Can a UK-US trade deal avoid ‘dreaded’ chlorinated chicken?

Depending on which government minister has been speaking and at what time, the prospects of a UK-US free trade deal are either very good (according to a “confident” Rachel Reeves last week) or “not certain” (according to Pat McFadden).

In a Sunday morning interview with Sky News yesterday, McFadden, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and a key ally of Prime Minister Keir Starmer, cast doubt on Reeves’ more positive proclamations at the IMF in New York last week.

“I don’t think it’s certain, and I don’t want to say it’s certain, but I think it’s possible,” said a rather uncertain McFadden.

He then said the government wanted to make an “agreement in the UK’s interests” rather than a “hasty deal”, reflecting concerns the UK will buckle under pressure from Donald Trump’s global tariff shitstorm to accept an agreement that could, for example, see the acceptance of US foods such as hormone-treated beef or the dreaded chlorinated chicken.

McFadden’s reluctance to be as effusive as Reeves just a few days prior reflects the fact the UK – ahead of key talks with the EU in May – sees the bloc as arguably more important than the US.

And in an act of political tightrope walking, Reeves herself has also made that point in recent days, as did McFadden, who told Sky News that securing a food, agriculture and veterinary agreement with the EU – leading to a loosening of increasingly ineffective border bureaucracy – was “first and foremost” on the government’s agenda.

Protecting British food standards

Improving these trade flows and negotiating a new veterinary agreement with the EU was a key manifesto pledge by Labour, and any upcoming talks would doubtless be derailed if the UK were also to acquiesce on this key US demand from any trade agreement.

It’s also worth noting the current Labour government has regularly pledged to protect British food standards in any future trade negotiations.

But like it or not, the genie is very much back out of the bottle when it comes to the debate on the UK’s food standards, versus those of our prospective trading partners.

That would explain why this explainer outlining what chlorinated chicken is by The Grocer, first published in 2017 and then updated in 2020, remains one of our best-read pieces each week.

And it’s why Nigel Farage – that renowned champion of the UK farming sector – reiterated previous calls for a UK-US deal in an interview with The Sunday Times last weekend.

Reform UK leader Farage pointed to how “every single bag of pre-made salad in every single supermarket has been chlorinated” – which, while (mostly) true, cannot be compared to hosing down chicken carcases to try and erase the conditions the birds face on farms.

Read more: Hormone-treated beef explained - is it a problem or a solution?

He also cast aspersions over food standards in countries such as Thailand – a key source of frozen chicken and chicken used as an ingredient for the UK – without offering up any evidence to support his claims.

Effectively accepting the fact that any US imports could price UK producers out of the market, Farage went on to say he wanted “to promote British farming as being a high-end product”, before citing the popularity of farmers markets.

The next time he rocks up at a farmers’ protest, maybe he can elaborate further on his big plans to turn around the fortunes of the notoriously skint farming sector.

Is chlorinated chicken really all bad?

Other outlets such as The Spectator are also banging the drum for the acceptance of chlorinated chicken, espousing the same talking points as Farage, while claiming the practice of chlorination is now also massively reduced. The whole policy effectively amounted to protectionism, it claimed earlier this month – which is, let’s face it, exactly what the Trump administration is now promoting too.

Of course, as we reported here earlier this month, one way of killing the argument – or at least neutering it – would be to focus more on equivalence, where we could allow more non-chlorinated chicken or beef that hasn’t been fed hormones in from the US.

Ultimately, though, most UK food and farming bodies are dead against a US trade deal, with the British Poultry Council recently warning that “if agrifood becomes a bargaining chip, we all lose”.

“This isn’t about chlorinated chicken. This is about the values that underpin our food system. Growth without integrity is a shortcut to failure,” said BPC CEO Richard Griffiths.

Others, such as the RSPCA, have warned that prospective deals with the likes of India are also hugely problematic for similar reasons, as the country allows battery cages for laying hens (banned in the UK since 2012) and has no rules on maximum transport times for live animals. A deal could “flood UK supermarkets with cheap, low-welfare Indian imports and put UK farmers’ livelihoods at risk”, it claims.

This all comes as a major report due to be published by Compassion in World Farming tomorrow is set to reinforce these concerns, outlining how a significant proportion of the UK’s future trade partners have far lower animal welfare standards than the UK.

And it all feeds into the narrative, post Trump’s upending of global trade, that the UK, even more than in the Brexit days, has trade-offs to make if it wants to seal deals and engender growth.

UK food producers will be hoping the government makes the right decision.