Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (Accession)

Mark Pritchard Excerpts

Wednesday 17th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Elizabeth Truss]

We are very committed as a country to our zero carbon target by 2050, and we are working hard on the new COP—conference of the parties—summit to make sure that we achieve that. In all the trade negotiations we are conducting, we want to have strong environmental protections protecting our environmental legislation in the UK but also reduced tariffs on low and zero carbon goods.

[Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)]

I congratulate the Secretary of State on the good progress she is making with the bilateral trade agreement with Japan, which will be very welcome to many people employed by Japanese companies in Shropshire. I welcome her announcement and, indeed, the announcement by the Prime Minister on Australia and New Zealand today. Specifically on the partnership agreement that she has announced, could she give the House an idea of an indicative timetable—when she thinks it might be signed and whether she thinks that will be quicker than many of the trade deals that the European Union has signed?

[Elizabeth Truss]

I thank my hon. Friend for his overall comments. In terms of the timetable for CPTPP, it is an agreement with 11 members, so inevitably that means that we have to be in discussions with all those 11 members and seek agreement with all 11 members. The convenient aspect of course is that there is already an agreement fleshed out, and we will be working within that framework. We are already in discussions with all 11 members. We are negotiating bilateral deals with some of them. When we are in a position, we will put forward our formal application, and I hope we can make rapid progress. There certainly is enthusiasm about having the UK as part of CPTPP, because people see us as a high-standards country that believes in free trade and the rules-based global system. I will reach an agreement as quickly as I can, but I will make sure that at all points we get a good deal for British industry and that we do not cross any of our red lines.