British PM Starmer seeks quick implementation of India trade deal to build business ties

MUMBAI – British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he wanted a trade deal with India to be implemented as soon as “humanly possible” as he began a two-day visit on Oct 8, joined by more than 100 leaders from the business, culture and university sectors.

Britain and India

signed a free trade agreement in July

during a visit by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, sealing a deal to cut tariffs on goods from textiles to whisky to cars, and to allow more market access for businesses. 

Talks on the trade pact were concluded in May after three years of stop-start negotiations, with both sides hastening efforts to clinch a deal in the shadow of the tariff turmoil unleashed by US President Donald Trump.

The deal between the world’s fifth- and sixth-largest economies aims to increase bilateral trade by a further £25.5 billion (S$44.3 billion) by 2040.

But the British government has said that the projections were a floor, not a ceiling, to the ambition of the deal, and the visit with executives from the likes of oil major BP, engine-maker Rolls-Royce and telecommunications firm BT was aimed at maximising Britain’s biggest post-Brexit trade deal.

“It provides huge opportunities,” Mr Starmer told the delegates of the trade mission on arrival in Mumbai, adding that he had asked his team to implement the deal as “quickly as humanly possible”.

“I think the opportunities are already opening up... Our job is to make it easier for you to seize the opportunities.”

Mr Starmer will hold bilateral talks with Mr Modi on Oct 9. Both sides have said they are looking to ratify the deal and bring it into effect by the end of 2026.

Growth is one of Mr Starmer’s key priorities as he tries to reverse his

Labour Party’s slide in polls

, with a November fiscal budget expected to show a tricky fiscal picture.

Ms Shevaun Haviland, director general of the British Chambers of Commerce business group, said Mr Starmer should avoid taxing businesses again at the budget, but drive growth through building ties with countries such as India and in the Gulf, where trade talks are ongoing.

“We’ve got partners all over the world, and that should be our role,” she told reporters.

She added that Britain could seek free trade deals while also dealing with the fallout from a global trade war and negotiating to lower US tariffs, saying “I think that the government is big enough to do both”. REUTERS