YouSaid · the spoken record
Liam Byrne
We hold 35 passages that may be Liam Byrne’s. We do not publish them until we can confirm who spoke. See the correction.
On the record 2004–2026
hansard · podcast
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“If we manage to get that right, the investment rate in the country will go up and the economy will grow faster in the years to come. Therefore, there is not a cost to the savings of Britain’s pension savers—it will actually be to their advantage.”
House of Commons22 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is for exactly that purpose that hon. Members on both sides of the House made the argument that we need to repatriate investment saving. The fact is, we have got to resolve the paradox that, on the one hand, we have £3 trillion-worth of pension savings and, on the other hand, while we have some of the world’s best life science, best universities and best entrepreneurs, we do not have the investment institutions and systems that connect long-term savings to that brilliant tradition of entrepreneurial genius. Unless we fix that long-standing paradox, this country will not grow faster. That is not a Labour analysis; it is an analysis that was first advanced by the former Conservative Chancellor, the right hon. Member for Godalming and Ash (Sir Jeremy Hunt).”
House of Commons22 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I rise to say a couple of things in support of the Minister, who not only has done a heroic job in laying out the intellectual architecture for the legislation before he got to the House, but is so expertly steering it through the House. I wish him all the very best this afternoon in finishing the job. I want to make three points. First, the measures that the Minister has set out are essential if we are to pursue the long-term interests of pension savers in this country. It is in their fundamental interests that they live and retire in an economy that is growing faster in the years to come. The only way in which we can collectively achieve that is by raising the investment rate in this country. For a long time, our investment rate was the lowest in the G7; it is improving and is now the second-lowest in the G7.”
House of Commons22 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am grateful for that intervention, because the hon. Lady made my second point for me. It is just not good enough to will the ends and not the means. The reality is that, after all the heroic work of the former Conservative Chancellor, built on ably by the current Chancellor of the Exchequer to advance the Mansion House accord and the Sterling 20, the repatriation of long-term savings into our country is going at a snail’s pace. If we want to deliver it by a timetable on which we are both agreed, we will need to give a little bit of encouragement to the industry. That is exactly what the Minister’s proposed provision would do.”
House of Commons22 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I can advance only my own analysis of what will be needed. Indeed, it is part of a wider Business and Trade Committee inquiry, which will produce a report in a couple of weeks, on how we transform the investment environment. The reality is that there is a shared ambition on both sides of the House to ensure that we fix this long-standing paradox. My judgment is that the measures the Minister is proposing are essential if we are to deliver on that by the early 2030s. It is just not good enough to try to persuade Britain’s pension funds through sheer mind powers alone to repatriate the investment they are proposing. By taking the Minister’s approach, we stand a better chance.”
House of Commons22 April 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Select Committee recently flagged that small businesses in our country now face pandemic-level pressures. In April, standing charges for energy are set to rise by 60%, with no price cap protection. Now, soaring oil and gas prices threaten to be the final straw for thousands of SMEs. Will the Secretary of State make an urgent assessment of the risk of soaring energy prices, and give a clear account of how we will keep the SMEs that keep this country running in business?”
