Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Tuesday 4th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Alistair Burt]

We would like to see Libya as the partner of choice in a range of commercial activities. The work done to date, following the re-establishment of the UK Trade & Investment office in September last year, has been to look at key sectors of mutual benefit to us both, such as health care, education and civil security. UKTI has led some 12 trade missions over the last year—about one a month—and has a further 27 planned.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

The development of democracies in this region will take a long time. Many organisations, including the Westminster Foundation for Democracy, are involved in this, and they are learning from the experience of what works in those countries and what help they will need in the future. Will the Minister ensure that the total learning from all that work, funded by the Arab partnership fund and others, is brought together so that parliamentarians and, equally, people who work in the Foreign Office understand exactly how we can best support that process?

[Alistair Burt]

The hon. Lady makes a good point. I pay tribute to her work and that of other parliamentarians involved in the Westminster Foundation for Democracy. It is indeed the case that the various non-governmental organisations have different skills to apply, and it is important that we learn all the lessons from them. We have learned, as if we needed it told, that each of these countries is different, following slightly different paths and requiring different skills to be applied. The value that this country’s really good NGOs and parliamentarians can provide to the development of the democratic system will stand these countries in good stead. We certainly need to make sure that we have pooled all the lessons learned.