Senior EU figures have hit back at Liam Fox’s “ignorant and indigestible” claim that lowering UK food standards to allow the import of chlorinated chicken from the US is an insignificant detail.
European officials warned that Fox has failed to grasp the implications of continuing trade with the EU, should the UK lower its standards compared to the EU, where chlorine-washed chicken is banned.
Fox has dismissed the row as a minor detail of trade negotiations that have not yet even formally begun, but critics said it highlighted the complexity of the obstacles in post-Brexit trade negotiations.
On Tuesday Donald Trump tweeted triumphantly that the US was working on a “very big and exciting” trade deal with the UK, a day after a visit from Fox to Washington, where he suggested lowering UK food standards may be possible to allow US imports of chlorinated chicken.
In a tweet on Tuesday lunchtime, the US president said his administration was “working on a major trade deal”, adding: “Could be very big & exciting. JOBS!”
The UK cannot begin official trade talks with any country until it formally exits the EU in March 2019.
Gianni Pittella, leader of the socialist group in the European parliament, said: “I’m sure British citizens will be enthusiastic to go from the EU high standard control over chicken and food to the chlorinated, full of hormones, US chicken.
“It is just a further indigestible gift from Tories and their Brexit. Luckily for British citizens, UK won’t be allowed to strike new free trade agreements as long as the
Brexit process has not reached a conclusion.”
Pittella added: “This news reinforces why the EU will eventually need to have checks and controls on goods coming from the UK. We won’t accept a race to the bottom on standards.”
Another EU senior official said Brussels had been surprised by the lack of knowledge shown by senior British politicians in their approach to the negotiations.
He added that while the UK was likely to avoid tariffs on many goods under any free trade deal with the EU, the apparent openness of London to lower standards below those of the bloc would significantly hinder trade in the future.
“If we look at goods the most important thing about is not tariffs, it is all the rules around it,” the official said. “That is why we invented the single market which is about having one set of rules instead of 28 set of rules. Tariffs in a way are not that difficult. I think we will find a way of avoiding tariffs in the future.
“When the stated aim is to make your own laws, not have the same controls, then we need to have checks. Then any good that travels from one market to another will have to undergo checks to see that it is legal to go on the market.”
The official added that the Republic of Ireland would in particular lament Fox’s comments, given the implications for talks on a future border with Northern Ireland. He also echoed the comments of the British poultry industry, which is concerned about being undercut in the UK by cheaper chlorine-washed chicken.
The official said: “If the UK were successful in gaining a free trade agreement with America, and that is the only area where there is a comparative advantage for the UK, given agriculture is the EU’s main defensive interest, then there will be problems.
“It will eliminate sections of the agriculture industry in the UK but the British government seem to be happy with that. But it will also create particular problems with Northern Ireland.
“The Irish won’t be happy about chlorinated chicken crossing the border which is said to be Northern Irish chicken. So there will have to be a border. It has been surprising to see how poor the understanding has been in the UK debate.”
Trump, who told US media he was in favour of Brexit before the UK voted to leave, also attacked the EU in his tweet, accusing it of a “very protectionist” stance towards trade with the US.
Fox is currently in Washington launching a working group with Trump’s trade representative, Robert Lighthize, expected to lay the foundation for a future free trade deal, though no formal negotiations can take place until Britain leaves the EU in March 2019.
Trump has repeatedly promised that the UK and US would be able to thrash out a speedy trade deal but agriculture is likely to be a sticking point.
The US has long pushed a general dilution of health and environment regulation, with hormone-treated beef and poultry processed with chlorine both currently banned under EU regulation. Food industry lobbyists in the US have also resisted products processed with chemicals from being clearly labelled.
EU guidance suggests washing chickens in chlorine could lead to worsening of standards in abattoirs who rely on chlorine as a decontaminant to cover for laxer welfare and sanitary conditions.
On Monday, Fox accused the media of being obsessed with concerns about chlorine-washed chicken being sold in Britain, adding that “Americans have been eating it perfectly safely for years”.
The comments put Fox at odds with new environment secretary Michael Gove, who was unequivocal last week that there should be no loosening of “any environmental standards whatsoever”. Instead, Britain would compete on quality and not take part in a “race to the bottom” to win new trading relationships, he said.
Theresa May’s spokesman has said it is too early to get into the specifics and “hypotheticals” of any deal but privately a Downing Street source gave their backing to Gove over the weekend, saying it was not in the UK’s interests to water down food safety regulation.
Former deputy prime minister Nick Clegg was also among those warning on Tuesday that the issue was likely to be highly complex and revealed poultry exports had been a key sticking point raised by the US while he was in coalition government.
Clegg, revealed a private conversation with an ex-vice-president, Joe Biden, around the negotiations of the EU-US transatlantic trade and investment partnership deal (TTIP) which underlined the importance of the poultry industry.
“He said ‘we’re happy to sign a trade deal with you Europeans, as long as the chicken farmers of Delaware are happy with it too’,” he told the Guardian. “It did suggest to me the poultry farming sector was uppermost in the vice-president’s mind at that stage. It certainly suggests it’s not an irrelevant footnote as Dr Fox suggests.”
At a breakfast meeting for members of the House of Representatives on Tuesday, Fox said he wanted Brexit to lead to a deepening of ties between the UK and US.
“The EU itself estimates that 90% of global growth in the next decade will come from outside Europe, and I believe as the head of an international economic department that this is an exciting opportunity for the UK to work even more closely with our largest single trading partner, the US,” he said.
The Liberal Democrat leader, Vince Cable, called on the government to guarantee parliament a vote on any post-Brexit trade deals, warning that MPs and the public will not accept agreements that weaken UK standards.
“After championing parliamentary sovereignty, the Brexiteers now seem intent on bypassing it,” Cable said. “Liam Fox and Boris Johnson must not be able to stitch up trade deals abroad and impose them on the country.
“MPs must have the right to scrutinise and reject any deal that would be bad for UK consumers and farmers. It is parliament, not
Liam Fox, that should be the final arbiter on whether to sacrifice our standards to strike a deal with Trump.”
