argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: Government Operations
Dominic Charles Roberts Grieve (Conservative, Centre-right): Yes, my hon. Friend is right. Maxwellisation provides people with the opportunity to respond to passages in a report that relate to them. In such circumstances, a reasonable period needs to be allowed for the process The point made by the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) is valid: if it is many years since a witness gave their evidence, it will take them longer to consider their response than if the process occurs a few weeks afterwards. However, I would still hope that a period of a few months was sufficient to conclude the process. That was why I was surprised, first, that the report was not published at the end of 2012 and, secondly—I must say that I am even more troubled by this—that we will not get it before the next general election.
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: Law and Crime
Bernard Christison Jenkin (Conservative, Centre-right): I will commit the sin of asking a question in the House to which I do not know the answer. Why is it called Maxwellisation? We used to talk about Salmon letters.? Is this process different or more protracted, and is it an opportunity for lawyers to extend the process for which they are paid?
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: Government Operations
Dominic Charles Roberts Grieve (Conservative, Centre-right): The terms mean one and the same thing. As with so many descriptions used in government, there is no difference between them. They started out as Salmon letters, but since Mr Maxwell’s experience the process has been described as Maxwellisation. I am sure that either term can be used. Is Maxwellisation an opportunity for lawyers to crawl over the report? I hope not. At the end of the day, it gives the person going to be criticised an opportunity to explain whether they agree or disagree with the criticisms, and in the light of any representations made it gives the inquiry members an opportunity to think about whether they wish to change their conclusions I must say, however, that the report is not ultimately holy writ. It will obviously have a marked effect, but it is the opinion of the inquiry. As long as the opinion has been arrived at reasonably and the process has been fair, the inquiry has to go ahead and produce its conclusions. Disagreements should not therefore lead to endless ping-pong. At some point, the inquiry has to come to a conclusion about whether or not it wishes to accept a representation. That is why I would not expect a Maxwellisation process to go on endlessly What has made me anxious is my impression that the Maxwellisation process seems hardly to have begun in many cases. For me, that raises these questions: has a further problem over the documentation led to the delays or has some other phenomenon crept in and caused the delays, and why has the Maxwellisation process taken so long to commence?
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: Law and Crime
Bernard Christison Jenkin (Conservative, Centre-right): As the inquiry is not a judicial one, do its findings have the legal immunity required to protect the authors of the report from judicial proceedings if they publish something defamatory or deeply unfair? Is that part of the reason why the process is taking longer?
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: Government Operations
Dominic Charles Roberts Grieve (Conservative, Centre-right): I can see where my hon. Friend is coming from, but his question goes into the realms of speculation. On the face of it, if the inquiry, which has been properly set up and conducted, makes a report—a Privy Council report—to Parliament, I do not see why such an issue should arise. My concern is to get an explanation.
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: International Affairs
Roderick James Nugent Stewart (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to my Cumbrian colleague for giving way. Is there not a paradox at the heart of this? One way in which the United Kingdom has responded to the humiliation of Iraq is by reducing our capacity to develop our own foreign policy and missions. If we look at our current position in Iraq, we see that we are in even less of a position today to provide an independent assessment of the US mission and strategy than we were in 2003.
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: International Affairs
David Michael Davis (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend will have noted that I deliberately avoided the Crimea, Dardanelles and other examples. The example I did cite was the Israeli Winograd inquiry, which was equally controversial and very sensitive. That inquiry was brought out, during the tenure of the Prime Minister involved, within seven and 17 months. Surely that is possible?
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: International Affairs
Keith Robert Simpson (Conservative, Centre-right): I agree with my hon. Friend, but the other factor, which has been touched on by a number of hon. Friends and colleagues, is that this is not a stand-alone British inquiry. We were the junior partner in an alliance with the United States of America. That lies at the heart of the Iraq inquiry. I would like to emphasise—I have discussed this with a number of hon. Friends and colleagues—that the Iraq inquiry is only act one of a two-act play. The second act is, of course, Afghanistan, and one feeds into the other. This is obviously a much broader subject, but we need to bear it in mind.
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: Government Operations
Keith Robert Simpson (Conservative, Centre-right): No, I do not. I have to say, with the greatest respect to my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve), the former Attorney-General, that my heart sinks every time I hear we are going to have lawyer-led inquiries. Ironically, despite the suspicion that it would be a cover-up, I actually think it is a great pity that we cannot have a parliamentary-led inquiry. There is enough talent in both Houses—experienced men and women—for Parliament to elect a person to chair such an inquiry and for the resources to be allocated. I would like to see that. That does not get around the length of timetable.
