Consular Assistance

Monica Harding Excerpts

Thursday 5th March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

[Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)]

The illegal war started by Trump and Netanyahu has now engulfed the entire middle east, and Iran’s reckless retaliation against our partners in the region is putting British lives at risk. There are 300,000 Britons still in the region, yet only 140,000—less than half—have registered with the Government.

For families in my constituency of Esher and Walton and across the country who have relatives in the region, the uncertainty is agonising. One of my constituents from Walton is stranded in Abu Dhabi and is six months pregnant. Her flight home has been cancelled and her only option is to book a taxi to Oman and then walk up to 4 km in the heat, in the hope of catching a flight. More of my constituents are stranded in Dubai in the Fairmont hotel, which was struck last week. They have registered, as instructed, but have said that the comms are poor and that they cannot get information on how to register for the Government flights.

Will the Minister outline what steps are being taken to encourage more Britons to register their location? Will he also update the House on what contact the Government have had with Lindsay and Craig Foreman, who remain imprisoned in Iran? What steps are being taken to confirm their safety and wellbeing? Even as the Government’s immediate focus must be on protecting and repatriating UK citizens in the region, I pay tribute to the officials from the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office who are working so hard on this.

We cannot, however, ignore what appear to be catastrophic errors in the Government’s readiness for this crisis. The Minister says that this is a consular challenge on the scale of covid, but the Government knew it was coming. Reporting by The Spectator and The Telegraph overnight suggests that the Government were asked for use of British bases on 11 February. There has been a huge deployment of US assets over the last month, and I also assume that the Government were not oblivious to the USS Gerald R. Ford steaming towards the eastern Mediterranean in late February. With so many signals suggesting that war was potentially imminent, why did the Government not move sooner on preparing repatriation plans for our citizens, or prepare for the defence of our base in Cyprus, with HMS Dragon still sat in Portsmouth?

[Mr Falconer]

Let me deal with a few of the Liberal Democrat spokesperson’s questions in turn. She is right to say that the Foreign Office is much more able to assist those who have registered their presence, and we encourage British nationals to do so in those countries where have called for this. There is also considerable uncertainty in other countries where there is disruption to flights. In countries where we are not calling on British nationals to register their presence, they should still feel free to be in touch with the Foreign Office crisis line. We are providing consular assistance right across the region, and we will continue to do so.

I want to correct, for the record, the precise nature of our advice about the United Arab Emirates and Oman. We are not encouraging British nationals resident in the United Arab Emirates to travel to Oman by land. We are conducting charter flights from Oman. We are not inviting people to put themselves forward for those flights; we are seeking to select people based on vulnerability. We will provide further update on the charters as they become available. British nationals should not move forward to Muscat airport in the hope of a flight. It is clearly a significantly congested area at the moment; they should wait to hear from the Foreign Office.

The Liberal Democrat and Conservative spokes- people both asked me about the Foremans. I confirm that this has been raised with the Iranian regime in the strongest possible terms, including during my summoning yesterday. They are still in Iran, and our thoughts go out to their families, who are currently receiving consular assistance.

In relation to the repatriation flights in general and the suggestion that it would be possible to, in advance, prevent this degree of disruption, I say gently to the Liberal Democrat spokesperson that this is a significant disruption, not just to the region but to the global aviation system. I know that many hon. and right hon. Members will have constituents stuck in places not in the immediately affected area. We hope that the disruption to global aviation can be addressed soon, but clearly, while there remains so much uncertainty about the airspace, there is likely to be a degree of mess and a great number of bugs in the system.

Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office

Monica Harding Excerpts

Wednesday 4th March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)]

I want to express my thanks to the FCDO and officials for their hard work helping British nationals overseas during the conflict in Iran and the middle east, including helping my own constituents get home.

This debate comes at a moment of extraordinary global crisis. More than 130 conflicts are active, 120 million people have been forcibly displaced, and over 300 million face acute hunger. There is war in Europe, and the middle east now stands on the precipice of full-scale regional war. It is against this backdrop of a world on fire that the Government are pushing through with the deepest cuts to British aid and development in a generation, bringing aid to its lowest level this century—from 0.7% when the Liberal Democrats were in government to 0.5% under the Conservatives, and now to just 0.3% under the Labour Government. This is a far cry from the Labour Government of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, who made it their aim to make poverty history.

This Labour Government’s cuts will contribute to more than 600,000 additional deaths by 2030. Let me pre-empt the Minister telling me that times have changed, and remind him that the legally enshrined 0.7% was designed to slide up and down with GNI and was made after the 2007 financial shock. This Government’s cut was made two days before the Prime Minister went on his first visit to Donald Trump, taking with him a cut that mirrored the one that the President had made to his own foreign assistance budget the previous month, at the start of his Administration. Congress has pushed back on that now and partially reversed the cuts, and now the cuts to ODA by this UK Labour Government run deeper than those of the United States. When today’s USA shows more restraint than this Government, something has gone badly wrong.

