Oral Answers to Questions

Ranil Jayawardena Excerpts

Wednesday 13th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I remind the House that an hon. Member should not leave the Chamber until the exchanges on his or her question have been completed. It really is the height of parliamentary discourtesy, and I hope that I do not have to say it again. I have just been alerted to someone doing that, and it should not happen again.

[Mr Ranil Jayawardena (North East Hampshire) (Con)]

6. What assessment he has made of the effect of the UK’s decision to leave the EU on Wales’s international business links.

[The Secretary of State for Wales (Alun Cairns)]

Leaving the EU allows us to establish new trading opportunities across the globe, forging ahead as a global leader in free trade. Welsh exports have outperformed the UK average over the last year, and I am working closely with the International Trade Secretary to build on that success.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I see that the hon. Member for West Dunbartonshire (Martin Docherty-Hughes) has beetled back into the Chamber. It is good of the fellow to drop in on us. We are grateful to him.

[Mr Jayawardena]

What is my right hon. Friend doing to encourage Welsh businesses and consumers to seize the opportunity of a global Britain by boosting imports and exports to increase consumer choice and helping businesses to create more good jobs as we leave the EU?

[Alun Cairns]

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for International Trade has established the UK Board of Trade, and I am pleased that Lord Rowe-Beddoe and Heather Stevens sit on it as Welsh representatives—their reputation goes well before them. Businesses are already responding. I have already quoted the encouraging export data, but clearly there is more work to do.