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: International Affairs
Keith Robert Simpson (Conservative, Centre-right): I, of course, accept that from my right hon. and learned Friend. In my opinion, it is a great pity he is no longer Attorney-General—[Hon. Members: "Hear, hear."]—but that is above my pay scale, as they say How can we help my hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Rory Stewart), the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, in his approach towards questioning Sir John Chilcot? One way around the problem is to suggest to Sir John Chilcot—other colleagues have touched on this—that he puts into the public domain, when he publishes his report, a lot of the correspondence and communications that went on between his inquiry, the Cabinet Office and various other organisations. My experience as a military historian is that when the official histories were published on the first and second world wars, they were interesting, but it was not until 30 years later that we were actually able to see the correspondence between official historians, individual commanders and others. We could then see how at times the official historians stood up to pressure, but how at other times things were massaged. I would be particularly interested to see the e-mails, correspondence and telephone conversations between Margaret Aldred, who ran the secretariat, Sir Jeremy Heywood and perhaps members of the Cabinet Office. That may be beyond his remit My final point is that we are where we are. When Sir John Chilcot publishes his inquiry, he will have a press conference. I assume that the Prime Minister of the day will make a statement, with questions and answers, but it is very important indeed that we have a full debate in both Houses, not immediately or on the next day, but within about three or four days. A report consisting of 1 million words will be a lot for us to consider. I do not blame Sir John Chilcot. I am not a man who sees a great conspiracy behind this, but I believe in transparency. It is about not just learning lessons, but trying to establish the truth.
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: International Affairs
Andrew John Bower Mitchell (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful for the chance to take part in an important debate that strikes at the heart of our role as Members of Parliament, for many of the uncomfortable reasons presented by the hon. Members for Newport West (Paul Flynn) and for Bradford West (George Galloway). It touches particularly on our responsibility, as the legislature, to our constituents. Our reaction, therefore, as Members of the House of Commons and on behalf of our constituents, to the grotesque delays in producing the report is a matter of great importance This debate is not about former Prime Minister Tony Blair. However, like my right hon. Friend the Member for Croydon South (Sir Richard Ottaway), the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, I was here for that debate in 2003. Although advised by the Opposition Whips, I had not made up my mind how to vote when I entered the Chamber. I could not get a seat, so I sat in the Gangway, and I listened to the Prime Minister. To some extent, this answers the important question from the hon. Member for Bradford West about how we, who were supposedly well educated and informed, knew less than the phenomenal number of people out on the streets demonstrating against the Iraq war. Sitting in the Gangway, with the Prime Minister a few feet away, speaking about the threat to Britain and the international order and the importance of military action, I was persuaded.
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: International Affairs
Roderick James Nugent Stewart (Conservative, Centre-right): Is there not a danger of this debate becoming an opportunity for self-congratulation or self-laceration on the part of Members of Parliament rather than focusing on the real lessons for how Britain acts in the world?
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: International Affairs
Roderick James Nugent Stewart (Conservative, Centre-right): It seems to me that the challenge in relation to the Chilcot inquiry is our inability in Britain to come to terms with failure, our inability to come to terms with what exactly went wrong with Iraq, and our inability to reform. As a result of all that, we have a real problem when it comes to acting in the world in the future. Unless we go through the process of coming to terms with who we are and how we got this wrong—whether through the Chilcot inquiry, through our Parliament, or by some other means—we will remain paralysed At present, Iraq is sitting like some rotting corpse in a cupboard, the nature of which we do not quite understand. We can see the consequences of that in the problems of British foreign and defence policy in the last 13 years. We can see the inability to come to terms with Iraq in our mistakes in Afghanistan. We can also see the inability to come to terms with Iraq in our current inaction. Britain is currently in a very paralysed state. There is a deep insecurity, and an anxiety. We are not pulling enough weight in NATO, and we are not pulling enough weight in the United Nations. We are failing to commit ourselves to spending 2% of our GDP on defence, which is symptomatic of our inability to come to terms with Putin or Ukraine All that brings us back to the four-letter word "Iraq". Iraq has become, for us, a kind of Vietnam. It has become, in the British consciousness, something that we cannot get beyond, something that we cannot see through. The Chilcot report needs to be published to enable us in Britain to understand what happened in Iraq—understand exactly what happened in Iraq—to enable us to introduce the reforms that the Government need in order to be able to act again in the future, and to enable us to recover our confidence as a nation One of our problems with the debate, and, perhaps, with the Chilcot inquiry, has been that the understanding of what went wrong in Iraq is still too limited. We are still understandably obsessed with the legality of the war, and also with the issue of post-war planning. In Afghanistan we went into a war that was legal, in those terms, and in which, at least in Helmand, a great deal of planning took place; yet the results there were also a mess. In other words, the problem of Iraq cannot simply be reduced to legality and post-war planning. There is a deeper problem in Iraq, and the deeper problem in Iraq, with which I think we all struggle to deal, is a problem with ourselves. It is the problem of who Britain is, and what Britain does in the world. One way of expressing it is that we are failing to come to terms with our limits—the limits of our knowledge, the limits of our capacity, and the limits of our legitimacy.
