Lord Elliott of Ballinamallard
Main Page: Lord Elliott of Ballinamallard (Ulster Unionist Party - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Elliott of Ballinamallard's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
(8 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Hammond
The statement that my right hon. Friend the Defence Secretary made yesterday clarified that point. Where troops or personnel are embedded in the military forces of other nations, they are treated as being part of those forces for operational purposes; they are not covered by the commitment we have made to come back to the House. It would be absurd if a British pilot embedded in the US navy, for example, maintaining our carrier base skills ahead of the commissioning of our own carriers in 2018, had to be the subject of a debate in the House of Commons because of some decision taken by the US Government.
Tom Elliott (Fermanagh and South Tyrone) (UUP)
In answer to a question last week, the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, the hon. Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood), said that the Government would facilitate a visit of UK victims of terrorism that involved Semtex to Libya in the near future. Now that the Foreign Secretary has gone there, is there any timescale for when we can expect such a visit?
Mr Hammond
I do not think that the conditions would be right for such a visit right now, and I cannot see exactly what the point would be at this stage. Once the Government of national accord are established in their Ministries, with access to their records and their competent civil servants, and once our ambassador is back in Tripoli, I will certainly be prepared to see what we can do to facilitate such a visit.