TN(T)(77)2
November 1977
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GATT MULTILATERAL TRADE NEGOTIATIONS (MTN'S)
CONSULTATION WITH INDUSTRY
1
On 27 May CRE1 circulated to interested departments in Whitehall a paper about the GATT Multilateral Trade Negotiations (MTN's).
(MTN's). Attached to that paper was an unclassified note which Departments were invited if they wished to pass on to industry.
2
Attached is a similar unclassified note which again departments are invited to pass on to industry associations as appropriate. The object is to keep them informed of developments in the MTN's as they unfold.
3
Paragraph 2 of the attached note mentions that consultations may be necessary at short notice on various aspects. For your information the main thing we have in mind here is the question of exceptions from tariff cuts. This topic has not as yet been considered within the Community. Until recently the Commission were taking the line that the Community should put forward no initial exceptions whatsoever; at that time we were arguing that this would only be acceptable if we had adequate assurance that we would get a selective safeguard right and that we would be able to suggest 'withdrawals" at a later stage. Since that time the tariff hypothesis explained in the note has emerged and Member States have concentrated on expressing views on this as such rather than on the substantive and tactical questions raised by the treatment of exceptions.
4
CRE1 appreciate that this question is of major interest to sponsoring divisions. We cannot however give you any firm lead on it at this stage. It remains possible - we shall be considering this that we shall think it right to take the line (or accept such a line from the Commission) that even with the much larger tariff reduction implicit in the new hypothesis in prospect there should be no initial exceptions on the Community's part. The reasons for this would be mainly tactical vis-a-vis the Americans. We would still of course make the reservation about safeguards and withdrawals mentioned above, and the line therefore would be without prejudice to the eventual outcome. We should be grateful if the Department of Industry and Energy sponsoring divisions, who have been making particularly powerful arguments in favour of their products being excepted, would consider whether this line might be acceptable to them. alternative would be to attempt to devise some criteria now, and to apply them, so that we have some alternative proposals to put forward in Brussels when the right time comes; the criteria we propose would have to be ones that could be agreed and applied by the Community as a whole. It would be as well in any case to be thinking about criteria which could govern the treatment we would wish the Community to adopt at the withdrawal stage.
5
An
In considering the choice discussed above sponsoring divisions should be aware
a that it is certain that the US will except, because of the requirement of their legislation, all products on which escape clause action is at that time in force (which is likely still to
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