National Memorial to British Victims of Overseas Terrorism

Friday 22nd January 2016 Written Statements

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr Tobias Ellwood)]

Today, the Government are launching a public consultation to help inform the creation of a national memorial to the British victims of overseas terrorism.

We are all aware of the devastating terrorist events that have taken place overseas in recent years, not least the atrocities in Paris. Following the terrorist attacks in Tunisia last year, my right hon Friend, the Prime Minister, announced that funding would be made available for a memorial dedicated to UK nationals who have been killed in terrorist atrocities overseas. My right hon Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, also announced in the Summer Budget 2015 that the national memorial would be funded by banking fines. Official Report, 8 July 2015, column 326.

We are launching this consultation in order to gather views on how the national memorial should be developed. We recognise that, for many, this will be a sensitive issue. We have worked with the Victims’ Commissioner, Victim Support and the British Red Cross, and with representatives of victims’ families to ensure that the consultation allows people to express their views, while remaining as sensitive as possible to individuals’ circumstances.

We propose that the memorial should be an enduring physical memorial that allows those affected to reflect upon their own loss in a way that is meaningful to them. We should not attempt to prescribe the nature of events, or the loss experienced by families and friends, in a rigid way. Consequently, the memorial should carry a dignified inscription to the victims of overseas terrorism and should not bear individual names or terrorist events.

The consultation will ask respondents whether they would prefer the national memorial to be in central London—where it might be seen by some to give due prominence to the memory of those who have died—or at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire—a peaceful location for personal reflection at the heart of the United Kingdom.

The consultation will be open for six weeks until 4 March 2016.

[HCWS486]