Brexit: Impact on UK-Americas Relations

Brexit: Impact on UK-Americas Relations

On 16 November, Canning House and the Americas Society / Council of the Americas (AS/COA) hosted a high-level discussion of the potential impacts of the UK's exit from the European Union on its westward-looking relations.

The session began with a presentation from Joanna Crellin CMG, a Trustee of Canning House and until recently Her Majesty's Trade Commissioner to Latin America and the Caribbean, who put forward Brexit as an opportunity for Britain to look beyond its traditional trading partners, and achieve the ambition of 'Global Britain' set out by the UK government through new, more comprehensive, bilateral free trade agreements, with Latin America a crucial region with many avenues for successful relations. Latin America's regional and international trade alliances will be important for this endeavour - with their openness and ambition of a like-mind with the UK. In a complex global context, Joanna said, Britain has been prudent in its ambitions and is facing up to challenges.

Following Joanna's presentation, we welcomed our panel of speakers. Chaired by Laura Trevelyan, BBC World News America anchor and career journalist, we were pleased to be joined by Francisco de Santibáñes from the Argentine Council for International Relations, Anahita Thoms from Canning House Corporate Member Baker McKenzie and Nicolás Urrutia from Canning House Corporate Member Control Risks. The panel's wide ranging and highly insightful discussion covered diverse topics from the challenges faced by British businesses in Latin America post-Brexit, opportunities and potential barriers to trade deals, and projections on the US presence in Latin America under a Biden presidency.

We thank all our speakers for their contributions, and our audience for their engagement!

A full recording of the session is available in our Canning Insights section!

Watch it here