6 things Trump wants from a US-UK trade deal

1. Drop the Big Tech tax
The UK’s digital services tax is projected to raise £5 billion by 2030, forcing notorious tax dodging Big Tech companies to pay tax on their activities in the UK. It’s part of a global effort to force big corporations to pay their fair share into public coffers. But our prime minister is already reported to have offered up the tax as a sweetener for a US trade deal. While the likes of Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg will save billions, the British public will be left with nothing.

2. Abandon online safety
The UK’s Online Safety Act is a first attempt to regulate the responsibilities of Big Tech to protect their users’ safety. It’s not perfect – but it was democratically decided in the Houses of Parliament. Under a US-UK trade deal, the UK could be forced to sign up to removing this law altogether, in a sacrifice to Trump and his billionaire Big Tech pals.

3. US companies in the NHS
Trump has long wanted to get the US into the NHS, and despite government protestations to the contrary, it remains a key US demand from a trade deal. The next frontier is data. A US trade deal could make it mandatory that data be allowed to flow freely across borders, as the US’s deal with Canada and Mexico already includes. That could mean US companies exporting NHS medical records to the US, and using them to create new products to sell back to the NHS at high prices. UK health secretary Wes Streeting has already admitted the UK government is considering this.

4. Block monopoly rules on Big Tech
For two decades the Big Tech industry has been accumulating dangerous levels of monopoly power. Concentrated corporate power subverts democracy and deepens inequality, both at home and around the world. Governments are taking steps to address this, from breaking companies up through to giving consumers a ‘right to repair’ their products. But a US trade deal threatens to make this harder, allowing anti-monopoly rules to be dismissed as ‘trade barriers’.

5. Scrap regulations on AI
Artificial intelligence could be a massive bubble – or it could transform the way we all live and work. But like all new technologies it needs regulating in the public interest. Yet Big Tech companies know this will restrain their ability to seek mega-profits. Learning from the pharmaceutical industry in the 90s, they are trying to use international trade deals to lock in rules that prevents domestic regulation of AI. The UK normally takes a precautionary approach – but it has already kowtowed to Trump, refusing to sign a broad international agreement on AI development and putting its own plans to regulate AI on the backburner.

6. Bring in chlorinated chicken and more
At the same time as imposing global tariffs earlier this month, the Trump administration released its hitlist of rules and regulations it wants to see scrapped in the UK – and food standards featured prominently. From chlorinated chicken to hormone-fed beef, these products are banned from our shelves. But Trump wants them on the menu. The Starmer government says food standards are a red line – but in its desperation for a deal, and given its reluctance to retaliate to Trump’s tariffs, can we trust them to hold to it?

Trump’s tariffs are a form of bullying – they’ve been imposed to try and extract as many concessions as possible. The hope is that countries like the UK will be so desperate to secure the removal of tariffs, they’ll give away more than they otherwise would. But signing a deal that concedes so much can’t possibly be worth the cost. Rather than caving in to Trump and his demands, we need our government to stand up to the bully.

Together we can stop this deal. We’ve done it before – fighting off TTIP, the EU-US trade deal, and Boris Johnson’s US-UK trade deal in the last parliament. But it’s going to take a massive effort. I hope you will be part of it.

Thank you,
Jonathan Stevenson
Campaigner at Global Justice Now

PS. Our campaigners Nick Dearden and Anita Bhadani have been out in the media raising awareness about the US trade deal threat. Hear them on BBC Radio 5 Live, BBC Scotland, LBC and Times Radio, or read articles in the Byline Times and Church Times. Plus you can watch back our webinar on Trump, tariffs and the US trade deal.

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