Question to the Department for International Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade, with reference to Article 20.4 of the UK-Japan Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement, on which date the Japanese Government provided the details of their contact point to the UK; and when her Department provided the contact details of their contact point to the Japanese Government.

The UK and Japan exchanged contact points for all areas of the agreement in December 2020. Japan shared contact points with the UK on the 18 December 2020. The UK shared contact points with Japan on the 24 December 2020.

The UK small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) contact points have attended all meetings of the Committees and Working Groups established by the UK-Japan Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement. The contact points for UK and Japan have not met to specifically discuss SMEs, but have discussed more generally utilisation of the Free Trade Agreement by business.