The UK is in a “better position than a lot of other countries” after Donald Trump imposed a 10 per cent rate of tariffs on exports to the US, Jonathan Reynolds has said.
The US President imposed a rate of 20 per cent on the European Union (EU), 24 per cent on Japan and 34 per cent on China, in a speech issuing sweeping global import taxes outside the White House last night, as he hailed America’s “declaration of economic independence”.
Speaking this morning, the UK business and trade secretary said the tariffs were a “disappointment” and “a challenge”.
Reynolds told Times Radio: “Any barrier to trade, particularly between the UK and our major trading partner, which the US is, is a disappointment to me. It’s a challenge.
“So, I recognise that the UK is in a better position than a lot of other countries from what was announced last night, but I was still disappointed.”
He said the UK has “modelled every scenario” for the impact of tariffs but it is “not just about the relationship between the UK and the US, but what is going on in the rest of the world”.
A timeline for the UK to seal an economic deal to mitigate tariffs is “largely in the gift of the US”, he said.
‘Remain at the table’
Reynolds said: “We have every scenario you could imagine planned for but we also have a plan in place to stay calm, to talk to the US, to continue our work, to make sure that we are getting the best for the UK and working with all friends and allies as a way through this, rather than let the rhetoric overcome us, let the siren calls to make this even worse be listened to.”
While the cabinet minister also argued those framing the lower tariffs on the UK compared to the EU as a vindication of Brexit have “missed the point” and that the situation was “much bigger than the UK’s relationship to the European Union and we’ve got to recognise that”.
He said: “I think anyone trying to use this to fight the kind of perennial historical political debates in the UK has missed the point. This is a really significant change to how the global trading system operates and the US’s role within it.”
Reynolds also told Sky News businesses were telling him not to “overreact” and to “remain at the table”.
He stressed: “We in the UK will take any action we need to give ourselves the tools that we need to respond to announcements of this kind.
“There’s some formal steps we need to take, particularly the evidence you ask for from business that comes into the Department for Business and Trade (DBT), and we can base decisions upon that.”