In the joint declaration published on GOV.UK on 14 June 2026, Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Japanese Prime Minister Takaichi Sanae set out a bilateral economic security programme that reaches well beyond conventional trade policy. Signed in London, the document brings economic policy, national security and industrial capacity into a single UK-Japan framework. The practical reading is straightforward. London and Tokyo are treating economic exposure as a matter of state resilience, not simply commercial policy, while building on the 2023 Hiroshima Accord and the parallel Japan-UK Frontier Technology Partnership.
The declaration does not create a single new institution. Instead, it pulls together existing channels, including the Economic 2+2, the Strategic Economic Policy and Trade Dialogue, the Financial Dialogue, the Energy and Climate Dialogue, the Ministerial Digital Council, the joint science and technology machinery, the Industrial Strategy Partnership and the Economic Security Partnership. That matters because the text reads like an operating brief for departments, regulators and partner agencies. Businesses should expect more regular UK-Japan coordination on investment rules, sector risk, finance and technology policy, even where the formal legal framework has not yet changed.
Trade and investment feature heavily, but the emphasis is not on liberalisation alone. The declaration says both governments will promote bilateral investment in strategic sectors, improve predictability and transparency and deepen information sharing on investment screening policy and practice. It also draws business bodies and research institutions into the programme. The text cites the November 2025 Keidanren-CBI statement, calls for stronger public-private consultation and highlights concrete sector projects, including an Offshore Wind Industrial Compact on finance, research and development, and supply chain development. For companies, that points to a policy climate that is more supportive in selected sectors but also more alert to ownership, dependency and security risk.
Supply chain resilience sits near the top of the declaration. Both governments commit to more work on diversified, secure and reliable supply chains and explicitly connect that goal to pressure on global energy routes arising from the conflict in the Middle East. The wording is notable for what it prioritises: continuity of energy trade, emergency response capacity, national oil reserve systems and coordination with bodies such as the International Energy Agency. It also stresses free navigation for critical commodities and notes that disruption falls hardest on more vulnerable countries. In policy terms, this suggests planning for repeated shocks rather than treating recent disruption as an isolated event.
The sharpest language is reserved for economic coercion and arbitrary export restrictions, especially where critical minerals are concerned. Without naming a specific country, the declaration argues that export controls should be narrowly drawn, non-discriminatory and consistent with international law, and it commits both sides to share information and consult on coercive conduct. That position is then carried into a more detailed minerals agenda. Building on the 2023 memorandum on critical minerals, officials have been tasked to pursue work on mining, refining, processing, recycling and stockpiling, with a focused discussion on battery materials, recycling and projects in third countries. The document also links mineral security to protection of critical technologies so that midstream and downstream industries remain competitive.
Technology policy is treated in the same way: growth and protection are presented as twin objectives. The declaration repeats support for cooperation on critical and emerging technologies and gives particular weight to research security and research integrity, with both governments seeking to manage risk in international collaboration while keeping research open where it can be safely kept open. That will matter to universities, laboratories, venture capital investors and start-ups. The text points to more two-way investment, more joint commercialisation in emerging and dual-use technology, and more work to identify risk around that process. It also links economic security to defence industrial cooperation, including through the Global Combat Air Programme, showing how civil and defence technology policy are increasingly being handled together.
On trade governance, the declaration anchors both countries to the World Trade Organization, the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership and the UK-Japan Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement. But it also makes clear that these frameworks are being asked to do more than support market access. Both governments back reform of the World Trade Organization, raise concern about non-market policies and harmful overcapacity, and say the CPTPP should be updated to address supply chain resilience, economic coercion and market-distorting practice. That is a significant policy choice: trade agreements are being used for security-related rule setting, not simply tariff reduction.
The final element is outward-facing. The declaration commits the UK and Japan to closer work with countries in the Global South, including the Indo-Pacific, through assistance, policy exchange and the sharing of legislative and administrative practice on economic security. No immediate change to domestic law is announced in the document itself. Even so, the London declaration gives officials a clear brief and signals where further UK-Japan activity is most likely to appear next: investment screening cooperation, critical minerals projects, research security guidance, offshore wind supply chain work and trade rule proposals tied to the CPTPP and the wider multilateral system.