The Trade Policy Research Centre is concerned with realistic solutions to the UK's trading relationships with other entities, especially the European Union.
In an article for CapX—a new global pro-market news service, making the case for popular capitalism—Ronald Stewart-Brown argues that if we are thinking of withdrawal we should not let the unattainable best be the enemy of the attainable good. Therefore we should be prepared to negotiate to stay in Europe for trade through a new inter-governmental customs union agreement with the EU.
Click through for the text of Ronald Stewart-Brown's address to Civitas, on 2 October 2014.
Alternatively, you can download a copy in Word format.
Set out below is the text of a speech by Ronald Stewart-Brown on 6th May 2014
Set out below is the text of a speech by Ronald Stewart-Brown at The Caledonian Club on 19th November 2013
Set out below is the text of a speech given by Ronald Stewart-Brown at a panel discussion on Tuesday, 19th March 2013 at The Institute of Economic Affairs. The subject of the discussion was "Britain and Europe—if out, how?"
This Briefing Note outlines the principal differences between a Customs Union, such as the EU, and a Free Trade Agreement, such as the NAFTA.
This blog on the Fresh Start Project website (http://www.eufreshstart.org/home) is based on a speech given by Ronald Stewart-Brown at a meeting of the All Party Parliamentary Group for European Reform on 22nd May 2012. It argues that it may be difficult to negotiate for the reform and recovery of powers within the EU treaties that many would like to see. But there is a lot to be done to make the TPRC's favoured alternative of a new, essentially inter-governmental customs union based agreement with the EU into a credible policy option.
This online version of Ronald Stewart-Brown's article in The Daily Telegraph on 5th January 2012 argues that the UK needs a fallback plan to leave the European Union in order to strengthen its negotiating position within it. Yet the most widely canvassed ways of leaving the EU would not work. To retain free movement of goods, the UK would need to negotiate to stay in customs union with the EU, but on a new inter-governmental basis. This article was later published on the Fresh Start Project website.
Speech by Ronald Stewart-Brown at the Evening Reception on 23 November 2011 to mark the opening of the Trade Policy Research Centre's Westminster office.
This article by Ronald Stewart-Brown reflects on how close World Trade Organization members came to reaching agreement in Geneva in July 2008 on the key agricultural and industrial issues at the heart of the Doha Round. But since 6 November, when the text of this article was finalised, the global economy had been in continuing decline and there was insufficient convergence on outstanding issues to justify a new ministerial meeting tentatively planned for December. The prospects of completing the round by the end of 2009 had therefore weakened.
Ronald Stewart-Brown's earlier fears about the shakiness of the Doha Round in Hong Kong were realised when the WTO Doha Round was suspended on in July 2006. In this July 2006 issue of the European Journal, he examines the causes and tensions that led to the Doha Round suspension.
Read the full article: The Suspension of Doha (160KB PDF)
Ronald Stewart-Brown comments, in the February 2006 issue of the European Journal, on the frustrations at the Doha Round in Hong Kong.
Read the full article: Doha Round in the Balance after Hong Kong (3.7MB PDF)
In the September/October 2004 issue of the European Journal, Ronald Stewart-Brown reported on the WTO meetings in Geneva.
Read the full article: The Multilateral Trading System Back on Track after Geneva (2.3MB PDF)
In the December 2003 issue of the European Journal, Ronald Stewart-Brown reflected on the "the sudden and perplexing collapse of the World trade Conference in Cancun on 14th September [2003]".
Read the full article: Reflections on the Debacle at Cancun (3.2MB PDF)
In the January 2000 edition of Eurofacts, whilst covering the WTO Conference in Seattle, Ronald Stewart-Brown observed that the UK is no longer really a country in terms of trade negotiations.
Read the full article: Sidelined in Seattle (745KB PDF)