Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, whether any trade missions to Iran are planned involving businesses from the UK in 2016.

The UK government fully supports expanding our trade relationship with Iran. UK Trade and Investment will be leading a whole of government approach to engage with UK companies to ensure that UK businesses are well equipped to benefit from the commercial opportunities that will arise from sanction relief.

There is a desire on both sides to build a long-term bilateral relationship based on future partnership, where trade and investment is a key pillar. We plan to take further trade delegations to Iran in the near future across a number of sectors where UK companies are best placed to benefit from commercial opportunities.