Douglas Carswell's Blog

The single market is not a free market

The single market must be extended, ministers keep telling us. It is, apparently, one of the great advantages that comes from being part of the EU.

Phew. Something we can all agree on.

Except that the more I examine the detail, the clearer it seems that the single market is not quite the free trade arrangement that we keep being told it is.

Far from enabling UK firms to export goods and services freely across Europe, it seems to impose great regulatory obligations on business and commerce regardless of whether the firms in question are looking to trade with Europe or not.

Rather than encouraging free trade for businesses looking to provide goods and services in Europe, the single market seems to mean that UK firms can only conduct any business at all if they do what the single market rules say they must do. A very different proposition.

In my part of Essex, firms have to comply with single market rules 100 percent. Yet what percentage of economic activity in my constituency is geared towards EU exports? 20 percent? 15 percent?

A firm that has its customer-base in entirely in Essex, or north America or Asia, ends up having to comply with rules introduced to supposedly facilitate trade with Europe. It makes no sense.

Visiting a supermarket this weekend, I noticed lots of products that were "Made in China". Presumably, Chinese firms wanting to sell to the UK market have to conform with regulatory standards in which Chinese officials had no say. It does not seem to have hindered market access.

Free trade means unhindered trade. The single market, I fear, hampers commercial activity of every kind.

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