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Mr. Mackinlay: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Blunt: I do not have time.
The cavilling, confused language in Security Council resolution 1132, typical of policy pursued by the Government, started them on the road to trouble. The hand-wringing, stuttering uncertainty in dealing with that difficult, bloody situation that has been characteristic of the Minister's handling has led to the problems. The delivery of the humanitarian, democratic and British interest was obstructed by the Government's agonies over the means that they needed to adopt to secure the ends.
The Government endorsed the end, but they were not prepared to face up to the means. No wonder Peter Penfold and Sandline were confused about the Government's position. They were the heroes of the shambles--people who were prepared to act to achieve the agreed and desirable objective. The Prime Minister endorsed Peter Penfold when he first became aware of the affair.
Peter Penfold and Sandline pursued their goals through a sea of cavilling Ministers and officials, few of whom acted with courage and decisiveness, or accepted responsibility. The primary objective of Ministers and many officials has been to cover their backs. That characterised the Foreign Secretary's handling of the reports. The horrifying harshness of what was happening in Sierra Leone was accompanied by Ministers trying to face in all directions at once.
Mrs. Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham):
I in no way underestimate the cycle of violence in Sierra Leone. Some hon. Members have sought to diminish our interest in the plight of the people in that country. We say that the situation is desperate, and any effort to relieve the suffering of the people of Sierra Leone will be supported by Conservative Members.
The contributions to this debate have been well-informed and have shown care and diligence. We have heard distinguished contributions from my right hon. Friends the Members for East Devon (Sir P. Emery) and for Tonbridge and Malling (Sir J. Stanley) and from my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Mr. Blunt). My right hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Malling made a superb speech and went into the details of the Government's contortions and the flaws in their policy towards Sierra Leone.
Even more telling, though, were the contributions from Government Members. The hon. Members for Swansea, East (Mr. Anderson) and for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney
(Mr. Rowlands)--distinguished members of the Select Committee--seemed very willing to wound the beast but not to deliver the coup de grace; but the hon. Member for Hackney, North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) proved once again her superb independence. If she will permit me, I will pay her a compliment: she is charming but lethal.
I am sorry that we did not have more time to accommodate all the hon. Members who wanted to contribute. We have spent three hours debating one of the most scathing reports ever published by a Select Committee on the workings of a Department.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for International Development (Mr. George Foulkes):
The hon. Lady has not been here very long.
Mrs. Gillan:
I have been here long enough to know a Government who are a shambles when I see one, and in the past two years my eyes have certainly been opened by the Labour Government.
The Select Committee report was compiled in what could almost be described as a hostile environment. It says:
The reputation of the Foreign Office has indeed been besmirched, and the Foreign Secretary and the Minister of State, the hon. Member for Manchester, Central (Mr. Lloyd) have betrayed the trust placed in them, that they would at the very least conduct the foreign affairs of this country in a competent fashion, finish the paperwork and deal in whole truths, not half-truths: a trust that we can, sadly, no longer place safely in them.
My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard) spelled out the main indictments. Like him, I will not dwell on the serious questions of integrity raised by the revelation that the Foreign Secretary, by foul means rather than fair, received four weeks' advance warning of the content of the Select Committee report--that will be investigated by others, as Madam Speaker said--but I will reiterate the specific criticisms that Ministers have sought to brush off and evade in another fine example of the "Not me, guv" society, as practised to perfection by the Government.
At first, the Government tried to frustrate the work of the Committee, as the hon. Member for Swansea, East and my right hon. Friend the Member for East Devon said. The report says:
The Committee's request to see relevant intelligence reports and take evidence--in private--from the head of the Secret Intelligence Service was refused. Is that open government, or an ethical position? No. The report says:
Ministers would prefer to interpret the reports as laying the blame at the door of officials. The Foreign Secretary said:
The Legg report lays the blame squarely at the Government's door, saying that it is the Government's responsibility to give citizens, and even their own officials, a reasonable explanation of the laws that they make under delegated powers, especially when those laws create a serious criminal offence: in this case, an offence punishable by up to seven years' imprisonment.