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: International Affairs
Roderick James Nugent Stewart (Conservative, Centre-right): I understand absolutely that that is the hon. Gentleman’s position, but our position should be different, and this is where Britain differs from a country like Denmark. First, we should be investing in knowledge—investing in knowledge in the Foreign Office, which means ensuring that there are proper language allowances and that we dismantle the grisly core competency framework for promotion, and that we get out of the situation of there being only three out of 15 ambassadors in the middle east who can speak Arabic.
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: International Affairs
Roderick James Nugent Stewart (Conservative, Centre-right): The danger of the hon. Gentleman’s anti-imperialist rhetoric is that we are not going to come to terms with how to prevent genocides in the future. What is he proposing in terms of reform, energy, compassion and confidence to deal with an Auschwitz-Birkenau, a Bosnia or a Rwanda in the future, if all he has to say is that we are a small country that cannot afford to do anything in the world?
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: International Affairs
David Anthony Andrew Amess (Conservative, Centre-right): I do not have a military background, as is obvious if one looks at my shoes—according to my wife, I am terribly untidy—but the House of Commons contains many military and foreign affairs experts. I recall 18 March 2003 clearly. My then party leader—in those days, we seemed to have a regular turnover of party leaders—was called to No. 10 Downing street and given a briefing. He came back and addressed the Conservative parliamentary party meeting. I listened carefully to what he said, but my gut instinct was that it was wrong for us to get involved in the conflict. Colleagues who were there have mentioned the House, and I was part of that packed Chamber. I listened carefully to what the then Prime Minister said at that Dispatch Box. He clearly told us that there were weapons of mass destruction that could reach this country within 45 minutes. I have to say to other Members who have spoken that I really did believe him. So I changed how I was going to vote and I will regret that decision until the day I die Following on from what colleagues have said earlier, when it came to the vote on Syria I did not discuss the matter with any colleagues. I dare say they said, "We’ll take the hon. Member for Southend West for granted. He is going to support the Government." They were surprised, because I decided to use my own judgment and not make the same mistake again. I was one of the 30 Conservative Members of Parliament who voted against that particular involvement in conflict. Just to pick up on what one hon. Member said earlier, it was not six Conservative Members of Parliament who voted against the Iraq war—I believe it was 16 to 18. Oh, how I wished I had done what they did.
Iraq Inquiry — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: International Affairs
David Michael Davis (Conservative, Centre-right): This has been an excellent debate, with cogent and well informed arguments delivered with both passion and forensic skill. There have been divisions between Members, of course, but virtually everybody in the House agrees that six years is too long and that the report should have been published some time ago. Although some think it is too late to hold people to account for what happened, it is not too late to learn. I believe that everybody agrees we should get this thing published as soon as possible. Next week, the Foreign Affairs Committee will meet Sir John, I think largely as a result of this debate being called, and will ask him for the reasons for the delays and for a timetable. I hope that he will be able to provide that. Part of the aim is to put pressure on him for a very fast delivery of the report. The reason is simple—the Iraq war was a disaster, and we need to understand why, simply so that we can make sure it never, ever happens again. To that end, I ask the House to support the motion Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House regrets that the Iraq Inquiry has decided to defer publication of its report until after 7 May 2015; and calls on the Inquiry to publish a timetable for publication and an explanation of the causes of the delay by 12 February 2015.