House of Commons12 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Why are we not asking for more money from Fujitsu, so that we do not have to put up these provisions of £1.2 billion? I would be grateful if the Minister could answer that question.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We now think that the total cost of the Horizon scandal, when we add in the legal costs, will be something like £2 billion, yet when we asked the head of Fujitsu what provision he had made for contributing to that bill, the answer was zero. When we followed up with the auditors, they confirmed that the directors had acted within the law because the Government had not yet made any demands on Fujitsu for the money that should come back from that company in order to help fund it. Just to add insult to injury, this is a company that has taken a grand total of £362 million in new contracts over the past year alone. It promised us a moratorium on bidding for new contracts, but that moratorium turned out not to be real and was merely a press stunt.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Post Office provisions for the Horizon scandal and the payouts have now risen to about £1.2 billion. Our Committee has consistently criticised Governments of all stripes for not paying out the money to those victims much faster. The Committee has now agreed a further report on measures, which we think Ministers should take in order to ensure that justice is genuinely delivered to all of the victims of this scandal. That report will be published in a few days’ time. The House is being asked to agree this increase in the provision to £1.2 billion, yet the question we have for Ministers is this: where is the provision that Fujitsu is supposed to be making? After all, the Fujitsu system was at least half the cause of this scandal.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The European Union has put up significant defences. We had significant defences, but they are about to come down in June. Industry is sending a message loudly and clearly to the Government that, unless they act and unless new defences and a steel strategy are put in place, we are looking at the end of the steel industry in this country. Thousands of jobs will go, along with a sovereign capability, which as a country we simply cannot afford to happen. I would be very grateful if the Minister could explain how, if the House is to agree the spending, we are actually going to make sure that that money is not wasted, because there will be further policy measures in place to ensure that we do not lose our steel industry in the weeks ahead. That takes me to the Post Office.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Certainly, the House did not divide when we were recalled for that unusual hearing on a Saturday to agree to the passing of that Act. None the less, there is one significant question that we have to ask this afternoon: where is the steel strategy to go with the extra money that the House is being asked to agree? When representatives from Tata Steel came before our Committee just a couple of weeks ago, they were very clear that there are now just eight weeks to save the steel industry in this country. Therefore, having passed that Steel Industry (Special Measures) Act, and having been asked to agree this extra money, the House now has to ask the Minister today where that steel strategy is. As we know, a wave of subsidised Chinese steel is about to land on our shores. The United States has put up significant defences.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Secondly, is the Department spending its money on the right priorities, given what we have heard from the business community? Thirdly, I want to underline this question about why there is not more significant support for small business, which is suffering what our Committee has found to be pandemic-style pressures but without a pandemic-style support package in place. Let me start with the significant increases in the Department’s supplementary estimates. Some £375 million has been provisioned extra to support British Steel. That takes the total support that this House has agreed under the Steel Industry (Special Measures) Act 2025 to about £710 million. That is a significant sum. I think it has broad cross-party support.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“At the end of a long day, let me express my gratitude to the Backbench Business Committee for providing us with this time to debate the supplementary estimates and the priorities of the Department for Business and Trade. I rise to open this debate and simply make three broad points. This is an important debate because, of all of the supplementary estimates that have been laid before the House this afternoon, the Department for Business and Trade has had by far and away the most significant increase. Day-to-day spending has been increased by some £360 million, which is a rise of almost 18%. Investment spending has risen by £626 million, which is a 41% rise. Those are significant sums, so I pose the following questions to the Ministers. First, are these increases justified?”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“But when we add on the national insurance contributions, we must accept that labour costs will rise. That means that labour has got to become more productive, and that the skills system has got to become better available to small businesses. But when we add to that rising energy costs—so much higher; perhaps 50% bigger than before the covid crisis—the lack of regulation in third-party intermediaries, the increases in business rates, the costs from crime, the organised crime takeover of the high street, late payments and a lack of access to procurement, we see the crisis that small business now confronts. Those are the priorities where we would have liked to have seen more action in the supplementary estimate. They will certainly be a focus of the Committee’s scrutiny work over the course of the next year.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“At a time when we have basically finished signing the free trade agreements that are available to us as a country, it is surprising to the Committee that export support staff are being cut so aggressively. If we want to make the most of these new opportunities and new free trade deals, we would have thought that increasing export support would be a Government priority. My final point is about the emergency facing small business. Right now, as I said in my introductory remarks, small business tells us that it is facing pandemic levels of pressure without a pandemic-style support package. Labour costs have gone up. As we know, the national minimum wage has gone up, which in my view is a good thing, and the Employment Rights Act 2025, which will improve rights, is coming through. That is also a good thing.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“There is nothing about making the skills system better financed and more available, in particular to small business. Where there is progress is in the extra £200 million for the British Business Bank and the £50 million for the growth guarantee scheme. That is significant, but it is probably not quite enough. Indeed, the evidence we have received suggests that the market for loan guarantees is probably about £2 billion bigger than the Government have provided for. If we want small and big business to have access to scale-up finance in particular, we need to make sure that the British Business Bank has a much bigger loan guarantee scheme available. Finally, there was nothing in the estimates to roll back the very deep cuts to export support.