Speech: PM remarks to business roundtable: 4 June 2019

Good morning everyone, thank for joining us today, and special thanks to His Royal Highness the Duke of York for hosting us here at St James’s Palace.

It’s a pleasure to welcome leaders of so many world-class companies around the table today – and of course our honoured guest, President Trump, a man who knows a thing or two about business himself as well.

I think the range of companies you see around this table shows us the huge scope of transatlantic business links that we have between the United States and the United Kingdom.

And the numbers I think show that they speak for themselves. Trade between our nations last year was worth almost $240 billion.

We see that British companies employ a million people across the US. And every morning, a million people in the UK go to work for American employers in the UK.

It is a great partnership, but I think it’s a partnership that we can take even further.

That’s with of course a bilateral free trade agreement. And also I think building a wider economic partnership for the future as well.

And by continuing to work together to underpin, shape and influence the global economy, the rules on which that’s based and its institutions, to keep markets free, fair and open, and keeping our industries and businesses competitive.

I think there are huge opportunities for us to seize together, and challenges for us to work together on to tackle as well.

And the opportunity today is that we are going to look at how we do both of those.

In a few moments I’ll ask Sir Roger to start the discussions, but first of all I would like you, Mr President, if you would like to open with some thoughts.