Development is no longer treated as a pillar of British foreign policy; it has been quietly demoted to an inconvenience. Let us be clear about what that framing of the cut gets wrong. The decision to slash aid budgets to shore up defence spending is a false economy—and a strategically illiterate one at that. Defence, diplomacy and development are mutually reinforcing pillars of a coherent foreign policy. One cannot be hollowed out without the other two being weakened.

Getting defence spending to 3% of GDP as soon as possible is vital, and the Liberal Democrats have laid out ways to get to that figure with the defence budget as it is now. I can point the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Sam Rushworth) to the debates in which those ways are laid out, and I would be very happy to go through them with him. He may not agree with the ways that we are going to get to that figure, but they do exist.

Leading voices in defence, including former chiefs of staff and two former heads of MI5, have criticised the decision to slash development in order to increase defence spending, warning that it risks making us weaker and making it harder to prevent conflicts in the first place. Prevention is cheaper than war. Aid stabilises fragile regions before crises require military intervention. It addresses grievances before they become insurgencies and builds good will, which supports diplomacy and trade. It sustains UK influence.

[Lincoln Jopp]

I am grateful to my constituency neighbour for giving way on that point. Would she like to give us a couple of examples where overseas development aid has prevented crises in the way that she describes?

[Monica Harding]

I would love to, and I will come back to the hon. Member with those at another point, but I am up against the clock at the moment. As I go through my speech, there may be some examples.

Aid is not charity, as the Minister for International Development suggested to the International Development Committee. It is a strategic tool that makes Britain safer and secure. It reduces the drivers of migration to these shores and strengthens health systems before pandemics cross borders. While we retreat, China and Russia expand their influence across Africa, the middle east and south Asia, filling the vacuum that we leave. UK aid to Africa has already been reduced by £184 million.

Countries such as Ethiopia, Syria, South Sudan, Somalia and fragile Sahel states—tinderboxes—have seen significant bilateral cuts, alongside a very thin Africa strategy released quietly before the Christmas recess. Africa has the world’s youngest and fastest-growing population and a projected $30 trillion economy by 2050. It represents a huge future trading opportunity, but our cuts risk weakening those relationships—relationships on which our country’s growth relies.

Even international climate finance, which has been rhetorically protected, could fall by nearly £3 billion, we are told by The Guardian. Programmes such as the biodiverse landscapes fund, the blue planet fund and the climate and ocean adaptation and sustainable transition programme are under threat, and support for Brazil’s Tropical Forest Forever Facility, which we co-designed, has yet to materialise. Intelligence chiefs have warned that the collapse of ecosystems like the Amazon and coral reefs will not just risk our climate obligations but trigger food shortages and unrest and lead to war reaching our shores.

In reality, the cuts are even worse than they look. Around 20% of the aid budget is projected to be spent on in-donor asylum costs by 2027-28, meaning that the amount reaching people overseas could fall to just 0.24% of national income. Is the British taxpayer aware that the money earmarked for the poorest in the world is being spent on asylum hotels in this country?

What is most striking about these supplementary estimates is not only their scale but the absence of a coherent strategy underpinning them. There has been no clear argument made, no case put forward and no honest reckoning with what is being lost and what the impact will be. There is no published road map explaining which capabilities we are prepared to lose and whether we intend to rebuild them later. There has been no serious articulation of why slashing bilateral aid strengthens Britain’s long-term interests. There is just a quiet hope that the cuts will land without anyone looking too closely.

In fact, the future of the very organisation tasked with scrutinising the UK’s aid and development spend—the Independent Commission for Aid Impact—is in doubt. One of its inquiries is on the impact of the Government’s ODA cuts. The very oversight mechanisms that hold the Government to account are being dismantled.

I will briefly turn to our soft power institutions. I will not dwell on them because other Members already have. The BBC World Service and the British Council—two of Britain’s most powerful instruments of influence, funded at a tiny cost to the taxpayer—are having their budgets eroded, the latter burdened by a Government loan with interest payments of up to £15 million a year.

Then there is the vital question of capacity and expertise. The FCDO is planning staff reductions of up to 25%, and the Department for Business and Trade, which works in-country to promote trade relations, is facing a 20% staffing cut, yet the Government have failed to produce a workforce plan before the cuts. It is cuts for cuts’ sake. All of this represents a hollowing-out of capability. Rebuilding that expertise later is neither quick to do nor cheap, and it is very difficult to bring back once it has been torn down.

The question is unavoidable: what is the plan? The Government must change course and set out a clear, binding timetable to return to 0.7%. I look forward to the Minister updating us on how he will do that. The Liberal Democrats will take a different approach to funding the defence uplift, and we have laid it out in this House. In the meantime, the Government must act to limit the damage that these cuts will cause. That means backing meaningful debt relief for low-income countries, redirecting the share of the aid budget spent on in-donor asylum costs back to aid, and safeguarding vital accountability mechanisms such as the ICAI.