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Critically, they need much better access to finance so that we can mobilise capital on a different scale. Trade deals need to become a gateway to increasing exports. Finally, they are asking for a lot more coherence in regulation. Right now people are being smothered in red tape, often because one Department is not talking to another. As we look at those priorities and at the estimates in front of us, we see that certainty has improved. The spring statement was a step forward, and the Chancellor has increased her headroom significantly. That definitely takes risk out of the investment environment. But there is nothing in these supplementary estimates about driving down energy costs. There is nothing about driving down business rates.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“As a Committee, we spend a lot of time listening to the business community, and we set out priorities based on what the businesses we talk to when we travel the country think we should be focused on. On our last national road trip we visited seven cities and did many roundtables on that tour. Last year we had 1,000 witnesses appear before the Committee—three quarters in private and a quarter in public—and we received 168 bits of evidence as we set out priorities for the future. We heard very clearly that what business is looking for is far more certainty about the investment environment for the years ahead. Businesses want a better return on investment. For that, they need energy costs and business rates to come down, and they need the skills system to be far more flexible and available.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The chief executive of Fujitsu came before the Committee to say that Fujitsu did indeed have a moral obligation to make a contribution. That is why we were so surprised when earlier this year, when we asked for him to return, he said that no provision had yet been made. For a company that is making hundreds of millions of pounds out of British taxpayers, it is simply egregious that it has not offered to pay, but it is also wrong that Ministers have not demanded that it pays up, and pays up quickly. I have touched on a couple of the significant increases in the estimates. There are two more points I want to make in the time available. The second broad point is the question of whether the money that the Department for Business and Trade is asking us to approve is in line with business priorities.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We expect much more aggressive action to drive down energy costs, we want to ensure that our manufacturing base is better supported and, crucially, we want to support the tradespeople whom my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth North (Amanda Martin) talked about, and the small businesses and high street businesses that my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Chris Vince) talked about. These are the people whom we are here to represent, and they deserve to have a policy that has their backs. Question deferred (Standing Order No. 54).”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“This is the most extraordinary country on earth. It is the home of the industrial revolution, and the home of the scientific revolution. It is a country with an abundance of ideas, and also a place that is blessed with trillions of pounds of long-term investment capital. If we in this House cannot put together a shared agenda for ensuring that our rate of growth is faster and living standards rise, we do not deserve to be here. This has been an excellent debate, and I have really appreciated the way in which the voice of business, large and small, has been heard loud and clear. I think the Minister will go away from today’s debate with real clarity from this House that we expect to see the steel strategy on the table pronto.”
House of Commons4 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The plan that the Chancellor has set out this afternoon shows that inflation, debt and bills are down, and that headroom, growth and living standards are up. That is testament to a plan for stability that is working, but that stability would be undermined if she surrendered to the idea of the £47 billion-worth of unfunded tax cuts set out by the Conservatives, so will she resist those calls? As fiscal headroom opens up, will she look again at what can be done to drive down energy costs for small business and genuinely reform business rates, so that we are backing our wealth creators, and not gambling with the public finances, as the Conservatives did?”
House of Commons3 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I think the diffidence that we have heard towards international law this afternoon is as unwise as, perhaps, it is unsurprising. For the sake of clarity, can the Prime Minister confirm what would have needed to have been true for it to be legal for him to have joined the offensive strikes last week? Surely that would have required an imminent threat to our national security, which was simply not present when the decision to strike was taken.”
House of Commons2 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I believe that I heard the hon. Gentleman accuse a political party in the Chamber of a “criminal abuse of democracy”. Did I hear that correctly? Is that remark in order, or does the hon. Gentleman—I use that word loosely—now need to back up his allegation with some hard evidence?”
House of Commons2 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Fourthly, we need to ensure that the powers of the Electoral Commission have been transformed so that it has the power to initiate investigations before it has all the evidence it needs. At the moment, it needs to initiate an investigation before it can get the evidence, which is very difficult to do. Finally, we need to ensure that there is a proper gateway to allow the Electoral Commission to share information with the National Crime Agency. Our enemies are undermining us now not just by dropping bombs through the ceiling, but by trying to destroy our foundations. Regulating political finance is one of the ways we can stop that now.”
House of Commons2 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“For a long time, the Russian intelligence services have had a strategy of what we might call “poodles on rubles”. Right now, we know they are moving about $30 million a year. We have to ensure that what has happened in Moldova does not happen in countries like ours. Banning cryptocurrency altogether—until, perhaps, one day in the future, the Electoral Commission has the power to police it—might be a good idea. Thirdly, we have to ensure that only profits earned from British companies can be used for electoral donations. It is ridiculous that an individual like Christopher Harborne can take $70 million in Tether tokens before then making about £23 million-worth of donations into British political parties, with none of us in this House having any idea where that money has come from.”
