Mr Speaker, I have been asked to reply on behalf of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. As the House will know, he is travelling in the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia to discuss energy security, diplomatic action on Russia in Ukraine and regional issues, including Iran.
Mr Speaker, with your forbearance, may I also say that I understand that four Members of the Ukrainian Parliament are here with us in the Gallery today? I am sure I speak for the whole House in saying that we stand in total solidarity with them. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”]
Camelot is one of the largest employers in Watford and for Watford, and its employees have worked tirelessly to run the national lottery successfully for decades, playing an important role in communities across the UK with many local projects and good causes, including in my constituency. I obviously declare an interest in the Gambling Commission’s decision yesterday not to appoint the licence to Camelot, but given the current situation in Ukraine, does my right hon. Friend consider it appropriate that the next licensee of the operator of the national lottery is known to have a joint venture with Gazprom?
Can I thank my hon. Friend, and just say what an incredible job the national lottery has done delivering £45 billion to good causes? He is right that the fourth licence will ensure operator profits are better aligned with returns to good causes. I would also say, on the specific points he makes, that I understand that Allwyn’s owner, Mr Komárek, who has long criticised the Putin regime, is in discussions with the Czech Republic Government regarding the joint venture with Gazprom and removing its involvement.
I also welcome the Ukrainian MPs to this House today.
Can I start by wholeheartedly welcoming the positive steps towards returning Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Anoosheh Ashoori to the UK? I am sure Members across the House want to show their support for their families and them. I know the Deputy Prime Minister would agree that this devastating situation must never be repeated, and other British nationals still trapped in Iran need to be brought home. So will he commit to a review of these cases to understand what more could have been done by the British Government to secure releases and whether the lazy comments of the Prime Minister worsened the situation?
I should first say that I cannot yet confirm the reports we have seen in the media, but of course it feels like positive signs. No one wants more than me—although I am sure all Members of the House want this—to see Nazanin and all the arbitrarily detained nationals reunited with their loved ones. I can tell the right hon. Lady, having worked for two years with the concerted diplomatic effort led by the Prime Minister, that we have done absolutely everything that we can. She should not give succour to the despotic regime that detained our nationals in Iran, or those around the world, by suggesting it is anyone else’s responsibility other than theirs.
It is exactly for that reason that I asked for the review. It is important to learn from our mistakes so that other innocent families do not face this ordeal again. I hope that the Deputy Prime Minister will consider my comments.
I would like to thank all the people who have been working tirelessly to bring British nationals home from Iran, our diplomatic staff and our world-leading British intelligence agencies. The role of British intelligence today is critical in the face of Putin’s aggression. The Deputy Prime Minister oversaw our foreign intelligence services as Foreign Secretary, so can he confirm if at any time he overruled or ignored direct advice from the British security services?
What the right hon. Lady suggests is nonsense. She is talking about the House of Lords Appointments Commission, and it has a vetting process. I have never overruled intelligence advice, and I would not comment on the details of it. I do agree with her on the strength and agility of the British diplomatic service, who time and time again are the unsung heroes in returning British nationals, often in less celebrated cases. Now is a great opportunity to recognise the heroic work that they do.
I agree with the Deputy Prime Minister’s comments on the diplomatic service’s heroic work. He was Foreign Secretary on 17 March 2020 when British intelligence reportedly warned against granting a peerage to the Prime Minister’s close friend who is now Lord Lebedev of Hampton and Siberia. Forty-eight hours later, the Prime Minister visited Lebedev at his home in London. Details of that meeting have never been released. In July 2020, Lebedev’s appointment as a peer was announced. Can the Deputy Prime Minister tell the House what changed between the security warning and the appointment?
As the right hon. Lady knows full well, all individuals are nominated for a peerage in recognition of their contribution to society. I should say that that includes those of Russian origin who contribute brilliantly to our nation—many of whom in this country are critics of the Putin regime. Life peerages are vetted by the House of Lords Appointments Commission for matters of probity. Frankly, she should know better.
What I do know better is that a central duty of any Government is to keep the British people safe. There are now widespread reports that the Prime Minister did not accept warnings from our own intelligence services about granting a Russian oligarch—the son and business partner of a KGB spy—a seat here in this Parliament. It should not matter if such a warning was about a close personal friend of the Prime Minister. It should not matter if he gave the Prime Minister thousands of pounds of gifts. It should not matter how much champagne and caviar he serves. There are no ifs or buts when it comes to the safety of the British people. So I ask the Deputy Prime Minister: can he guarantee that the Prime Minister never asked anyone to urge the security services to revise, reconsider or withdraw their assessment of Lord Lebedev of Hampton and Siberia?
The suggestion that the right hon. Lady is making is sheer nonsense. But if she wants to talk about national security, I remind her that not so long ago she and her shadow Cabinet colleagues wanted the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) to be Prime Minister—a man who wanted and talked about abolishing the Army and pulling out of Trident. She voted for that. Has there ever been a more ridiculous, reckless, naive moment to call for unilateral nuclear disarmament and to pull out of NATO? A Labour Government would put at risk our security. We are doing everything that we can to protect it.
Labour Governments increased support for our Army. Labour is committed to NATO. I remind the Deputy Prime Minister that it was his Prime Minister who said in 2015 that he was not sure if it was morally irresponsible to work with Putin. I do not think the Deputy Prime Minister is on safe ground there.
Last week, my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the Opposition said that Britain should never again be at the mercy of a foreign dictatorship for our energy and fuel security. This week, the Prime Minister has gone cap in hand from one dictator to another, on a begging mission for the Saudi prince to bail him out. The Government have had 12 years to end their reliance on foreign oil and to invest in home-grown energy to secure our supplies. Their failure has left us all vulnerable, reliant on another murderous dictator to keep the lights on and the pumps open. [Interruption.]
Order. I am going to hear this question. If some people do not want—[Interruption.] If someone wants a little argument, I am more than happy to argue outside the Chamber, but for the moment I need to get on and I want to hear the question.
Thank you, Mr Speaker. The Government Benches have a choice. They could accept Labour’s plan to save working families hundreds of pounds on bills, funded with a one-off levy on the soaring profits of big energy companies. So I ask the Deputy Prime Minister, is their only plan to keep on begging?
Can I just gently say to the right hon. Lady that when she was campaigning, as the rest of them were, to make the right hon. Member for Islington North Prime Minister, this Prime Minister was the Foreign Secretary leading the response to the nerve agent attack.
Order. I hate to say it, but the Deputy Prime Minister cannot keep going back 12 years as a defensive mechanism. What we want to do—[Interruption.] I will decide, thank you. What I want you to do, Deputy Prime Minister, please, is to try to stick to the general rules without talking about history. I have a lot of people ahead of me who are desperate to get in. How far we want to go back, in passing, is one thing.