House of Commons Hansard Debates for 12 Nov 1992

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suggests that the voluntary agencies should pay for that service. I wonder how on earth they could possibly afford that, given the current economic climate.

Concern about children who come into Britain has been growing for some time. For some children, their only chance of a happy family life is through inter-country adoption. However, those children need and deserve the same kind of protection that we take for granted in domestic adoptions. The proposals represent a real step forward in introducing safeguards. They will not prevent inter-country adoptions when that is best for the child, but they will go a long way towards preventing abuses such as trafficking in children.

We look forward to the proposals being translated into legislation, but only after full consultation with all concerned.

8.39 pm

Mr. Hinchliffe : I wish to take up some points from the debate and reinforce comments made on both sides of the House. We have had a useful debate. There is broad consensus on what is proposed in the review, albeit some reservations have been expressed.

Although there was only one contribution from the Government Back Benches, it was by the hon. Member for Bolton, North-East (Mr. Thurnham), who has a particular interest in the issue. I read with interest the comments that he was reported in The Sunday Telegraph on 25 October as having made :

"Mr. Thurnham does not support calls from the far right that children should be placed only in two-parent families and that homosexuals should be rejected. Every case should be considered on its individual merits. I know of many cases where single people do a wonderful job,' he said."

I reinforce that comment. Although I disagree with the emphasis in parts of his speech tonight, it was thoughtful, useful and helpful. I think that we would all concur with his central point that the main issue is what is best for the individual child.

My hon. Friend the Member for Eccles (Miss Lestor) has had to leave the Chamber, but I am glad that she was able to make a contribution. I affirm her success as a single parent, having met her children and her grandchildren. She described from her personal knowledge the marked changes in society which have led to the need for the review and for changes in adoption legislation. My hon. Friend reinforced the point that children's rights and interests must underpin the adoption proposals.

One crucial point made by my hon. Friend on inter-country adoptions was that British children have been exported for adoption. When the Australian rugby league team were here for the world cup final recently, I met a woman who had come with the team. She had found out that her father had been exported to Australia, without the knowledge of his family, and had been adopted in questionable circumstances. That happened within the lifetime of hon. Members present for the debate.

My hon. Friend also stressed the need for balance in same-race adoptions. Again, no doubt most hon. Members would agree with what she said.

I was pleased to hear the contribution of my hon. Friend the Member for Morley and Leeds, South (Mr. Gunnell), who has a unique background, both in personal terms and because of his political involvement as a past chair of Leeds social services department. He made the important point that the same principles should apply to

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inter-country adoptions as apply to adoptions within this country. I support that ; no doubt Conservative Members would subscribe to that, too.

My hon. Friend also raised the issue, covered by several other hon. Members, of proper resources being necessary for local authorities to operate provisions affecting children. Many hon. Members with experience of working in local government or as councillors can vouch for how hard pressed many local authorities have been over many years and certaintly recently.

My hon. Friend the Member for Stockport (Ms. Coffey) gave us the benefit of her recent professional knowledge. It is gratifying for me to welcome her as a former social worker to the House. I felt somewhat lonely having only the Secretary of State to talk to as a former social worker, and I did not often get great comfort from her. I am glad that my hon. Friend is here to support me and to contribute to these debates from her practical experience.

My hon. Friend referred to the need to encourage people to listen to children. In the past we have often disregarded the voice of children. When I worked for Leeds social services department, I can recall the first time that the actual child in care was involved. That was as recently as the mid -1970s. That is a disgrace. I look forward to the Minister's response to a specific issue raised by my hon. Friend--the gap in the Children Act 1989 in regard to unregistered private children's homes. The Minister has corresponded with my hon. Friend on that. I am concerned about the issue which she has uncovered. No doubt the Minister will be willing to respond to it.

My hon. Friend also made a telling point about the need for appeal mechanisms. Sometimes social workers make wrong decisions. A social worker may be prejudiced about an adoptive applicant, so it is right that appeal mechanisms should be introduced in future adoption legislation.

My hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster, North (Mr. Hughes), another former chair of social services who speaks with experience of balancing demands and statutory obligations against the matching resources, made an important point which has underpinned several contributions. He wanted to know how the Government would square the recommendations with resourcing the extra social work time that will be needed to carry out many of the provisions.

We have had an interesting debate with several important points being made. I hope that the Government will realise how much interest there is in this subject and that the Minister will take note of the pleas of several hon. Members to extend the consultation period so that there can be proper debate and public discussion of the many important recommendations in the report.

8.46 pm

Mr. Yeo : With the leave of the House, Madam Deputy Speaker, I should like to reply to the debate. As the hon. Member for Wakefield (Mr. Hinchliffe) has said, it has been a useful debate, characterised by the fact that all hon. Members who spoke did so either with a long-standing interest in the subject or with direct experience of it.

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May I begin by welcoming the hon. Gentleman to his Front-Bench duties? He brings considerable knowledge and experience of the issues. I do not suppose that we shall always enjoy the same harmony as this evening. He was somewhat ungracious in his reference to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State.

Mr. Hinchliffe : I was paying her a compliment.

Mr. Yeo : The compliment was heavily disguised. The attitude of the Government Benches towards social workers has undoubtedly been influenced in a most favourable manner by my right hon. Friend's demeanour, bearing, and, if I am allowed to say so on the day after the Church of England decided to approve the ordination of women, even her appearance ; she has influenced many of my hon. Friends to take a more sympathetic attitude towards social workers.

The hon. Gentleman referred earlier to the high success rate of adoptions in this country. Above all, that is a tribute to the care with which the whole process is undertaken. We must be careful not to do anything which diminishes that success rate in future. I noted the hon. Gentleman's point about the suitability of the age of 12, which was also mentioned by the Member for Morley and Leeds, South (Mr. Gunnell). Inevitably it is an arbitrary figure which we may want to reconsider in the light of the response to the review. The court has the power to make any child, however young, a party to the proceedings.

The hon. Member for Wakefield referred in his opening speech to the sad case of an adopted person who experienced difficulty in tracing his birth family. Such experience must influence our consideration of issues about openness and contact.

The only time when the hon. Gentleman dragged in politics was when he tried to imply that poverty and deprivation were factors which might lead parents to decide that they wanted their child to be adopted.

Mr. Hinchliffe : That is true.

Mr. Yeo : If it is true, as the hon. Gentleman says from a sedentary position, the dramatic fall in the numbers of children needing adoption since 1979--a fall of more than 40 per cent. over the last 13 years--is yet another indicator of the massive rise in living standards enjoyed by every section of the community.

Mr. Hinchliffe : To balance the figures that the hon. Gentleman just quoted, he ought to consider alternative means to deal with children requiring substitute care other than adoption. The figures are not as bland and simple as he quoted.

Mr. Yeo : As the hon. Member knows, the number of children in residential care has fallen dramatically during the same period. The hon. Member for Wakefield commented on the consultation period and was supported by his hon. Friend the Member for Stockport (Ms. Coffey). I do not have a passionate view on that subject. If the timetable were extended, it would obviously have an effect on the timing of future legislation. The more protracted the period of consultation, the later will be the chance for legislation, but we shall take account of the views expressed. The consultation process is helped by the fact that much of the work of the review was published as the process unfolded.

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The hon. Member for Wakefield quoted an article in Social Work Today. I make no apology for reiterating my conviction that in the majority of cases a married couple is the best answer for the child. I cannot stress how strongly I feel that every local authority should make the most strenuous efforts to seek married couples. No one has any right to adopt.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bolton, North-East (Mr. Thurnham) cited a useful example of the sort of single parent who can make a valid contribution as an adoptive parent. That was a helpful example. He also said that he had been assessed as having an insecure job. I am so glad that in 1987 and 1992 his job was demonstrated to have a high degree of security. If he continues to contribute to the House so thoughtfully and constructively, he has one of the most secure jobs of anyone who took part in the debate. I have noted his concern about the tone of the report's references to inter-country adoptions.

