Mark Prisk
Main Page: Mark Prisk (Conservative - Hertford and Stortford)AstraZeneca (Pfizer Bid)
Mark Prisk ExcerptsUrgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
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Vince Cable
Should this proceed—as I said at the outset, we have not yet had a formal bid—it will obviously be a matter for negotiation. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman would not want me to go into exactly what is being said in the discussions at the moment. Negotiations will clearly happen to make sure that any obligation is binding. I am sure that Pfizer itself would want to ensure that any obligations are clear and binding. Just to reinforce the point about nationality, which the right hon. Gentleman rightly stressed at the outset, we are talking about two international companies. I think we all acknowledge that AstraZeneca is an admirable company. It is Anglo-Swedish, with a Swedish chairman, a French chief executive and an international shareholder base. Pfizer is predominantly an American company and has a British chief executive. We are talking about international companies.
Mr Mark Prisk (Hertford and Stortford) (Con)
The Secretary of State is absolutely right to keep his options open—certainly at this stage. He is right, too, to learn the lessons from the appalling way in which the Kraft-Cadbury deal was handled. Following on from the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Norfolk (George Freeman) about research and development, will my right hon. Friend give us some assurance that using purchasing power as part of a long-term industrial strategy is the intelligent way not to pick winners but to make sure that we have the key base of skills that we need for the future?
Vince Cable
That is an interesting new angle. I believe my hon. Friend is talking about NHS purchasing, which we have not considered in this context. We have always made it very clear—there are, of course, European rules on this matter—that public procurement cannot be used in a protectionist manner. We need to be very careful of that, but we are aware that public procurement can be used to secure strategic long-term investment. We are already seeing that on the railways, for example.