Britain won’t be ‘shut out’ of the room for EU trade talks says defiant Liam Fox
Brussels is threatening to kick our officials out of meetings to avoid the UK gaining sensitive information for after Brexit
Britain will not be shut out of the room for current EU trade talks with Australia and other countries, Dr Liam Fox declared last night.
Brussels is threatening to kick our officials out of meetings to avoid the UK gaining sensitive information for after Brexit.
EU officials fear the UK could gain confidential information that would help us agree favourable terms with the same nations after we leave the EU in March 2019.
He added that Britain will “exercise our full legal rights as one of the 28 members until such time as we stop being a member”.
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Fears emerged last month after the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier said there needed to be a “discussion about the treatment of sensitive information in the context of certain trade negotiations, to which the UK would continue to have access to while it remained a full member of the union”.
EU rules ban member states from striking individual trade deals with non-EU countries but ministers have already started informal negotiations with 16 countries across the world.
Dr Fox vowed to fight any attempts to stop UK ministers and officials holding these informal talks before we leave.
He told Bloomberg: “We’ve certainly got greater freedom now that we are in the process of leaving.
“Obviously we can’t sign any agreements while we are still members legally of the European Union but we can certainly begin to talk about what we want.”