About Nick Phipps

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So far Nick Phipps has created 54 blog entries.

Will Brexit Raise the Cost of Living?

2 November 2017 Ilona Serwicka is Research Fellow in the Economics of Brexit at the UKTPO. As the United Kingdom is preparing to leave the European Union, Government policy is to seek a deep and comprehensive free trade agreement with the EU. But Brexit talks have not moved onto the trade issues yet and even if the future trade relationship is taken up in December, this gives little time and offers no guarantee that an agreement will be reached and ratified before 29 March 2019, the Brexit date. The Government has recently recognised the possibility that talks might break down and started to outline a ‘no deal’ vision of the UK-EU trade. Our analysis reveals that unemployed households, those with children, and pensioners will all fare off worse than average in the case of a ‘no deal’. A new paper, Will Brexit Raise the Cost of Living? by Stephen Clarke, Ilona Serwicka and L. Alan Winters, and published by the National Institute Economic Review, looks at the impact that imposing Most Favoured Nation (MFN) tariffs on UK imports from the EU would have on the price of goods sold in the UK and the average cost of living. […]

By |2017-11-02T16:53:35+00:002 November 2017|UK- EU|3 Comments
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Boeing – Bombardier and Brexit II

17 October 2017 Steve McGuire is Professor of Business and Public Policy and Head of the School of Business, Management and Economics at the University of Sussex. He is a Fellow of the UKTPO. Bombardier has found an elegant solution to its trade problems with the United States: sell a controlling stake in the programme to a company with deeper pockets to defend itself – and with a US production base immune, by definition, from US tariffs. […]

By |2017-10-17T14:53:45+01:0017 October 2017|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|1 Comment
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No deal’ Brexit tariffs could mean millions of households facing price rises of over £500 a year

17 October 2017 Lower-income households would be disproportionately affected should the UK revert to WTO tariffs Exiting the EU without a trade deal and reverting to WTO ‘most-favoured nation’ (MFN) tariffs with the EU would lead to significant price rises across a range of goods, with low-income households facing the biggest cost pressures. This is according to a new joint-report published by the Resolution Foundation and the UK Trade Policy Observatory at the University of Sussex. […]

By |2017-10-17T08:11:04+01:0017 October 2017|UK- EU|2 Comments
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The ins and outs of the Single Market

11 October 2017 One of the most critical issues for the Brexit negotiations in relation to trade is whether the UK should remain in the EU Single Market.  The Conservatives claim that the UK will no longer be members of its single market or its customs union by the end of a two-year transitional period, but at his party’s conference, Jeremy Corbyn said a Labour government would strike a deal with the EU that "guarantees unimpeded access to the single market" after Brexit. We have produced a short, animated video that explains what the Single Market is, how it works and the ways it effects trade, and thereby the economy.  This includes the role of the European Court of Justice. Ultimately, the video explains that there is a trade-off between making your laws independently and cooperating sufficiently to be a part of a bigger market and achieve higher incomes. https://vimeo.com/237091027 Republishing guidelines The UK Trade Policy Observatory believes in the free flow of information and encourages readers to cite our materials, providing due acknowledgement. For online use, this should be a link to he original resource on the our website. We do not however, publish under a Creative Commons license. This means you CANNOT republish our articles online or in print for free.

By |2017-10-11T15:47:19+01:0011 October 2017|UK- EU|3 Comments
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Boeing, Bombardier and Brexit: what does a North American trade dispute say about Brexit?

27 September 2017 Steve McGuire is Professor of Business and Public Policy and Head of the School of Business, Management and Economics at the University of Sussex. He is a Fellow of the UKTPO. As Bombardier is bombarded with a 220% tariff increase on exports to the US, the UK needs to wise up. There are two key points from the Boeing-Bombardier dispute that have implications for Brexit. First, leaving the European Union will not affect the sovereignty that national governments already have to dish out state aid for key industries. This will not change. Second, and this is the critical point, trade is bound up in broader political calculations. […]

By |2017-09-27T15:59:33+01:0027 September 2017|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|4 Comments
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The Customs Union: The Fiction of ‘Frictionless’ Trade

