Military Action Overseas: Parliamentary Approval

Oliver Letwin Excerpts

Tuesday 17th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr George Howarth (Knowsley) (Lab)]

I start by saying from a purely personal point of view that I accept that, on occasions, the use of military force is necessary to achieve humanitarian aims. Regardless of which Benches we sit on, I think most of us in this House accept that that probably has to be correct as a principle. What most of us are now debating are the circumstances in which we take such decisions, and in the few minutes available to me, I will concentrate my remarks on that specific point.

It is worth starting from the perspective—a lot of right hon. and hon. Members have argued this—that the United Nations should be front and centre in the decision-making process. In principle, that sounds like a good thing. My right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) quoted articles 3 and 28 of the universal declaration of human rights, which the UN General Assembly adopted in 1948, and they bear repetition. Article 3 states:

“Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.”

Article 28 states:

“Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.”

They are laudable objectives that all of us could easily subscribe to. The difficulty we have with the United Nations, however, is that the way in which Russia can exercise its veto at the Security Council—as it does regularly and repeatedly—means that the achievement of the high ideals set out by the United Nations in 1948 becomes increasingly difficult when one permanent member of the Security Council effectively prevents those ideals being carried out in practice through the use of a veto.

[Sir Oliver Letwin (West Dorset) (Con)]

The right hon. Gentleman is making an extraordinarily central point. Does he agree that the whole structure of the P5 essentially depends on the assumption that all permanent members of the Security Council have it in mind to enforce the international rules-based order? When that breaks down, we have a fundamental problem.

[Mr Howarth]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman, who I think is just saying what I said using different words. In so far as that is the argument that I am using, I accept what he is saying.

Before I move on to another matter, I want to say a further word about Russia. There is a view in some quarters that Russia is, if not benign, then a neutral force in all these matters—[Interruption.] I said on the part of some people. Although the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Ms Dorries) is shaking her head, I would never have thought such of her. However, some people do genuinely and sincerely believe that. I spent 11 years as a member of the Intelligence and Security Committee—I resigned because I thought that was long enough—and members of that Committee find out some things they cannot talk openly about. However, one thing I will say is that I have seen in real time how Russia tries repeatedly to interfere with the apparatus of state through cyber-attacks and even in terms of the confidentiality of products in the defence industry. Any idea that Russia is this friendly state that we can all rely on is frankly not borne out by the facts.

I want to conclude with a word about what the Prime Minister had to say earlier. First, she said that she came to the House at the first possible opportunity, but I ask the question: did she? Secondly, she referred to intelligence that cannot be shared with Parliament, and I will deal with each point separately.

Unlike the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin), I accept that the convention that the Prime Minister has relied upon to justify what she did is appropriate. It says, basically, that

“parliament will be given the opportunity to debate the decision to commit troops to armed conflict and, except in emergency situations, that debate would take place before they are committed.”

I accept that there have to be exceptions, and any legislation or convention would have to allow for that fact. I would argue, however, that the Prime Minister could have recalled Parliament last week. We could have had a debate not about the intelligence that was involved, but about the open-source materials that she referred to, and this Parliament could, on the basis of a general resolution about humanitarian aims, have come to a conclusion, so I reject that assertion on the Prime Minister’s part.