House of Commons2 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“All of this is overseen by a National Crime Agency without the resources to do the job and an Electoral Commission without the powers to do the job. There are five changes that need to be made to the text of the Bill before us tonight. The first, as many have said, is on media systems. It is ridiculous that I can set up a trust in Dubai that is owned by a company registered in the British Virgin Islands and chuck tens of millions of pounds into a British TV station, which can then go on to pay politicians in this House. There are no rules and balances on that, which is ridiculous and needs to end. Secondly, as many people have said, we need to ban cryptocurrency. We know that cryptocurrency is the vehicle of choice for the Russian intelligence services moving money into the bank accounts of western proxies.”
House of Commons2 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I, too, want to welcome the Bill; I think it has a lot of good measures. However, whether it becomes the watershed Bill that I think it could be depends on whether much of the debate we have heard tonight gets translated into successful amendments over the next couple of weeks. We all have an ideal of democracy in this House, but we all know that democracy, too, is a system, and systems can be gamed, corrupted and undermined, not merely by force of arms, but by force of money: foreign money; dark money; money that is faceless, but has an agenda. That is the situation we have in this country today because we have allowed the activities of shell companies, alka-seltzer companies and unincorporated associations, with about £1 in every £10 coming into political parties now from some kind of dark source.”
House of Commons2 March 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The evidence that we took in the Business and Trade Committee did raise concerns about the impact of the deal on both the brick industry and the ceramics industry in the UK. The Minister knows that the Trade Remedies Authority is not really equipped with the tools that it needs to defend us in this new world; nor has the Competition and Markets Authority yet seen fit to finalise its foreign subsidy control regime, despite two years of consultation. Will the Minister at least assure the House that he will keep a very close eye on this matter, and will not hesitate to bring forward protections or trade remedies if the need arises?”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I worry that the reduction in export support staff in the United Kingdom will deny firms in Britain the knowledge and connections they might need to exploit the full possibilities of this new agreement.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am glad that the Minister sought to take this bull by the horns in his opening remarks, because we are being asked to debate a treaty at a time when the Department for Business and Trade is seeking 40% reductions in export support staff. He went out of his way to stress that those headcount reductions would not be in India—I think that was the guarantee that he gave the House. That is important because those officials are responsible for helping firms to navigate the rules of origin, quota management, regulatory blockages and enforcement failures. They will also be required to staff a lot of the working groups that he and his counterpart will oversee.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The other real advances reflect years of negotiation and should not be dismissed, but the Committee wishes to underline that there are very significant risks attached to this agreement. India is not a frictionless market; tariffs were never the only barrier. The regulatory system in India is complex, decentralised and highly discretionary. Many of the barriers—be they licensing requirements or certification documentation—are at the state level, and the state-level variation, and state-level stubbornness in bringing those barriers down, will require an awful lot of work in India by His Majesty’s Government. That is why the successes of this agreement depend less on what is written in the treaty text, and far more on whether firms can operationalise it in day-to-day, week-to-week business.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“When the deal was signed and first published, there was a lot of noise in the media about migration and mobility, and the Committee took a lot of evidence on that. We concluded that the agreement is not, in fact, a big migration deal, and nor does it materially change overall migration policy. As the Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for Arundel and South Downs (Andrew Griffith), pointed out well, it provides limited facilitation of mobility for skilled professionals linked to trade and services delivery. It could go much further in the future, but given where the Home Office positions itself on that policy at the moment, we accept that there will not be much progress in the near term.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“There will be clear future gains for particular sectors. We think there could be a significant prize in the automotive industry, although there are implementation challenges, and clarity is required on how the quotas will work in practice. As the Minister said, and as we heard from other hon. Members, spirits exporters will do extremely well from this new bargain. They will see reductions in the extremely high tariffs of today. As the Minister belaboured, UK firms will for the first time secure access to India’s central Government procurement market. That is a very large number. Whether our firms can genuinely compete for those new contracts is something that the Committee plans to study carefully.