Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what assessment his Department has made of the impact of the UK-India Free Trade Agreement on manufacturing output in the North East.

A wide variety of manufacturing companies in the North East will benefit from this FTA, including those producing cars, who will benefit from tariffs reduced from over 100% to 10% under the quota, and wind turbines, whose tariff will drop from 11% to 0%.

In addition, SMEs in the North East, who account for 99.9% of all businesses, will benefit from simplified customs and digital processes, helping them to take advantage of a rapidly growing market in India.

The department has published a full impact assessment, that outlines the sectoral and regional impacts of the agreement.