ratified EU-Japan free trade accord so that it also applies to Britain after Brexit. They also set out specific demands for the future EU-UK trade agreement. These demands echo origin rule requests by Britain’s …
Germany is leaving behind a period of six months of wait-and-see on major policy areas and has finally installed a new coalition government. For Berlin, Brexit is now starting to be one of the country’s top European priorities. The trade aspect of the UK’s withdrawal, transition period and future …
Statements by European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier and the European Parliament’s Brexit leader, Guy Verhofstadt, today in the parliament in Strasbourg revealed nothing new about the EU’s position on everything related to Brexit (details in this blog series). So what’s new on the Brexit-and-trade …
Parts of the UK business community are getting impatient at the way Brexit negotiations are being conducted. Positions are hardening and the disagreement reaching a new dimension over Northern Ireland. Will the British government survive this standoff? Business anger There was a real sense of anger at the …
