My Lords, the Committee is in the debt of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. He is rare among us in being able to identify the questions, ask them and then come up with a sensible answer, all in one. He did so on this. I am slightly anxious,
because he took away the only thing I was going to mention: tied aid and some of the experiences that we have unfortunately had with it—we have banned it in the UK—and the Pergau dam situation with regards to contracts that have been issued. We have memories of how this can go awry.
I record a recent visit I made to Vietnam. I wish to see UK trade with Vietnam grow and am very supportive of any areas in which we can make that happen, but in some CPTPP member countries it is less clear than it is in the UK what the balance is between private and public enterprises and what are the funding mechanisms of bodies that would be open to potentially benefit from UK procurement access. The noble Lord asked valid questions, and I have a degree of sympathy with his conclusion that it would be worth accepting his amendment.