Oral Answers to Questions Debate

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Department: Department for Education

Oral Answers to Questions

James Gray Excerpts
Thursday 24th May 2012

(11 years, 11 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Lord Willetts Portrait Mr Willetts
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I agree with what the director general of the CBI said the other day. I thought he put it very well:

“We have always said that the path back to sustainable economic growth will be a long and difficult one, with many bumps along the way. To re-balance our economy towards exports and investment will take time and patience.”

We are absolutely committed to rebalancing towards exports and investment, and in my conversations with engineering businesses and others across the country it is clear they understand that that is exactly what the Government are doing.

James Gray Portrait Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)
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Will the Minister join me in congratulating businesses across North Wiltshire, who are reporting extremely good conditions? Honda has just announced a new line, the excellent automatic hand dryer I used a short time ago in a House of Commons lavatory was made by none other than Dyson of Malmesbury, and a number of enterprise awards have been given to firms in the constituency. The picture is actually not bad at all. Will the Minister congratulate those companies?

Lord Willetts Portrait Mr Willetts
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My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There is a spirit of innovation in our country of which we can be proud. It is one of the reasons that our exports to the emerging economies of India, China and Brazil—which are the most competitive and important economies of the future—are shooting up, even while, sadly, we are held back by the economic problems of the eurozone, brought on by membership of the euro, a policy advocated by the Labour party.