International Court of Justice

Debate between Ian Murray and Philip Hollobone

Thursday 1st March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Ian Murray]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who is not only a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, but a distinguished former Chair. There is a real danger, as I have just said, that France will become the voice of the European Union in the UN Security Council, and therefore in the UN General Assembly, which means the UK’s voice would be diminished. No direct implications of Brexit were outlined in the report, but mainly because the Minister refused to answer whether that was a reason for the defeat. However, there is no doubt that the UK’s international voice is much diminished as a result of Brexit.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his statement and his Committee on its report. Reading the report, it does not strike me that this is about the loss of UK influence in the world; it instead smacks of complete cock-up by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, with a lack of ministerial direction about the importance of securing this re-election and, frankly, the civil service messing up the procedure for doing so. No wonder they do not want to share the internal report with the Committee—it would be embarrassing to senior civil servants and to the Minister concerned. I encourage the Committee to pursue the cock-up theory, rather than ideas about this country’s loss of overall influence in the world.

[Ian Murray]

The hon. Gentleman raises a perfectly valid point. One of the recommendations in our report is that the FCO’s lessons learned report should come before the Committee, even on a private basis, so the Committee can be assured that this was a cock-up and not something wider. However, I draw his attention to the fact that the Foreign Office has used this process for a number of successful elections in previous years. Had the diminishing vote in the General Assembly been brought to the Foreign Secretary’s attention sooner, it may or may not have helped, depending on whether or not the Foreign Secretary may or may not help those particular processes. However, the hon. Gentleman’s points will be taken back to the Committee and used in future reports.