The importance of EU rules to maintaining open borders within Ireland has been at the centre of UK and EU negotiations. Yet what is less appreciated is the significance of those rules for achieving frictionless trade between England, Scotland and Wales. In this Briefing Paper, the authors highlight that leaving the EU could create new border trade barriers inside the UK, and opens up questions about how – and whether – the devolved nations will unite with England on external trade agreements. They argue that a US trade negotiation poses a serious threat to the unity of the United Kingdom because it would likely require changes to UK domestic legislation in very sensitive areas, including drug pricing and food safety regulation, which Scotland, with its large Remain-voting majority and stated desire to maintain alignment with EU regulation, would strenuously oppose. The authors argue that devolved nations should have a formal role in the setting of UK negotiating objectives, to ensure, among other things, that external trade agreements do not lead to internal trade barriers. Read Briefing Paper 38: DESTRUCTION OF THE UNION: TOO HIGH A PRICE TO PAY FOR A US TRADE AGREEMENT

As set out in the EU Withdrawal Act (2018) the government’s approach to Brexit is to transfer EU law into UK law and address any deficiencies in that law by secondary legislation. This Briefing Paper examines post-Brexit food safety legislation and finds that the UK’s post-Brexit  safety rules fall short of the level of protection currently provided by the EU and, in some cases, they give ministers broad discretion to make future changes without full parliamentary scrutiny.  This would provide a relatively clear path for a UK Prime Minister to overcome parliamentary opposition to any new trade agreements that cover agricultural and food products, such as US-UK FTA. Also, Brexit food safety legislation allows for devolution which could undermine both the UK’s ability to undertake a unified approach to external trade agreements and also the maintenance of the UK’s internal free movement of goods. Read Briefing Paper 37 BREXIT FOOD SAFETY LEGISLATION AND POTENTIAL IMPLICATIONS FOR UK TRADE: THE DEVIL IN THE DETAILS