Question to the Department for International Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade, with reference to her Department's monthly transparency publications on expenditure over £25,000, where the following payments made to Linklaters LLP are recorded, as set out in Linklaters' filings under the United States Foreign Agents Registration Act: (a) $294,935.44 on 6 July 2020, (b) $65,965.67 on 12 August 2020 and (c) $51,439.05 on 21 August 2020.

Due to an administrative error, these transactions were not included in the Department’s regular monthly transparency publications on expenditure over £25,000. The Department is currently investigating this error and will correct any omissions in the published data as soon as possible.

In accordance with the Department for International Trade’s obligations under section 5 of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015, an Award Notice for US Trade Legal Support contract was published to the Contracts Finder website on 2nd of March 2020. This can be found at https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/notice/926103bc-59ab-426c-bc15-44756efad7b2

Obtaining expert legal advice to negotiate trade deals of this size and importance is standard practice. UK-US negotiations have proceeded at an impressive pace, in part due to the internal and external expertise we have in place.