Britain says US agrees on need to implement tariff deal soon

Britain and the United States have agreed on the need to implement a tariff relief deal between the countries as soon as possible, the UK government said, after their trade envoys met on the eve of impending higher tariffs on steel.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and U.S. President Donald Trump agreed to reduce tariffs on British imports of cars and steel to the United States last month, with Britain agreeing to lower tariffs on beef and ethanol.

But a delay in implementing the deal means steel tariffs may go up before they come down, as Trump last week said that tariffs on imported steel would rise to 50% from 25% starting on Wednesday.

Industry body UK Steel said it understood that British producers were likely to be affected, which would be a “body blow” to the sector.

British trade minister Jonathan Reynolds met U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer on Tuesday to discuss the pace of implementation of the deal.

“The pair discussed their shared desire to implement the Economic Prosperity Deal, including implementing agreements on sectoral tariffs as soon as possible,” Britain’s trade ministry said in a statement after the meeting.

“The pair agreed that businesses and consumers on both sides of the Atlantic must start to feel the benefits of the deal soon, with both sides committing to work closely to make that happen.” Greer’s office did not have an immediate comment.

Before the meeting Starmer’s spokesperson said that, once implemented, the deal with Washington would eliminate tariffs on the “majority of steel products” exported to the United States, and that “we’d continue to expect that to be the case” regardless of the 50% tariff announced by Trump.

He also said that industry minister Sarah Jones was meeting with representatives from the steel sector on Tuesday.

Asked earlier if the 50% tariffs would go ahead on Wednesday, Greer, speaking French with reporters in Paris, said: “We’ll see.”

Reynolds is on a three-day trip to Paris and Brussels. After meetings with Group of Seven and OECD counterparts in Paris, he will hold talks with EU trade commissioner Maros Sefcovic.

Britain struck deals with the U.S. and the European Union – its two biggest trading partners – last month, but both are political pacts rather than formal trade agreements, and the details of their implementation have not been set out.

With the EU deal, plans to remove red tape on the food sector are yet to be finalised. In advance of that agreement coming into force, Britain on Monday said it would scrap border checks on fruit and vegetables imported from the EU that had been due to be effective beginning in July.