My hon. Friend mentioned Romania, and I have been disappointed that, since we signed the agreement with the Romanian committee for adoption in March-- it became operative on 5 May--not one child has been adopted by a United Kingdom parent under the agreement. When the agreement comes up for review in January next year, we must consider carefully whether it is in our interests to continue with it. My hon. Friend the Member for Bolton, North- East may like to know that I have decided to ask our ambassador in Bucharest to take up with the Romanian Government our concerns about the lack of results from the agreement, and to press them to take whatever measures may be needed to make that agreement work more effectively. I shall also write to some of the other countries involved--more than 20 have signed similar agreements with Romania--to find out their experiences and whether they have encountered similar difficulties.

Mr. Harry Barnes (Derbyshire, North-East) : May I give an example of a successful adoption from Romania? Bev and Ruth Smith, in my constituency, adopted Emese Gabor and at the time of her adoption she was the only child that I had heard of being adopted from a Romanian mental institution. The couple adopt many mentally disabled children and have all the facilities and abilities to deal with them. When they saw the terrible conditions which existed in Romania, they insisted on the adoption. It turned out that Emese is not mentally disabled, although she was in one of those terrible institutions. On carefully monitored occasions, such adoptions are very much worth while.

Mr. Yeo : I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that contribution.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bolton, North-East mentioned one case and he will understand that I do not want to comment on it in public, although I shall consider what has happened and what the Home Office is doing about it. I suggest that he pays a visit to the helpline that he referred to. We should be glad if he did so. As he knows, the committee on inter-country adoptions has nominated a representative to serve on the project board which will review the operation of the helpline in the new year.

Several hon. Members mentioned resourcing of local authorities. Personal social services have been resourced

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generously--resources are up by two thirds in real terms since 1979. Charging is permitted, so no local authority should be deterred by a lack of resources from undertaking work in connection with possible inter-country adoptions.

An inter-country adoption agency could well have a place, but it would be better if it emerged from the domestic adoption service. The specialised knowledge of economic and social circumstances on an international scale may well be outside the scope of a local authority and an independent agency could fill that need. Of course, the basic principles and the standard of domestic adoptions, including the home study process, would need to be maintained. The hon. Member for Eccles (Miss Lestor) made an outstanding contribution to the debate. She has been in touch with me about her interest in the subject and she has great experience of it. I welcome her endorsement of much that I said in my opening speech. She described powerfully the experiences of children taken from this country many years ago, and that underlines the fact that we should be careful to avoid allowing apparently up-to-date and fashionable ideas or modern thinking to outweigh basic common-sense principles when we consider adoption. Her remarks about age were important. I share her view that most of us enter parenthood with limited knowledge of what we are in for and that we have to learn as we go along. She was particularly right in her view of the race issue. There are appalling instances of children being removed from foster parents merely on the ground that they are of a different race from the child.

The hon. Member for Eccles made an interesting remark about the possibility that great openness and contact might lead to more adoptions. Under the Children Act 1989, grandparents may apply for a residence order which gives some stability and parental responsibility without the drawback of confusing the relationships of being a grandparent and a parent.

The hon. Member for Morley and Leeds, South made an important point about the need to avoid an unnecessary extension of the court time required.

The hon. Member for Stockport has been in correspondence with me about the position of small, unregistered children's homes and I shall respond to her about that as it falls slightly outside the terms of the debate. She referred to the fact that three out of five children adopted are between the ages of one and nine. That percentage has changed surprisingly little during the past 15 years. I note her concern about the procedure for the court to grant a placement order before placement commences, and we shall reflect on that. I do not share her view that unmarried couples should be considered equally suitable adoptive parents as married couples. Couples who have decided to get married have demonstrated a commitment to a relationship which is of a different order from that of two people who happen to live together.

The debate has been most helpful, and we shall take note of all the views expressed inside and outside the House. I hope that other people will follow the discussions and will support them by sending in their views.

Mr. Timothy Kirkhope (Leeds, North-East) : I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion, by leave withdrawn.

