Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, with reference to her Department's publication entitled UK-Canada Free Trade Agreement: The UK’s Strategic Approach, published 24 March 2022, for what reason does the UK's strategic approach (a) include an ambition to ensure the agreement does not contain an investor-state dispute settlement mechanism and (b) not commit to disapply such a mechanism with Canada as part of the UK’s accession to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership.

The UK will not be seeking to negotiate an investor state dispute mechanism (ISDS) in the UK-Canada FTA and will instead seek to consider alternative options for investment dispute resolution that are best suited to the bilateral relationship between the UK and Canada.

In seeking accession to CPTPP, the UK committed to the agreement’s existing standards, including its provisions on investor protections backed by a modern and transparent ISDS mechanism. These features balance the need to protect UK investors accessing and operating in CPTPP markets and ensure that the Government can regulate in the public interest.