Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what steps he is taking to further increase defence, security, and trade partnerships on a bilateral basis with Japan.

The UK-Japan bilateral relationship is a strong and wide-ranging partnership. It is an increasingly deep and broad relationship, encompassing close collaboration in areas from security and defence to science and innovation, supported by regular Ministerial and official visits to and from Japan.

Our economic relationship is going from strength to strength following the agreement of our bilateral Free Trade Agreement (FTA) in 2020, which we are now seeking to implement in full. UK accession to the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) would accelerate trade cooperation even further.

In the security and defence space, Japan and the UK have agreed in principle the Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA) and we continue to work on closer collaboration on combat air programmes. As fellow members of the G7 and ahead of Japan's G7 Presidency next year, we look forward to continuing to grow the UK-Japan relationship.