Aviation Security

Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts

Thursday 5th November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

The noble Baroness is right to return to this key concern that we all share for the British citizens on the ground. She is quite right that the numbers have varied. That is partly due to the fact that some numbers and details come from the tour operators and other people have gone there of their own accord, perhaps visiting or passing through the country. The figure that the media are primarily using is 20,000. That is the figure at which we are looking at the highest level. Some may well be there serving and working throughout Egypt. It is not possible to give an exact number now. Nevertheless, we are fully aware of the assessments and working very closely with the carriers.

She asked about the airlines. This morning, we have had the airlines working with us at the Department for Transport. They are working together and with the Government. I acknowledge, as did the Secretary of State, the incredible support and co-operation that they are giving to the Government and to the authorities and in particular to the people on the ground.

She rightly raised the issue of those who, financially, could not afford to make arrangements. Again, through the airlines we are working to ensure that anyone whose flights are delayed, or who are delayed in the resort, are also catered for without extra financial hardship. She is also aware from her own experience that there is a specific fund that has been created to deal with these issues, the hardship fund. We believe that the combination of factors, working together with the airline operators and the Egyptian authorities, will enable us to address the primary concerns and to facilitate the safe departure of all those who wish to leave the resort as soon as possible.

She raised the valid point about this being a Russian plane. I can assure the noble Baroness that this afternoon, following the visit by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Transport and Foreign Office representatives to the Russian ambassador, the Prime Minister will be speaking to Mr Putin directly. Without pre-empting what the Prime Minister or President may discuss, I am sure that during the course of those discussions we shall, as we do when such tragedies happen around the world, seek to extend whatever assistance we can from the British Government.

[Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Lord did not address the issue of forensics that was raised by my noble friend directly. The subtext to his Statement is that the evidence of a device on board is not forensic; otherwise, the Government would probably have placed the information in the public domain. Therefore, we must presume that it was intelligence based. We know that the evidence of intelligence information is not going to be placed in the public domain, but in so far as the Egyptian economy is going to be quite badly damaged as a result of this and we know that there have been protests from Ministers in the Egyptian Government, surely we owe it to them at least to give the Egyptian Government some information, not as to the source but as to what intelligence information we may have gained that has led us to take the decision that we have taken?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

I assure the noble Lord that the situation with regard to forensics is ongoing and evolving as more details emerge, which we will provide when that is possible. We have made a Statement to the House today. I have also shared with noble Lords the fact that two COBRA meetings have occurred. As the noble Lord is aware, it is not just the President meeting our Prime Minister today; other officials are also attending. Those meetings will be used to share information and our concerns. We will use this opportunity to discuss this matter with them. Notwithstanding some of the media reports, the reciprocal arrangements that we had in place with Egypt before this tragedy occurred have worked well. We have a good relationship with the Egyptian Government. The respective authorities have been extremely co-operative throughout yesterday and during the last day or so. The common cause and concern we all share is to identify and, more importantly, address the exact reason why this tragedy occurred. The noble Lord is also right to point out that this is based on the intelligence that the Government have received thus far. However, I cannot go into more detail on that. I reiterate that after the COBRA meeting today the Prime Minister said specifically that our hearts and sympathy go out to the Egyptian people. However, as I repeated at the start of the Statement, our primary concern—I am sure the noble Lord shares that—must rightly be for UK citizens. That is what we are putting first.