14 August 2017 After Brexit, the UK will have to leave the EU Customs Union (CU) and become a legally separate customs territory. It might then, however, seek to create a new Customs Union with the EU to cover their mutual trade. The UK Trade Policy Observatory at the University of Sussex (UKTPO) has produced this short animated video that explains what this entails, and what kind of an agreement the UK and the EU would need to establish in order to achieve the same level of trade costs as we have now. Ultimately, the video explains, a Customs Union will not produce ‘frictionless’ trade without re-creating several aspects of current EU membership. With Brexit negotiations already underway, it emphasises that maintaining a customs union is just one part of the story; and not, by itself, the be all and end all for achieving a smooth trading process. https://vimeo.com/229297381 Republishing guidelines The UK Trade Policy Observatory believes in the free flow of information and encourages readers to cite our materials, providing due acknowledgement. For online use, this should be a link to he original resource on the our website. We do not however, publish under a Creative Commons license. This means you CANNOT [...]

By |2017-08-14T11:00:37+01:0014 August 2017|UK- EU|4 Comments
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The EU referendum – one year on, and back at square one?

23 June 2017 L. Alan Winters CB, Professor of Economics and Director of UKTPO and Ilona Serwicka, Research Fellow at UKTPO One year ago the British people voted to leave the EU. Out of 33.5 million votes cast, 51.9 per cent were for ‘leave’, albeit in the absence of any statement about what ‘leaving’ might mean. The government is still vague about what the UK’s post-Brexit trade policy should be – even after triggering the formal leave process – but the general election has pressured Theresa May to soften her Brexit stance. Even though Brexit negotiations are now formally under way, the options suddenly again seem wide open for debate. In terms of options the UK is back at square one, but following a year’s analysis, it is now clearer what these options amount to. Over the year, the UK Trade Policy Observatory (UKTPO) has discussed many of the options and this note draws on some of that analysis to try to light the path forward. […]

By |2017-06-23T09:23:51+01:0023 June 2017|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|1 Comment
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Animal Welfare and Post-Brexit Trade: can you have your cake made with free range eggs and eat it?

12 June 2017 Guest blog by Iyan I.H. Offor, Trade & Animal Welfare Project Officer at Eurogroup for Animals and David Bowles, Assistant Director, Public Affairs, RSPCA. The Conservative Government has been quick to highlight the potential benefits and quick wins for animal welfare made possible by new UK trade competencies post-Brexit. However, experience with the reality of trade negotiations is making some animal welfare organisations more sceptical. The UK has some of the highest standards in the world enacted under a legislative model. This is in contrast to the approach of the US and Canada, for example, which place reliance upon voluntary industry standards. Diverging welfare standards can result in increased imports of low-welfare products for two reasons. First, lower animal welfare standards are invariably linked to cheaper production which out-factors transport costs. Second, there are no effective mandatory product labelling mechanisms for animal welfare, except for shell eggs. Thus, although consumers express willingness to buy higher welfare products and to pay a premium for such products, they inadvertently purchase low welfare meat and dairy because the market does not operate transparently. This puts the livelihoods of British farmers who comply with animal welfare production requirements at risk. […]

By |2017-06-12T10:16:46+01:0012 June 2017|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|2 Comments
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South East hopes for tourism boom but fears border headache post Brexit

5 June 2017 Brexit could lead to a boom in tourism and high-end exports in the South East, according to a consultation of locals by trade experts at the University of Sussex. However, there is growing concern about the logistical headache of potentially increased customs and immigration checks at South-East airports, seaports and the Channel Tunnel, the process found. With the UK General Election only a week away, and with Brexit such an important issue for this election campaign, economists and lawyers from the UK Trade Policy Observatory (UKTPO) based at the University of Sussex have been exploring the key issues for post-Brexit trade policy for the South-East region. […]

By |2017-06-05T11:31:27+01:005 June 2017|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|0 Comments
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What do the General Election Manifestos say about International Trade? The Scottish National Party

31 May 2017 Compiled by Fellows of the UKTPO Brexit will leave many areas of UK policy open to change. International trade policy is among the most important of these for UK prosperity and also among the most immediate because the status quo cannot simply be extended. This is the sixth in a series of blogs reporting what the major political parties say about trade policy in their 2017 manifestos, as they become available. The UK Trade Policy Observatory (UKTPO) has set out a series of issues that it believes should be considered in any election manifesto that might form the basis of the UK’s future trade policy. The table below checks whether or not the SNP Manifesto mentions these important elements explicitly or implicitly. Following that, we offer a brief commentary on the treatment of trade policy in the manifesto. […]

By |2017-05-31T11:14:37+01:0031 May 2017|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|0 Comments
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