Exiting the European Union and Global Trade

Debate between Barry Gardiner and James Cartlidge

Thursday 6th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Barry Gardiner]

Let me be absolutely clear: we welcome foreign direct investment in this country—of course we do. We want people to be investing in our jobs, our economy and our future—

[James Cartlidge]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Barry Gardiner]

Perhaps if I can finish responding to the Secretary of State’s intervention, at an appropriate juncture the hon. Gentleman might catch my eye.

There is no difference between the Secretary of State and me on those matters. In fairness, I will say that in the past 50 years there have been 15 sets of quarterly balance of payments figures that have been worse than last week’s, and one of them was under a Labour Government, just after the global financial crisis. The other 14 have all been in the past five years, under the Conservatives.

It would be mean of me to give the right hon. Gentleman too hard a slapdown because the Chancellor has been doing it so effectively on behalf of us all. Only yesterday, we read that the Chancellor is demanding that the Secretary of State prove the case that our ability to strike trade deals after Brexit will make up for losing tariff-free access to the EU. In other words, the right hon. Gentleman is being asked to justify his job as the Secretary of State for International Trade once leaving the customs union gives us the competence—perhaps in this case I should say the right—to negotiate our own independent trade agreements.