Question to the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what estimate the Department has made of the financial value to businesses in the Tees Valley of trade agreements since July 2024; how many businesses in the Tees Valley are expected to benefit and how much by; and whether the Department has made any assessment of sectors or businesses in the region that may be negatively affected, and how much by.
The Department does not produce such specific estimates. For new free trade agreements (FTAs), the Government publishes impact assessments to support the parliamentary scrutiny process of FTAs, which include an assessment of the UK’s regions and nations. We expect all English regions and UK nations to benefit from from the new FTAs we have already signed. The Department’s latest impact assessment for the UK-India FTA (published July 2025) estimated that the gross-value added (GVA) in the North East of England could grow by £70 million (0.12%) in the long run due to the FTA.