Businesses in the UK are still critically unprepared for the end of the transition period, with fewer firms conducting risk assessments and many unanswered questions remaining on what lies ahead.

According to The British Chambers of Commerce’s Brexit guidance dashboard, of 35 questions that businesses are asking on Brexit, 26 remain unanswered, including key areas such as recruitment, investment and labelling of food and drink.

The Chambers has also conducted new research into the Brexit-readiness of UK companies and found that the rate at which risk assessments were being carried out has dropped too. Last year, almost six in 10 firms had conducted a Brexit audit. This year, with the pandemic largely to blame, that number has fallen to under four in 10. 

Less than half of businesses have taken the government’s recommended eight steps to get Brexit-ready for changes in the movement of goods between the UK and EU, including key operational fundamentals for trading such as customs declarations and impacts to customers and suppliers. 

Director General of the British Chambers of Commerce, Adam Marshall, commented on the recent updates that: “With just 98 days to go, business communities face the triple threat of a resurgent Coronavirus, receding government support schemes, and a disorderly end to the transition period.

“Significant unanswered questions remain for businesses, and despite recent public information campaigns, base levels of preparedness are low. Many firms say they’ve heard talk of deadlines and cliff edges before, and others are still grappling with fundamental challenges as a result of the pandemic and have little cash or information with which to plan.”

Read more: The greatest Brexit challenge you’ve never heard about

“While we recognise that some of the questions facing businesses are subject to ongoing negotiations between the government and the EU, other matters are within the UK’s own hands. The government must ramp up engagement with business urgently – to the levels seen prior to previous ‘no deal’ deadlines – to ensure that the real-world issues facing firms get tackled immediately.

“The ‘Check, Change, Go’ campaign gives the impression that Brexit-related changes are like getting an MOT – whereas the reality is that for many businesses, they’re more akin to planning a moon landing. Businesses need honest communication about the complexity of the changes they face – and stronger encouragement to act.”

Now is the time to conduct a Brexit audit of your businesses

The good news for UK firms is that, despite there being less than 13 weeks to go until the end of the transition period, there is still time to act. 

A Brexit audit can reduce the risk to businesses, help avoid skills shortages and plan for new paperwork requirements – as well as assessing your current export strategy and analysing new potential opportunities. 

Whilst mitigating the damage being caused by the global pandemic rightly takes immediate priority, the Government has confirmed on numerous occasions that Brexit will not be delayed. 

So, FastTrack your company’s international growth and spot the threats and opportunities that leaving the EU will deliver through our Brexit consultancy services.

The Department for Business has confirmed that the UK will follow World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules regarding subsidies following the end of the transition period, replacing EU state aid laws from January 1st. 

The rules will cover financial assistance granted by governments and public bodies to businesses, something which has become a sticking point during the latest round of EU/UK trade deal talks. 

The WTO subsidy rules are internationally recognised as the common standard, covering financial assistance given to private firms. However, unlike EU member states, most other advanced economies don’t have rules regulating these subsidies – beyond those set by the World Trade Organisation. 

Currently, the European Commission policies state subsidies to businesses to ensure no distortion of competition regulations between EU member states within the single market – something which the UK will no longer be bound to next year – allowing the creation of its’ own subsidy control regime. 

Yet despite having more freedom in this area, business secretary Alok Sharma said the government has no plans to return to a 1970’s approach of trying to run the economy or bailing out unsustainable firms. 

He said that: “We want a competitive, dynamic market economy in which we can back British industries to create more jobs in this country, while also making the UK the best possible place to start and grow a business.

“While our guiding philosophy remains that we do not want a return to the 1970s approach of picking winners and bailing out unsustainable companies with taxpayers’ money, the UK must have flexibility as an independent, sovereign nation to intervene to protect jobs and to support new and emerging industries now and into the future.”

Read more: Johnson gives trade deal ultimatum as Barnier sets to touchdown for next round of talks

“As we take back control of our money and laws from the EU, we have a unique opportunity to design our own subsidy control regime in a way that works businesses, workers and consumers.

“Over the coming months, I want to work closely with businesses and public authorities across all parts of the United Kingdom to consider how best we can use these new freedoms.”

Further guidance will be published before the end of the year. 

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has upped the stakes on the eve of the eighth round of trade talks between the UK and EU by stating that a lack of a free trade deal agreement by mid-October would mean no trade deal.

Brexit is very much back on the agenda with a bump as EU diplomats explained their irritation at the UK’s stance, slightly dismissing it as ‘muscle-flexing’ and ‘self-defeating’ as talks enter the final weeks.

Two key issues remain which neither party is looking likely to make concessions over – that of access to UK fishing waters and rules regarding government intervention in struggling businesses.

In a statement on Facebook, Johnson stated that: “We are now entering the final phase of our negotiations with the EU.

“The EU have been very clear about the timetable. I am too. There needs to be an agreement with our European friends by the time of the European Council on 15 October if it’s going to be in force by the end of the year. So there is no sense in thinking about timelines that go beyond that point. If we can’t agree by then, then I do not see that there will be a free trade agreement between us, and we should both accept that and move on.

“We will then have a trading arrangement with the EU like Australia’s. I want to be absolutely clear that, as we have said right from the start, that would be a good outcome for the UK. As a Government we are preparing, at our borders and at our ports, to be ready for it. We will have full control over our laws, our rules, and our fishing waters. We will have the freedom to do trade deals with every country in the world. And we will prosper mightily as a result.