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Government modelling, such as it is—always a bit speculative; always some interesting assumptions; always a bit long term; and always a bit difficult to pressure-test—suggests that the deal will add nearly £5 billion a year to UK GDP by 2040, and raises UK-India trade by £25.5 billion. Those are the numbers that the Minister rehearsed in his opening speech tonight. The Committee’s analysis, however, presents more meaningful numbers for UK business. The £400 million-worth of tariff savings in year one is real revenue for UK businesses. That will flatter the bottom line, and, for businesses that are under pressure for reasons that we will set out in a report on Wednesday, it could provide much important cash flow. Those tariff savings could rise to about £3.2 billion over 10 years, as export volumes improve.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If we are to build what the Finnish call “values-based multilateralism”, which is probably the best safeguard for peace in this world, India’s role in promoting free trade could be an important component. Another important dimension of that new posture relates to China. If India does indeed grow a low-cost manufacturing sector, the world will need to depend much less on China. All in all, it is important that the UK has played its role in securing that agreement. The Committee’s report confirms that the agreement secures substantial tariff liberalisation in what is a highly protected market. As the Minister said, Indian tariffs are reduced or eliminated —by our reckoning—on 92% of UK exports by value, with around 64% of tariff lines liberalised on day one.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“For the first time, India has agreed deals that will be policed by powerful external partners, not just the Minister—a powerful interlocutor in any trade negotiation—but by the combined might of the European Commission. For an Indian Government who have been protectionist by conviction for a long time, this represents an important reversal of deep nationalist instincts. As one of the world’s great homes of free trade, our nation should celebrate that. I hope that the Minister can use Delhi’s new-found philosophy in his conversations at the World Trade Organisation and elsewhere over the course of the year. Let us face it: we all need more allies for free trade in this world.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a country that has long been defined by its protectionism, but it now chooses to use its trade agreements as the anchors for ambitious domestic reform. If these agreements hold, as I hope they will, with the exception of agriculture, India is now moving from selective liberalisation to something approximating a near-open economy. That is a very significant moment in India’s long history, home as it is to about a sixth of humanity. These trade deals are not the traditional kind of “Swiss cheese deals” with lots of carve-outs, delays and exemptions. India is now set to almost fully liberalise its manufacturing sector within seven to 10 years. That is a step change by any historical standard.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That is much less than the perhaps £140 billion hit to GDP that we have had since leaving the European Union. But I will not provoke you, Madam Deputy Speaker, by dwelling on that point for too long. None the less, this India free trade agreement is the keystone of that new architecture. It connects us to one of the world’s fastest growing economies and anchors us in the Indo-Pacific for decades to come. It is also worth saying that this is a significant moment for India, because this is not the only deal that India has signed, as the Minister said; it has also signed the EU deal, and it appears that there is a deal with the United States. India is on the cusp of the biggest transformation in its trade policy since independence.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Although we do not know quite when he will get the Gulf co-operation deal, which is no doubt imminent, over the line, or the Swiss deal—presumably it is not too far off—this could well be the year when he crowns a number of free trade agreements signed since we left the European Union. They could, in effect, create a triple ocean system of alliances that basically brings UK free trade agreements to about 46 countries in all, home to 2.5 billion people and blessed with something like 60% of world output. That is quite an achievement. Pro-Europeans on the Government Benches will, of course, say that we can now look at the prize of what free trade agreements have brought compared with the losses entailed since we left the European Union. About £14 billion of GDP uplift is forecast as a result of the free trade agreements that we have signed.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this debate. I want to start with huge thanks to my colleagues on the Business and Trade Committee for helping to inform the debate with a report that was agreed cross-party and that provided, if anything, a reasonably warm welcome for the Government’s work in securing this free trade agreement, but with a number of caveats, which I will touch on. Before I set out the Committee’s evaluation of the agreement, it is worth marking this moment. The Minister, who is not known for underselling such moments in the House, actually could have sold this one rather more.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am grateful to the Leader of the House and the Minister for ensuring that there is a general debate tonight, but it is not a debate on a votable motion. If this Parliament is to be a strong watchdog and guardian of the Executive, it is important that what were once prerogative powers are transferred to us, here in this House. I hope that this is the last debate on a free trade agreement that takes place on a general motion; in a democracy, we decide things by voting.