§ Mr. John GreenwayTo ask the President of the Board of Trade if he will make a statement about the recent US legislation on Cuba. [29304]
§ Mr. Ian TaylorI made a speech to a seminar hosted by the Caribbean trade advisory group on 2 May setting out Her Majesty's Government policy in respect of this legislation and how the interests of United Kingdom business could be protected if threatened by its provisions. A copy of this speech has been placed in the Library of the House.
As I Indicated in that speech, we are still seeking to clarify certain areas of deep concern about this potentially damaging piece of legislation. Our objection is to its attempts to interfere with the legitimate trade of UK companies outside US. In this connection, my officials will be meeting US State Department officials this week to establish details on how the latter intend to implement the provisions covering the exclusion of persons from the US. We will take the opportunity to reiterate the UK's concern that the Helms/Burton legislation could disrupt normal trading relationships with the USA. We shall consider carefully how to co-ordinate our response with our EU partners.