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PETITION

Pit Closures

8.57 pm

Mr. Alan Meale (Mansfield) : It gives me great pleasure to present a petition on behalf of more than 136,000 people from Mansfield, Nottinghamshire and elsewhere. The petition calls upon the Prime Minister to intervene personally to stop the recent pit closure programme announced by the Government.

I should like to pay tribute to the Chad News Group, the Mansfield Observer, the Sutton Coldfield Observer and Worksop Guardian whose editors and staff have organised, launched and managed this petition. The petition from people of the area expresses their fears about the consequences of pit closures on their community, which could lead, if unchecked, to the loss of up to 100,000 jobs in the coalfield communities of Britain and up to 32,000 jobs in the areas served by those newspapers.

This fine and honourable petition of honest opinion from my area I give unto the House's keeping and it reads :

To the Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled. This humble petition of people of Mansfield, north Nottinghamshire and elsewhere, sheweth that 136,000 people of the said area are deeply concerned about the recently announced pit closure programme and have called upon the Prime Minister to intervene personally to stop these closures.

Wherefore your Petitioners pray that your Honourable House listens to this call upon the Prime Minister to intervene personally to stop such measures which would lead to the annihilation of the coal industry.

And your Petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray etc. That petition is signed by Mr. Jeremy Plews of 21 Newgate lane, Mansfield, Nottinghamshire.

To lie upon the Table.

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Mr. Allan Nicklin

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.-- [Mr. Kirkhope.]

8.59 pm

Mr. Patrick Cormack (Staffordshire, South) : I am extremely grateful to Madam Speaker for choosing this subject for the Adjournment debate.

I rise to raise the case of my constituent, Mr. Allan Nicklin, with a mixture of regret, frustration and anger : regret because what I say might conceivably strain relations between two friendly nations--this country and Saudi Arabia ; frustration because, after 18 months of almost ceaseless work on behalf of my constituent, I have had to take the step of having an Adjournment debate on the subject ; but most of all anger that Allan Nicklin has been treated so abominably merely because he had the misfortune to work for a company that turned out to be of dubious repute.

Allan Nicklin, who is a Wolverhampton boy, educated at the grammar school, went into insurance after he left school. He qualified in the profession and has spent 30 years in various managerial positions. About half that time has been spent in the middle east, an area of the world to which he is passionately attached. Prior to the last job that he held in Saudi Arabia, he had done two tours in that country, to which he is also very attached.

In 1988, Allan Nicklin was appointed general manager of Western Agencies, an insurance company based in the United States, with responsibility for three offices in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. To him this was a job of challenge and promise, and he and his family relished the opportunity. They were in a part of the world that they all liked, in a country to which they had become attached. He felt that he would be able to do a good job in his chosen profession. Unfortunately, it did not work out quite that way. It soon became clear to Allan Nicklin that the company was not quite what he thought. There was slow payment of repair accounts for Saudi companies and towards the end of 1989 claims were being pressed. Throughout that time Mr. Nicklin made strenuous efforts to ensure that everything was done properly. By March 1990, however, he was advised that he had better not apply for an exit visa because he would not have a chance to leave the kingdom if he did. By July of that year, he was in prison, held responsible for the alleged debts of the company of which he was an employee. His wife made constant intercessions on his behalf. She took his food to gaol and she presented herself at office after office and worked tirelessly to ensure that her husband was released. She sought to ensure that it was recognised that he was not in any way responsible, so that he would be allowed to try to sort things out.

At the end of November 1990, he was released from prison, but the case dragged on. At that stage, Mr. Nicklin looked upon this as a commercial and personal matter. Although the British authorities were aware in general terms of what was going on, Mr. Nicklin did not seek their active involvement or their help. He felt that it was a matter which he must sort out with the company for which he worked, and that was what he tried to do.

By July 1991 he was told by the Saudi civil rights department that if he did not personally pay up he would go to gaol. It was at that stage, the middle of last year, that he asked for as much help as possible from the British

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consul and sought, through his wife, my help and intervention as his local Member of Parliament. He did not wish his predicament to become public knowledge or property. He was conscious of the fact that Britain and Saudi Arabia enjoyed close and cordial relations. He had spent much of his working life seeking to strengthen in his own way those close and cordial relations. If we look back to midsummer last year, we had just gone through the Gulf war, in which those close and cordial relations had been demonstrated in a particular way.

