Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what estimate his Department has made of the number of UK aid trucks reaching Gaza in (a) September and (b) October 2024; what steps he is taking with international counterparts to tackle constraints reportedly imposed by the Israeli Government on the number of aid trucks entering Gaza; and if he will make an estimate of the average daily number of (i) aid trucks and (ii) tonnes of aid that were needed to meet the demand for aid in Gaza in the last month.

As set out in the Foreign Secretary's statement to the House on 2 September, this Government assesses that Israel must and should do more to ensure that life-saving food and medical supplies reach civilians in Gaza. The Foreign Secretary has raised repeatedly with Israeli leaders the need for a rapid increase of aid into Gaza, including during his joint visit with French Foreign Minister Stéphane Séjourné in August. I also raised this concern directly with the Israeli Ambassador to the United Kingdom during our meeting on 24 July. The UK does not operate independent trucking routes into Gaza, as this is more effectively managed by the UN and our other delivery partners. Truck numbers are a poor metric of humanitarian delivery, but UN figures show a daily average of 97 trucks (both humanitarian and commercial) entered Gaza in September, far below the 500 daily before 7 October 2023.