Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 11:18 am on 8th December 2022.
My Lords, we will certainly not just conduct chats within the City. The reality is that there is an enormous amount of muscle there; if some of our companies are engaging in activity which is exacerbating the problem, it is right that we should talk to them and address those issues, as the noble Baroness pointed out. The UK is working with international partners across the world to address illicit mining, including through the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, which contributed to the establishment of transparency provisions in the 2018 mining code. We have launched our first critical minerals strategy, which aims to improve the security of supply of critical minerals. That matters because China so dominates that sector at the moment. Through it, we are also using our ODA to help countries develop critical mineral resources in a market-led, transparent way which respects human rights and broader environmental goals.