Sir Keir Starmer has begun the first full-blown trade mission to India since Theresa May was prime minister, bringing 125 UK CEOs, entrepreneurs and university leaders to Mumbai.
The prime minister flew on a plane with dozens of Britain’s most prominent business people, including bosses from BA, Barclays, Standard Chartered, BT and Rolls-Royce, for the two-day trip designed to boost ties between the two countries.
Starmer will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday, five months after the UK signed the first trade deal with India since Brexit.
The agreement has yet to be implemented, with controversial plans to waive national insurance for workers employed by big Indian businesses sent to the UK still the subject of a forthcoming consultation.
Speaking to journalists on the plane on the way out, the prime minister said he was determined to boost ties between the two countries.
The trip has been arranged to coincide with the Conservative Party conference, with the first day of meetings coinciding with Kemi Badenoch’s speech to activists in Manchester.
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However, the business delegation is likely to use the trip to lobby the prime minister not to put more taxes on them in the November budget.
Sir Keir has already turned down the wish of some of the CEOs on the trip to increase the number of visas.
“The visa situation hasn’t changed with the free trade agreement, and therefore we didn’t open up more visas,” he said.
He told business that it wasn’t right to focus on visas, telling them: “The issue is not about visas. It’s about business-to-business engagement and investment and jobs and prosperity coming into the United Kingdom.”
The prime minister sidestepped questions about Mr Modi’s support of Russian leader Vladimir Putin, whom he wished happy birthday on social media. US President Donald Trump has increased tariffs against India, alleging that Indian purchases of Russian oil are supporting the war in Ukraine.
Asked about Mr Modi wishing Mr Putin happy birthday, and whether he had leverage to talk to Mr Modi about his relationship with Russia, Sir Keir sidestepped the question.
“Just for the record, I haven’t… sent birthday congratulations to Putin, nor am I going to do so,” he said. “I don’t suppose that comes as a surprise. In relation to energy, and clamping down on Russian energy, our focus as the UK, and we’ve been leading on this, is on the shadow fleet, because we think that’s the most effective way. We’ve been one of the lead countries in relation to the shadow fleet, working with other countries.”
Sir Keir refused to give business leaders any comfort about the budget and tax hikes, despite saying in his conference speech he recognised the last budget had an impact.
“What I acknowledged in my conference and I’ve acknowledged a number of times now, is we asked a lot of business in the last budget. It’s important that I acknowledge that, and I also said that that had helped us with growth and stabilising the economy,” he added. “I’m not going to make any comment about the forthcoming budget, as you would expect; no prime minister or chancellor ever does.”
Asked if too many wealthy people were leaving London, he said: “No. We keep a careful eye on the figures, as you would expect.
“The measures that we took at the last budget are bringing a considerable amount of revenue into the government which is being used to fix things like the NHS. We keep a careful eye on the figures.”
