Cyprus

HC Deb 19 May 1976 vol 911 cc1399-403

12. Mr. Townsend

asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on Cyprus.

Mr. Hattersley

Her Majesty's Government actively support Dr. Waldheim's efforts to promote substantive negotiations between the Cyprus communities. They are the fora from which progress is most likely. Today the Select Committee on Cyprus publishes its report. The Government will formally comment upon it in the usual way. However, in the light of the report's contents, the House would expect a general reaction now. The Government regret that the Committee did not take the opportunity to make an impartial and constructive contribution to solving the Cyprus problem. The Committee ignored evidence demonstrating that military intervention in Cyprus was neither right nor possible. The report offers no evidence to show that the Committee's favoured strategy of isolating Turkey internationally would promote a solution. The Government of course accept the view that we should do all we can to achieve a solution. That is, and always has been, our policy.

Mr. Townsend

Does the right hon. Gentleman appreciate that the all-party report bears out what many of us have been saying, namely, that Government policy in this area has been badly misjudged, and that it also brings into question the judgment of the Prime Minister? Will he look carefully at the colonisation of northern Cyprus, bearing in mind that about 35,000 Turks have been introduced from the mainland to Cyprus at a time when the Greek Cypriot community in the north has been reduced to about 8,000?

Mr. Hattersley

I am conscious of the report and I spent my lunch time reading it. I also had the benefit of hearing the comments leaked on the radio at 8 o'clock this morning. The report contains a set of conclusions with which I disagree, and they are based on a number of facts which seem to me not to stand examination.

Mr. Christopher Price

The House will be in some difficulty. As my right hon. Friend may have read the report more carefully than others have done, will he convey to his right hon. Friend that his welcome translation to the Foreign Office gives him a real opportunity, whatever may have happened in the past, for a new British initiative, both through European institutions and through the coming Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference, to settle the Cyprus problem in a wider context, since clearly the present inter-communal talks have failed? Is my right hon. Friend aware that his tetchy comments on this report will not help in any way to get a real solution to this problem?

Mr. Hattersley

I always accept my hon. Friend's strictures, and I take it from him that the object of the report, of which he is a part author, was to contribute to the future rather than to dwell in a maudlin fashion on the past. He can be assured that my right hon. Friend will continue the Government's policy of trying to promote a solution to the Cyprus situation. My judgment of the report is that the idea that a solution can be brought about by isolating Turkey and relegating her to a situation of international isolation is not only wrong but diametrically wrong.

Mr. Jim Spicer

Will the right hon. Gentleman accept that many of us on this side of the House, and, I hope, on the other side too, will welcome his initial reaction to this report, which takes no account whatsoever of the persecution of the Turkish minority in Cyprus between 1960 and 1974? Will he confirm that in his view and in the view of the Government we should not reappoint the Select Committee if it is going to continue to produce reports that are as utterly biased as this one?

Mr. Hattersley

I am much obliged to the hon. Gentleman. Much as I am grateful for the first part of his question, I can hardly endorse the second part. It is a matter for the House what it does in terms of appointing Select Committees. It is a matter for Select Committees what they write. They are free to write and say what they want, so long as it is agreed that I am free to write and say what I conclude about their recommendations.

Mr. Corbett

The contents of the Select Committee's report apart, I plead with my right hon. Friend and the Secretary of State to put some new private and public initiative behind the drive to find a solution to the problem on this tragic island, which is of great concern. Will he assure the House that every possible step is being taken to encourage a successful outcome of the inter-communal talks as speedily as possible?

Mr. Hattersley

I am well aware of my hon. Friend's interest in these matters. We have had a number of conversations about them. I hope that I have done something to convince him, but, if not, let me reiterate that the Government will bend all their efforts to bring about a solution to this wholly tragic situation, which no one doubts has gone on for an intolerably long time. We have done our best within the EEC through private initiatives and through other fora, and we have done so in the belief that making progress is more important than making declarations. I know that that view is shared by my hon. Friend, and we shall go on operating in that way, because that seems the practical and right way to proceed.

Mr. Maudling

I have not had a chance to read the report and therefore cannot comment on its substance. In view of the unusually terse remarks of the right hon. Gentleman about the report, may we assume that there will be an early debate on it in the House? This is of great importance. We support the view that, whatever the past may have contained, the future and the present are important, and new initiatives of any kind that might produce results will be welcomed by the Opposition.

Mr. Hattersley

The question of a debate is not for me but for the Leader of the House. I should welcome a debate, not in terms of clarifying facts or correcting statements relating to this House and to the performance of the Government, but simply to ensure that any damage which may have been done in terms of the Government's initiative is corrected so that world opinion realises what the Government's attitude is to the report and that the report does not speak for the Government.

Mr. R. C. Mitchell

How can we expect a balanced report if we do not set up a balanced Committee? Is it not the responsibility of the House to ensure that any future Committee is far more balanced than this was?

Mr. Hattersley

It is not for me to comment on the composition of Committees, although it is my duty to comment on their conclusions.

Mr. Aitken

In view of the Minister's sanctimonious comments on how the report was leaked on the early morning radio, may I ask whether he is aware that his statement to the House a few moments ago was leaked on the one o'clock news, only two hours ago? Can the Government ever get away from double standards?

Mr. Hattersley

I know that the hon. Gentleman is an authority on these matters, but today he has got it wrong. As is well known, some amorphous being known as a "spokesman" speaks on behalf of the Foreign Office each morning. By an extraordinary coincidence, he said something that was about the same as my answer, though not identical to it.