Commons Sense

House of Commons · Ministers' Questions

Trade with European Countries

Thursday 29 June 2023 · 2 questions

Summarised by AI from the official record, so it can contain mistakes.

Read the full transcript on Parliament.uk

At a glance

Answered 0 Partly answered 1 Not answered 0

Key points

  • British businesses exported 401 billion to Europe in 2022, marking a 26% increase from the previous year.
  • The Minister attended the OECD SME conference, which focused on international trade barriers.
  • The Department for Culture, Media and Sport is working to ease difficulties for musicians touring Europe.

Topics (select to filter)

Questions & Answers

Q1 Jeff Smith Lab Manchester Withington
Business & Trade
Context

There has been a focus on increasing UK exports to Europe, following the post-Brexit economic challenges.

Question

What steps she is taking to increase trade with European countries. Europe remains a vital export destination for British businesses, with exports of £401 billion in 2022, an increase of 26% on the previous year in current prices.

Answer from Kevin Hollinrake

Europe remains a vital export destination for British businesses, with exports of £401 billion in 2022, an increase of 26% on the previous year in current prices. Only this week, I attended the OECD small and medium-sized enterprise conference, which dealt largely with international barriers to trade. We are determined to remove market barriers to make it easier, particularly for SMEs, to trade across borders.

Partly answered

Not addressed: Did not specify any concrete steps or mechanisms to increase trade.

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Q2 Jeff Smith Lab Manchester Withington
Culture, Media & Sport Business & Trade
Context

Musicians face unnecessary red tape when trying to tour in Europe, hindering cultural exports and soft power.

Question

On the subject of barriers to trade, not only is our world-leading cultural sector valuable in itself for our soft power, but it is an important part of our export trade. But our musicians face unnecessary red tape when trying to tour Europe. We need an EU-wide visa waiver for touring artists. The Secretary of State said earlier that her Department “works closely with musicians”, so what is it actually doing to resolve this problem?

Answer from Kevin Hollinrake

I know that my colleagues at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport are working hard with our European counterparts to try to ease the difficulties in that area—we recognise it as a problem. Many positive things are happening in current trade with the EU. Indeed, in 2022, the north-west—the hon. Gentleman's region—exported £33 billion-worth of goods and £24.5 billion-worth of services, which is the area he is referring to. The north-west is the third largest area in the country for services exported to the EU.

Not addressed: Did not address the visa barriers faced by musicians specifically and instead focused on general trade statistics.

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