G20

Lord Adonis Excerpts

Monday 10th July 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

I thank the right reverend Prelate. Tackling human trafficking and modern slavery remains a top priority of this Government. We are very grateful for all the work that the Church does internationally in this important area. The leaders of the G20 countries agreed with the Prime Minister that we need to take immediate and effective measures to eliminate modern slavery, child labour and forced labour from global supply chains, and we called on our G20 partners to follow our lead in working with businesses at home to ensure that they report any modern slavery in their supply chains. As the Statement made clear, this is a personal priority of the Prime Minister and one that she will continue to push among our G20 colleagues.

[Lord Adonis (Lab)]

My Lords, I ask the noble Baroness about the phrase in the Statement that we must reform the world trading system,

“so it is better able to resolve disputes”.

What proposals did Her Majesty’s Government put forward better to resolve trade disputes? Does she believe that the United Kingdom will be in a better position to advance that cause outside the European Union than inside?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

We want to champion this agenda. We called for change and will be working with colleagues in advance of a meeting later in the year to develop proposals. Good progress has been made. The trade facilitation agreement that came into force earlier this year will benefit UK exporters through its customs reforms, and could boost global trade by up to $1 trillion every year. We are clear that the WTO must remain the foundation of the global trading system, but we need to work together to improve it.