Select Committee · Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee

Australia FTA: Food and Agriculture

Status: Closed Opened: 9 Nov 2021 Closed: 9 Nov 2022 13 recommendations 3 conclusions 1 report

The Government published the text of its Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with Australia on 16 December 2021. The followed the publication of the agreement in principle in June 2021. The UK-Australia FTA is the first new trade deal negotiated “from scratch”/ that the UK Government will have signed since leaving the EU. The Government has …

Reports

1 report

Title	HC No.	Published	Items	Response
First report - Australia FTA: Food and Agriculture	HC 23	17 Jun 2022	16	Responded

Recommendations & Conclusions

1 item

3 Recommendation First report - Australia FTA: Food and … Accepted in Part

In future negotiations the Government should ensure that its approach to negotiating changes to tariff...

In future negotiations the Government should ensure that its approach to negotiating changes to tariff free access to the UK meat market is more sophisticated than just weight of gross products and can differentiate between different cuts of meat—by using a carcass weight equivalent approach or similar—to mitigate the risk …

Government response. The government states each FTA is bespoke and may include equivalence approaches, like Carcass Weight Equivalent, but there is no inherent advantage and final outcomes will depend on negotiations. They cite the UK-Australia trade deal includes an alternative mechanism for …

Oral evidence sessions

6 sessions

Date	Witnesses
11 May 2022	Chris Heaton · Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, James Clarke · Department for International Trade, Rt Hon Penny Mordaunt · Department for International Trade, Victoria Prentis · Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs	View ↗
11 May 2022	Professor Lorand Bartels · Trade and Agriculture Commission	View ↗
29 Mar 2022	Dr Chris Kebbell · New Zealand High Commission, His Excellency The Hon Bede Corry · New Zealand High Commission, His Excellency the Honourable George Brandis QC · Australian High Commission, Kieran Macdonell · Australian High Commission	View ↗
8 Mar 2022	Andrew Opie · British Retail Consortium (BRC), Anna Sands · WWF, James Russell · British Veterinary Association, Kate Nicholls · UKHospitality, Ms Orla Delargy · Sustain, Sue Davies MBE · Which?	View ↗
23 Feb 2022	Emily Rees · European Centre for International Political Economy, Professor Fiona Smith · University of Leeds, Professor Louise Manning · Royal Agricultural University, Sarah Baker · Disability Unit, Sarah Baker · Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board	View ↗
8 Feb 2022	Mr Phil Stocker · National Sheep Association, Neil Shand · National Beef Association, Nick von Westenholz · National Farmers' Union, Peter Hardwick · British Meat Processors Association	View ↗

Correspondence

2 letters

Date	Direction	Title
12 Oct 2022	—	Correspondence from the Chair to Defra and DIT SoS re Australia FTA Govt respon…
22 Jun 2022	To cttee	Letter from the Secretary of State for International Trade to the Chair regardi…