In an era of intensifying geopolitical competition, rising instability and growing humanitarian need, Britain faces a choice: we can be an engaged, outward-looking power, shaping events, building partnerships and investing in prevention; or we can shrink our presence, reduce our expertise and hope that the consequences do not rebound on us—a decision to retreat, a decision for the short term, not the long term. The Government’s cuts show that we are drifting towards the latter. Once expertise is lost, once trust is eroded, and once influence is surrendered, it is far harder to recover than it is to protect.

Britain still stands tall in the world, but these cuts threaten to diminish that. Britain does not lead by retreating. We lead by showing up, keeping our word and standing with our partners when it matters most. I urge the Government to reclaim our moral authority, rebuild our global influence and lead once again on the world stage.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

I call the shadow Foreign Secretary.

Ukraine

Monica Harding Excerpts

Wednesday 25th February 2026 Commons Chamber

[Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)]

Any contribution to this debate must surely start with a tribute to the remarkable courage of the Ukrainian people. Four years ago, at the start of Vladimir Putin’s brutal full-scale invasion of Ukraine, many people expected Russian tanks to be on the streets of Kyiv within days. They did not come because brave Ukrainian troops held them back. Today, four years later, there are still no tanks on the streets in Kyiv and Ukraine is not broken. Ukraine still holds around 80% of its territory and the Russian troops move at glacial speed, with an astonishing and tragic number of Russian dead: young men sent to fight for an imperialist autocrat, whose self-indulgent dream has become his nightmare, stopped by the resistance of the Ukrainian people and their extraordinary resilience, innovation and sacrifice.

We have heard already about that sacrifice. Ukrainians have suffered more than half a million military casualties, at least 15,000 civilians have been killed and millions have been forced from their homes. Towns and cities have been relentlessly bombarded, and hospitals and schools targeted. The line that Ukraine has held for four years is the line that separates all of us in Europe, including here in the UK, from a brutal authoritarian dictatorship and a threat to our liberal democracy. Putin wants to destroy that liberal democracy because it threatens him.

Britain has stepped up. I am proud to sit on these Benches and look around at the cross-party consensus that means Ukraine is not alone in its fight. We stand with Ukraine. As Putin seeks to reduce Ukraine to a dependent and weakened state, we must be absolutely clear: sovereignty is not a bargaining chip and any peace must be shaped by the Ukrainians themselves. I urge the Government to continue to work closely with our allies to ensure that Ukraine is not strong-armed into an unjust and unstable peace.

The war has given rise to Europe’s largest displacement crisis since the second world war. Some 7 million Ukrainians now live abroad as refugees, with a further 5 million displaced within their own country. I say to the 700-odd Ukrainians in my constituency of Esher and Walton: you are very welcome and we are proud to have you. I pay tribute to residents in my constituency who have generously opened up their homes, and to Elmbridge borough council and our local charities, including the brilliant Elmbridge CAN, that have housed families and helped them to integrate.

Ukrainians are making Esher and Walton richer. They teach in our schools, including at Walton Leigh; they are chefs, carers and nurses; and Father Ruslan Kurdiumov is the parish priest at St Erconwald’s Catholic church in Walton. Among them are Tetyana and Lena, who once ran their own tourist company in Kyiv. When war broke out four years ago, they put their children in cars and drove across Europe to stay with host families in my constituency. Today, they are rebuilding their lives, running a gardening business and studying garden design, while one of their husbands continues to fight on the frontline. One of their boys is at Esher college, having excelled in his GCSEs. We are lucky to have them with us.

Another Lena, living in Thames Ditton, has three children, two at secondary school and one at university. She told me:

“We are deeply grateful to the UK for the safety, support, protection and kindness we have received. We are doing everything we can to rebuild stable, productive lives, working, paying taxes, learning the language and our children are growing up in British schools. We want to not only rebuild our lives but also to give back to the country that helped us in our most difficult times. The greatest challenge we face today is uncertainty about our future. If we were required to return because the war is considered ‘over’, my greatest fear would be for my children. They have already integrated here. They have friends, education, routines and a sense of emotional stability again after displacement and trauma. Forcing them to start over for a second time would be a profound psychological strain. For many families the end of active war does not mean life is safe or normal. Homes have been destroyed, communities damaged. Some people simply have nowhere to go back to.”

The 24-month visa is welcome, but it still leaves many families living with uncertainty. We Liberal Democrats are calling for an automatic visa extension, a clear route to long-term status, trauma-informed education for children and real stability for families who are already contributing so much to our communities.

Another of my constituents, Graham, offered his home to a Ukrainian guest, Kristina Hotsyk. She is desperate to reunite with her parents, but the reintroduction of biometric requirements, forcing people to travel to cities under nightly attack, is making that process extremely dangerous. I urge the Government to address this issue as soon as possible.

Let me turn to the aid situation. It is reassuring that the Government have decided to protect the overseas aid spend for Ukraine this year, but while that is welcome, the increase is modest. At a moment when global aid flows are collapsing, it will not do as much as we would like. At the same time, the Government have decided to slash overseas aid, meaning that it will become harder for us to sustain aid flows to Ukraine in the coming years. That is a strategic mistake, because overseas aid is not charity; it is an investment in our own security.

