The UK’s meat industry faces a loss of up to 50 per cent of all its exports because of ongoing problems with “mountains” of Brexit red tape, a leading trade body has warned.
In a new report, the British Meat Processors Association (BMPA) said “systemic weaknesses” in trade arrangements meant a potential loss of trade for UK exporters of between 20 and 50 per cent. It also outlined that meat producers face an additional £120m a year in extra costs because of the trade deal forged by Boris Johnson’s government.
BPMA has urged the government to establish a new agreement on food standards with Brussels to ease problems sending food to both EU, and from Great Britain into Northern Ireland (NI).
Elsewhere, the DUP has called for new guidance around the union flag – which states it should be flown on UK government buildings every day in a bid to “unite the nation” – to be extended to NI.
Currently, union flags are only flown on designated days but the new policy will ask for it to be flown all the time in England, Scotland and Wales. In NI, though, guidance will remain the same due to the issues flags have previously caused in the country’s divided communities.
DUP MP Sir Jeffrey Donaldson said the “decision to exclude NI at this stage is wrong and runs contrary to New Decade, New Approach which sought to align us with the rest of the UK when it came to the union flag being flown on government buildings”.
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