Lord True (Con)

The Statement was made by someone who did not attend the summit and in the absence of the Prime Minister—a decent man forced from office by self-interested colleagues who owed their place in Parliament to him. As someone else once said at that same podium in Downing Street, “them’s the breaks”. Many unkind things were said back then about my right honourable friend Boris Johnson, not least in this House. It was “a good day”, one allegedly impartial former official deplorably gloated. I will not follow the road of rejoicing in another’s downfall. I place on record my thanks to Sir Keir Starmer for his service to our country, even if the results were not always quite as perfect as this Statement claimed. Indeed, can the Minister tell us why on earth he is going if everything is as amazing as the Statement says? At the summit, Sir Keir maintained the unflinching support that he has given to Ukraine, so vigorously begun by the reviled Mr Johnson. We support that stand and will uphold the unity of this House on it. Conduct of foreign policy will now fall to the first Prime Minister since Lord Home to assume office without facing the electorate at the preceding general election. If we do not have a clue what he thinks, heaven help our allies. If he fails to make a dispassionate assessment of the poor choices that led to Sir Keir’s resignation, he risks repeating those mistakes and leaving us in a doom loop of lost opportunity. The same old Labour, with tax and spend policies that were out of date even in the 1970s, will deliver the same dismal outcomes. We are told in the Statement that the Prime Minister made Britain safer and rebuilt Britain’s reputation around the world. Really? Endless delays to the defence investment plan have not made us safer. With continued instability in the Middle East, war in Europe and an increasingly reckless Russia, any further delay in the defence investment plan is unacceptable. Can the noble Baroness tell us today when it will be published? The stunning resignations of the Defence Secretary and the Veterans Minister did not enhance our reputation in the world. Two principled men, actually the best of the Labour Party, laid bare a bitter truth—their view, not ours—that a Government overdosing on welfare spending were unable or unwilling to find money for defence. It is a shambles. What on earth will the Prime Minister tell NATO on 7 July? Mr Carns in his statement was also devastating about the injustice of the legal pursuit of our Northern Ireland Army veterans and the folly of the so-called remedial order. That was being rushed forward so the Prime Minister could offer up our compliance with the ECHR at the so-called EU reset summit. That has now been delayed, so can the noble Baroness tell the House that that vindictive order will also be shelved? We welcome good news in the Statement on foreign direct investment from France, India and Japan. We welcome the free trade agreement with India. This is the Britain we want, opening to the wider world. But foreign direct investment cannot offset the devastating impact of Labour’s domestic policies. If we want real growth, the next Prime Minister must change course. Change in terms of security is needed too to Mr Miliband’s obsessive pursuit of net zero. Did the House notice the outcome of the election in Aberdeen South? Working people want our North Sea open. Working people want to exploit our own energy resources and the jobs the oil and gas industry brings. We have heard it here from the noble Lord, Lord Woodley, and others. We have heard it from the secretary-general of Unite. For once, they and we are united in a common-sense cause: we must open the North Sea. Speaking of common sense, I think the noble Baroness knows how pleased we are that this House stopped the disastrous Chagos deal. Did the Prime Minister try to resurrect this in any way at the summit, or is this turkey now dead? We hope progress in the US-Iran talks will end barriers to free navigation in the Strait of Hormuz. We all want peace in the Middle East, but we must not soften our stance on the murderous regime in Tehran. We have been far too slow to take action on the IRGC, although I welcome steps now being undertaken. Will the noble Baroness confirm that we will remain in lockstep with our US allies in ensuring Iran never has a nuclear weapon? Can she tell us when the Franco-British action in the Gulf and the strait will begin? We agree that more should be done to ensure civilian aid gets through in Gaza and indeed Lebanon; it must flow more smoothly. But we are also clear in our view that Israel had and has a right to defend itself. Was I alone in thinking it truly astonishing that, in 360 words on the Middle East in this Statement, there was not a single word of condemnation of terrorist Hezbollah and terrorist Hamas? Instead, the Deputy Prime Minister said that Israel must tone down what he called “inflammatory language”. What are they supposed to say of the butchers of Jewish babies? On illegal immigration, the Deputy Prime Minister promised to build on our 2018 Sandhurst agreement with France, and we welcome that. In contrast, this Government’s so-called one-in, one-out policy had to be rewritten after illegal migrants once removed returned to the UK. Can the noble Baroness tell us how many criminal gangs have been smashed? Finally, the Statement referred with regret to the 10th anniversary of Brexit. Some people, it seems, will never accept the verdict of the British people or own that the fast first Covid vaccine, the free trade deal with India we have just heard about, the summer holidays VAT measure and so much else would never have been possible without that vote. I must test the tolerance of the House by declaring I voted for our freedom to choose our own destiny 10 years ago, and I would do so again. We need to look to the future, not plunge back to past battles. I wish the next Prime Minister well, but it is not a change of Prime Minister that this country needs, it is a change of Government.