When Boris Johnson flew to meet Donald Trump for the first time at the Biarritz G7 summit in 2019, he boasted en route to reporters about the huge benefits a post-Brexit trade deal with the US would bring – citing a baffling range of great British products, from pork pies to shower trays.
The last new US free trade agreement that came into force was with Colombia, in 2011 – aside from the USMCA, a reworking of the Nafta deal with Canada and Mexico, which Trump signed in 2020 and is now busy smashing up.
Labour’s stated aim of striking up a closer post-Brexit trade relationship with the EU creates an added barrier to this kind of deal, because accepting US food standards, for example, would scupper any veterinary agreement with Brussels.
What the US and UK now appear to be aiming at, after Keir Starmer’s trip to Washington, is not a broad-based free trade agreement like that contemplated (unrealistically) by Johnson, and covering a range of sectors – but something much more limited.
John Springford, of the Centre for European Reform, suggested a narrow, tech-focused deal could include the UK promising to adopt a similar approach to artificial intelligence regulation, for example – where the US has strongly criticised the EU’s more stringent legislation.
