The British international trade secretary, Liam Fox, has told an Australian parliamentary committee the May government wants to expedite a free trade deal with Australia, and wants to work with Canberra to champion trade liberalisation globally after the UK’s exit from the EU.

Fox has made a personal submission to Australia’s joint standing committee on foreign affairs and trade, which is examining the trade and investment relationship between the two countries.

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He notes in the submission that the UK worked first with Australia after the Brexit vote to establish a bilateral trade working group.

Fox says the UK will do preparatory work on the new bilateral trade pact with Australia before leaving the EU in spring 2019.

“Whilst the UK is not able to conclude FTAs whilst still a member of the EU, we can do preparatory work with other countries on our future trading relationships,” the minister says. “With Australia, we aim to ensure the expeditious transition to formal FTA negotiations once the UK has completed its negotiations to to exit the EU.”

Fox’s submission comes as Theresa May has signalled that free movement of EU citizens may continue during a transitional phase after the UK leaves the EU.

The European council president, Donald Tusk, has made clear that while the EU27 will be willing to seek transitional arrangements with the UK, the “core principles”, including over immigration, must be maintained during that period.

The guidelines indicate that if Britain wants to remain in the single market while settling a post-Brexit free trade deal with Europe, then free movement will have to remain.

Some Australian business organisations, including the Minerals Council of Australia – which represents the major mining giants – have warned during the Australian parliamentary inquiry that the Turnbull government needs to be hard headed in considering how to proceed, given all the complexities the UK is now managing associated with the break from Europe.

The MCA says in its submission the Australian government needs to “assess the potential gains that would come from an FTA with the UK compared to the trade and investment arrangements that will prevail immediately following Brexit”.

It also cautions the government to balance the opportunity of striking a new FTA with the UK with other priorities – including Australia negotiating its own FTA with the EU.

While support an FTA with the UK in principle, the MCA says the mining industry has more immediate priorities. “For the Australian mining industry, finalising FTAs which are currently under negotiation with India and Indonesia are a higher priority than FTA negotiations with the UK.”

But Fox suggests concluding an FTA with Australia is part of strategic efforts by the two countries to push back against the protectionism which has manifested in the wake of the global financial crisis of 2007-08.

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Fox says to counter the populist backlash to trade liberalisation, “free trading nations like the UK and Australia should work together to explain the benefits that an open trade system provides”.

He argues that an open approach to trade “helps ensure that nations are economically fit enough to be able to tackle some of the biggest global challenges today – terrorism, poverty, climate change and an increasingly volatile and interdependent global financial system.”

“Unless we remove damaging restrictions, trade cannot act as a great social leveller, or spread political freedoms to societies that need them the most.”

While launching the robust defence of free trade, Fox acknowledges that it is important to ensure the forces of globalisation do not “leave people behind”.