5 ms·

Did food standards desync between the UK and EU considerably since Brexit? I doubt that loosening food standards happen in general, but I can imagine newer EU f

Did food standards desync between the UK and EU considerably since Brexit? I doubt that loosening food standards happen in general, but I can imagine newer EU food standards that are not copied over to the UK.

Mashimo 3y ago
From the article: > Shoppers can rest assured, however, that the labels do not denote a reduction in standards. Aside from some divergence on pesticides, British food standards so far remain largely unchanged since Brexit.
- inductive_magic 3y ago
  This is quite the misleading wording. Britains own standards remain largely unchanged, meaning that they did not reimplement the standards enforced by the eu via national law. It follows that the standards are lower than pre brexit. /edit: apparently I stand corrected.
  - jcranmer 3y ago
    One of the steps of Brexit was incorporating all the then-existing EU standards into national law, because that was far easier than trying to figure out which regulations they wanted and which regulations they didn't in the X-month period they had.
inductive_magic 3y ago
I’m not sure I follow. The eu regulations no longer apply to food companies operating in the UK, as the UK no longer is in eu-jurisdiction. The uk govt would have to re-implement them one by one, which a) would be a considerable effort and b) defeats the point of brexit, and thus likely come at political costs. /edit: thanks for the responses, TIL.
- kwhitefoot 3y ago
  > The uk govt would have to re-implement them one by one, You have it backwards. They have to de-implement them in order to get rid of them. The EU doesn't have federal laws in the way that the US does, each law is independently implemented in each member state.
- rcxdude 3y ago
  It's the opposite: Upon leaving the EU, the UK basically declared their standards to be exactly those of the EU (at the time that they left), unless the government decides otherwise (there's a bit of a fight about exactly how that happens, as I think at the moment the cabinet has the power to throw out whatever EU legislation they like, as opposed to parliament voting on each repeal, but I might be wrong about whether that actually passed). This is better than the alternative, which would basically not having any national standards until they developed their own, but you are right that it basically means brexit has mostly increased the amount of paperwork and friction in trading but not actually produced material benefits for most industries in the UK. And in general it makes sense to follow the EU for most standards anyway: if you diverge too much you risk people just not bothering to sell in your country anyway. There's already stupid headaches like this: for EMC certification, if you need a lab to do some tests to sell in the UK and the EU, you currently need to get a lab in the UK and a lab in the EU to perform the exact same tests to the exact same standards. This means a lot of EU companies are just not bothering to certify their products for the UK market (customers will often just import them illegally).
deleted 3y ago
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sp332 3y ago
Not a lot, but the point is that EU rules do not apply at all. If they want a certain standard, they need to change British regulations.
alistairSH 3y ago
No, UK has not reduced standards, they're still in line with EU. But, as you note, it won't be a surprise for the EU to introduce new standards that the UK doesn't want to follow, so this labeling seems like a forgone conclusion.
TrueDuality 3y ago
Probably not if I had to guess, but trade deals between the EU and Britain still need to be worked out, and that trade needs to be facilitated by customs enforcement which there hasn't been infrastructure for before between the EU and Britain. Complicating the issue is Northern Ireland which effectively falls under the jurisdiction of both. If British products need to be sold there, they need to be distinguishable somehow from the versions that are allowed to leave Northern Ireland into the rest of the EU. That combination of shared jurisdiction and lack of trade infrastructure is how you get these labels. Its the laziest solution to a self-imposed problem.
cesarb 3y ago
> Did food standards desync between the UK and EU considerably since Brexit? It doesn't matter. When people see "not for EU" in a label, what they understand is "not for EU because it doesn't meet the EU requirements", which implies that the EU has higher requirements which aren't being met by that product. And a further implication (understandable since brexit means "we don't have to follow the EU requirements anymore") is that the EU requirements haven't changed, but the UK requirements have, and the product only follows these new lower requirements.

Mashimo 3y ago

From the article: > Shoppers can rest assured, however, that the labels do not denote a reduction in standards. Aside from some divergence on pesticides, British food standards so far remain largely unchanged since Brexit.

inductive_magic 3y ago
This is quite the misleading wording. Britains own standards remain largely unchanged, meaning that they did not reimplement the standards enforced by the eu via national law. It follows that the standards are lower than pre brexit. /edit: apparently I stand corrected.
- jcranmer 3y ago
  One of the steps of Brexit was incorporating all the then-existing EU standards into national law, because that was far easier than trying to figure out which regulations they wanted and which regulations they didn't in the X-month period they had.

inductive_magic 3y ago

I’m not sure I follow. The eu regulations no longer apply to food companies operating in the UK, as the UK no longer is in eu-jurisdiction. The uk govt would have to re-implement them one by one, which a) would be a considerable effort and b) defeats the point of brexit, and thus likely come at political costs. /edit: thanks for the responses, TIL.

kwhitefoot 3y ago
> The uk govt would have to re-implement them one by one, You have it backwards. They have to de-implement them in order to get rid of them. The EU doesn't have federal laws in the way that the US does, each law is independently implemented in each member state.
rcxdude 3y ago
It's the opposite: Upon leaving the EU, the UK basically declared their standards to be exactly those of the EU (at the time that they left), unless the government decides otherwise (there's a bit of a fight about exactly how that happens, as I think at the moment the cabinet has the power to throw out whatever EU legislation they like, as opposed to parliament voting on each repeal, but I might be wrong about whether that actually passed). This is better than the alternative, which would basically not having any national standards until they developed their own, but you are right that it basically means brexit has mostly increased the amount of paperwork and friction in trading but not actually produced material benefits for most industries in the UK. And in general it makes sense to follow the EU for most standards anyway: if you diverge too much you risk people just not bothering to sell in your country anyway. There's already stupid headaches like this: for EMC certification, if you need a lab to do some tests to sell in the UK and the EU, you currently need to get a lab in the UK and a lab in the EU to perform the exact same tests to the exact same standards. This means a lot of EU companies are just not bothering to certify their products for the UK market (customers will often just import them illegally).

deleted 3y ago

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sp332 3y ago

Not a lot, but the point is that EU rules do not apply at all. If they want a certain standard, they need to change British regulations.

alistairSH 3y ago

No, UK has not reduced standards, they're still in line with EU. But, as you note, it won't be a surprise for the EU to introduce new standards that the UK doesn't want to follow, so this labeling seems like a forgone conclusion.

TrueDuality 3y ago

Probably not if I had to guess, but trade deals between the EU and Britain still need to be worked out, and that trade needs to be facilitated by customs enforcement which there hasn't been infrastructure for before between the EU and Britain. Complicating the issue is Northern Ireland which effectively falls under the jurisdiction of both. If British products need to be sold there, they need to be distinguishable somehow from the versions that are allowed to leave Northern Ireland into the rest of the EU. That combination of shared jurisdiction and lack of trade infrastructure is how you get these labels. Its the laziest solution to a self-imposed problem.

cesarb 3y ago

> Did food standards desync between the UK and EU considerably since Brexit? It doesn't matter. When people see "not for EU" in a label, what they understand is "not for EU because it doesn't meet the EU requirements", which implies that the EU has higher requirements which aren't being met by that product. And a further implication (understandable since brexit means "we don't have to follow the EU requirements anymore") is that the EU requirements haven't changed, but the UK requirements have, and the product only follows these new lower requirements.