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Trade with UK will be more difficult and expensive post-Brexit, Swedish government warned

Trade between the UK and Sweden will be both more expensive and more difficult after Brexit, a new report commissioned by the Swedish government has warned.

Published: 14 March 2017 15:45 CET
Trade with UK will be more difficult and expensive post-Brexit, Swedish government warned
Trade with the UK will be more expensive and tricker post-Brexit, Sweden's government has been told. Photo: Matt Dunham/AP

The report by Sweden’s National Board of Trade (Kommerskollegium) looked into how the trade of services between the EU and UK may be regulated once Britain leaves the union, and also provided alternatives for how customs and trade procedures for goods could be regulated.

“The UK is an important trade partner for Sweden and we hope that will continue in the future. But it is clear that it will be both more expensive and more difficult to trade with the UK after Brexit, and we need to look at possible solutions to reduce the negative effects on trade,” Sweden’s EU affairs and trade minister Ann Linde said in a statement after receiving the report on Tuesday.

The 177-page study does not paint a particularly encouraging picture. It notes that “regardless of which alternative is the result of the exit process, there will be a worsening in trade between the EU and the UK compared to today”.

The document explains that customs procedures will return from the first day that the UK is no longer a member of the EU, meaning “increased administration, increased costs, and reduced stability in the flow of goods”.

“The possibilities of making the customs procedures easy for countries which leave the customs union are small, and the risk of substantial administrative burdens and complicated trade procedures is serious,” Linde commented.

The Kommerskollegium study also warned that businesses are likely to adjust to a worsened trade situation by looking for new markets other than the UK to work with:

“Trade and businesses adjust themselves according to opportunities and hindrances. Trade patterns are not static, and it can be assumed that other markets will be prioritized over the British one if the UK leaves the single market.”

The study calculated that half of the UK's trade currently occurs with EU nations, with 53 percent of its imports coming from the EU and 44 percent of its exports going there. About 1.7 percent of the UK’s imports come from Sweden while 1.5 percent of its exports go there.

Sweden imported 62 billion kronor ($6.92 billion) worth of services and the same amount in goods from the UK in 2016. That same year, Sweden exported services worth 51 billion kronor ($5.69 billion) and goods worth 72 billion kronor ($8 billion) to the UK.

A more general conclusion from the document is that the EU single market clearly benefits the trade of goods and services compared to other alternatives:

“A deep and broad free trade agreement similar to the ones the EU has with Canada, Ukraine or South Korea, even in its most ambitious form, does not provide the benefits the single market does.”

The report is set to be an important contribution in shaping Sweden's position during the forthcoming Brexit negotiations between the UK and EU.

IMMIGRATION

Border centres and ‘safe’ states: The EU’s major asylum changes explained

UPDATE: The EU parliament has adopted a sweeping reform of Europe's asylum policies that will both harden border procedures and force all the bloc's 27 nations to share responsibility.

Published: 8 April 2024 09:42 CEST
Updated: 11 April 2024 10:29 CEST
Border centres and 'safe' states: The EU's major asylum changes explained

The parliament’s main political groups overcame opposition from far-right and far-left parties to pass the new migration and asylum pact — enshrining a difficult overhaul nearly a decade in the making.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen hailed the vote, saying it will “secure European borders… while ensuring the protection of the fundamental rights” of migrants.

“We must be the ones to decide who comes to the European Union and under what circumstances, and not the smugglers and traffickers,” she said.

EU governments — a majority of which previously approved the pact — also welcomed its adoption.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Greece’s migration minister, Dimitris Kairidis, both called it “historic”.

French President Emmanuel Macron said Europe was acting “effectively and humanely” while Italian Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi hailed what he termed “the best possible compromise”.

But there was dissent when Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban derided the reform as “another nail in the coffin of the European Union”.

“Unity is dead, secure borders are no more. Hungary will never give in to the mass migration frenzy! We need a change in Brussels in order to Stop Migration!” Orban said in a post on social media platform X.

For very different reasons, migrant charities also slammed the pact, which includes building border centres to hold asylum-seekers and sending some to outside “safe” countries.

Amnesty International said the EU was “shamefully” backing a deal “they know will lead to greater human suffering” while the Red Cross federation urged member states “to guarantee humane conditions for asylum seekers and migrants affected”.

The vote itself was initially disrupted by protesters yelling: “The pact kills — vote no!”, while dozens of demonstrators outside the parliament building in Brussels held up placards with slogans decrying the reform.

The parliament’s far-left grouping, which maintains that the reforms are incompatible with Europe’s commitment to upholding human rights, said it was a “dark day”.

It was “a pact with the devil,” said Damien Careme, a lawmaker from the Greens group.

Border centres

As well as Orban, other far-right lawmakers also opposed the passage of the 10 laws making up the pact as insufficient to stop irregular migrants they accuse of spreading insecurity and threatening to “submerge” European identity.

Marine Le Pen, the figurehead of France’s far-right National Rally, complained the changes would give “legal impunity to NGOs complicit with smugglers”.

She and her party’s leader who sits in the European Parliament, Jordan Bardella, said they would seek to overturn the reform after EU elections in June, which are tipped to boost far-right numbers in the legislature.

The pact’s measures are due to come into force in 2026, after the European Commission first sets out how it would be implemented.

New border centres would hold irregular migrants while their asylum requests are vetted. And deportations of those deemed inadmissible would be sped up.

The pact also requires EU countries to take in thousands of asylum-seekers from “frontline” states such as Italy and Greece, or — if they refuse — to provide money or other resources to the under-pressure nations.

Even ahead of Orban’s broadside, his anti-immigration government reaffirmed Hungary would not be taking in any asylum-seekers.

“This new migration pact practically gives the green light to illegal migration to Europe,” Hungary’s Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said before the vote, adding that Budapest “will not allow illegal migrants to set foot here in Hungary”.

‘EU solidarity’

German’s Scholz said on X that the accord stands for “solidarity among European states” and would “finally relieve the burden on those countries that are particularly hard hit”.

One measure particularly criticised by migrant charities is the sending of asylum-seekers to countries outside the EU deemed “safe”, if the migrant has sufficient ties to that country.

The pact resulted from years of arduous negotiations spurred by a massive inflow of irregular migrants in 2015, many from war-torn Syria and Afghanistan.

Under current EU rules, the arrival country bears responsibility for hosting and vetting asylum-seekers and returning those deemed inadmissible. That has put southern frontline states under pressure and fuelled far-right opposition.

A political breakthrough came in December when a weighted majority of EU countries backed the reforms — overcoming opposition from Hungary and Poland.

In parallel with the reform, the EU has been multiplying the same sort of deal it struck with Turkey in 2016 to stem migratory flows.

It has reached accords with Tunisia and, most recently, Egypt that are portrayed as broader cooperation arrangements. Many lawmakers have, however, criticised the deals.

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