Question to the Department for International Trade:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made as to whether the progress of negotiating free trade agreements and economic partnership agreements is constrained by a lack of staff and resources.

The Government has an ambitious programme of Free Trade Agreement (FTA) negotiations. When delivering any programme, but particularly one of such scope and ambition as our FTA programme, resource will always be a constraint.

To achieve the best outcomes for the UK, we manage the delivery of our work to ensure that we use our finite resource in the right way. This has allowed the Department to realise unparalleled success in the delivery of our FTA programme. So far, we have agreed trade deals with 70 countries plus the EU. Those deals covered £766 billion of our bilateral trade in 2020.