Kemi Badenoch flies to India for trade deal talks

Kemi Badenoch will arrive in India on Monday for the latest round of talks as the UK seeks to revive hopes of a free trade deal.

The Government is still in the process of negotiating a free trade agreement with India after a target of securing a deal by Diwali in October slipped.

The negotiations, which are expected to focus on a deal to cut tariffs and open opportunities for UK financial and legal services, are the first formal round of talks since July.

The International Trade Secretary, who told MPs last month that she wanted to move away from her department being seen as the “department for free trade agreement”, flies to New Delhi for the sixth round of talks, where she will meet her counterpart, Indian minister of commerce and industry Piyush Goyal, in person for the first time.

The visit will also include meetings with business leaders and UK companies.

Ms Badenoch said: “I’m here in New Delhi to kickstart round six of UK-India trade negotiations and meet my counterpart Minister Goyal in person to drive progress on this agreement.

“Both nations have come to the table with the very highest of ambitions and a willingness to work together towards a mutually beneficial deal. I’m excited about the opportunities we can create for British business.”

Previous post-Brexit free trade agreements have come under scrutiny after former environment secretary George Eustice claimed that the Australian agreement “was not actually a very good deal” as the UK “gave away far too much for far too little in return”.

Mr Eustice also criticised the approach adopted by then-trade secretary Liz Truss in pursuing the deals, prompting Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to promise not to “sacrifice quality for speed when it comes to trade deals”.

Mr Sunak met Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the G20 summit in Bali in November, where the pair discussed hopes for a free trade deal.

The visit by Ms Badenoch comes as Pret A Manger, Revolut and financial tech company Tide all plan to expand to India.

In an interview with the Telegraph newspaper, Ms Badenoch signalled that the potentially difficult issue of student visas would not form part of her negotiations.

In October, Home Secretary Suella Braverman was accused of damaging trade talks after she said that the largest group of people who overstay visa requirements in the UK are Indian migrants.

Ms Badenoch said: “Student visas are a separate Home Office responsibility.

“So they wouldn’t come into a free trade agreement.

“Often FTAs get dragged into things that aren’t to do with trade… Making sure we don’t let business talks turn into Home Office talks is very key for me.”

She also told the paper that Mr Sunak had prompted a “lot of warm feelings” in India.

Mr Sunak was born in Hampshire, south-east England, to Indian migrant parents – a pharmacist mother and a GP father – and is married to Akshata Murty, the daughter of Indian IT giant Infosys’s founder NR Narayana Murthy, with whom he has two young daughters Krishna and Anoushka.

Ms Badenoch said: “I think that obviously there’s a lot of warm feelings towards him from India because he is somebody of Indian heritage.

“That’s not relevant to the deal specifically, but it all helps in terms of having good relationships between countries.”