Chris Bryant

I completely agree that there is a cultural issue that needs to be looked at. I am certainly not able to commit the Government today to a public inquiry—I think all Members accept that I am not going to do that—but I am also not entirely convinced that public inquiries actually often end up changing culture. Culture changes because we choose to. [Interruption.] I note that the Whips have a terrible case of coughing, but I want to end with a few more short points. The first point relates to trade envoys. I want to praise the work of our present trade envoys—not just from the Labour party and not just from this House—who are helping us to win contracts around the world. They are all accountable through the Minister for Trade and the Department. I would quite like there to be more questions about trade envoys at Business and Trade questions, which are coming up in the near future. On the Act of succession, which the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam asked me about, we are working at pace on this, and we intend to bring forward legislation when we can. I cannot commit to a particular date on that, but I note that Julie Andrews, in “The Sound of Music”, sang, “I have confidence that spring will come again”, so I have confidence that the Act of succession will come around at pace. The hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam also said: “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” The cultural point I will make is that, actually, this was not about power; this was about influence. Influence can be just as pernicious in the body politic as anything else, and that is one of the things we need to address, because it can lead to corruption. I will end with this point. The hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam said, “Let’s make sure this never happens again.” Of course, every single Member of this House would hope that we never again see the horrific abuse that happened under Jeffrey Epstein and the concatenation of different forms of abuse that were created by the complicity of people from so many different sectors—people turning a blind eye and people participating, whether because they loved wealthy people, they loved the wealthy lifestyle or whatever it may be. Of course, I would dearly love to be able to stand at this Dispatch Box and say that it will never happen again, but I would bet my bottom dollar that there will be young people today who are being abused by rich, wealthy, arrogant, entitled people, and it will continue. Yes, we must do everything in our power to make sure that deference, influence and complicity do not allow that to happen, but in the end the only recourse we have is to the court of law, to ensure that those who abuse their position of trust face the full rigour of the law. Question put and agreed to, That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty, that he will be graciously pleased to give directions to require the Government to lay before this House all papers relating to the creation of the role of Special Representative for Trade and Investment and Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s appointment to that role, including but not confined to any documents held by UK Trade and Investment, British Trade International (BTI) and its successors, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, the Cabinet Office and the Prime Minister’s Office containing or relating to advice from, or provided to, the Group Chief Executive of BTI, Peter Mandelson, the Cabinet Office and the Prime Minister regarding the suitability of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor for the appointment, due diligence and vetting conducted in relation to the appointment, and minutes of meetings and electronic communications regarding the due diligence and vetting.