Alas, all Mr. Nicklin's hopes and aspirations seemed to count for very little. On 6 November last year, the threat that had been uttered in July was carried out and he found himself in gaol. This was no mere arrest and detention. He was imprisoned in a cell 10 m by 5 m. There were 24 other people in that cell at all times, and 28 for some days. He was in the company of murderers and other criminals of evil repute. He was not allowed to wash. He was not allowed exercise. His wife, when she visited him, was subjected to body searches and had to sit in a dusty courtyard with crowds of other women, waiting to see her husband.

Allan Nicklin was detained in those conditions until 21 January this year, in spite of the best efforts of the ambassador and the consul, my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (Mr. Lennox-Boyd) and myself. And still Mr. Nicklin did not wish his predicament, his troubles, to be made public. Obviously, I was in constant touch with his wife, and the House can imagine her distress and anguish when she returned to this country before Christmas last year.

Soon after his release, the Saudi authorities admitted that Mr. Nicklin was indeed not personally liable for any debts ; that there was no suggestion that at any time had he been guilty of any impropriety at all. This is not a British subject suspected of a criminal act. This case is not to be equated with the cases of drugs traffickers and those other cases about which one reads from time to time in which British subjects, sadly, contravene local laws, behave in a criminal manner and then, of course, must take the consequences. Here was a man who had sought to do nothing but follow his profession properly, and honourably discharge his business responsibilities, but all this to no avail.

Although it is not done to name officials, I will name one official here-- the private secretary of my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale, Mr. Charles Moore, who has been exemplary in the way he has sought to help and has handled this case and kept in constant touch with me. But in spite of all our efforts, in July of this year, what happened? I got a call from Mr. Moore one Friday to say that I could expect Mr. Nicklin to be flying in within two or three days. That was just as we were about to rise for the summer recess. My last conversation in July with the Minister gave hope that I would be able to greet Mr. Nicklin at Heathrow or at his home in the constituency conveying the good wishes of everyone concerned.

In the event, nothing happened. Papers had been passed from one office to another and from one Department to another. Since those days in July, much effort has continued to be put in. My hon. Friend who will answer this debate has been constantly helpful in the matter. The Foreign Secretary has raised the issue with his opposite number, the Secretary of State for Defence has raised it at

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high level and with his opposite number and the Prime Minister, with whom I have been in correspondence, has expressed concern and frustration.

Indeed, as a result of a letter from the Prime Minister in which he said he saw no reason why I should not make the matter public, I talked to Mr. Nicklin and we decided that, at long last, the issue had to come into the open. It is a tribute to Mr. Nicklin and his wife that for all those long, dark, difficult months, they put the interests of this country and its relations with another country before their personal comfort and convenience.

As I say, despite the totally genuine expressions of concern by the Minister who has had day-to-day charge of the case, by the Foreign Secretary, by the Secretary of State for Defence and by the Prime Minister, Mr. Nicklin remains without a passport and without permission to leave.

This has been a cat-and-mouse game. Mr. Nicklin is being treated virtually as a hostage, and the situation is unacceptable. It is utterly unacceptable to Mr. Nicklin and his family and to their Member of Parliament. I hope that the Minister will demonstrate when he replies that it is equally unacceptable to Her Majesty's Government.

This is a country with which, we all agree, we wish to have close relations, yet a British subject is being treated by that country in the way that I have described. It was out of sheer desperation that we decided- -I spoke to Mr. Nicklin on the telephone from Saudi Arabia and I had numerous conversations with his wife, who comes regularly to see me and visits my office in the constituency virtually every day--that we could not allow the matter to go on without people knowing about it.