A stable Ukraine deters Russian aggression across Europe, sends a clear message that borders cannot be redrawn by force and raises the cost of future wars. Poverty and hardship in any country send people into the arms of those who offer a populist, easy message. Aid stabilises societies and prevents crises from spiralling into conflict, displacement and insecurity that ultimately reach our shores.

Ukraine shows what continuous, serious aid flows can achieve. Our support has helped to keep a country under siege functioning. It has strengthened civilian morale and reinforced a frontline state standing between Europe and authoritarian expansion. That is what properly funded aid looks like. I hope the Government do not throw away the progress that they have made and reverse course on the aid cuts as soon as possible.

The Liberal Democrats call on the Government to take bolder action. First, we must scale up our military and bring forward plans to reach 3% of GDP being spent on defence as quickly as possible, instead of waiting until the next decade. Our armed forces have been hollowed out, such that we now have the lowest troop numbers in more than 200 years, while stockpiles have become depleted. That weakens support for Ukraine and makes us feel less safe here at home. Let me be clear that defence must not come at the expense of development; it is a false and dangerous narrative to pitch the one against the other. As the US general and former Secretary of Defence, Jim Mattis, said:

“If you don’t fund the State Department fully, then I need to buy more ammunition”.

Secondly, we must hit the Russian war machine where it hurts. More than £30 billion-worth of frozen Russian assets sit in the UK alone. The Liberal Democrats have introduced legislation for those to be seized and redirected to Ukraine’s defence and reconstruction, and I urge the Government to put it into law as soon as possible. We should also work with G7 partners to lower the oil price cap, cutting directly into Putin’s war profits.

Thirdly, accountability matters. The war crimes that we have seen in this tragic conflict, from the attacks on humanitarian convoys and the missile strikes on churches and children’s playgrounds to the abduction of an estimated 35,000 Ukrainian children, have shocked the conscience of the world. I went to see the International Committee of the Red Cross in Geneva and saw the records of soldiers and the work that it is doing to reunite families and children and identify the missing so that their families can have closure. I applaud its quiet work.

International law must be upheld, and war criminals like Putin must not be allowed to act with impunity. The rules-based order is under attack—a climate that makes the work of vital international institutions such as the United Nations, the International Criminal Court and NATO even more important. Putin would like nothing more than for the UN and NATO to collapse, so we must protect them. I urge the Government to continue their full-throated support for those vital entities and resist pressure from the United States to ignore or defy them.

Today, four years on, we are proud to still stand with Ukraine. Let us not allow Ukraine to be forced into a settlement that rewards aggression and leaves all of us less safe, because the Ukrainian people are fighting not just their war, but our war. They deserve nothing less than our full and unwavering commitment.

I will end with a poem written by a Ukrainian constituent, Nikita Balakin. He is nine and is at Cleves school in Oatlands. It reads:

“Mum, me and one suitcase

Three of us only

I left my cat, I left my dog

And all my dreams behind in the fog

I was just five but looked like more

Because I knew the world of war

New country, language, school and friends.

Thanks to everyone who helps.

I started to smile and play the games

And I can start to hope again.

I want the world to see my joy

PEACE is the biggest dream of a Ukrainian boy!”

Gaza Healthcare System

Monica Harding Excerpts

Tuesday 24th February 2026 Westminster Hall

[Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Jeremy. I thank the hon. Member for Stroud (Dr Opher) for securing the debate and for bringing his expertise to this issue.

More than two years of devastating conflict has left Gaza in ruins. Over 70,000 Palestinians have lost their lives. More than 1 million people remain unable to return to their homes, while the vast majority of the population relies on humanitarian aid to survive. The attacks carried out by Hamas on 7 October were appalling, and their continued violations since the ceasefire remain indefensible. They must play no future role in the governance of Gaza.

Israel’s war on Gaza over the past two years has been conducted without due regard for international humanitarian law, with devastating consequences for the Gazan healthcare system. Gaza’s healthcare system is no longer functioning in any meaningful sense. Doctors on the ground describe surgeons being forced to amputate limbs and stitch wounds without anaesthesia. Patients remain fully conscious because there is no fuel, pain relief or functioning supply chains. That has been the daily reality inside Gaza’s hospitals as they buckle under continued bombardment, medicine shortages and staff losses. There is not a single fully functioning hospital left. Even since the ceasefire, more than 500 Palestinians have been killed and over 1,500 injured. There is urgency to protect civilians and rebuild a shattered healthcare system.

Aid access is in a state of crisis. Medical staff are exhausted, many nurses have fled, doctors have been killed, equipment has been destroyed and antibiotics are scarce. Amputations are common because injuries go untreated, cancer care is barely available and dialysis is severely limited. Intensive care is stretched beyond breaking point and routine vaccinations have been disrupted. Thousands of patients are effectively queued with no realistic access to care, and some remaining hospitals have been described by doctors on the ground as “waiting stations for death”.

At the same time, as we have heard, medical evacuation is limited, and beyond hospitals, public health conditions are in a dire state. Unsafe water, poor sanitation, overcrowding and winter conditions have driven notable increases in respiratory infections and diarrhoeal disease. Vaccination coverage was already fragile before the war and it is now years behind.

