'Hiring Blitz' Needed For EU Trade Negotiations

The UK needs to move quickly to hire hundreds of top trade negotiators from abroad and the private sector if it is to meet the challenge of striking post-Brexit deals with the EU and countries beyond.

The warning comes from former head of the Foreign Office and one-time chief of staff to the European Trade Commissioner, Sir Simon Fraser, who says Britain has only a few dozen trade negotiators in the civil service compared to hundreds in Brussels.

"Over recent decades, we like other EU states, have used the European Commission to do trade deals for us as we had a common external trade purpose," he said.

"So we don't actually have in Whitehall the armies of negotiators the Commission has and we are likely to need in the future."

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Sir Simon says trade is a highly specialised and complex area and Britain now faces a significant challenge to hire experts from the private sector abroad and train up other people already in the UK civil service.

"People say in Whitehall at the moment the people with active trade negotiating experience number around 30 to 40," he said.

"But the part of the European Commission which deals with trade has around 600 people.

"Not all of them are negotiators but it gives you an indication. We would be looking for several hundred people to take on that task."

And they will be engaged in high stakes, high pressure work, according to Sir Simon.

He said: "It can get pretty tense and yes that is sometimes part of the theatre of the negotiations.

"But you have to remember there are big interests at stake. Political, economic and commercial interests. It is high pressure and can become dramatic."

His concerns are echoed within government where ministers have said they will look to hire from abroad as well as rehiring civil servants with trade negotiating experience.

A number of countries including Australia have offered to loan experts to the UK, which has to not only renegotiate its relationship with the EU post-Brexit, but strike new deals with more than 50 countries around the world which have agreements with the EU.

"We are going to have to go on a hiring blitz," says Allie Renison, who is head of EU and Trade Policy at The Institute of Directors.

"These people don't come cheap and if you really want to get the best in the world then many will be practising attorneys versed in international trade law.

"We really are going to have to hire a lot of people.

"I think this is the period when we are going to have to focus on building infrastructure to do deals before the substantive part of negotiating."

But she stresses before talks can begin that the Government needs to figure out what its trade strategy is going to be.

"We need to figure out which countries we want to do trade with right away," she said.

"And what kind of trading nation does the UK want to be?

"Does it want to be like the US which is very protective of its industries or does it want to be a more open to the rest of the world kind of nation.

"It's so important to work these things out before we start to try to do deals."

Ms Renison is sceptical that the UK will be able to lure back British trade experts from Brussels, saying they will be at the pinnacle of their careers there.

And the European Commission has said they are welcome to remain.

But the Government will need to find people and fast. And they are going to come with a hefty price tag.