The United Kingdom has no plans to follow the European Union’s lead and impose tariffs on imports of China-made electric vehicles, or EVs, the nation’s new business minister said.
UK’s Secretary of State for Business and Trade Jonathan Reynolds, who started overseeing the country’s trade policy after the Labour Party’s July 4 landslide election win, said at a meeting of G7 fellow ministers in Italy on Tuesday that he had discussed the EU’s planned tariffs with his European counterparts, and that the idea did not appeal to him.
“I am not ruling anything out but, if you have a very much export-orientated industry, the decision you take (must be) the right one for that sector,” the Financial Times quoted him as saying.
The EU announced in June plans to introduce tariffs of up to 37.6 percent on Chinese EVs, to counter what it said were unfair state subsidies in China.
But Reynolds said he is not interested in introducing similar tariffs in the UK, or in launching a formal investigation into Chinese EV imports.
The paper said the UK car sector has not called on the government’s Trade Remedies Authority to launch such an investigation, something that would be needed before tariffs could be contemplated.
Electric vehicles made in China have been popular with UK drivers, with EVs produced by Western companies, including Tesla and BMW, common on British roads alongside China-owned brands, such as MG.
And some of the leaders of the EU’s 27 member nations are now known to share Reynolds’ lack of enthusiasm for tariffs on Chinamade EVs, Reuters reported.
It said a nonbinding but influential vote on Tuesday showed EU governments are divided on the issue, something that was laid bare after the European Commission canvassed opinion from EU member nations through the so-called advisory vote.
The poll found 12 EU member nations were supportive of the tariffs, four were against them and 11 abstained. Reuters said a large number of abstentions “reflects wavering among many EU members”.
The European Commission is set to make a final decision on its tariffs in October, following the completion of an investigation into China-made EVs.
If the bloc’s executive decides to push ahead with the tariffs, they will be the subject of a binding vote, in which a qualified majority of 15 member countries representing 65 percent of the EU’s population could block them.
The tariffs seem to be losing favor because nations are eager to avoid a trade war with China. Additionally, they have been opposed by German carmakers that sell extensively in China.
There has been opposition from major Western automakers that manufacture electric vehicles in China that would also be subject to the EU’s proposed tariffs.
