Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between James Cleverly and Ian Paisley

Tuesday 13th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[James Cleverly]

We continue to work to prevent Afghanistan becoming a future source of terrorist threats here in the UK. We work with our international partners to limit the flow of illegal drugs and illegal migration. We continue to provide lifesaving humanitarian assistance and to work to ensure that our target—that 50% of the beneficiaries are women and girls—is reached. We are on track to reach that, despite the attempt by the Taliban to prevent women and girls from receiving the international support they deserve.

[Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)]

T2. May I refer the Foreign Secretary to column 289 of the Official Report on 24 May, when I asked the Prime Minister to publish the list of the 1,700 veterinary medicines that will no longer be available in Northern Ireland? He told us all to “take heart” that the extension of the grace period would work that out. However, in correspondence, the Ulster Farmers’ Union has said that the EU has told it that veterinary medicines are not up for discussion with the EU. What heart can we take from that?

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[Ian Paisley]

Yes, Mr Speaker. You will know that the issue of the Windsor framework falls within the remit of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office. It is a joke to be told by an FCDO Minister that he will take this matter up with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, because DEFRA has no role in negotiating veterinary medicines. How can I obtain an answer to the question that I posed today, Mr Speaker?

[James Cleverly]

rose—

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between James Cleverly and Ian Paisley

Tuesday 13th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)]

4. What recent discussions he has had with the European Commission on the operation of the Northern Ireland protocol.

[Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)]

13. How many hours his Department has spent on negotiations with (a) EU member states and (b) the European Commission on the Northern Ireland protocol in the last month.

[The Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs (James Cleverly)]

Fixing the Northern Ireland protocol is a top priority for this Government. Since September I have been in regular contact with Vice-President Šefčovič. We last spoke on 1 December and I will be seeing him for further talks this week. My officials have also been working with our counterparts in the EU on a regular basis to try to resolve the issues, which we recognise—and we are impressing this upon them—are causing serious, genuine and damaging friction in relationships between the various communities in Northern Ireland.

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[Ian Paisley]

Is it not the case that there has not been one hour of actual negotiations, because the EU has not extended its mandate to allow for any changes whatsoever in the operation of the current protocol? That being the case, does the Foreign Secretary not believe that the EU will smell weakness in this Government if they take their foot off the pedal with the protocol Bill in the other place? I encourage him to press on with the Bill.

[James Cleverly]

I can assure the hon. Gentleman that the UK negotiating team are very conscious of the frustrations, particularly in the Unionist community in Northern Ireland. But we have also made the point to our interlocutors in the EU that, across communities in Northern Ireland, there is a recognition that the protocol is not working, that it needs to be addressed, and that the relationships between Northern Ireland and Ireland, and between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK—of which Northern Ireland is a part—all have to function properly. That is the underpinning of the Belfast/Good Friday agreement and that is what we seek to achieve through our negotiations.

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[James Cleverly]

My hon. Friend makes an incredibly important point. We have summoned senior Iranian diplomats to make clear the UK’s position on the brutality they are meting out on their own people, we have sanctioned judges involved in the secret courts that have imposed the death sentence on Iranian protesters, and we will continue to push the Iranian regime to do better.

[Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)]

T2. Is the Secretary of State aware of the abusive hate speech issued by Ken Mifsud-Bonnici, who works in the office of President Ursula von der Leyen, and his comments about Northern Ireland, which matched indeed the equivalent to a goose-step across Ireland by President Ursula von der Leyen herself when she spoke from Dublin? Could the Foreign Secretary indicate if he has spoken to those in the President’s office and asked them to disassociate themselves from those abusive comments about Northern Ireland?

Northern Ireland Protocol: First Treasury Counsel

Debate between James Cleverly and Ian Paisley

Thursday 9th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[James Cleverly]

Preservation of the Union will always be a priority for a Conservative Government, and my hon. Friend is right that it is something we should all hold dear.

[Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)]

Is it not a disgrace that hon. Members cried for years that Northern Ireland should not be used as a pawn and that the Belfast agreement should be protected and applauded but, at their very first opportunity to Boris bash, they use Northern Ireland as a pawn to thinly veil their attacks on the Government? Northern Ireland needs support from every party in this House.

Is it not also the case that the UK’s proposals to remove trade friction between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and between Northern Ireland and Great Britain, are in keeping with international trade law, and it is the EU, under the terms of the 2014 trade facilitation agreement, that is in breach of its international obligations to reduce trade friction between co-signees, which include both the EU and the UK? The fact is that the protocol is the worst example of a European Government or Governments trying to use red tape to destroy commerce in the United Kingdom.

[James Cleverly]

Her Majesty’s Government are committed to ensuring that north-south trade and east-west trade are free flowing and beneficial to all communities in the UK and Ireland. The hon. Gentleman speaks with great authority on the importance of protecting the Good Friday agreement.

Violence in Israel and Palestine

Debate between James Cleverly and Ian Paisley

Wednesday 12th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[James Cleverly]

My hon. Friend makes an incredibly important point about the importance, during this holy month of Ramadan, of worshippers having access to one of the most holy sites in Islam, which is something we have communicated to the Israeli Government. We will continue to work towards de-escalation, particularly at this most sensitive and religious time, and it is a conversation we have had recently, and we will continue to have, both at ministerial level and at senior official level.

[Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)]

In 2018, I stood in Mefalsim, in the Southern District of Israel, just on the edge of the Gaza strip, and held in my hands the remains of a Hamas-engineered rocket that had been fired into a playground of schoolchildren with one intention only: to murder mothers and children who were doing what we have the freedom in this nation to do, which is raise our kids in peace.

No right-thinking person could not be heartbroken by the horror in the holy land they see on our television screens. However, is it not the case that Hamas will not negotiate with Israel because it wants to murder Israelis and to obliterate the state of Israel off the map of the world? That is Hamas’s stated objective and position. The Palestinian people need to free themselves from being used as human shields by a terrorist and political organisation that wishes to continue to launch rocket attacks into Israel. I urge the Minister to do everything in his power to persuade the Palestinian people to free themselves from the grip of Hamas.

[James Cleverly]

The rocket attacks by Hamas, whose military wing has, as I say, been proscribed as a terrorist organisation by the UK Government, are completely counterproductive to the effort for peace and do harm to the Palestinian people. On behalf of moves towards peace, we urge Hamas to cease these actions, because they are completely counterproductive to peace and completely against the interests of the Palestinian people, in Gaza and elsewhere.