LGBT Rights: Brunei
Debate between Richard Graham and Philip Hollobone(5 years, 2 months ago)
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Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)
Thank you very much, Mr Hollobone. This is a good debate that follows both Foreign Office Questions and the statement by the Minister last week. I congratulate the hon. Member for Bristol West (Thangam Debbonaire) on raising the issue, about which many around the House and around the country will feel the same way.
I want to make two points, if I may. The Commonwealth charter itself is very clear about the requirements on Commonwealth members to oppose all forms of discrimination. In 2018 at CHOGM, the Prime Minister was clear about the importance that nobody faces discrimination or persecution because of whom they love. I suspect that the amount of strong opposition to the sharia penal code that has been implemented in Brunei will come as a surprise to the population of that country—an ally and friend of ours—because they will not have anticipated the stream of condemnation that has come their way.
I ask the Minister whether we can, in a sense, help to guide the Kingdom of Brunei through what is a very difficult situation for our relationship with it. Can we encourage it to look carefully at means of reassuring its own citizens, as well as others around the world, that this is not a change in the fundamentally tolerant approach that is characteristic of that country for all of us who have been? Can we encourage Brunei to do whatever possible to mitigate the introduction of the last part of the sharia penal code?
Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)
We now come to the Front Benches. I call Hannah Bardell for the SNP.