Friday 5 March 2021

Tariffs & Freeports

I sometimes wonder whether the solution to Brexit is prohibitive import tariffs such that, if any foreign company wants access to the UK market, they have to set up a factory here which will provide jobs. OK, profits would be repatriated to the company's country, but it would certainly be a boost to jobs. The downside would be tit-for-tat tariffs on our exports - except, perhaps, from countries that have businesses that set up in the UK. A natural extension of that would be the creation of a Free Trade Area of like-minded countries who committed to a set of standards for products and labour laws. Such countries could even allow free movement.


Not sure about this Freeports concept - they bring benefits solely to large companies and work to the disadvantage of smaller manufacturers and exporters. They also simply move jobs from one area to another, rather than creating jobs.


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