“We will of course always be ready to talk to our EU friends even in these circumstances. We will be ready to find sensible accommodations on practical issues such as flights, lorry transport, or scientific cooperation, if the EU wants to do that. Our door will never be closed and we will trade as friends and partners – but without a free trade agreement.

“There is still an agreement to be had. We will continue to work hard in September to achieve it. It is one based on our reasonable proposal for a standard free trade agreement like the one the EU has agreed with Canada and so many others. Even at this late stage, if the EU are ready to rethink their current positions and agree this I will be delighted. But we cannot and will not compromise on the fundamentals of what it means to be an independent country to get it.”

Read more: Brexit deal ‘seems unlikely’ this year

Earlier, the UK’s lead negotiator David Frost told the Mail on Sunday that the UK was more than ready to walk away from negotiations.

“We came in after a Government and negotiating team that had blinked and had its bluff called at critical moments and the EU had learned not to take our word seriously,” he said.

“So a lot of what we are trying to do this year is to get them to realise that we mean what we say and they should take our position seriously.”

The Government is being urged to make good on its’ manifesto pledge to stop the exports of live animals with Brexit affording the best opportunity to push through the relevant regulations. 

Up until now, EU laws have stopped the UK banning live exports, and the RSPCA, as well as Conservative ministers, are urging the Government to make the change. 

Head of public affairs at the RSPCA, David Bowles, said that: “Leaving the EU is the best chance we have had so far to end the live export trade which causes so much unnecessary suffering to animals.”

Each year, tens of thousands of live animals are exported from the UK to make journeys across Europe, something which ministers are urging action on with lengthy journeys leading to injury, overheating and extreme stress in cramped conditions.

Theresa Villiers, former environment secretary said that leaving the EU is the best chance to take action. 

Read more: Trade between UK and EU won’t ‘collapse overnight’ without agreement

She said that: “Now we’re heading for the end of the transition period, we have the opportunity to take action.

“There are some serious legal complexities to be tackled, but there is a clear moral case to end live exports.

“We need to live up to our manifesto commitment on this and restrict excessive long-distance transport of live animals so overseas exports become a thing of the past.”

The latest round of Brexit negotiations has seen talks going backwards according to reports, with EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier saying the chances of striking a deal before the end of the year are looking ‘unlikely’. 

With the countdown to the end of the transition period ticking on, the EU has warned that UK negotiators have taken discussions backwards, with issues surrounding fishing and rules surrounding competition seemingly to be two of the main stumbling blocks around the negotiating table. 

However, Boris Johnson has urged talks to ‘rapidly accelerate’ over fears of a cliff-edge Brexit – especially on the back of the economic damage seen so far by the coronavirus pandemic. 

Barnier has said he is surprised and concerned by the lack of progress, commenting that ‘too often this week t felt as if we were going backwards more than forwards’. 

BBC Brussels correspondent Nick Beake believes that both the EU and UK are locked in a last-minute power play, writing that ‘the latest round of discussions were courteous and friendly – with a warmth between the two chief negotiators facing each other – even when each was delivering an uncomfortable message’.

“As ever, the EU and UK are hardly seeing eye-to-eye though.”

However, one UK negotiator has suggested it is the EU that are holding up talks by insisting on agreeing to specific elements of the deal before progressing. 

An official commented that: “The process block now is the EU’s insistence that we must accept their position on state aid and fisheries before we can talk about anything else. I mean obviously we’re not going to do that. So it’s frozen.

“Things are focussing down, not necessarily helpfully, on the issues of state aid, subsidy policy and fisheries policy. What’s frustrating here is that Michel Barnier said in his press conference just now, ‘Brexit means Brexit’, which is of course correct. They don’t apply that in this area where they want to see us continuing arrangements that are very like those that we’re bound by as members of the EU.”

Read more: Trade between UK and EU won’t ‘collapse overnight’ without agreement

With the seventh round of talks over, the next phase of negotiations will take place in London next month with just weeks left until the initial Autumn deadline to complete a deal. 

An economist has reminded those fearing the consequences of a no-deal Brexit that trade won’t simply ‘collapse overnight’ if no agreement is reached before the end of the transition period. 

Catherine McBride has noted that demand from both businesses and consumers will continue to drive trade and investment between the two sides – though that trade would likely become more expensive with the introduction of tariffs. 

She said: “The idea that trade or financial ties between the EU and the UK would ‘collapse overnight’ without an agreement is not something you would expect to read in the financial media.

“Trade agreements do not generate trade – consumer demand, and business suppliers do.

“Trade agreements can make trade easier but if consumers want to buy something, then that demand will be supplied with or without a trade agreement – even if the product is banned by the government.”

 “At the very worse, if tariffs are added to products crossing from the EU into the UK and vice versa, then EU-UK trade would merely become more expensive.

“But this would be a bigger problem for the EU than the UK because the UK is a net importer of goods from the EU. It is the UK that provides a lucrative market for EU merchandise.”

Read more: Barnier warns ‘changes are inevitable’ on release of Brexit guidance dossier

Trade negotiations are ongoing but are being hindered by the time and energy required to combat coronavirus with many rounds of talks held over conference and video calls. And while the UK government has struck a number of trade deals with smaller nations, bigger agreements with the US and also Japan, where talks have been held up with a row over cheese, are ongoing.