Mr. Nicklin has not left Saudi Arabia for three and a half years. He has not been allowed to leave for two and a half years. He has not seen his daughter for two years, and during that time she celebrated her 21st birthday and graduated. He has missed all of the sort of family occasions that he should have had the right to attend. His son had to leave his independent school because the fees could no longer be paid. I managed to persuade the headmaster and governors to let him take his GCSEs, but then he had to leave. Mr. Nicklin has not seen his son for almost two years. The last time he saw his wife was when she visited him about a year ago in the intolerable conditions in prison to which I referred.

Friends have helped to sustain Mr. Nicklin, and his wife has been marvellous in her support. But the strain on the family has been intolerable. Mr. Nicklin has no job and is without money. He has not been paid for over two years. It is clear from recent telegrams that the company for which he was working has almost certainly been guilty of criminal acts, but that is not his fault. In the United States, certain people are having to answer questions, but I will not digress and go into that now. Mr. Nicklin's reputation is such that other companies have been wanting to offer him employment. He has been unable to attend interviews, still less to contemplate taking up a job, because he has no passport and does not have permission to leave. He is entirely dependent on friends to feed and look after him.

Although I do not want to over-emphasise my role as his Member of Parliament, had it not been for my intervention with all the statutory authorities who supply electricity, gas and so on, his family would have been in dire straits. I pay tribute to those to whom mortgage payments are owed, to British Telecom, British Gas and

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the local council for being extremely understanding and anxious to help. The position is desperate and that man remains in detention. We have moved a long way since 1850 and the days of Don Pacifico when Palmerston sent in the gunboats and later spent four hours addressing this honourable House to justify his conduct, making the greatest speech of his life. I do not necessarily invite my hon. Friend the Minister to emulate that but I stress that the position is unacceptable. I know that he and his colleagues in the Foreign Office have done all that they possibly could but it is terrible when, in spite of the constant entreaties of a friendly power, a nation refuses to allow a man against whom no charges are preferred or contemplated to return to his home and family.

I tabled a question a few weeks ago asking my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary to summon the ambassador. My right hon. Friend replied that the ambassador was trying to be helpful and that he did not feel that that was the right moment to summon him. I do not criticise the Saudi ambassador in this country and am sure that he has tried to be helpful. However, all those good intentions and genuine efforts have not produced Mr. Nicklin at Heathrow airport and have not allowed him to rejoin his family.

The last thing that I wish to do is jeopardise relations between Britain and any friendly country. Nevertheless, will my hon. Friend tell my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary in stark, unequivocal terms that such treatment of a British subject is utterly unacceptable and that the Saudi ambassador must be told that in no uncertain terms? Mr. Nicklin must be allowed to have his passport, return to his country and be reunited with his wife, son and daughter well before Christmas so that they can have a family time together. The family can then begin to unravel the manifold problems, financial and otherwise, that have encompassed and enmeshed them in the past two and a half years, particularly the past difficult year since he was imprisoned in those atrocious conditions in November 1991. I hope that my hon. Friend, to whom I am grateful for the time that he has given to this case, will be able to give me a reassuringly robust answer tonight. I appeal through the House and beyond the House to the Government to say to his Majesty the King of Saudi Arabia that, if he cherishes his relationship with Great Britain and truly believes what he said on his state visit to this country and during the Gulf war--I have no reason to doubt it--he should show that he repudiates the prevarication of his officials and that he will allow Mr. Nicklin to come back quickly.

9.19 pm

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Mark Lennox-Boyd) : I fully understand whymy hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire, South (Mr. Cormack) has brought this important matter to the attention of the House. I shall be speaking to my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary about the subject following tonight's debate. A copy of the text of the debate will be sent to our mission in Riyadh for

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transmission to the appropriate authorities, and a copy will be made available to the Saudi Arabian ambassador in London. As my hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire, South said, the story starts on 12 August 1990, when our consulate in Jedda was informed of Mr. Nicklin's arrest for debts incurred by Western Agencies Ltd., often known as WAL (Jedda)--the company for which he was general manager. As a result of representations made by our embassy in Riyadh, Mr. Nicklin was released for the first time from prison on 26 November 1990, two years ago to this month. But he was not free to leave Saudi Arabia then or now.