Open-cast Coal Sites (Restoration) — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: Environment
Matthew John David Hancock (Conservative, Centre-right): The expected cost of future restoration was taken into account in the amount that the companies paid at the time for the right to mine We will work with all parties on this. I look forward to working with Treasury civil servants and, I hope, Ministers, but also with Members in the House today, with the Coal Authority, which has an important role to play, and with devolved Administrations and local government. I confirm the offer of the meeting that we discussed earlier this month. I will ask the Coal Authority to make sure that it makes itself available to Members to discuss, in particular, the detailed issue of having the often highly specialist expertise needed within mineral planning authorities to tackle these problems I want to turn to the Hargreaves proposal, which was recently discussed in Westminster Hall. The suggestion is that if available resources at unrestored sites orphaned by failed companies could be mined and sold exempt of carbon price support payments, sufficient revenue could be generated to restore the sites to a good standard. The proposal is unusual because it suggests using a tax exemption to pay for a cash obligation. Employment creation and retention and the offsetting of tax generated are cited as additional benefits, above and beyond the core environmental question We are working with the Treasury on whether there can be exemptions from the carbon price floor. The Treasury has the lead on the carbon price floor because it is a tax, but that issue is worth considering. The CPF exists to enable us to meet our climate obligations, and it is an important part of our armament for tackling climate change. We have capped the carbon price floor—we have fixed it, so to speak—but I am happy to look at that and to continue to discuss it with my hon. Friends.
Open-cast Coal Sites (Restoration) — House of Commons, 2015-01-29
Topic: Environment
Matthew John David Hancock (Conservative, Centre-right): The carbon price floor is a UK tax, so although the proposal was made in response to the problems in Scotland, it could be applied across the UK. I cannot, however, commit to taking that forward. It may well be that a tax solution to what is essentially a spending liability is not the most resource-efficient policy for a Government who do not have much freely available finance, for reasons that we all know and understand I want to turn to the payments or restoration funds available. Under British Coal, once coaling ceased and restoration began, the restoration lump sum was released progressively to the contractor to finance the process. We must remember that British Coal primarily operated on a commercial basis, and the revenue it derived from licensing coal for extraction was offset against its operating costs. The fact that that has now moved to a private company does not change the fundamental question of whether enough has been put aside to ensure that, after the event, we can restore sites where coal was brought out of the ground I end by saying that when such a process is done well, it can be very positive for the local environment. In my constituency and others across the country—from Berwick-upon-Tweed to south Wales—sites have been restored effectively and, if anything, they are more beautiful and positive than sites elsewhere. That is a difficult task, but I look forward to working with Members from all parties to resolve this very difficult issue.
Public Procurement: Small Businesses — House of Commons, 2015-03-25
Topic: Government Operations
Robert Owen Biggs Wilson (Conservative, Centre-right): We have obviously made a lot of progress and there is more to do, but we intend to extend and embed the reforms that we have made over the past five years. I would just remind my hon. Friend that at the last general election, only 6.5% of direct central Government procurement spend was with smaller businesses, and we had no idea how much was spent in the supply chain, so we have made huge progress.
Building Workers: Shrewsbury — House of Commons, 2015-03-25
Topic: Law and Crime
Questions: If he will expedite the review of papers held on people convicted in 1973 in relation to alleged incidents during the national building workers’ strike at building sites in the Shrewsbury area so that the review is completed as soon as possible.
Oliver Letwin (Conservative, Centre-right): I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman is unaware of the actual situation. The review of which he speaks is under way at present, but the papers—and the particular parts of those papers that were kept back on security grounds—have all been given to the Criminal Cases Review Commission, which has looked at them and is using them in the course of its review. There is no question of any injustice of the kind he describes occurring as a result of the lack of those papers being present. I, however, assure the hon. Gentleman that if I find myself in my current post after the election, I shall seek to expedite the review.
Building Workers: Shrewsbury — House of Commons, 2015-03-25
Topic: Law and Crime
Questions: If he will expedite the review of papers held on people convicted in 1973 in relation to alleged incidents during the national building workers’ strike at building sites in the Shrewsbury area so that the review is completed as soon as possible.
Oliver Letwin (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend is also suffering from a misconception. The bulk of the papers involved were released. The bits that were not released relate to security and make specific references to the security services and their activities. Those are being reviewed, and a decision will be made. He is absolutely right that the crucial point is that the people involved deserve justice, so the CCRC needs to see the unexpurgated version, and it has. It has been given full sight of all the papers.
Building Workers: Shrewsbury — House of Commons, 2015-03-25
Topic: Law and Crime
Questions: If he will expedite the review of papers held on people convicted in 1973 in relation to alleged incidents during the national building workers’ strike at building sites in the Shrewsbury area so that the review is completed as soon as possible.
Oliver Letwin (Conservative, Centre-right): I am sorry that the shadow Minister wrote that question before she heard my previous answers. If, as I hope she will not, she finds herself a Minister after the election and has to make this decision—[Hon. Members: "Hear, hear."] If she finds herself in that position, I hope that she will discover the truth, which I have already told the House—that the CCRC has already seen the papers, so there is no question of justice being either delayed or denied.