Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2015-11-23-Speech-1-039-000"
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"en.20151123.11.1-039-000"2
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"Mr President, to get one thing in perspective: the European Union began as a protectionist construct, it remains a protectionist construct, it will always be a protectionist construct. Doha or no Doha, the European Union is a roadblock to free and freer trade. To give one example, which was just previously touched upon, European protectionism in food production has direct consequences which harm the developing world.
First, the EU markets are closed to a greater or lesser extent to the export of agricultural products. Secondly, and more damagingly, the European Union dumps agricultural over-production, occasioned by its misallocated agricultural subsidies, onto the world market, and the effect of this is that farmers and food growers in the world outside – especially in those countries that have a large primary sector – are severely damaged. The people adversely affected are some of the poorest in the world. This is not fair trade.
There are also other consequences. EU protectionism hurts and harms consumers in the European Union itself. Consumers here have to pay the hiked and inflated European Union price for foods and other goods instead of the world price. Professor Patrick Minford and his colleagues at Cardiff University have calculated that the cost of this to the UK consumer is 8% of the cost of living. It follows that, on Brexit, the cost of living in the UK would be reduced by 8% at least. We may be sure that in other Member States the figure would not be dissimilar. And so it is not just for my country: the dissolution of the EU customs union would be a huge plus for the whole world. That, perhaps, is what we should bear in mind when we are discussing the Doha agenda."@en1
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