The UN has warned that tens of thousands of pregnant women, newborns and children now face compounded risks of malnutrition, disease and preventable death—not from bombs, but from a shattered health system unable to provide prenatal care, vaccinations or even basic hygiene. On top of that, the introduction of additional Israeli administrative restrictions has placed dozens of international humanitarian organisations under new registration requirements with limited timeframes to comply. The deadline of 1 March—next week—is approaching fast.

The uncertainty over legal status and operational permissions continues to disrupt medical deployments, supply procurement and programme continuity at a moment when trauma care, dialysis, maternal health services and infectious disease control depend heavily on international partnerships. At the same time, tighter Israeli constraints on major humanitarian service providers, particularly the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, have had direct knock-on effects on health delivery. When indispensable agencies such as UNRWA, which runs primary care clinics, vaccination programmes and community health outreach, face limits on staff entry and access to premises, utilities, banking or logistics, the impact is immediate and severe. That is because healthcare does not function in isolation. It relies on fuel for generators, secure facilities, functioning cold chains for vaccines and the ability to move personnel and supplies without obstruction.

If the operating space for humanitarian organisations is narrowed, the remaining fragments of Gaza’s healthcare system weaken further. So it is fair to ask: what are the UK Government doing about all of that? There have been some positive steps. The additional aid packages, including the £20 million humanitarian post-ceasefire package, is to be welcomed. The Government have supported about 50 sick and injured children to come to the UK for NHS treatment under a Gaza medical evacuation scheme. There have been diplomatic efforts at the UN Security Council, but the UK has much more work to do.

First, the UK Government must make reliable humanitarian access a top-tier diplomatic objective. The Israeli Government must immediately allow international humanitarian NGOs full access to Gaza and the west bank. The UK Government must co-ordinate with European partners to apply sustained diplomatic pressure on Israel to reverse the ban on aid organisations, and engage with Washington directly, consistently and regularly on the issue. There must be consequences if access continues to be denied, and the UK must act with like-minded partners to establish alternative delivery channels. We should apply co-ordinated pressure for full access across all crossings while scaling up parallel routes to ensure that aid reaches those who need it.

Secondly, the UK must treat the protection of healthcare workers and medical NGOs as a red line. Medical neutrality has to be defended in practice, not merely asserted in principle.

Thirdly, it is vital that international journalists are granted full access to the Gaza strip so that the world can see events on the ground clearly and independently. The UK must continue to press for that.

Fourthly, we must expand sanctions. It is right that we have sanctioned some Ministers, but that cannot be where it stops. We should also sanction other Ministers in the Israeli Government who oppose the lifting of the aid blockade or who promote the erosion of humanitarian protections. Accountability must be consistent or it means nothing.

Let me close on the west bank, because what is unfolding there is not peripheral to the crisis, but central to it. Across the west bank, settlement expansion, demolitions and tightening movement restrictions are accelerating displacement and entrenching instability. I support the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) in her call for medical transfers to the west bank, but there too, while most hospitals remain technically operational, medicine shortages are deepening and referral approvals are increasingly delayed. This winter alone, hundreds of attacks on healthcare facilities were recorded, alongside the closure of key UNRWA services.

Severe funding shortfalls now compound access barriers, forcing critical service reductions at precisely the moment when needs are surging. To compensate, clinics and mental health teams are scaling up where they can, but for many vulnerable communities, care is becoming slower, more fragmented and increasingly out of reach. The result is an inevitable erosion of basic medical access, with growing delays, disruption and unmet needs that are quietly pushing the west bank deeper into humanitarian crisis.

I hope that the Government will now move beyond statements and take concrete action to expand accountability through sanctions to protect and open humanitarian access, and to press relentlessly for an equitable political pathway out of the crisis. Lives are being lost while we deliberate. The UK still carries diplomatic weight, and with that comes moral obligation. I urge the Minister to use it.

Sudan

Monica Harding Excerpts

Thursday 5th February 2026 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

[Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)]

The situation in Sudan is the world’s biggest humanitarian crisis. I welcome the increased funding and the sanctions, which are long overdue, but why do the sanctions still fall short of the EU action? Why do they still fail to target the heads of the SAF and the RSF? Why has it taken this long? Will the Government now target those profiting from Sudan’s gold trade, which continues to bankroll the war economy?

Humanitarian aid must flow freely and independently. In its role as the United Nations Security Council penholder, what steps are the Government taking to secure a ceasefire so that humanitarian aid can get through, and to expand the arms embargo beyond Darfur to the whole country? Will the Government expand their aid provision and ensure that aid delivery, including from UK taxpayers in my constituency of Esher and Walton, is distributed through the UN and the international non-governmental organisations, or through localised efforts, such as the emergency response rooms, and that the UN system is not undermined?

