Mundell welcomes French trade delegation to Scotland
Single UK market is delivering for Scottish businesses, says Scotland Office Minister.
David Mundell with the French trade delegation during a visit to Rosyth.
The single UK market delivers for Scottish businesses, and the UK’s membership of the single EU market delivers for trade between UK and France. That was the message from Scotland Office Minister David Mundell as he led a delegation of French business leaders on a tour of Rosyth Shipyard.
France is the UK’s fourth largest trading partner and, led by the French Ambassador to the UK, the 15 strong trade delegation visiting today included companies who have a strong Scottish presence like Thales and Total.
The construction and assembly of the Queen Elizabeth carrier at Rosyth is one of the UK’s biggest engineering projects, sustaining thousands of skilled jobs and with expenditure to date in Scottish shipyards estimated to be in the region of £1.9bn. As part of the visit Mr Mundell also hosted a roundtable to discuss opportunities to build on the strong links which exist between Scotland and France.
Mr Mundell said:
I was delighted to welcome the delegation of French businesses to Scotland and was pleased to accompany them on their visit to Rosyth Dockyard. The delegation’s visit to Scotland provided an excellent opportunity to discuss and develop the longstanding links between Scotland and France.
The UK Government is firmly committed to building on Scotland’s established strengths as a place for inward investment as part of the UK. The single UK market delivers for Scottish businesses, and our membership of the single EU market delivers for trade between the UK and France.
Mr Mundell also welcomed today’s news that Paris-based contact centre firm Teleperformance is to create up to 1,000 new jobs in Scotland.
He said:
This news is a big vote of confidence in our workforce here in Scotland and another encouraging sign for the UK economy.