Remarks on Post-Brexit Agreements: Free Trade Agreement between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and New Zealand, and Free Trade Agreement between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Australia

Following Brexit, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (UK) negotiated a set of agreements to guide and govern the future European Union-UK relationship as well as the UK-other countries relationships. The goal of these agreements was and remains to protect citizens’ rights while ensuring fair competition and continued cooperation between the UK and the rest of economies, including the other countries constituting the CANZUK. This paper is to provide a preliminary impact assessment of the Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) between the UK and Australia as well as between the UK and New Zealand, based on their language, rationale, background, possible economic gains and possible impacts on other countries, developed by an author from outside the CANZUK sphere. It appears that thanks to their broad, general legal language, rather of declarative nature than being a firm commitment, the said FTAs seem to serve as tools for the UK facilitating a greater access to, respectively, Australian or New Zealander markets while creating reduced regulatory burdens on goods and services. Thus, both FTAs shall be expected as documents that may induce more real opportunities for UK business entities, business persons and consumers rather than symmetry in relationships between the said countries and the UK.