Question to the Department for International Trade:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to (1) revoke all existing, and (2) ban future, export licences for the sale of arms to Saudi Arabia.

The Court order of 20 June 2019 remitted the decision to grant export licences for the sale or transfer of arms and military equipment to Saudi Arabia for possible use in the conflict in Yemen to my Rt Hon. Friend the Secretary of State for International Trade to re-take on the correct legal basis.

The order did not require the Secretary of State to suspend existing licences. As a matter of priority, and without prejudice to our appeal against the 20 June judgment, we are considering the implications of the judgment for decision-making.

Amending our decision-making process in line with the judgment does not necessarily mean that decisions would be different.

On 20 June, the then Secretary of State, set out in a statement to Parliament that until we retake our licensing decisions in line with the judgment we will not grant any new licences for exports to Saudi Arabia and its coalition partners that might be used in the conflict in Yemen.

However, you will be aware of the Secretary of State’s statement to Parliament of 26 September, in which she set out information on inadvertent breaches of the Undertaking given to the Court of Appeal by the then Secretary of State in the Order of the Court dated 20 June 2019 and licences that were granted contrary to the wider commitment to Parliament, made in a statement that same day. The Secretary of State has apologised unreservedly for these errors, both to the Court and Parliament.