Member

Actually, as transport links have improved since the original wrong was done at the end of the 1960s, I can easily see a luxury holiday industry developing on some of those atolls. It is not so far from the Maldives, there is a premium on both novelty and exclusivity; it would be the last frontier. One could see all sorts of viable industries developing there. It need not be a long-term burden on the British taxpayer. But even if it does end up costing us something, it will be a fraction of what we are paying now. There is the vision of having the Chagossians back among the frangipani and the bougainvillea, the churches growing again, with the coral stone and the crash of the surf; all of them loyal to the Crown and therefore putting utterly beyond question the issue of who has the sovereignty over the archipelago.