I welcome the steps that the UK has taken to ensure that Sudanese pro-democracy actors are not sidelined by external powerbrokers. Will she reaffirm the UK’s commitment to a civilian, non-military end state in Sudan? What is being done to prevent parallel diplomatic tracks from undermining UN-led peace efforts? Will the Government suspend arms exports to the United Arab Emirates, given credible evidence of its role in fuelling the conflict?

What discussions had the UK held with partners to ensure that humanitarian assistance is not being used to mask responsibility? How will accountability for atrocities be safeguarded with any peace process supported by the UK, including support for international justice mechanisms, such as the International Criminal Court? The UK has a long legacy in Sudan, and with that comes responsibility. Sudan’s civilians cannot wait. I urge the Government to act with ever more urgency and focus.

[Yvette Cooper]

I thank the hon. Member for her commitment to reaching peace in Sudan and her comments on the horrendous nature of the crisis. The sanctions that we have now issued bring us broadly in line with the EU. The US has gone further, so we are continuing to look at the issues. We are seeking to link our sanctions to the evidence on atrocities, to the evidence on arms flows and, crucially, to the peace process and the peace discussions that we want to take place.

I agree with the hon. Member about the importance of the UN. A few weeks ago, I met the UN Secretary General and the UN emergency co-ordinator, Tom Fletcher, to discuss Sudan and the importance of the work that the UN is doing. The UN is in close touch with the Quad on these discussions and is pressing for much greater humanitarian access. We certainly need to move towards a civilian Government. We need a political transition and a process to get there, but that has to start with a humanitarian truce. We have to start by silencing the guns and, as part of that, we need an end to the arms flows. I have seen evidence of a whole series of countries being involved in the arms flows to different sides, and we need action against that.

Armed Conflict: Children

Monica Harding Excerpts

Wednesday 4th February 2026 Westminster Hall

[Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I thank the hon. Member for Hyndburn (Sarah Smith) for securing this vital debate. As we have heard, today one in five children live in areas affected by armed conflict, displacement or related violence. Such children face a daily threat to their lives, their health and their education. Such children are forced to flee their homes, are pulled out of classrooms, are separated from parents and are exposed to violence that no adult should have to endure, let alone a child.

The damage does not end when the fighting pauses. Trauma, lost education and broken health systems follow children for decades. Britain has a proud history of leadership in this space. It has saved the lives of millions of children through vaccinations, nutrition, clean water and frontline healthcare; through support for UN monitoring and reporting for accountability; and through funding programmes that have helped to secure the release and reintegration of child soldiers. But at a time when the number of armed conflicts is at the highest level since the end of the second world war, the UK is choosing to look away: cutting aid to its lowest level this century with devastating consequences for children.

I will speak briefly about the conflicts that are bringing this issue into sharp focus. In Ukraine, children are growing up under constant missile and drone attacks from Russia. Tens of thousands of Ukrainian children may have been abducted and taken into Russia or Russian-controlled areas without consent and under coercive conditions.

In Gaza, the impact of the conflict on children has been devastating, as we have already heard. Hospitals and schools—places that should be sanctuaries—have been systematically and repeatedly struck. I will never forget the testimony given to the International Development Committee, on which I serve, by a doctor working at a Gaza hospital who was treating children targeted by drone attacks.

Save the Children estimates that over 20,000 children have been killed in Gaza, which is one every hour during the two years of war. Of those children who are still alive in Gaza, UNICEF tells us that there is a ton of emptiness and deep sorrow that can be seen in them. Some 39,000 children have been orphaned and 17,000 children are unaccompanied. Children in Gaza often play in areas that are at risk from explosive ordnance, putting them at high risk of injury or death. In turn, that is leading to high rates of disability; many children have had hands and legs amputated.

These children are suffering from hunger, disease, displacement and cold. Eight infants have died of hypothermia this winter alone, and over 100 children have been killed since the ceasefire. Some children need urgent medical evacuation, which is simply not happening at scale, while others are growing up with trauma that will shape the rest of their lives.

As Israel moves to tighten and in some cases end the registration of international non-governmental organisations, it risks forcing dozens of those INGOs to halt lifesaving operations across the Gaza strip and the west bank. The lifeline agency for Palestinian refugees, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which runs over 700 schools, has had its ability to function curtailed.

In Sudan, one of the world’s most severe and—tragically—most overlooked crises affecting children is unfolding in the world’s worst humanitarian catastrophe. UNICEF has warned that nearly half a million children are now at risk of acute malnutrition as the conflict intensifies. That is a stark reminder that for many children in Sudan, survival itself is becoming increasingly uncertain. Checkpoints are armed by boys—teenagers—while girls are at risk from endemic sexual violence.

The United Nations continues to verify thousands of cases each year of children being recruited and used by armed groups, which is a grave violation of international law. Children are deployed not only as fighters but as guards, scouts and messengers, exposing them to extreme danger and lifelong trauma. In camps in north Darfur in Sudan, survivors describe how RSF fighters killed parents and abducted children as young as nine, blindfolding them and driving them away. Some were told that they would “look after livestock”, which is a euphemism for enslavement.

