Labour’s ideological closeness to the Democrats puts the party in an ideal position to sign trade deals with the US should both parties win their elections next year, the shadow trade secretary has said.
Nick Thomas-Symonds told the Guardian he thought Labour’s shared economic values with the Biden administration meant his party would have more success than the Conservative government has had in making trade agreements across a range of sectors.
The comments, which come after Thomas-Symonds travelled to Washington in July, reflect a growing economic consensus between Labour and the Democrats, which shadow ministers hope to use to their advantage after 2024.
“We share the Biden administration’s worker-centric trade policy,” he said. “The Biden administration will have a strong ally in a Labour government. I think it would be great to have those shared priorities across the Atlantic, whether on workers’ rights, consumer protections, environmental protections, the ‘jobs first’ agenda.
“Together the two could be really powerful allies for those priorities across the world, especially when it comes to signing trade agreements.”
In Washington, Thomas-Symonds met Katherine Tai, the US trade representative, to begin talks between the two parties on a potential US-UK digital trade deal. Labour officials hope such a deal would guarantee tariff-free transatlantic data flows, as well as lowering barriers for industries such as financial services and cybersecurity.
The US and UK agreed last year to deepen trade ties, including “harnessing the benefits of digital trade”. Since then, however, talks on digital trade have slowed, in part because of resistance from Democrats in Congress who are concerned about passing a deal that would boost large technology companies.
Thomas-Symonds did not go into detail about what Labour could offer beyond what the Conservative government has in order to complete a digital trade deal. But he said he believed his party’s willingness to discuss enshrining labour and environmental protections in such deals would give it a better chance of success in agreeing them in the future.
The Biden administration has used international agreements to broaden the scope of environmental regulations, such as the recent deal with the EU on sustainable steel and aluminium. Labour officials point to Thomas-Symonds’s meeting with Tai as a sign that the Biden administration is taking their position seriously.
The shadow trade secretary believes a digital trade deal could pave the way to a series of other sector-specific deals, after it became clear the US would not prioritise a more wide-ranging free trade agreement.
Earlier this year the prime minister, Rishi Sunak, and the US president, Joe Biden, committed to sign a deal on critical minerals that would guarantee Britain access to materials such as cobalt, graphite and lithium, which are used to make batteries. That agreement has not yet been formalised, however.
Thomas-Symonds is at the forefront of a broader push by shadow ministers to integrate more closely with senior officials in the Democratic party. His visit last month followed one earlier in the summer by Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, who gave a speech comparing her vision of “securenomics” to what the administration calls “Bidenomics”.
The two philosophies call for the state to play a greater role in the economy, for example by investing in green technology or bolstering workers’ rights in the face of technological change.
A Department for Business and Trade spokesperson said: “We have a trade strategy, and it’s working. We’re signing high-quality trade deals with some of the world’s biggest and fastest-growing economies, and recently became the first new country to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership – worth a combined 15% of the world’s GDP.”
The spokesperson added that exports had grown year on year, and pointed to recent “valuable investment into the UK”, such as the £4bn Tata gigafactory announcement.
