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Mr. Cook: The hon. Gentleman talks about a mantra of "systemic and cultural" factors. Those words are quoted directly from the Legg report, which I hope that he will find time to study. I have presented the changes to the House clearly as a programme to modernise the Foreign Office and ensure that it is representative of modern Britain. I have a single figure number of women heads of mission out of 140-odd posts. If the hon. Gentleman does not understand why improving that gender balance should be part of a modern programme, I cannot help him any further.
Mr. Malcolm Savidge (Aberdeen, North): Does my right hon. Friend believe that, in the light of the report,
the attacks made on him and on the Foreign Office by the right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard) can be seen to be
- "full of sound and fury, signifying nothing"?
Mr. Cook: My hon. Friend makes his point well and with great literary knowledge. I shall not pursue him on that. I used to be a teacher of English and I would give him 100 per cent. for that effort.
Mr. Tim Collins (Westmorland and Lonsdale): Twice this afternoon, the right hon. Gentleman has quoted the Legg report, saying that the briefing provided to Ministers in advance of the Adjournment debate in March was seriously inadequate. Given that, does it not follow that--perhaps entirely inadvertently--Ministers misled the House? If that is so, should there not be a formal apology?
Mr. Cook: If the House was misled, of course there should be an apology. I have refreshed my memory by re-reading this morning what was said in the relevant passage by the Minister of State, and did not see any point at which he could have been accused of misleading the House. It is to his credit that he raised the issue in a debate in which nobody else raised it. I think that he should have had a full briefing on the allegations, although I should add that I would have been very distressed had he told the House that a Customs and Excise investigation was about to start. We are not going to get many convictions if we start to insist that Ministers should announce such investigations the moment they are set up.
Dr. Norman A. Godman (Greenock and Inverclyde): I was in a minority of one on the Select Committee in arguing for the Committee to investigate the Sierra Leone affair following the publication of the Legg report. I argued that case in the interests of natural justice for those who were to be cross-examined by Sir Thomas Legg. The Foreign Secretary referred to officials needing to obtain permission before they engage in discussions and negotiations with representatives of private military companies. Should the process not be tougher than that? Should there not be a code of practice concerning dealings with these so-called private military companies? Did not my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock(Mr. Mackinlay) get to the heart of the matter, when he said that there should be tougher supervision and regulation of groups of mercenaries that go under the rubric "private military companies"?
Mr. Cook: As I said, we will keep very much under review whether further supervision or regulation is required. I assure my hon. Friend that I have circulated written guidance--it goes under the rubric of "code of conduct"--that will require permission to be sought at head of Department level before any such contact takes place. Nobody should assume that, when sought, such a permission will automatically be given.
Mr. Andrew Lansley (South Cambridgeshire): The report offers no criticism of Ministers, yet does the Foreign Secretary not understand that it should have done so--and for the following reason? Speaking as a former civil servant, may I ask whether the Foreign Secretary
understands that a strong culture throughout the civil service demands that civil servants direct their efforts towards full and accurate briefing of Ministers? Does he not understand that Ministers might not have received a full and accurate briefing, and, in pursuance of that, neglected or failed to give full, accurate and timely information to Parliament, because of the way in which he and other Ministers conducted themselves in the management of the Department? Before the Foreign Secretary casts out the mote in other's eyes, should he not see whether there is a beam in his own?
Mr. Cook: If the hon. Gentleman wants to bother to take the time to read the Legg report, he will find that the passage on briefing of Ministers is, perhaps, the longest in the report. If he looks at it, he will find that it is not consistent with his description of conventional practice. As for the rest of his comments, I would say only that the idea that I should have sent back the Legg report because it did not criticise me sufficiently has given me the best laugh of the day.
Mr. Tam Dalyell (Linlithgow): Am I misguided in being rather uneasy about the treatment of a letter to Peter Penfold? On 11 May, the Prime Minister was widely reported as going out of his way to praise Britain's high commissioner in Sierra Leone, Peter Penfold, who was accused of co-operating with a mercenary operation mounted by Sandline International. According to the Prime Minister, Mr. Penfold had done "a superb job" in dealing with the consequences of the military coup and in working closely with the President. How can a man who was told by his Prime Minister in May that he had done "a superb job" receive a career-ruining letter of rebuke--for that is what it is--and be required to attend an interview with the permanent secretary in July? What differed between May and July?
Mr. Cook: My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister indeed said that Peter Penfold behaved as a hero during the original coup. In fairness to myself, I repeated that point in my statement when I said that Mr. Penfold showed great courage and commitment during that original coup and that he had since won high standing for Britain in Sierra Leone. He is entirely entitled to have that good record taken into account against the explicit findings of the Legg report on his contacts with Sandline. I announced to the House that I had taken that into account; that is why I do not intend to institute any formal proceedings against him. In the circumstances, a letter drawing the permanent secretary's attention to the report's findings is the least that could be done; indeed, I should expect the House to expect me to make him aware of what was said in the report.
Mr. David Heath (Somerton and Frome): Do not the "systemic and cultural" problems revealed by the report underline the fact that the Foreign Affairs Committee was entirely correct to take a real interest in the matter? Is not the Foreign Secretary slightly concerned at the lack of intellectual curiosity displayed by senior members of his Department when difficult questions on Sierra Leone were
asked in March and April? Does he regret that his decision to change the sanctions regime on arms exports was not highlighted in the report published by the Department of Trade and Industry on 1 July?
Mr. Cook: I plainly could not have expected the Department of Trade and Industry to highlight in its report of 1 July something that I am announcing in response to a report that I received on 24 July, but we shall be in contact with the DTI, with which we work closely on this matter, to ensure that everyone understands our new working procedures. I am not sure that I am entirely aware of the difficult questions that the hon. Gentleman says were raised in March. The Legg report certainly draws attention to the failure in February of senior management to act on information, but that is put in the context of what was then a major military engagement in Sierra Leone and of the substantial demand for humanitarian assistance, which management perhaps rightly regarded at the time as the more important priority.
Mr. Howard: May I again direct the Foreign Secretary's attention to the questions that I posed at the end of my response to his statement? He may not have heard them; he certainly made no attempt to answer them. Is he aware of the criticisms in paragraph 3.19 of the report that Ministers played down the fact that the coverage of the United Nations Security Council resolution was comprehensive? Does he appreciate that the report concludes that that playing down was deliberate, as Ministers knew that people on the ground were contemplating the use of force? Has he read paragraph 3.20, which, together with paragraph 3.19, specifically criticises the Minister of State and his answers to Parliament? Is he aware of the seriousness of those criticisms? Does he have any defence to them? If so, will he now say what it is?
Mr. Cook: The most obvious defence to paragraph 3.20 is that it does not refer to my hon. Friend the Minister of State--[Interruption.] I am merely reading the paragraph to which, after six hours of research, the right hon. and learned Gentleman has directed me. If the most damaging paragraph that he could find was one that contained no reference to my hon. Friend, perhaps I should have given him 12 hours to demonstrate how clean the report was.
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