The Society of Motor Manufacturers & Traders (SMMT) has called on the Government to secure an interim agreement with the European Union (EU) to safeguard the future of the UK motor industry until a final agreement on Brexit is reached.
Formal talks over Britain’s withdrawal from the EU began in Brussels yesterday, and are expected to take up to two years to complete.
SMMT chief executive Mike Hawes said the UK automotive industry accepted that Britain would be leaving the EU, but raised doubts as to whether a final deal on a future relationship could be finalised and implemented by March 2019.
Hawes called Brexit "the greatest challenge the industry has faced in a generation", and said it was vital an interim agreement be secured by the British government to safeguard the country's motor industry.
"Any Brexit agreement will be hugely complex," said Hawes. "We [the UK] must negotiate with 28 countries, each with their own vested interests, making a March 2019 completion date to negotiations - as indicated by the triggering of Article 50 - feel somewhat ambitious.
"We need to be pragmatic - we are not going to be able to negotiate a plan of the complexity we require in that time and an interim deal would give us stability. We need no tariffs, frictionless trade and no uncertainty, as we have today, if we are to keep growing the industry during this period.
"Uncertainty risks death by a thousand cuts - this is an incredibly competitive global industry, with major investment decisions being made all of the time. If there is any uncertainty it erodes our competitiveness, because the companies making the major investments don't like uncertainty. If we have an interim deal that maintains what we have today then it allows time to negotiate a full deal without the risk of the UK dropping off a cliff edge that could undermine our industry permanently.
"This uncertainty cannot be allowed to drag on and drag down UK business," he said. "We need business as usual from day one - this process will likely take five years or more, not two. We need an arrangement for as long as it takes, otherwise we risk damaging our business permanently."
Hawes did note that, in the long-term, there could be positives to come out of Brexit. He said: "We trade with 160 countries and there could be ways to reduce tariffs with some, for instance, or for small-volume manufacturers to work to new regulatory requirements that improve competitiveness."
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Referendum result
max1e6 wrote:
Really? I must have missed this in the Leave campaign material. There was actually no detail whatsoever about what Brexit would mean from either camp, which further underlines the idiocy of voting for Brexit - nobody actually knew what it was, other than xenophobia and spite.
Whatever Brexit turns out to be, it will be. If that's a soft Brexit with single market access than that is what you voted for.
oaffie wrote:
Max is entirely correct to say that Brexit is all about British freedom, democracy and sovereignty. We exercised our democratic right to leave the EU, as defined in its rules, yet we have been threatened by the likes of Juncker with being punished, made an example of, for democratically choosing the path of our own futures.
If a business in this country operated in such a manner with either its customers or other businesses, threatening reprisals if they cease to do their business with them, they would be charged with running a protection racket and locked up.
That is how the EU operates, they are nothing but gangsters. What is the attraction of staying in membership of an institution which has to threaten its members to keep them as members. Nobody with any sense or standards of decency would want to be a member of such a gang.
For forty-three years we have been put upon by that gang. Nothing has ever been done with our best interests in mind, and the only times that anything has been achieved in our favour has been the occasions when we have been able to exercise a veto, such as the opt-out from taking the Euro as our currency.
We voted, democratically, for Brexit. There is no hard Brexit, there is no soft Brexit, there is only Brexit. Brexit means leaving the EU. Brexit means leaving the single market, the customs union, the free movement agreement, the European Court jurisdiction. Everything. A complete separation from the EU. Anything else is staying in the EU, because to have one of those things requires having all of them and being subject to their rule.
We voted out, we're getting out, and whether we get a tariff-free trade agreement or not, we shall be better off out, because we shall stay British, we shall continue being Britain, while the rest of them go to hell in a handcart as part of the single European state. I don't believe that there will be such hard times, because I believe in Britain and the British people, but even if there were a tough spell to get through, it would be worth the effort to maintain our British status and all of the freedoms it brings.
As to the subject of cars, if tariffs were to prevent us buying from them and them buying from us, UK manufacturing would receive an almighty boost in being asked to cater for the domestic demand.
In 2016 UK exports to the EU were approximately 758,361. In 2015 (latest available figures) UK imports from Germany were 809,900 (compared to German exports to the whole of Asia, 701,300, and to the USA, 618,800). Don't forget to add on all those German vans and lorries we buy as well. Figures are from SMMT and VDA websites.
That's just from Germany, by the way, not the whole EU, so we can expect that the German manufacturers and unions will be telling Merkel she'd better ensure no tariffs are put in their way. Merkel will tell the other twenty-six and when Merkel says jump they jump, as high as they are able, until she tells them to stop.
Bosch, Siemens, Neff, Bayer, Staedtler, Liebherr... The list is lengthy, of German companies who do well out of the UK and will not be looking to lose out on how highly regarded are German products in Britain. Not to mention the rising takings of Aldi and Lidl.
Doubtless, when Juncker's plans of conquest set the continent on fire, as did Napoleon's and Hitler's, they'll expect us to bail them out once more. They always come crying to us when they're in trouble, which is probably why the likes of Juncker have been so keen to have us inside their corrupt little organization, so they could make us impotent to prevent their scheming to subjugate the continent. Well they can cry all they like this time, but they can get lost. They're making their bed and they're going to have to lie on it while Paneuropa burns around them. They cannot say they haven't been warned.
The EU