U.S. tariffs squeeze UK trade

The United States now applies tariffs to most goods Britain sells into the American market, hitting one of the United Kingdom’s biggest export relationships. (commonslibrary.parliament.uk) The House of Commons Library says the Trump administration imposed a 25% tariff on steel, aluminium and derivative products from March 12, 2025, a 25% tariff on passenger vehicles, and a 10% baseline tariff on most other UK goods from April 5, 2025. (commonslibrary.parliament.uk) The Office for National Statistics said the United States bought £59.3 billion of UK goods in 2024, including £9.0 billion of cars, and remained Britain’s largest goods export market. Services were larger still at £137.0 billion, and were not covered by the new U.S. goods tariffs. (ons.gov.uk) The first trade data after the tariffs showed the shock quickly. The Office for National Statistics said UK goods exports to the United States fell by £2.0 billion in April 2025, which it said was likely linked to the new U.S. import duties. (ons.gov.uk) London and Washington later struck a limited economic deal to cut some of the pain rather than erase it. The UK government said the agreement lowered U.S. tariffs for British automotive and aerospace exporters and set work toward a quota system for steel and aluminium at most-favoured-nation rates. (gov.uk; gov.uk) That left a two-track system in place: relief for a few politically important sectors, and the 10% baseline still hanging over most other goods. The House of Commons Library describes the UK-US arrangement as legally non-binding and focused on reducing, not eliminating, the tariff hit. (commonslibrary.parliament.uk) The pressure lands hardest on industries that depend on the U.S. market for scale. The Office for National Statistics said the United States accounted for 27.4% of all UK car exports in 2024, making autos especially exposed when the 25% vehicle tariff took effect on April 3, 2025. (ons.gov.uk) Economist Richard Baldwin wrote in 2025 that Trump’s trade policy followed a pattern of escalation followed by partial pullbacks, with governments and companies forced to plan around repeated tariff shocks rather than one settled rulebook. (cepr.org; rbaldwin.substack.com) For Britain, that means the story is no longer whether a deal exists. It is whether sector-by-sector carveouts can keep exports moving while most UK goods still enter the United States under a tariff regime that arrived in 2025 and has only been partly rolled back. (commonslibrary.parliament.uk; gov.uk)