Geoffrey Clifton-Brown
Main Page: Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Conservative - The Cotswolds)Department Debates - View all Geoffrey Clifton-Brown's debates with the Cabinet Office
(6 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Prime Minister
The hon. Lady knows full well that those who work in the UK Visas and Immigration section of the Home Office look at every case very carefully. She has made her point in this House, and I am sure that the Home Office will look again at that case.
Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con)
The City of London has recently topped the worldwide Z/Yen index and it supports 450,000 jobs and is worth £45 billion to the UK economy. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is essential for both the EU and the UK that the final Brexit agreement supports these financial services, because otherwise they will simply move elsewhere in the world?
The Prime Minister
That is an important issue and I referred to it in my Mansion House speech. I said that we wanted to ensure that financial services were a part of the deep and comprehensive partnership that we wished to build with the EU27. Our goal should be to establish access to each other’s markets. That should be based on maintaining the same regulatory outcomes over time, with a mechanism that determines proportionate consequences where they are not maintained. That is part of my ambition for an economic partnership with the European Union that goes way beyond any existing free trade agreement, covering more sectors and co-operating more fully. My hon. Friend is right that if firms and financial services are looking to go elsewhere, they are more likely to look to go elsewhere in the world, rather than elsewhere in Europe.