‘There are only so many hits you can take as a business’: Both sides being hurt by fishing dispute
Brexit is done, and for many, there’s genuine relief it’s over.
But ongoing disagreements and post-treaty disputes are having real world costs to businesses who say they feel let down and misled by the Brexit process.
The row over fishing rights and the threat of retaliatory action from the French have already cost one oyster producer in Kent tens of thousands of pounds worth of business.
Meanwhile, Sky News has learned that the Department for Transport has asked a Kent lorry park that is due to close shortly, to stay open for a few months longer over Christmas to help with anticipated extra pressure on an already strained supply chain.
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France postpones sanctions over fishing row
“There are only so many hits, so many body punches you can take as a business and get back up and start again,” says James Green, director of The Whitstable Oyster Company.
Mr Green’s business is based in the picturesque north Kent town, famous for its oysters.
It has farmed oysters for generations and is responsible for about a third of the UK’s entire production.
But Brexit has already cost them dearly. New rules mean he can no longer export fully-grown market-sized oysters to France – those exports had accounted for around 50% of his orders, and that disappeared overnight.
James Green voted for Brexit but says he feels misled
He moved his focus to building up the domestic market, an encouraging albeit slow process, and continuing to export juvenile oysters to France.
This is still allowed because the juveniles are put back in the sea off the coast of France, to be harvested later by his buyers.
But last week as the post-Brexit fishing row intensified, French threats set him back further.
In a disagreement over how many licenses have been granted to French trawlers operating in British waters, France’s president Emmanuel Macron set an ultimatum, demanding the UK grant more or face retaliatory measures including British boats being banned from landing their catch in France and increased customs checks on exported British goods.
Such tightened restrictions might have included the removal of veterinary checks in France that are necessary for James to sell his oysters there. His buyers got nervous and cancelled orders – he lost roughly £25,000 worth in just a few days.
Mr Green’s business is based in the picturesque north Kent town of Whitstable
“With farms you can’t stop, you’ve got to continue otherwise the stock becomes unsellable,” he said.
“There are quite a lot of costs involved in continuing that process, so it’s frustrating.
“Coupled with COVID, coupled with Brexit, coupled with water quality from Southern Water, this is the fourth thing in the space of less than a year that has had a massive impact on our industry.
“You can’t just take away that main market overnight and expect these businesses to continue because they’re just not.”
Whitstable is famous for its oysters
Mr Green voted for Brexit in 2016, and said fishing rights were his key motivator. But the reality has not been as he was promised, and he said repeated reassurances that his exports would not be affected now feel misleading.
“I think the deal we got was very, very poor, very poor,” he said. “So I probably would change my vote, if I’m honest.”
The threats from France were deferred this week, paving the way for talks between Lord Frost, the UK’s chief Brexit negotiator and France’s Secretary of State for European Affairs, Clément Beaune.
Under the Brexit deal, French trawlermen who had traditionally fished between six and 12 miles off the coast of the UK would be allowed to continue to do so as long as they could provide proof they had fished there every year since 2016.
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While the French have said that too few licenses have been granted, the British have said that those not approved have not provided sufficient evidence.
But despite all the smiles and handshakes for the cameras, positions on both sides are still entrenched and no significant progress was made.
The context this side of the Channel is not just businesses suffering, but a supply chain already stacked up.
Some say a system still grappling with global delays and a shortage of lorry drivers can’t cope with much more pressure.
Mr Green’s business has farmed oysters for generations
Any further delays or customs checks at ports may well be seen and felt in lorry parks across Kent.
Sky News has learnt that the Department for Transport has asked one such site, Ashford International Truck Stop that was due to close shortly in favour of a new bigger site next door, to remain open for a few extra months over Christmas.
A sense perhaps that preparations are being made for extra seasonal pressure.
On the other side of the Channel there is another side to this story.
New rules mean Mr Green can no longer export fully-grown market-sized oysters to France
Laurent Merlin fishes for crab from Boulogne sur Mer. He has been fishing in British waters since the 1990s and his father did the same for years before him. But he hasn’t been granted a license yet and he’s getting desperate.
“It’s frustrating because it has now been 10 months that we’ve been waiting,” he said.
“If we get nothing, we will have to react. If we don’t we won’t be able to continue. French waters have been overfished, there are no fish left there.”
Officials will talk again in the coming days and while they’re talking, threats are unlikely to be actioned.
On different sides of these waters there’s different sides to this story, but ongoing disputes are costing.
