The FCO and the Spending Review 2015

Debate between John Baron and Crispin Blunt

Tuesday 1st March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Crispin Blunt]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. I have made that point before and will make it again in respect of the inquiry we are conducting into the intervention in Libya. Just how deep was the knowledge on the basis of which we decided to intervene? It is the depth of knowledge that has been lost.

Another price that is being paid is that locally engaged staff do not really understand the UK context. It has been put to me that the quality of the reports that are coming through is not quite what it was because they are not addressed to the needs of the Ministers at whom they are aimed. The difficulty is that very overstretched UK-based staff in a post are, in addition, having to oversee the work of the locally engaged employees.

Returning to the issue of Tunisia, I accept that the security of our citizens must be a Government priority and that they cannot commend travel unless they have confidence that our citizens will be reasonably safe, but this decision had serious consequences for Tunisia’s stability and the security of the region. We must therefore be completely confident that we can make informed decisions, rather than simply defensive decisions because of an absence of capability.

Reports are, of course, the standard mechanism by which Select Committees express their views. I believe that Committees can miss opportunities by not getting inside the decision making cycle, or by devoting our energies to conducting retrospective analyses after policy has been formed and executed. The Government should welcome input at an early stage from an informed, cross-party Committee that could make practical, forward-looking suggestions, rather than just telling the Government where they went wrong.

We published our report on the Budget in October last year, almost exactly a month before the spending review, and we made just one recommendation:

“We recommend that the Treasury protect the FCO budget for the period covered by the 2015 Spending Review, with a view to increasing rather than cutting the funds available to support the diplomatic work on which the country’s security and prosperity depend.”

I am delighted that our recommendations were accepted, and that the settlement reflected our central recommendation.

We spent much of our first few evidence sessions looking at how the Foreign Office was preparing for the spending review, and at what scope there was for it to absorb further cuts of the scale already imposed over the previous four years. The Foreign Secretary gave oral evidence twice, and we tried to get a sense of his priorities and what he would seek to preserve. We then took evidence from Sir Simon McDonald, the new permanent under-secretary, and his senior management team, to try to understand the grit and detail of what might be achieved and how if—God forbid—savings of 25% or even 40% were required. That gloomy environment perhaps reflected our rather defensive recommendation, which was obviously designed to hold the current position, but the Committee clearly believes that more resources are needed to support our diplomacy.

[Mr John Baron (Basildon and Billericay) (Con)]

As a member of the previous Foreign Affairs Committee, may I suggest that trying to make unnecessary savings can prove to be a false economy in the longer term? If we do not invest in expertise and analytical skills, we could end up making errors that can cost a lot more than if we had a proper view of things in the first place. The extreme example of that is avoiding conflict, which is much cheaper than conflict itself.

[Crispin Blunt]

My hon. Friend makes an entirely valid point. He sat on the Committee in the last Parliament and in this one, and he will know about the diminution of our expertise, for example on Russia. When he and I were soldiers back in the 1980s there was a wealth of expertise about the Soviet Union, but that has simply been stripped away. When faced with a crisis in Crimea and Ukraine, the level and depth of our knowledge were certainly a handicap.

When looking at future Committee reports and how we might influence future events, I hope that we will be able to report with authority and fulfil a much requested public need about Brexit. The Committee is conducting an inquiry into the costs and benefits of European Union membership for Britain’s role in the world—whether we stay in the EU or whether we leave. Hon. Members will already have found that people are asking where they can turn for independent analysis and who will give them the facts. Unhappily, the Government have placed themselves in a position where they are unable to give an independent view, since the entire institution is placed firmly on one side of the campaign. Happily, however, I preside over a Committee of 11, and the publicly expressed views of my Committee are balanced at five each on either side of the question.

ISIL in Syria

Debate between John Baron and Crispin Blunt

Wednesday 2nd December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Crispin Blunt (Reigate) (Con)]

There are those who have honourably opposed intervention on every occasion since 2003, including my hon. Friend the Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Baron), a fellow member of the Foreign Affairs Committee and the mover of today’s principal amendment. Part of the strength of his case is that he was undoubtedly right over Iraq in 2003 and, prima facie, Libya in 2011—that is the subject of a Committee inquiry. However, it is my judgment that he was wrong last year to oppose our support for the Government of Iraq against ISIL. I do not know what he would say to the Yazidi families rescued by British forces and British helicopters from the terror that ISIL brought, and I am satisfied that our military effort in Iraq over the past year has been to the enormous credit of our armed forces and has stabilised Iraq in the face of a rapidly advancing threat from ISIL. It wholly justified the strong majority that this House then gave for that intervention.

[Mr Baron]

My hon. Friend directly referred to me, so I will answer him as best I can. The reason a number of us opposed the motion about airstrikes in Iraq last year was simply that we did not feel then—and I still have great reservations now—that we had a comprehensive plan. We have not beaten ISIL in Iraq, despite nearly 1 million security forces on the Government payroll. That brings us on to Syria, because we have nothing near that in Syria and we still do not have that plan.

[Crispin Blunt]

The position in Iraq was desperate. Baghdad was threatened by the advance of ISIL, and it was absolutely necessary that the international community went to the aid of the Government and the people of Iraq.