The Legg report says that no such explanation was given. Instead, the impression was given in communications that the embargo applied only to the junta. As Legg concludes, British officials and Ministers
If we need further confirmation of that, we need look only as far as the Foreign Secretary, who said, of the telegram that advised key diplomatic staff of the extent of the arms embargo, that it was
The Foreign Secretary and his Ministers are, and should be, accountable to this House for their policies and their Department's actions. The Foreign Secretary has shown today that he is too arrogant to accept that responsibility, and that "sorry" is a word sadly lacking from his vocabulary. That should be a matter of grave concern in all quarters of this House.
"Our inquiry has given a unique insight into the working, or lack of working in this case, of the FCO machine."
The report goes on to say:
"It has exposed even further a story which the FCO would have preferred not to have had besmirch its reputation."
The Foreign Secretary did not want the report to see the light of day but, thanks to the Committee's determination, it has been published and the whole House can draw its conclusions on the sorry affair from both the Select Committee report and the Legg report.
"The Committee's interest in Sierra Leone continued, but was impeded"--
yes, impeded--
"by the refusal of the Government to release to the Committee, firstly telegrams concerning Sierra Leone and secondly . . . the information which fell within the ambit of the Legg inquiry."
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When the Committee's persistence prevailed, Ministers yet again sought to impede its progress.
The report states:
"We have again encountered some frustrations. Our original request to hear three of the officials involved in the affair was met by a proposal that we should take evidence from only one of them."
In the end, a compromise of taking evidence from two officials was agreed on.
"This sounds very much like a Minister determined to defend his own position."
As my right hon. Friend the Member for East Devon said, the contrast with the attitudes of other Departments is striking. The Chief of Defence Intelligence was allowed to appear before the Committee, and the director general of the Security Service was allowed to brief the Home Affairs Committee. Even the hon. Member for Swansea, East condemned the lack of access afforded to his Committee. I leave the House to draw its own inevitable conclusions about the Foreign Secretary's actions and whether they were designed to help or to obstruct the inquiry.
"I would perfectly happily accept any criticisms of myself . . . but there are none."--[Official Report, 27 July 1998; Vol. 317, c. 28.]
That really will not wash. Even the Legg report concludes that
"the officials concerned were working hard and conscientiously, and should not be judged too harshly."
Officials made mistakes, no doubt, but so did Ministers. The Select Committee report concludes that the Government's policy on the arms embargo was stated in a way that could mislead Parliament, the public and even the Foreign Office's own staff into thinking that the arms embargo applied only to one side of the warring factions: the junta.
"continued to play this aspect down."
Ministers patently failed to give a clear and full explanation, preferring to deal in half-truths, not whole truths.
"quite plainly wrong that this telegram did not make it clearer what was the full scope of the resolution."
2 Mar 1999 : Column 929
I hope that the Minister will deal with the point raised by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe and tell us what his response is to the Foreign Secretary telling us that his answer of 12 March was "quite plainly wrong".
The Committee report reinforces ministerial culpability when it refers to the Foreign Office's dealings with Sandline. By way of a final indictment of ministerial behaviour, it says that
"many of the problems which occurred would not have done so . . . If Ministers had made their policy on dealing with mercenaries clearer to officials."
What picture do we paint of Foreign Office Ministers and their competence? It is a very sorry picture of bungling and buck passing. We have a Foreign Secretary who does not finish the paperwork; a Foreign Secretary who deals in the dangerous commodity of half-truths, and is quite content to do so; a Foreign Secretary who should hang his head in shame, but who could not even come to the Dispatch Box today to utter one word of apology for the mess over which he has presided. As his own permanent under-secretary put it:
"The revelation of this mess, which is not a pretty sight, has not been a very enjoyable experience."
He is a master of understatement.
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