Baroness McIntosh of Pickering
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Business of the House
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts(9 years, 8 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Hague
This is also a very important issue and the hon. Lady is quite right to draw attention to it. I cannot offer an additional debate in Government time at the moment, but of course these issues are related to some of the matters that we will discuss in Wednesday’s foreign policy debate. We should all be clear that whatever our views about the rights and wrongs of conflicts in the middle east, Israeli action in Gaza, attacks on Israel by Hamas from Gaza or the two-state solution that is necessary in the middle east conflict, it is utterly unacceptable to try to translate that into anti-Semitism in any form. In the United Kingdom, we should stand strongly against that and that is why, whatever our disagreements from time to time with the Government of Israel, we stand by the legitimacy of Israel and stand strongly against anti-Semitism in any form.
Miss Anne McIntosh (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)
I welcome my right hon. Friend and constituency neighbour to his new position. The publication of the Elliott review today is very welcome, and it makes some specific proposals. The general debate on Monday will discuss food fraud in broad terms, and we obviously want to congratulate the Government on accepting all the Elliott proposals, but we need to know the time scale and the specific proposals for when the food crime unit and national lab service will come into effect.
Mr Hague
I welcome my hon. Friend’s welcome for what my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has set out in accepting the recommendations of the Elliott report. As I said, that has been set out in a written ministerial statement but I have no doubt that the Secretary of State will wish to expand on the detail of the implementation in due course. This is the Government’s initial and very clear reaction, but of course the Ministers concerned will have to return to the issue and keep the House up to date on that.