Syria

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Thursday 26th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I have said before that I think the right hon. Gentleman speaks with great clarity about this issue: about ISIL, the threat it poses and its own responsibility for its actions, rather than believing it is somehow a reaction to what we do. On what Britain can bring in terms of statecraft and resources, he will have seen the decision we have taken about our Foreign and Commonwealth Office and aid budgets. I think we have the ability to bring countries together, to play a big role in what is needed diplomatically, and to have a large wallet at the end of the process not just to look after refugees, vital though that is, but to help to rebuild the country once the war is over.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

The right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden) spoke correctly when he said that those in ISIS are absolutely responsible for their actions. Will my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister make a few comments on the fact that their actions are not simply an add-on? The attacks in Paris are not an add-on to their strategy. They are a core part of their theology. They are a vile, satanic death cult and they must be stopped.

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend has considerable military experience and understanding of these issues. It is a core part of ISIL’s strategy not simply to build a so-called caliphate across Iraq and Syria, but to plan external attacks from that caliphate, as we have seen in Ankara, Beirut and Paris and the attacks we have thwarted in London. It is a core part of what it does.