EU Free Trade Agreements
Chris Ruane Excerpts(5 years, 3 months ago)
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George Hollingbery
Indeed, I can: that is the correct figure. There are two or three other agreements that will add substantially to that if we manage to transition them, and I am very hopeful that we shall be able to do so.
Chris Ruane (Vale of Clwyd) (Lab)
The Minister waxes lyrical about foreign inward investment into the UK. May I remind him that, in north Wales alone, we have had two devastating announcements in the past seven days? Last week, Hitachi said that it is pulling out of Wylfa Newydd, a £16 billion project in north-west Wales, and today, Tom Enders, the CEO of Airbus International, said that it will pull out of the UK, including out of its Airbus factory in north-east Wales, if there is a no-deal Brexit. What type of message does it send out to current and future international trading partners and investors when the UK Government cannot successfully engage with some of the most successful businesses in the world?
George Hollingbery
It is a complex web we weave, and there are clearly incentives in many different directions for many different companies. I have every sympathy with workers in Wales and others who find their jobs threatened by the decisions that companies make. The UK Government continue to engage with those companies, and to try to mitigate any moves they may make. We engage widely through POST with the parent companies of many of those organisations, and we are doing everything we can to ensure that foreign direct investment continues in the UK. Indeed, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development announced a week or two ago that the UK remains Europe’s primary choice for foreign direct investment.