British Overseas Territories: International Negotiations — Question

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 3:04 pm on 13 July 2009.

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Photo of Lord Wallace of Saltaire Lord Wallace of Saltaire Deputy Leader in the House of Lords, Spokesperson for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs 3:04, 13 July 2009

My Lords, I thank the Minister for that Answer and I thank the Foreign Office for its useful briefing on general entrustments and individual entrustments, and the technical terms of which I had not been previously aware. Is it not extraordinary that the Government of Bermuda negotiated directly with the United States Government that senior members of the White House staff would accompany the Uighurs from Washington to Bermuda without informing the British Government? Do the Government think that it is possible to sustain the current relationship with our overseas territories in the western Atlantic and the Caribbean, given the extent of their dependence on the United States for American money—legal and illegal—in those territories and the extent to which the American Administration now expect to influence what goes on in those territories, and I have not even mentioned Grenada yet?