London, Oct 3 (TNS): The U.K. will not “cut and paste” existing European trade agreements once a deal for Brexit has been completed, the country’s trade chief told CNBC Tuesday.
Liam Fox, the U.K.’s international trade secretary, denied that he ever implied that the current agreements would be closely replicated to ensure the British economy isn’t affected by Brexit.
“I never actually said ‘cut and paste’ because that’s not the case, because many of these (trade) agreements we have to do things like look at the quotas that were given by the European Union to some of these countries, and then to work out a way of disaggregating them, so I’ve never used the phrase ‘cut and paste’ because it’s not correct,” Fox told CNBC, speaking at the Conservative Party Conference in Manchester.
Fox instead said the U.K. will try to transition deals in a way where goods and services will continue to be sold from and to the U.K. once it leaves the EU.
“These are deals that are already in place, these are agreements that the European Union has with countries outside the European Union that Britain is part because of our European membership. And the question is, can we get those transitioned to be U.K. agreements so there’s no disruption in trade?” he said.