Mr. Nicklin was initially given three months to settle the debts, and that period was extended to one year. He was unable to raise the money to pay the debts and, on

6 November 1991 he was rearrested. He was released into the custody of his sponsor, Prince Mishaal, on 21 January this year.

Some 22 representations have been made to the Saudi Arabian authorities about the case by Ministers, consulate officials, myself and others during the past 12 months. Although, after Mr. Nicklin's arrest in January of this year, he was subsequently cleared of liability for all debts, he has not been allowed to leave Saudi Arabia. His case is now before the Council of Ministers, and we hope for an early and favourable decision that will enable him to return to his family in Britain.

Under Saudi Arabian law, the senior representative of a company is liable for its debts and, until the debts are paid, he may be imprisoned. We have taken the view that Mr. Nicklin was an employee, not an executive, of WAL (Jedda), which was a subsidiary of the parent company based in Cyprus. WAL, a Cyprus-based company owned by two British nationals, Mr. Clive Lewis and Mr. Vincent Deacon, began operating in Jedda under the sponsorship of Prince Mishaal bin Saud bin Abdul Aziz on 27 March 1984. Mr. Nicklin arrived in Jedda in May 1988 to take up an appointment as general manager of WAL (Jedda). On 11 August 1990, he was arrested and imprisoned for the local company's failure to pay claims to SASCO and Abbar company, both Saudi Arabian companies.

During 1988 and 1989, numerous claims were made on WAL (Jedda) by both Saudi nationals and companies in respect of material damage, by fire and other events, which the company was unable to make good because the United States underwriters defaulted. The claims, amounting to about £600,000, were underwritten by the United States companies Wilmington Marine and General Insurance company and American Marine and General Insurance company. Mr. Nicklin holds that all correspondence and dealings with the American insurers were conducted by WAL (Cyprus). One of the two major shareholders of WAL (Cyprus) admitted in a letter, dated 26 September 1990, that he and the other shareholder, as directors of the Saudi firm, were responsible for the debts of WAL (Jedda) and that Mr. Nicklin should not be held liable.

In December 1991, during an official visit to Washington, I asked an official at the United States State Department to look into the status of the two United States insurance companies. After the State Department confirmed that neither company was under federal investigation, our missions in Houston and Atlanta tried to contact them direct.

We learned that American Marine and General, which may now be in liquidation, maintained that, since it had

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never received any premium on policies written by WAL (Jedda) and had never indeed written or authorised these policies, it did not consider itself liable for policies issued in its name. Mr. Nicklin disputes this, maintaining that premiums on policies issued up until the end of 1988, the period in question, were fully paid. Furthermore, he claims that virtually all policies issued by WAL in Saudi Arabia were signed by persons other than himself. Wilmington Marine and General, which was owned by a company now in liquidation, claimed that it was in the process of repaying its debt to WAL (Cyprus) by instalments, and that most of the money had already been repaid. The directors of WAL (Cyprus) claim that they have not received any payments.

I want to put all the facts on record, as I am sure that they will be considered by others at a later date.

In January 1992, the then Secretary of State for Defence, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King), raised Mr. Nicklin's case with Prince Ahmed, the Saudi Vice-Minister of Interior. As a result, Mr. Nicklin was released into his sponsor's custody and the documentation was transferred from Jedda to Riyadh. Our embassy in Riyadh submitted a dossier on the case to the Interior Minister on 23 March.

In the meantime, our high commission in Nicosia had had a number of contacts with the two directors of WAL (Cyprus), the parent company, to try to bring home to them the seriousness of the position of their employee, Mr. Nicklin. Mr. Nicklin says that he has not received any financial assistance from them since mid-1991, although it has been made clear to them that both he and his wife, in the United Kingdom, are now destitute.

We have repeatedly raised Mr. Nicklin's case at a high level with the Saudis, and our embassy in Riyadh has been active in trying to secure his release. Since my right hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater raised the case in January 1992 with the Saudi Vice-Minister of Interior, a senior FCO official saw the charge d'affaires of the Saudi embassy in London on 26 March. On 13 May, our ambassador in Saudi Arabia called on the Interior Ministry to express concern that the case had been transferred to the Ministry of Commerce. I raised the matter with the Saudi ambassador on 15 May, and the Foreign Secretary subsequently raised the case with the Saudi Minister of State, Mr. Masoud.

