Mr. Speaker, it's a privilege to report today on an economy which the IMF predicts will

be the fastest growing major advanced economy in the world this year.

An economy with employment at record high and unemployment at an 11-year low. An economy which through the hard work of the British people has bounced back from the

depths of Labour's recession and an economy which has confounded commentators at home and abroad

with its strength and its resilience since the British people decided exactly five months ago

today to leave the European Union and chart a new future for our country.

Mr. Speaker, that decision will change the course of Britain's history. It has thrown into

sharp relief the fundamental strengths of the British economy that will ensure our

future success, the global reach of our services industries, the strength of our science

and high-tech manufacturing base and the cutting-edge British businesses that are leading

the world in disruptive technologies. But it's a decision that also makes more urgent than ever the need to tackle our economy's

long-term weaknesses, like the productivity gap, the housing challenge, and the damaging imbalance

in economic growth and prosperity across our country.

Mr. Speaker, we resolve today to confront those challenges head-on, to prepare our country

to seize the opportunities ahead, and in doing so to build an economy that works for everyone,

and an economy where every corner of this United Kingdom is part of our national success.

Mr. Speaker, I want to pay tribute to my predecessor, my right honourable friend, the Member

for Tatton.

Yes.

My style, Mr. Speaker, will, of course, be different from his.

I suspect that I will prove no more adept at pulling rabbits from hats

than my successor as Foreign Secretary has been at retrieving balls from the back of scrums.

...