Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Dan Carden and James Duddridge

Tuesday 20th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Dan Carden (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

On the G7, what are the Government doing to address the global debt crisis engulfing the world’s poorest countries? Might I suggest that one way to show leadership on that would be for this House to pass legislation to compel private creditors to participate in debt relief and to stop them suing for debt recovery under UK law?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs (James Duddridge)]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his engagement in this issue. We are already doing an awful lot on debt suspension, most importantly on the common framework and on those remaining countries such as Somalia and Sudan, which were left out of the HIPC—heavily indebted poor countries—process, but there are other parties and complexities, China’s sovereign debt being one of them and multilaterals another, as well as sovereign nations’ private sector debt, which we would encourage to participate where appropriate.