Britain hopes to join CPTPP in 2022, has no date yet for trade pact with US

Both Britain and the US want a free-trade deal, but there is no timetable yet for talks, says the UK trade minister

Britain sees the CPTPP as a way to lock in market access and gain influence in a region increasingly dominated by China

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Britain’s Secretary of State for International Trade Anne-Marie Trevelyan. Photo: Reuters

Published: 10:35pm, 13 Oct 2021Updated: 1:35am, 14 Oct 2021

Britain does not know when it might get a full trade deal with the United States but is hoping to join a trans-Pacific trade partnership next year, British trade minister Anne-Marie Trevelyan said on Wednesday.

Trevelyan only took up her post last month and met many of her key counterparts face-to-face for the first time earlier this week, including US Trade Representative Katherine Tai, at a gathering of ministers from the Group of 20 major economies.

Both Britain and the US want a free-trade deal, but there is no timetable yet for talks, Trevelyan said.

“We haven’t got a date in the diary. What we have got is a continuing dialogue on the opportunity to look sector by sector on those key areas that we know will fall into that full, comprehensive deal in full course,” Trevelyan said.

The British government once touted a trade accord with the US as one of the biggest prizes of leaving the European Union, but since Joe Biden’s election as US president, the prospect of a swift deal has all but disappeared as his administration conducts a wider review of trade policies.