Covid-19

Stephen Kinnock Excerpts

Tuesday 17th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

I reassure my hon. Friend that Foreign Office staff are working round the clock and around weekends, but in some of those countries there is an issue about their own personal safety. We are giving advice here. It is important that Ministers and officials follow that advice, but we must also look after and protect their safety. Notwithstanding that, there is certainly not a nine-to-five or Monday-to-Friday approach—far from it. This is round the clock and right through the weekend, and we are straining every sinew to ensure that constituents, however far flung the place in which they find themselves, are getting the most support, the clearest guidance, and the best practical help that we can provide.

[Stephen Kinnock (Aberavon) (Lab)]

To follow the question from my right hon. Friend the Member for Exeter (Mr Bradshaw), may I press the Foreign Secretary on the talks on the future relationship with the European Union? Those incredibly complex and multi-faceted talks are absorbing a tremendous amount of Government time and attention. Rather than trying to fight a war on two fronts, and stretching Government bandwidth to breaking point, surely the time is coming to request an extension to the transition period. It is better to do that than to put ideology ahead of the health and safety of the British people.