Select committee: Foreign Affairs Committee
Recommendation 39
First report - In the room: the UK’s role in multilateral diplomacy
Published 17 Jun 2021
Addressed to Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
Foreign Affairs Committee The UK’s role in strengthening multilateral organisations All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
We recommend that the Government’s engagement with multilaterals includes a tactical element of multilateral strategy such that it tracks the activities of authoritarian states within both higher and lower profile multilateral organisations, reports on implications of any moves to exert influence; and adjusts its interventions accordingly. We recommend that the FCDO should coordinate this unified approach across Whitehall, covering all multilateral organisations. Coalitions of like-minded states
From: Foreign Affairs Committee, First report - In the room: the UK’s role in multilateral diplomacy (HC 199), 17 June 2021
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 10 September 2021.
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government responds on a report-by-report basis, agreeing with the Committee on defending the multilateral system, while setting out its own position on funding, INTERPOL, the WTO and aid conditionality.
- On reform, it "agrees that large-scale reform, subject to intergovernmental negotiation, comes with potential risks as well as benefits" and says reform should not be "an end in itself".
- On funding, it points to a new £340mn voluntary contribution to the WHO over four years, "linked to achievement of reform objectives", and says it will evaluate the mechanism at the end of that period.
- It does not accept incentivising ICC compliance through development assistance: "we do not believe it is appropriate" and says conditionality of this type "does not work".
- On INTERPOL, it says it is "considering" a joint statement against abuse of INTERPOL systems in a G7 communique, and says INTERPOL "has sufficient tools and measures" to address member behaviour.