Part of 1. 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 2:01 pm on 28 February 2017.
Leader of the house, it’s clearly vital that we develop stronger economic links across the world in the wake of the vote to leave the European Union and if we could still in some way access schemes such as Horizon 2020 and similar programmes following Brexit in some way then that would be a bonus, so I was pleased to hear you mention that. However, I would say a trade mission—and obviously the First Minister is away on a trade mission at the moment—only works if enough planning has gone into it and the right companies have been invited in good time and the mission is clear about its objectives. That didn’t happen entirely back in 2012 on the previous US mission of that time. Has it happened this time around? Who is on that mission with the First Minister and have they been given adequate preparation time?