Saudi Penal System

Alan Duncan Excerpts

Tuesday 13th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his detailed questions. Some, of course, strayed into diplomatic matters, which are not the responsibility of the Ministry of Justice, but I can confirm that whenever any monarch of any country dies, the flag is flown at half-mast. It is a long-standing convention—one that has been honoured in the past and continues to be honoured.

The hon. Gentleman’s broader point about the administration of justice within Saudi Arabia was well made. We have profound concerns about the respect accorded to human rights within Saudi Arabia, but it is also the case—I must stress this—that the most effective way of ensuring that human rights progress can be made in Saudi Arabia, both for its citizens and for others, is to allow the Foreign Office to continue its diplomatic work, which balances the strong relationships built up over time with an absolute insistence that in all countries and at all times, we oppose the death penalty. We will never resile from that.

[Sir Alan Duncan (Rutland and Melton) (Con)]

Deny it though he might, many are left with the impression that this decision has been guided more by my right hon. Friend’s rather caustic personal view of Saudi Arabia than by any legitimate concerns of his Department’s policy on justice. Is it not the case that when we look at a country’s judicial system of which we do not in many respects approve, engagement is far better than disengagement, and that disengagement may be a comfortable moral position, but can lead to no progress whatsoever?

[Michael Gove]

I take my right hon. Friend’s comments very seriously. He is absolutely right to say that constructive engagement with Governments like Saudi Arabia’s is always the wisest course. However, it is also the case that there is always a balance to be struck in the nature of the engagement that we make. The decision was made across Government that the Just Solutions International branch of the National Offender Management Service should be wound up, and this decision is consequent on that cross-Government decision.

As I have said before at the Dispatch Box, it is vital that we support the Foreign Office, its skilled diplomats and its excellent Ministers in the work that they continue to do to influence not just the Saudi Government, but other Governments who are considering how they can improve their own domestic human rights record and, indeed, promote the rule of law.