Oral Answers to Questions

Neale Hanvey Excerpts

Tuesday 21st November 2023 Commons Chamber

[Laura Farris]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question. As he will know, our Victims and Prisoners Bill is making its way through Parliament as we speak. He has talked about victim-focused support; I draw his attention to things like Operation Soteria, which is directed at rape victims and has now been rolled out on a national basis. That places victims’ rights at the heart of the inquiry and focuses all the effort on the suspects and their behaviour, so to be honest, what he has described is consistent with our current models of policing and investigating crime. I hope the Victims and Prisoners Bill will conclude its passage through Parliament and receive Royal Assent soon.

[Neale Hanvey (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (Alba)]

2. What additional (a) financial and (b) practical support the Government plans to provide the International Criminal Court for its war crime investigations.

[The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Alex Chalk)]

The UK is one of the major funders of the International Criminal Court, and provides further practical support including sentence enforcement, pro bono expertise in victim and witness protection, and secondments. In June, I met with the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Karim Khan KC, and I will remain in contact with the ICC to discuss what resources it needs to operate effectively.

[Neale Hanvey]

It should go without saying that the International Criminal Court needs to be able to do its work unimpeded if it is to establish when collateral damage transcends into deliberate slaughter, or whether self-defence was in fact collective punishment. Will the Government provide a guarantee from the Dispatch Box that they will not intervene—as they did alongside the United States in 2021—against any future ICC investigation into war crimes perpetrated against the people of Gaza?

[Alex Chalk]

The hon. Gentleman’s original question was about the resource that we provide to the ICC. We are the second largest donor after Germany, and we have provided some additional support this year. Questions about prosecution are matters for independent prosecutors. It is not for Ministers in this Parliament to make that sort of decision: that will be a matter for independent prosecutors, whom I would expect to exercise their discretion freely and fairly.