Retaining access to overseas skills after Brexit is a fundamental requirement if the service sector is to continue to thrive, the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) said.

Maintaining mobility and skills after Brexit

The ability of companies to continue to hire staff from across Europe formed one element of a five-part CBI plan which, the organisation said, must be embraced by negotiators on both sides to guarantee the sector’s continuing success.Agreement must be reached, said the CBI, to ensure access to talent and the mobility of people on both sides of the Channel, by negotiating a reciprocal agreement on intra-company transfers and posting of workers; negotiating a dynamic mutual recognition agreement for professional qualifications; and adopting a preferential route for EU migration that allows UK services to continue to access the people and skills they need.

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Comprehensive transitional arrangements

The CBI plan also called on negotiators to “remove the cliff edge for trade in services” by quickly agreeing comprehensive transitional arrangements; to secure an adequacy decision for the UK’s data regime to maintain the free flow of data between the UK and EU; to negotiate ambitious mutual market access for service businesses by aligning with the rules of the EU Single Market for some important sectors; and to invest in regulatory cooperation between the UK and the EU by agreeing a mechanism for continued regulatory and supervisory cooperation.“UK services are in demand all over the world, but the EU is the single largest destination for them – worth £90 billion annually to the UK economy – with hundreds of thousands of companies and individuals benefiting from the services UK firms provide on both sides of the Channel,” said the CBI report.“As negotiations on the UK’s exit from the EU progress to the next phase, attention is turning to the real prize: the future relationship between the world’s fifth largest economy and the European Union.“Getting the right deal for services trade will be critical to the success of this new relationship. But the trade in services is complex and will require an agreement of unprecedented depth to ensure trade between the UK and the EU remains as frictionless as possible.”

Danger of a no deal scenario

The report said that there was a real danger of no deal being reached on services in the Brexit talks, “leaving cross-border trade in disarray and hitting hundreds of thousands of contracts, jobs, customers and companies in the UK and the EU”.The CBI added, “Action is needed quickly to avoid disruption for businesses and stop them from carrying out costly Brexit contingency plans that will create lasting damage to jobs and the wider UK economy.“In the long-term, a smooth and open relationship will ensure consumers on both sides of the Channel can continue to access a variety of services, and employees of companies on both sides can continue providing them competitively.” 

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Read more about the future of the UK industry in the Winter issue of our magazine 

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