Business
Asian stock markets tumble – with Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index suffering worst fall for 28 years
Asian stock markets have fallen dramatically amid escalating fears of a global trade war – as Donald Trump called his tariffs “medicine” and showed no sign of backing down.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index of shares closed down 13.2% – its biggest drop since 1997, while the Shanghai composite index lost 7.3% – the worst fall there since 2020.
Taiwan’s stock market was also hammered, losing nearly 10% on Monday, its biggest one-day drop on record.
Elsewhere, Japan’s Nikkei 225 lost 7.8%, while London’s FTSE 100 was down 4.85% by 9am.
Tariffs latest – FTSE falls after Asian markets tumble
US stock market futures signalled further losses were ahead when trading begins in America later.
At 4am EST, the S&P 500 futures was down 4.93%, the Dow Jones 4.32% and the Nasdaq 5.33%.
Markets are reacting to ongoing uncertainty over the impact of President Trump’s tariffs on goods imported to the US, which he announced last week.
A screen showing the Hang Seng index in central Hong Kong. Pic: Reuters
Speaking on Air Force One on Sunday, Mr Trump said foreign governments would have to pay “a lot of money” to lift his tariffs.
“I don’t want anything to go down. But sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something,” he said.
The US president said world leaders were trying to convince him to lower further tariffs, which are due to take effect this week.
“I spoke to a lot of leaders, European, Asian, from all over the world,” Mr Trump told reporters.
“They’re dying to make a deal. And I said, we’re not going to have deficits with your country.
“We’re not going to do that because to me, a deficit is a loss. We’re going to have surpluses or, at worst, going to be breaking even.”
Mr Trump, who spent much of the weekend playing golf in Florida, posted on his Truth Social platform: “WE WILL WIN. HANG TOUGH, it won’t be easy.”
President Trump believes his policy will make the US richer, forcing companies to relocate more manufacturing to America and creating jobs.
However, his announcement has shocked stock markets, triggered retaliatory levies from China and sparked fears of a global trade war.
US customs agents began collecting Mr Trump’s baseline 10% tariff on Saturday.
Higher “reciprocal” tariffs of between 11% and 50% – depending on the country – are due to kick in on Wednesday.
Investors and world leaders are unsure whether the US tariffs are here to stay or a negotiating tactic to win concessions from other countries.
Richard Flax, chief investment officer at wealth manager Moneyfarm, said: “I guess there was some hope over the weekend that maybe we would see this as part of the start of a negotiation.
“But the messages that we’ve so far seen suggest that the President Trump is comfortable with the market reaction and that he’s going to continue on this course.
Goldman Sachs has raised the odds of a US recession to 45%, joining other investment banks that have also revised their forecasts.
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In the UK, Sir Keir Starmer has promised “bold changes” and said he would relax rules around electric vehicles as British carmakers deal with a new 25% US tariff on vehicles.
The prime minister said “global trade is being transformed” by President Trump’s actions.
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KPMG has warned tariffs on UK exports could see GDP growth fall to 0.8% in 2025 and 2026.
The accountancy firm said higher tariffs on specific categories, such as cars, aluminium and steel, would more than offset the exemption on pharmaceutical exports, leaving the effective tariff rate around 12%.
Yael Selfin, chief economist at KPMG UK, said: “Given the economic impact that tariffs would cause, there is a strong incentive to seek a negotiated settlement that diminishes the need for tariffs.
“The UK automotive manufacturing sector is particularly exposed given the complex supply chains of some producers.”
Traders called this morning a complete bloodbath as the UK’s FTSE 100 joined world indexes in turning red as uncertainty over Donald Trump’s tariffs continued to batter stock markets.
Across Asia and Europe, hundreds of billions have been wiped off companies’ values, particularly in banking and manufacturing.
The cause is not just the imposition of those tariffs (the largest the US has inflicted since the 1930s) and the very obvious drag this will have on global trade and growth, but also the uncertainty of ‘what next?’.
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Investors cannot work out if the Trump administration is genuinely wedded to tariffs on this scale, on the proviso that they will help re-shore companies and millions of jobs to the United States.
They don’t know if they are permanent or merely part of a negotiating tactic to address trade imbalances, and for America to use its economic heft to strike better deals.
If Mr Trump is open to deals (the first test comes later in a meeting with the Israeli prime minister), markets will calm, even if the midst of uncertainty hasn’t fully cleared.
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Time to change tactics with Trump?
However, if this is a genuine rewiring of global trade and the end of globalisation as we know it, markets and economies will continue to get battered.
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As one Trump supporter, billionaire Bill Ackman – who opposes the tariffs – put it, President Trump has launched a “global economic war against the whole world” that will usher in an “economic nuclear winter.”
It’s time for all of us to buckle up.
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