Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Nigel Adams and Gareth Bacon(4 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister for Asia (Nigel Adams)
The UK Government work in 35 low and middle-income countries to implement legal, regulatory and policy reforms to make it easy for business, including from the UK, to operate. Business-enabling environment reform was also discussed at the UK-Africa investment summit, which secured commercial deals between UK companies and African partners worth more than £6.5 billion.
Gareth Bacon
Does the Minister agree that now we have formally left the European Union we have an exciting opportunity to build on our historic ties with the Commonwealth and use close business links to help developing countries create wealth?
Nigel Adams
I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. He makes a good point. The Government are committed to working with our Commonwealth partners to support and deepen intra-Commonwealth trade, to improve the business environments in Commonwealth countries to enable them to be more globally competitive, and to facilitate the economic empowerment of women and young people by providing more business and educational opportunities. He will have an opportunity on Monday to take part in the Commonwealth debate.