A new parliamentary report draws on evidence submitted by the UK Trade Policy Observatory (UKTPO).

The report is the first to be published by the newly created House of Lords International Agreements Committee, which succeeded the EU International Agreements Sub-Committee following the end of the Brexit transition period.

The report discusses three international agreements laid before the UK parliament - the Free Trade Agreement with Singapore, the Trade Continuity Agreement with Canada, and the Association Agreement with the Arab Republic of Egypt.

The Committee invited the UKTPO to submit evidence about the Trade Continuity Agreement with Canada in particular.

The Trade Continuity Agreement with Canada seeks to replicate the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement between Canada and the EU (CETA), which covered UK-Canada trade before Brexit.

UKTPO analysis cited by the committee found that ‘there are almost no differences and the impacts, in comparison to CETA, will be negligible’. However, the UKTPO explained that the services chapters in the agreement provide a ‘relatively modest liberalisation’, and that ‘financial services and transport services remain relatively closed’.

The Trade Continuity Agreement is a temporary deal. It will last for one year (which could be extended) and the UK and Canada are supposed to start negotiating a new agreement in that time and conclude that within three years.

In the conclusion to its evidence, the UKTPO recommended that the Government seek to ‘negotiate a deeper agreement with Canada,’ and noted in particular ‘the importance of financial services and business services, and the mutual recognition of professional qualifications’.

This is echoed in the Committee’s recommendations to Government:

‘We call on the Government to cover the liberalisation of the services sector, including financial and transport services, and the mutual recognition of professional qualifications in its negotiating objectives for an enhanced UK-Canada agreement under Article IV of the Trade Continuity Agreement.’

Find out more about the UKTPO and its responses to parliamentary inquiries.