International Trade Committee Chair comments on New Zealand trade deal

• Inquiry: UK trade negotiations: Agreement with New Zealand
• International Trade Committee

The Committee Chair has written to the Secretary of State for International Trade, Rt. Hon. Anne-Marie Trevelyan MP, calling her to give evidence.

The Committee is particularly interested in finding out how this agreement will affect people and businesses across the UK, and its likely economic, social and environmental impacts.

Terms of reference

Send us your views

• Submit written evidence to the inquiry

The Committee welcomes short submissions which answer one or more of the following questions:

• How good a deal does the AiP represent for the UK?
• To what extent has the Government achieved its stated negotiating objectives?
• How are the terms of the AiP between the UK and New Zealand likely to affect you, your business or organisation, or those that you represent?
• What is likely to be the impact of the agreement on:
  • the UK’s economy as a whole?
  • particular sectors of the UK economy?
  • the UK’s devolved nations and English regions?
  • social, labour, environmental and animal welfare issues?
  • UK consumers?
• How well is the Government communicating its progress in negotiations – and how much is it listening to stakeholders during those negotiations?
  Form of written evidence

Submissions should be no longer than 3,000 words. The main body of any submission should use numbered paragraphs. Each submission should contain:

• a short summary, perhaps in bullet point form;
• a brief introduction about the person or organisation submitting evidence, for example explaining their area of expertise or experience;
• any factual information from which the Committee might be able to draw conclusions.
• any recommendations for action by the Government or others which the submitter would like the Committee to consider.

Submissions should be in malleable format such as MS Word (not PDFs) with no use of colour or logos. Guidance on submitting written evidence and data protection information is available here: Guidance on submitting written evidence.

Deadline for submissions

The Committee is asking for initial written evidence to be submitted through the Committee’s web portal by 10 November 2021.

It is recommended that all submitters familiarise themselves with the Guidance on giving evidence to a Select Committee of the House of Commons which outlines particulars of word count, format, document size, and content restrictions.

Diversity

We encourage members of underrepresented groups to submit written evidence. We aim to have diverse panels of Select Committee witnesses and ask organisations to bear this in mind when we ask them to choose a representative. We are currently monitoring the diversity of our witnesses.

Chair's comment

Commenting on the announcement, International Trade Committee Chair, Angus Brendan MacNeil MP, said:

“I commend the dedication of the civil servants who have worked long and hard in order to reach this Agreement in Principle. However – as the Secretary of State acknowledges – there is still a long way to go as the Government continues to negotiate the full agreement over the coming months.

While the prospect of increased trade with our friends in New Zealand is welcome, the devil of this agreement will be in the detail. My Committee will be looking underneath the bonnet and kicking the tyres to find out how far the Government has achieved its stated ambitions, exploring whether this represents a good deal for all sectors of the UK economy and all parts of the country.

The Government had particular ambitions to open up New Zealand to UK service industries and investors. We need to know how far these have been achieved – and what concessions have been given in return. A serious concern is the speed at which UK tariffs and quotas on agri-food products will be removed, and how this will affect our farmers. While there will be transitional quotas for some products, over 95% of all UK tariffs will be eliminated on day one. British agriculture must not become a casualty of the Government’s desire to sign a deal in haste.

Also, with the COP26 summit in less than a fortnight, I am keen to know what this deal will do to further the UK’s environmental ambitions.

My Committee has today launched an inquiry into the UK-New Zealand negotiations, to rigorously examine the detail of this agreement in principle – and the full agreement, when it is agreed – to help ensure thorough parliamentary scrutiny. We will also be looking at whether the Government is achieving its objectives and what trade-offs it is choosing to make in order to get the final deal signed.

We look forward to hearing from the Government, as well as experts and stakeholders, during our inquiry. Good scrutiny needs to be timely, and I have called on the Secretary of State to appear before the Committee on 3 November to give evidence on the agreement in principle.”

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