The persistence of child recruitment across multiple conflicts reflects the collapse of protection, education and accountability, and preventing it must remain a central test of the international community’s commitment, and indeed of our commitment here in the UK, to the laws of war. Across all these different contexts, the pattern is the same: children are not a sideshow of war, but are among its primary victims. That is why the Government must commit to treating the protection of children not as a secondary concern but as a central pillar of their foreign policy.

First, our diplomacy must put children at the heart of peace efforts. The safety of children—their access to schools and hospitals, and the reunification of families—must be built into peace processes from the beginning. Britain has both the responsibility and the leverage to lead, as a major international actor and as the penholder at the UN Security Council.

Secondly, our humanitarian response must go beyond survival alone. Education must be protected, and schools must be treated as humanitarian spaces in a conflict zone. Mental health support for children affected by conflict should be provided for by core funding. A child who survives war but who is left traumatised, uneducated and unsupported is still a casualty of conflict. If we ignore that trauma, we should not be surprised by the consequences. Entire generations growing up with grief, anger and abandonment become a fertile ground for radicalisation, with many children and young people ending up in terrorist groups such as Hamas.

Thirdly, accountability matters. We must make every effort to ensure that crimes are recorded, that journalists are allowed into conflict zones and that we call out breaches of international humanitarian law wherever they occur. That must apply to allies and adversaries alike, because selective outrage weakens international law. We must name violations consistently, support independent investigations and back consequences when the law is ignored. Finally—

[Graham Stringer (in the Chair)]

Order.

International Day of Education

Monica Harding Excerpts

Thursday 22nd January 2026 Westminster Hall

[Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under you chairship, Ms Vaz. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Southgate and Wood Green (Bambos Charalambous) for securing this debate to mark the International Day of Education this Saturday. I pay tribute to our hard-working teachers and our schools in the UK, especially in my constituency.

This should be more than a moment of reflection; it must be a call to action. Education is a moral good, but it is also one of our most effective tools to prevent poverty, conflict and instability. When children are pushed out of classrooms by war, displacement or climate disaster, the consequences are long lasting. The scale of the crisis is severe: worldwide, more than 272 million children and young people are out of school and that figure is projected to rise to 278 million due to global aid cuts.

[Ms Julie Minns (Carlisle) (Lab)]

The hon. Lady is making a powerful point about the number of children who are outside of the classroom globally and the impact that has, but it also happens in our own country. I recently visited the Gillford Centre pupil referral unit in my constituency. It does phenomenal work and, unlike other schools, the hallmark of its success is pupils leaving and going back into mainstream education. Does the hon. Lady agree that pupil referral units like the Gillford Centre make a huge contribution to closing the opportunity gap that we know exists abroad and at home?

[Monica Harding]

I agree 100%, and let us not forget that children are left behind in our country too. In my Esher and Walton constituency, we found that 1,800 children were missing school because of special educational needs and disabilities. Pupil referral units do brilliant work in bringing children back into mainstream education, which is good for our economy and for growth.

As I said, children around the world are missing education; the global aid cuts will increase that number and that rise will be concentrated in humanitarian hotspots. Education systems are being put under strain by the combined impact of conflict, climate shocks and humanitarian collapse. Last year alone, 242 million students in 85 countries saw their schooling disrupted by climate events.

Education is not a luxury; it underpins development, public health, gender equality and long-term stability, yet the global commitment is weakening just as pressures on education systems intensify. International education funding is projected to fall by $3.2 billion dollars this year—a 24% cut—placing an additional 5.7 million children at risk of dropping out of school. Cuts to the United States Agency for International Development alone are expected to push 23 million children out of education in the years ahead.

Girls will be hardest hit, with gender-focused education aid projected to fall by 28% this year, despite clear evidence that educating girls delivers some of the highest returns of any development investment. At the same time, primary education funding faces a 34% cut, with severe long-term consequences for literacy, numeracy and economic growth. Against that backdrop, the Government’s decision to cut the aid budget to the lowest level this century will only deepen the global education crisis, undermining long-term stability, prosperity and the UK’s influence abroad.

With aid projected to fall to 0.3% of national income by 2027, education funding is already being squeezed, and overseas education spending is set to drop by 40% this year alone. At the same time, one fifth of the aid budget is now spent on in-country refugee costs, crowding out overseas investment—precisely the spending that helps prevent instability and forced displacement in the first place.

Britain has not always stood on the sidelines. For many years, the UK was a leading global voice on education—particularly girls’ education—backing that leadership with sustained multilateral investment. Between 2015 and 2020 alone, UK aid helped more than 15 million children attend school worldwide.

I will now illustrate the scale of the crisis by giving examples from some of the worst-affected areas globally. Nowhere is the global collapse in education more stark than in Afghanistan, where more than 2 million girls are formally banned from secondary and higher education, making it the only country in the world to exclude girls from school legally. Meanwhile, learning outcomes for boys in the country deteriorate amid systemic breakdown. The collapse in education in Afghanistan has been worsened by the collapse of international aid: the United States has effectively disengaged from Afghanistan, while British aid to the country has fallen by nearly half over the past five years.

