Exiting the European Union (Sanctions)

Debate between Mark Menzies and Lindsay Hoyle

Tuesday 9th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con)]

I rise to support the Government’s statutory instrument on sanctions on Venezuela. As chair of the all-party parliamentary group on Latin America, and as the Prime Minister’s trade envoy for a number of countries, including Colombia, I have seen at first hand the brutality and human rights abuses that the Maduro regime has inflicted on its own citizens. Some 3.6 million of them have now fled, largely to Colombia, Peru, Chile and Argentina. I have visited all those countries over the past 12 months and seen at first hand people living in abject poverty.

I take real exception to the claim made by the hon. Member for Glenrothes (Peter Grant) that Conservative Members have in some way celebrated the misery of the Venezuelan people and the human rights abuses taking place in that country, which is a grotesque and untrue allegation. It is grotesque and untrue because Members on the Government side of the House know the need for this sanctions regime—

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

Order. I think that the point has been made, but we need to get back to the debate. A very good point has been hammered home, but we now need to move on.

[Mark Menzies]

Let us move on with the need for sanctions against Venezuela. That regime has not entered hardship as a result of the oil price collapse; it has entered hardship because, not just under Maduro but under Chávez—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) shakes her head, as though it is all down to the oil price collapse. It is not; it is down to the fact that Maduro and Chávez played fast and loose with the constitution. They both abused their positions in order to suppress opposition, including within the press. To suggest that all this misery has been brought about by the oil price collapse is to be economical with the actualité.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

Following the intervention the hon. Member for Ilford South (Mike Gapes), a fact that I find most harrowing is that aid lorries are now being turned away from the Venezuelan border because the Government are worried that they will lose their grip. That and the point he made exactly define an absence of humanity.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. May I just remind the House that we have quite a lot of other speakers?

[Mark Menzies]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I hear your guidance and I know that there is much pressure on our time.

I encourage the Government to enact this statutory instrument on sanctions for Venezuela and to ensure that, while we are still a member of the EU and while we have reach through the United Nations, we ensure that the sanctions regime targets those in the military and the senior members of the Maduro and Chávez regimes who have stolen billions from Venezuela, in order to get that money back to the people where it belongs.