Oral Answers to Questions

Sandra Osborne Excerpts

Tuesday 17th January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

I can assure my hon. Friend of that. The view across and in all parts of the House on the Falkland Islands is firm and consistent: we believe in the self-determination of the people of the Falkland Islands, and it is their self-determination, of course, that they wish to remain British.

[Sandra Osborne (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (Lab)]

T4. In line with the recent report by the UN rapporteur on torture, will the Minister condemn the practice by Israel of holding children in solitary confinement, and will he make representations for the release of the 106 children who remain detained within the Israeli military prison system?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Alistair Burt)]

We welcome the fact that Israel has recently changed to 18 the age of majority in those territories for criminal jurisdiction, but we have made, and continue to make, representations in relation to children’s rights—the right of audience, the right to interpreters and the like—and from the Dispatch Box recently I said that the practice of shackling children was wrong.