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“For a long time, he has been one of the leading voices in the House in standing up to Putin and the evil of Russia, so I hope during the wind-ups he will say more about exactly what he is doing, along with his colleagues, to ensure that we are stopping the possibilities of importing Russian oil derivatives from India. In conclusion, our overall take is that this is a good deal that is in the UK national interest, but I do want to supply one final note of dissent. When the CRaG legislation was introduced to the House in 2010, it was always the intention of Parliament that when free trade deals came for debate, there would be a votable motion. That would allow Parliament to exercise the licence that it was promised to delay ratification if it was discontent with the terms of an agreement before us.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The reality is that India remains one of the biggest customers of Russian oil. That money is fuelling Putin’s war machine, and as recently as January, His Majesty’s Government had not introduced controls that were in place in the European Union to ensure that oil derivatives made from Russian oil were banned from this country. Indeed, when Politico reported on this earlier in the year, it noted that something like one in six units of Britain’s aviation fuel imports were derived from Russian oil. That is not something that the Minister will want to tolerate for very long.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Ensuring that we have good ways to monitor and escalate this will be important if the deal is to be a success. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Gareth Snell) flagged up, some UK sectors, like textiles and ceramics, will face increased competitive pressure, and although the agreement does contain binding human rights provisions, the responsibilities of UK firms do not end at the border. Being strong on human rights protection, upgrading the dysfunctional Trade Remedies Authority and pressuring the Competition and Markets Authority to publish a foreign subsidy control regime would be extremely welcome. The final point I want to flag is an issue that came up during the Minister’s appearance in front of the Committee, and I have not heard enough tonight or since he came to the Committee about its progress.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It appears that the White House has prioritised strategic leverage and tariff pressure over comprehensive liberalisation, extracting concessions through market power, not through traditional FTA approaches. The UK has chosen a different path: ruled-based, negotiated commitments and long-term engagement. I think that choice can work for us, as long as we are ruthless about ensuring good implementation. We are sceptical about the level of services mobility that has been delivered, and about the absence of a bilateral investment treaty—we think that is a significant gap in our long-term framework. We also recognise that policy volatility and regulatory risk still matter. In particular, India’s record on investor protection remains uneven, and its tax administration is still too often used in a way that is, frankly, weaponised.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The EU deal obviously covers a much wider volume of trade than we deliver with India, so the EU will therefore enjoy much bigger total tariff savings and a much bigger quota access, particularly for the automotive sector, among others. However, as the Opposition spokesman rightly flagged, there was limited progress on services—we flagged that, too. Services are the lifeblood of the British economy and of our exports—we are a services superpower. The EU’s negotiating position appears at first blush to be broader and deeper, but the final outcomes will remain unclear until the final text is published. Compared with the United States, the contrast is different again.”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I hope that the Minister will, as quickly as he can, rustle up an implementation plan to tell us how the agreement will be implemented. I very much hope that he will be able to align the ambitions for the treaty with the level of resource that he and his Department are investing in it. The House will want to know that the Committee also tested the treaty against the deals secured by our allies in the European Union and the United States. Compared with the EU-India deal, it seems that the UK has moved faster and secured earlier liberalisation on some tariff lines. We have liberalised 92% of the value of our exports, while the EU has secured 96.6% of its exports, but both were for roughly the same level of market access offered to India—offers covering over 99% of India’s exports by value to the UK and EU markets.”
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“We think that there could have been some wisdom in at least attempting an implementation plan, not least a resource plan that goes alongside the treaty—and perhaps even something tabled in time for tonight’s debate, to reassure the House that the Government will watch the implementation of this deal like a hawk. The Select Committee has decided to go to India in March to understand how this deal will be implemented in real life. If our export support work is hollowed out, the consequences will be predictable: smaller exporters will walk away, utilisation rates for the treaty will remain low, and the headline gains will fail to reach the wider economy and benefit the constituents who sent us to this House to debate this treaty.”
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“The hon. Member is exactly right. When the Committee published our report, we lamented that there was not a full-scale, full-blown implementation plan alongside the proposals. To a degree, those are difficult things to write, because it is difficult to forecast how quickly the treaty will go through the ratification process needed in India, for example, but we heard evidence that some markets—not least in automotives—had been chilled. Of course, if people know that there are huge tariff and price savings on the way, why would they not delay their purchase rather than make it today?”
House of Commons9 February 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