Could Australian trade talks undermine the UK’s post-Brexit welfare promises?

Just when we thought we were safe from US chlorinated chicken imports, the issue of post-Brexit food standards has lurched back into focus, with Australia reportedly set to demand any future trade deal with the UK includes a relaxing of the ban on hormone-enhanced beef.

The government sees a free trade deal with Australia as a potential ‘early win’ after Brexit, because the limited scope of such an agreement would make it easier to negotiate than more complicated trade deals with likes of the US and Japan.

But according to reports in The Times over the weekend, the issue of hormone-treated beef will be central for Australian negotiators. Trade secretary Liam Fox is understood to be “sympathetic” to their cause, because he believes relaxing the ban would help reduce meat prices for UK consumers.

Michael Gove has insisted Britain would never accept imports of chlorine-washed chicken as part of a US trade deal because it’s an animal welfare issue. He claims US producers cannot guarantee birds are raised to the same welfare standards as in the UK.

Hormone-treated beef could be a different beast, though. The government has yet to set out its stance on this particular issue, and Gove is staying uncharacteristically quiet so far.

The Department for International Trade says only the UK “will maintain its own high animal welfare and environmental standards in future free trade agreements”. Whether or not the UK would view hormone-treated beef as a violation of its welfare and environmental standards, however, remains unclear.

In the EU, the practice is banned under the precautionary principle over fears at least one of the hormones used could be carcinogenic. But Australia has long questioned this scientific analysis, arguing the ban is nothing more than protectionism to stop European farmers being undercut by cheaper imports.

Even if the UK government wants to maintain the ban, it’s hard to see how negotiators will seal a good deal with Australia without reaching some sort of compromise. As Australian beef exporters have pointed out, they’d struggle to increase supply to the UK market if the ban wasn’t relaxed – which could seriously undermine the country’s enthusiasm to come to a free trade agreement with the UK.

And Australia won’t be the only country putting pressure on the UK to allow hormone-treated beef imports, with Donald Trump’s team of negotiators also likely to play hardball on the issue when UK-US trade talks kick off.

Michael Gove might have won the battle over chlorinated chicken, but the war on our food standards has only just begun.