On 19 May, our ambassador in Riyadh called on the Saudi Minister of Commerce, who said that the case was complex and would require careful scrutiny. He added that Mr. Lewis's 1984 contract with Prince Mishaal to sell insurance had not received Ministry of Commerce endorsement. Our ambassador reiterated our view that, as an employee of the company, Mr. Nicklin could not be held liable for its debts. Subsequently, we learned that the Ministry of Commerce had informed the Ministry of Interior that it considered that Mr. Nicklin should not be responsible for any debts ; the United States underwriters should be responsible for the larger debt of about £500,000 ; the smaller debts, made up, for example, of repairs to vehicles insured, should be the responsibility of Prince Mishaal. The embassy was informed that the Minister of Interior would write to Prince Mishaal asking him to take on these liabilities. Our ambassador wrote to Prince Saud on 7 July to brief him on developments in the case. On 15 July, our consul in Riyadh accompanied Mr. Nicklin to a meeting with his sponsor, Prince Mishaal. The

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prince said that he had not yet received any communication from the Ministry of the Interior. However, as he had no claim against Mr. Nicklin personally, he said that he would not stand in the way of his leaving Saudi Arabia. On 22 July, the prince's manager in Jedda told our embassy that the prince had been informed of Prince Naif's wish to have the debt issue resolved. Although he intended to dispute his own liability for the debts, Prince Mishaal instructed his office manager to request an exit re-entry visa in Mr. Nicklin's passport to enable him to travel as soon as possible.

However, the immigration authorities in Jedda remained unprepared to remove Mr. Nicklin's name from their list of people forbidden to leave the kingdom. They said that they needed specific instructions from the Ministry of the Interior to remove his name from the list. On 28 July, a senior FCO official raised the problem with the Saudi ambassador, who said that he would see what he could do.

Repeated representations by our embassy in Riyadh and consulate-general in Jedda have not yet overcome this new obstacle. Our consul-general in Riyadh and Mr. Nicklin called on the deputy Minister of Commerce on 8 September, and were again told that the Ministry considered that Mr. Nicklin should not be held liable for any debts, which should be the responsibility of the underwriters and his sponsor.

My right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Defence raised the case when he met His Royal Highness Prince Naif bin Abdul Aziz, the Minister of the Interior, during his recent visit to Saudi Arabia, on 20 September. The Minister told my right hon. and learned Friend that he agreed that Mr. Nicklin should not be held liable for the debts, and hoped that he would be allowed to leave Saudi Arabia very soon ; however, he wished to have a final look at the papers. Since then, the Interior Ministry has asked the Ministry of Commerce for further confirmation and clarification of its decision that Mr. Nicklin was not to be held liable for any debts. The Ministry of Commerce has, I understand, replied in the affirmative. As my hon. Friend knows, I spoke to the Saudi ambassador on 22 October, and followed that up with a letter enclosing a chronology showing how and when the Nicklin case had been discussed by British and Saudi Ministers and officials over the past six months. On 1 November, our ambassador in Riyadh was told by senior officials in the Interior Ministry that, as Mr. Nicklin's debts were not personal, the way should very soon be clear to authorising his release. We have now been informed that Mr. Nicklin's case has been referred to the Council of Ministers for final approval. Our ambassador spoke about the issue to the Foreign Minister on 8 November. We cannot, of course, tell exactly when that final approval will be given ; but we have been given to understand that we are really at the last hurdle, and that Mr. Nicklin could well be free to return home very shortly.

I know that this further delay will increase the distress to Mr. and Mrs. Nicklin, but I assure them, my hon. Friend and the House that we shall continue to do everything possible to secure Mr. Nicklin's unhindered departure from Saudi Arabia as soon as possible.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at twenty-seven minutes to Teno' clock.

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