British Indian Ocean Territory

Andrew Murrison Excerpts

Wednesday 26th February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

The bottom line in all this is that there is no transparency at all from the Government. We will absolutely press and hold them to account on that.

I come back to the point we have just heard from the Opposition Benches, which is that no Minister—not even the Defence Secretary today—has told us where that money is coming from. Perhaps this Minister does not know the cost, or maybe she needs permission from the Attorney General, or from Rachel from accounts, even to comment on the numbers, but the House must know. Labour has sought to hide behind the real reason for what is going on. It is constantly using the fig leaf of national security to avoid telling British taxpayers how much the deal will cost. That is simply not acceptable.

If the Government will not tell us the numbers, they should at least tell us where the budget has come from. In a written parliamentary answer of 22 November, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury confirmed to me that he had engaged in discussions and reached an agreement with Cabinet colleagues on the financial elements of the proposed lease of the military base on Diego Garcia, as part of the UK-Mauritius agreement announced on 3 October. Will the Minister confirm—she can intervene now if she would like to—whether that funding will come from the defence budget? If it does, will it count towards the new 2.5% target announced by the Prime Minister yesterday? It would be a stain on the Government if they reached that target as a result of wasting money—hard-pressed taxpayers’ money—on that unnecessary lease. The British public deserve accountability and transparency.

[Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Priti Patel]

I will give way one more time.

[Dr Murrison]

She is being very generous in giving way. Does she agree that the Government stand accused of perhaps being guilty of some creative accounting? If they are transferring money from the international development budget to defence, and then transferring the self-same money from defence to Mauritius, allowing Ministers to benefit from the fiction of an uplift in the defence budget, the public are entitled to smell a rat.

[Priti Patel]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. It is completely duplicitous. That is no way for any Government to conduct themselves, particularly in relation to such a matter.

To conclude, in negotiating this deal and agreeing to surrender—