Hi John,
It would be unbelievable if it wasnât so predictable. Despite all its promises, the government is offering to allow chlorinated chicken as part of a US-UK trade deal.Â
The story hit the headlines this week [1], and it confirms our fears about the risks of this deal. Whatever reassurances are given in public, when push comes to shove behind closed doors, the government is prepared to put corporate profit before welfare, health and sustainability. We canât let that happen.
Can you email your MP to tell them how concerned you are?
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Whatâs the background?
Chlorinated chicken is primarily an animal welfare issue. Washes such as chlorine are used to compensate for birds being kept in dirty, crowded, low welfare conditions where bacteria are more likely to spread.[2] This has been banned in the UK for more than twenty years. Â
Thanks to pressure from campaigners like you, the government has been backed into making promises on this. The Conservative election manifesto said they would not compromise on animal welfare, environmental protection and food standards in trade negotiations. The objectives the government published for the US trade said the same. And in January, then environment minister, Theresa Villiers, stated explicitly that the bans on chlorine chicken and hormone-fed beef would be kept after Brexit.[3]
But we know agribusiness has been lobbying hard on this, and 47 members of the US Congress have written to the US negotiator, calling on him to get rid of the UKâs ban on chlorinated chicken âonce and for allâ.[4] Former trade minister, Liam Fox, said last month that âthe US would walkâ if it had to comply with the UKâs animal welfare standards.[5]
And so we have the climb down. The ban will be dropped and low animal welfare, chlorinated chicken will be on our supermarket shelves. The concession is that low welfare products will pay a higher tariff (the tax charged on imports) than high welfare products. But even if the US agrees to this, there is no guarantee that the tariffs rate wonât be cut later on.Â
Worryingly, the government is trying to present this as a win for the environment minister, because even though the promise that a ban would be maintained has been broken, it turns out that what the trade minister, Liz Truss, actually wanted to do was not only overturn the ban but also reduce all tariffs on chicken to zero!
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This isnât just about chlorine chicken
Firstly, this is not just about importing one or two US products, itâs about importing the US regulatory system. A system that puts the burden on the regulator and the public to prove that any products might be dangerous, rather than on the manufacturer to prove that it is safe.
Secondly, this is fundamentally about the right of our government or any government to set standards and regulations on things that people care about, whether on animal welfare, climate standards, workers rights, public health, environmental standards or anything else.Â
Thirdly, it reveals why secrecy in trade negotiations is so dangerous and why transparency is needed. Truss gave a brief update to parliament on the last round of negotiations with the US, which consisted of little more than a bland reassurance that the talks were âpositiveâ. Yet this is what was actually going on.
These headlines confirm that these talks are playing out as we had feared. This will be a dangerous deal and we need to take action together to stop it going ahead.
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