UK HM Braverman's xenophobic remarks on Leicester riots may dampen FTA talks with India
13 Oct 2022 11:56:41
London, Oct 13: India’s reputation as one of the world’s toughest trade negotiators is becoming more than an inconvenience for UK Prime Minister Liz Truss.
While Prime Minister Narendra Modi pledged to prioritize rapid “early harvest” trade agreements in 2021, India has signed just two new deals — one with the United Arab Emirates and another with Australia. Now prospects for a much-touted pact with the UK look to be getting bogged down.
For Truss, India’s stance may force her to offer concessions because the pressure to strike big trade deals is already high. Failure will provide another blow to her post-Brexit vision that the UK can clinch new deals in previously closed-off markets due to its membership in the European Union. The US has already signaled that an agreement with the UK is off the table in the short run. Any failure to conclude a trade accord with Britain will be a missed opportunity for India, a nation upon which many economies are pinning their hopes amid intensified geopolitical struggles between the west and China. The deal, if clinched, would be India’s biggest and most ambitious free-trade agreement to date. But talks between India and the UK have hit a snag over easier access to thousands of skilled workers from the South Asian nation that is likely to push finalizing a free-trade agreement beyond the October deadline. New Delhi’s position has hardened in the ongoing negotiations amid concerns raised by UK Home Secretary Suella Braverman on migration from India. The comments made last week prompted India to say both nations should “honor” the “understanding” regarding migration mobility. New Delhi is also seeking to claw back half a billion pounds in payments made by Indian workers toward Britain’s social security system as part of the deal, people familiar with the matter said. Further, the UK’s offer to restrict the movement of skilled workers would skew the proposed trade deal in favor of Britain and wouldn’t be a win-win for both nations, the people said.
Modi’s government this year has baulked at the trade portion of the Biden administration’s Indo-Pacific Economic Framework and entirely backed out of the China-led Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership back in 2020.
Max Blain, the official spokesman for Truss, said the government was still hoping to get a trade deal with India by late October “that would put the UK front of the queue to supply India’s growing middle class and boost the UK economy by more than £3 billion by 2035.”