Post-Brexit licences for exporting food to EU cost UK firms up to £65m last year

Government to promise it will scrap existing scheme by reaching new deal with Brussels in next 18 months

UK companies spent up to 65m last year on licences to export food and agricultural products to the EU - costs that the government is promising to eliminate as part of a new deal to be agreed by 2027.

Government figures released on Tuesday showed it issued 328,727 such licences last year, at a cost of between 113 and 200 each. That would put the total cost to business at somewhere between 37m and 65m.