Around 150,000 businesses in the UK are still not fully ready to export to the European Union in the event of a no-deal Brexit, the governor of the Bank of England has warned.
Speaking to the BBC, Mark Carney said that "business will be reliant on what the governments are able to do in order to keep the ports open, the trade flowing", explaining that many of the 150,000 businesses have not secured the necessary documents to continue trading with the EU.
However, this doesn't mean that the scale of businesses is due to their own lack of preparation. In fact, Mr Carney said around three-quarters of businesses in the UK have done all they can to prepare for a no-deal, "but it doesn't mean they are fully ready, in fact far from it".
The governor of the Bank of England also denied Boris Johnson's suggestions that trade tariffs in the event of a no-deal by using an article of the EU's General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, known as "Gatt 24". The Conservative leadership and prime ministerial candidate claimed Gatt 24 could be used to maintain tariff-free trade with the EU by up to 10 years.
"The Gatt rules are clear... Gatt 24 applies if you have a [withdrawal] agreement, not if you've decided not to have an agreement, or you have been unable to come to an agreement," Mr Carney said.
"So... we should be clear that not having an agreement with the European Union would mean that there are tariffs, automatically, because the Europeans have to apply the same rules to us as they apply to everyone else."
