EU Commission publishes draft negotiating guideline for UK FTA negotiations

The European Commission  published this morning its negotiating guidelines for the future EU-UK Free Trade Agreement (FTA). Here's the bit about procurement:

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Although this is just the draft mandate prior to approval in the Council and that no one knows at the moment how detailed the agreement will be, it is interesting to see that the Commission is already boxing in the UK in what concerns procurement between what are the UK's commitments in the context of the GPA accession and the current procurement rules. This was to be expected but surely pours cold water over the more exuberant comments of a new dawn for procurement rules in the UK completely free from the EU's blueprint.

I find the last sentence of the first paragraph cited above particularly telling, with the Commission leaving it clear it will not accept a mercantilist approach to public procurement in case the UK wants to have access to EU public procurement markets. Ditto as well for the need of remedies, again an area where some have voiced concerns that it is too easy to challenge procurement decisions in the UK.