Results 1-20 of 559 for speaker:Robert Marshall-Andrews

Debate on the Address: Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and Defence (23 Nov 2009)

Robert Marshall-Andrews: It is a privilege, as always, to follow the right hon. and learned Member for North-East Fife (Sir Menzies Campbell), and a privilege to be given the opportunity to spend 12 minutes reflecting, if I may, on the greatest British failure of foreign policy for 40 years. There are, unhappily, many worthy candidates for that particular plinth in our political pantheon: Iraq, certainly;...

Debate on the Address: Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and Defence (23 Nov 2009)

Robert Marshall-Andrews: Yes, I do, and I found the excuse for that situation-that the wording of the resolution was partial-to be deeply unsatisfactory and unmoving. The truth is that the debate was about Goldstone and everyone knew that-Goldstone being one of the most respected and distinguished South African judges, with an extremely long pedigree of dealing with matters of civil liberties within his own country...

Debate on the Address: Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and Defence (23 Nov 2009)

Robert Marshall-Andrews: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Debate on the Address: Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and Defence (23 Nov 2009)

Robert Marshall-Andrews: May I put to the right hon. Gentleman the same question that I put to the Foreign Secretary about the Goldstone report? That report identifies a large number of flagrant breaches of the Geneva convention-the fourth convention and its first protocol. In this country, as a result of the Geneva convention Acts, we have a duty to pursue and prosecute those breaches. In those circumstances, will...

Debate on the Address: Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and Defence (23 Nov 2009)

Robert Marshall-Andrews: The Foreign Secretary will be aware that, under the Geneva Conventions Act 1957 and the Geneva Conventions (Amendment) Act 1995, our country has not only a right, but a duty, to pursue in criminal courts those who are responsible for grave breaches of those conventions. As a matter of urgency, will he therefore speak to the Director of Public Prosecutions with a view to issuing warrants...

Written Answers — Health: Medical Treatments: Compensation (11 Nov 2009)

Robert Marshall-Andrews: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what ex-gratia payments have been made by his Department to (a) persons adversely affected by thalidomide and (b) other NHS patients who have been adversely affected by NHS treatment.

Bill Presented: Coroners and Justice Bill (9 Nov 2009) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: I will be very brief—briefer than I would otherwise be—one reason being that like many Members of the House, I would like to hear the views of the right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard), if, indeed, Mr. Deputy Speaker, you were minded to call him at any stage. In that hope, I will be as brief as I can be. I am grateful to be able to make a...

Bill Presented: Coroners and Justice Bill (9 Nov 2009) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: rose—

Bill Presented: Coroners and Justice Bill (9 Nov 2009) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: Does my right hon. Friend not understand that it is a question of scale? In any jury system there are always problems with public interest immunity—there always have been—and we get round them by a mixture of evidential routes that has served us extremely well. We now have a problem in one case—just one case in five years—and to rectify that evidential problem the...

Bill Presented: Coroners and Justice Bill (9 Nov 2009) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: This assessment must have been made so will the Secretary of State please tell us how many inquests—shall we say in the last five years—he estimates would have been affected by this Executive intervention?

Government Policy (Torture Overseas) (7 Jul 2009)

Robert Marshall-Andrews: I understand, as well as anybody, the Minister's reticence to deal with any case that is sub judice, whether before the initial court or before the Court of Appeal. What I do not understand, because he has gone on to deal with the general, rather than the particular, is why we cannot address the very simple issue in this case: that this man, who was plainly under investigation as a terrorist,...

Opposition Day — [14th allotted day]: Iraq Inquiry (24 Jun 2009) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: The passage to which I think the right hon. Gentleman is referring is exactly the mandarin passage that I had in mind, when Lord Butler said that, taking everything together, the committee was "surprised" that none of the intelligence being placed before the Government was reflected in the statements being made. The word "surprised" in mandarin does not mean: "Good Lord! Is that the time?" It...

Opposition Day — [14th allotted day]: Iraq Inquiry (24 Jun 2009) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: Many art forms thrive as a result of warfare, but none more, as a result of the Iraq war, than the art of sophistry. The ancient art of the sophist took apparently wise and irrefutable statements which, when they are carefully examined in the context in which they are made, turn out to be utterly without reason. There was no better example of that than the words that fell from the Prime...

Opposition Day — [14th allotted day]: Iraq Inquiry (24 Jun 2009) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: My good and hon. Friend shakes his head when I say that, but let us have an inquiry to find out, and then, at least, something that has passed between he and I will be laid to rest. It is we who were misled, if we were misled, and it is to us that the inquiry must answer and it is to us to set the terms of reference of that committee. The terms of reference are not in themselves a matter of...

Oral Answers to Questions — Children, Schools and Families: Iraq (15 Jun 2009) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: In the history of the conflict, two political matters cry out for explanation more than any other. The first is why the House was never informed of the contents of the Downing street minute that revealed knowledge six months before the conflict that the Bush Administration had decided on the inevitability of war, whatever concessions were made. The second matter that requires explanation is...

Employment Retention: Prevention and Suppression of Terrorism (3 Mar 2009) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: Most hon. Members remember that the legislation was passed immediately before the last general election. Many of us regard that as at least one reason for the Labour party's sustaining a seismic loss in its popular vote in the months that followed. The Government pray in aid the independence of the judiciary for sustaining the legislation, claiming that we can pass such legislation safely...

Employment Retention: Prevention and Suppression of Terrorism (3 Mar 2009) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: I am interested in the example that my right hon. Friend gave about the atrocity that took place in the past 48 hours against Sri Lankan cricketers. That happened in a country that not only has access to control orders, but has access to regular torture of suspects. I should have thought that if ever there was an example of repressive measures not controlling terrorism, it was that one.

Gaza (15 Jan 2009) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: I wonder if my hon. Friend can answer the following question, which I also put earlier. If there is systematic use by Hamas of civilians, schools, hospitals and the like in order to shield weaponry, why are journalists not allowed into the Gaza strip so that that can be verified independently?

Gaza (15 Jan 2009) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. The hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs. Ellman) would not give way to answer questions, so I wonder whether he will have a shot at answering this one. If there is any truth in the allegation that there is a deliberate and normal use of civilians as human shields—in other words, that they bring the attacks on...

Business of the House: Speaker's Committee on the Search of Offices on the Parliamentary Estate (8 Dec 2008) has video

Robert Marshall-Andrews: Will my right hon. Friend give way?