LONDON — The Labour government will on Monday scrap an unpopular Brexit policy requiring food sold across Great Britain to carry “Not for EU” labels.
But ministers haven’t ruled out bringing them back in at a later date.
The eleventh-hour policy reversal follows a huge backlash from businesses, who claim the labeling rules are not only off-putting to consumers but costly for manufacturers and “cataclysmic” for food exports.
Under the plans inherited from the previous Conservative government, meat and dairy products sold across the U.K. would have been required to carry the labels from Oct. 1 this year. The labels were then set to be applied to even more products, including fruit, vegetables and fish, from July next year.
The labeling rules already apply to food sold in Northern Ireland as part of the Windsor Framework agreement between the U.K. and the EU and are supposed to ensure that goods are not moved onward to the Republic of Ireland, an EU member country. But by applying the policy GB-wide, the government has been accused of over-applying the Brexit deal.
On Monday, however, the government is expected to confirm that it will not be proceeding with the October deadline as planned, with further guidance due to be set out to businesses.
Two food industry figures with knowledge of the plans confirmed that the policy could be reintroduced if market monitoring and analysis shows supplies to Northern Ireland are detrimentally affected. They were granted anonymity to speak freely.
The development comes after POLITICO reported over the summer that the new Labour government was reviewing the policy, following heavy lobbying from food and drink businesses.
The scrapping of the October deadline will be welcomed by food and drink businesses, which have campaigned for months against the changes.
Call for clarity
In a letter to ministers sent over the summer, food trade bodies had pressed the government for an “immediate decision not to proceed or, at a minimum, the announcement of a formal six-month moratorium to allow more time for deliberation,” complaining that they had been “left in complete limbo.”
The Labour government is seeking a veterinary — or sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) — agreement with the European Union as part of a wider “reset” in U.K.-EU relations, which would potentially remove the need for the food labels altogether.
In their letter, the food trade bodies said the labeling policy would “sit uneasily with the current government’s stated aim of seeking a new and closer relationship with the EU, particularly in the area of SPS controls which have been at the origin of many of the problems currently associated with moving goods from GB to NI.
“We would strongly urge you to draw a line under this poorly handled chapter and make the earliest possible announcement to that effect.”
A government spokesperson said: “Ministers are carefully considering the evidence provided in the recent consultation on UK wide ‘Not for EU’ labeling. We are committed to taking all necessary steps to protect the U.K. internal market and are continuing to engage with businesses to ensure the smooth flow of goods to Northern Ireland.”
Joseph Bambridge contributed to this report.
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