In the Gaza strip, over 650,000 children—almost the entire school-age population—have received little or no formal education for years, with around 97% of schools in the region having been damaged or destroyed. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which has long been the backbone of education provision for Palestinian refugee children, educated over half a million children in the Gaza strip and the west bank. However, it is now operating under severe legal and operational constraints imposed by the Israeli Government, including bans in east Jerusalem, the demolition of facilities, and restrictions on staff, utilities and partner NGOs.

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where more than 7 million children are already out of school due to conflict and displacement, a flagship education programme for girls that was previously supported by British aid is set to close this year. That will affect 170,000 children in just one region, the vast majority of whom are girls, and is a direct consequence of our aid cuts.

In fragile and conflict-affected states, education is not only about future opportunity; it also provides safety, routine and dignity right now. Schools often deliver clean water, meals, sanitation and access to child protection services. Yet globally, school feeding programmes face cuts of over 50%, while education in emergencies has been reduced by 24%, with countries such as Haiti, Somalia and the Central African Republic losing aid that is equivalent to more than 10% of their public education budget.

It should not be, and does not have to be, this way. The Liberal Democrats believe that education must be a protected priority within the aid budget and not a discretionary extra. However, that requires reversing the aid cuts and setting out a clear path back to meeting the legally enshrined target of spending 0.7% of national income on aid. I respectfully point out to the hon. Member for Romford (Andrew Rosindell) that although I agree with his words about the British Council and the potential cuts to its budget, and about the influence of British education, it is impossible to see how the British Council could be protected under the cuts that his party is proposing, whereby just 0.1% of GNI would be spent on ODA.

The International Day of Education is a reminder that behind every statistic in this area is a child whose future depends on political choices. If we are serious about reducing poverty, empowering women and building stability—which in turn will benefit the UK by providing economic trading opportunities in global markets, less compelling reasons for people to migrate to these shores, and more global stability and security for our citizens—education must move from the margins to the centre of our international priorities.

[Valerie Vaz (in the Chair)]

We now come to the winding-up speeches. The Front Benchers have 10 minutes each.

Oral Answers to Questions

Monica Harding Excerpts

Tuesday 20th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

The hon. Member raises two important issues. We agree that the decommissioning of Hamas weapons is a central and crucial part of the 20-point plan. That is why the three issues that we have continually prioritised are the establishment of the Palestinian National Committee, the increase in humanitarian aid and the establishment of the process for decommissioning Hamas weapons. We have put forward proposals based on our experience in Northern Ireland and our expertise, and I believe that we urgently need to make progress as part of phase 2.

[Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)]

There are reports that this morning Israeli security forces arrived at the United Nations Relief and Works Agency compound in Sheikh Jarrah, in occupied East Jerusalem. Security guards were forced out of the premises, bulldozers subsequently entered the compound and began to demolish UNRWA buildings, and the demolitions are ongoing. If that is true, it is not only an unprecedented attack against UNRWA and its premises; it also constitutes a serious violation of international law, and of the privileges and immunities of the United Nations. What consequential action will the Foreign Secretary take if these reports are true?

[Yvette Cooper]

We had issues last month with Israeli authorities entering UNRWA’s compound in East Jerusalem without prior authorisation. UN premises are inviolable under international law, so we have already raised this and condemned it. It is immensely important that everyone recognises the important role that UNRWA plays, and this year the UK has committed £27 million to help it scale up lifesaving aid, including food, water, shelter and medical care.

Iran: Protests

Monica Harding Excerpts

Monday 19th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Falconer]

I can confirm to the House that both the Foreign Secretary and I have been in extensive discussions over the last few days, and I expect those to continue this week, including at Davos.

[Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)]

The Iranian Government are massacring civilians, and brave young protesters are risking their lives for freedom and dignity against a violent and corrupt regime. The Minister has spoken about the thousands of people who we fear have lost their lives, and The Times is reporting that up to 16,000 people may have died—and in an age when we can see news as it happens in the palm of our hands, we see nothing because of the darkness of the internet crackdown. What are the Government doing to support internet access across Iran so that we can collect evidence to hold the perpetrators to account for this brutality?

[Mr Falconer]

The hon. Lady asks important questions. We are working with our allies and continue to press the Iranians, both in public and in private. They must restore internet access.

Iran

Monica Harding Excerpts

Tuesday 13th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

We want to see a better future for Iran and the Iranian people. We must be clear: it is the Iranian people who are expressing that urgent desire for a better future. The future of Iran must be in their hands. We will continue to work with international allies in support of action against the brutality we have seen. That is exactly why we are considering further sanctions measures.

[Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)]

When the US President tells the Iranian protesters that

“help is on its way”,

as he has just done, does that include British help? Will the Government rule out the UK taking part in any planned US military intervention without multilateral authorisation?

[Yvette Cooper]

As the hon. Lady will know, I cannot set out the US foreign policy approach—that is for the Americans to do. What I can do is set out the action that we are taking, the further sanctions that we will implement, and the work that we are doing, with international allies, to sustain and increase economic and diplomatic pressure in the light of the regime’s brutality.