EU’s Hogan: UK consumers will expect EU standards in FTA - RTE

The European Union (EU) Trade Commissioner-designate Phil Hogan was on the wires last minutes, via RTE, noting that “the UK consumers will expect Britain to sign up to the EU’s labor, environmental and food standards as part of a free trade agreement (FTA) for which he will be chief negotiator next year”.

When asked how quickly the trade negotiations could be concluded, Hogan said: “The EU would be ready to go “before St Patrick’s Day” next year, but that the UK would have to decide early on in the negotiations which EU rules they were prepared to sign up to.”

“We’re not starting from zero so therefore I believe we can do - with a bit of good will on both sides - we can do an agreement more quickly than we would do with any other negotiations around the world which would take three or four years", he added.