Withdrawal from Afghanistan: Joint Committee — House of Commons, 2021-09-15
Topic: Defense
Alyn Edward Smith (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The Scottish National party supports the motion. I am very glad that the Opposition tabled it, because there is a great deal to learn from the debacle, the failure, the ignominious defeat that we have seen in Afghanistan. We have expressed a preference for an independent judge-led inquiry and we are still very open to that option, but let us consider the motion that stands before us I would quibble slightly with the scope of paragraph (1)(a)(i), which would start the timetable from the Doha agreement; we think that previous events need to be properly considered in the round. I would also quibble with paragraph (1)(a)(ii), because I think that there would be quite a lot of overlap with the Intelligence and Security Committee, a point that has been dealt with already. Nevertheless, we support the motion. While taking due cognisance of the Committee inquiries already under way, we think, as Labour does, that the matter is of such significance and magnitude that it must be properly ventilated There is a lot to learn from the past few months. One thing that has struck me personally is that, in all our discussions and urgent questions on Afghanistan during and since the emergency recall, not a single person—on either side of the House, actually—has said sorry. Four hundred and fifty-six service personnel lost their lives. We have not said sorry to the veterans and their families. We have not said sorry to the Afghans who believed our promises and whom we collectively—all of us—failed. We have not said sorry either to our taxpayers, who funded this to the tune of many billions of pounds. There is a real need for more collective humility on all of this. I myself am sorry, because I think we have all let the people of Afghanistan down, and I think we need to learn the lessons from that I have to say, even to the Minister, that while I pay tribute to the intelligence personnel, the defence personnel and everyone else involved in Operation Pitting—and to everyone who has spent time in Afghanistan keeping the people of the country safe—to present Operation Pitting and recent events as some sort of herculean triumph is out of tune with the reality of the situation. I pay tribute to all those who have achieved so much over recent months, but we must learn the lessons of this collective huge failure. I would counsel a little more humility from the Government Benches and a little less hubris when we are discussing this issue There are also lessons for the conduct of the House’s business, because the responses that Members received from the Government were not as they should have been. We are reasonable people. We understand that things were stretched, we understand that things were unprecedented, and we understand that things were moving very fast. We would have taken all that in the round, but it was particularly galling to have a breezy assurance from the Prime Minister and former Foreign Secretary that everything would be dealt with, and that everyone would receive a response "by close of play" There is a world of difference between a response and an answer, and the inquiries of many Members, on all sides of the House, were not properly dealt with and still have not been. That is something of which the House should take due cognisance. I think that the distinction between those words was cynically abused by the Prime Minister himself—not by this Minister, who is far more credible on the issue. I think that there has been a collective failure of government. It was suggested earlier that the duty of the House is not necessarily to understand the administration of government. I thought that that was precisely the function of the House. We fear that there has been a failure of collective responsibility in this regard.