MPs have called on UK ministers to toughen their approach towards foreign governments which detain British nationals overseas amid efforts to free a British-Egyptian citizen held in Egypt.
Foreign Office minister Hamish Falconer claimed positive links between London and Cairo could help Egypt improve its human rights record.
But earlier on Thursday, chairwoman of the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee Emily Thornberry warned of a “lack of cohesion” in Whitehall when officials deal with UK passport holders arbitrarily detained abroad.
John McDonnell, who had the Labour whip suspended in July for backing an SNP motion on welfare policy, urged Mr Falconer to consider how he could hit Egypt with trade penalties until authorities free 43-year-old pro-democracy writer Alaa Abd El-Fattah.
Mr El-Fattah was detained in September 29 2019, and in December 2021 was sentenced to five years in prison after being accused of spreading false news.
The Free Alaa campaign said he should have been released in September 2024 and his 68-year-old mother Laila Soueif is on hunger strike in protest over his continued imprisonment in Egypt, surviving on salts, black coffee and herbal tea.
Debating detained British nationals abroad, Labour MP Ms Thornberry told the Commons: “Why did the Department for Business and Trade organise industry delegations to Cairo in June 2024 and UK export finance in September to help host an Egypt-UK investment opportunity forum here in London, all the while that the Egyptian government have one of our citizens – Alaa Abd El-Fattah – wrongfully held in prison without consular access?
“Who thought that through? Did anybody think that through? Or was it one of those things that because there isn’t the focus, it just happened – and I suspect it’s the latter, that’s why we have to change.”
Douglas McAllister, the Labour MP for West Dunbartonshire, raised the case of 37-year-old Sikh rights campaigner Jagtar Singh Johal, from Dumbarton, who was arrested in November 2017 in Punjab, northern India, while in the country for his wedding.
Mr McAllister said: “Consular assistance should have a legal framework and not just a discretionary offering.
“Changing the culture of the FCDO (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office) and providing families with certainty with respect to what support their loved ones will receive as a matter of right is a necessity and we must introduce this.”
Mr McDonnell, who tabled a later adjournment debate about Mr El-Fattah’s case, watched on by his sister Sanaa Seif and cousin Omar Robert Hamilton from a side gallery, told MPs: “I hope the Government can grasp the urgency and the seriousness of the situation, especially in the context of a 68-year-old woman on hunger strike, whose life I believe is at risk.
“I urge the Government to take the action necessary to secure Alaa’s release in time hopefully to spend Christmas with his son in Brighton.”
He also said the Foreign Office should change the travel advice for Egypt on its website “to reflect the reality of the moment – the reality is if a person is arrested in Egypt, the Government cannot guarantee even consular access”.
Mr McDonnell suggested the move “would demonstrate to the Egyptians that our Government was talking Alaa’s detention seriously”, particularly in a country where “tourism is a significant part of the economy”.
He added: “We know that the Egyptian government is seeking an increase in British investment into Egypt. We should be clear and announce a moratorium on any new trade agreements with Egypt until Alaa is free.”
MPs agreed through a backbench business motion tabled by former Conservative minister Sir Iain Duncan Smith that they were “concerned by the number of arbitrarily detained British nationals at risk of human rights abuses abroad”.
Responding, Mr Falconer said: “We are currently assisting 1,400 British nationals overseas, some of these cases are more straightforward, some are considerably more complex. We provide assistance both directly and through a partnership with Prisoners Abroad, a highly valued charity.
“I regret, in so many of these cases, that in our few months in Government we have not yet seen positive progress on all of them.”
He said the Labour Government planned to introduce a “special envoy for complex consular cases” and added: “We will do so in part because we have heard from those families, including those in the gallery today, about what their experience has been of seeking Foreign Office support.”
Responding to the adjournment debate, the minister said: “I am aware of course of the understandable frustration that members feel at Alaa’s situation and the desire that the UK Government roll back our relationship or drop all economic support.
“But the truth is our partnership with Egypt is crucial to alleviating suffering in the region, and in our push for wider peace and security in the region.”
Mr Falconer continued: “At the heart of our general approach is the firm belief that through continued engagement, we can encourage the Egyptians to improve their human rights record, and that a stronger relationship than the one that we inherited will allow us to have the frank and open discussions with key decision-makers as I and colleagues have recently done, to see improvements both in Alaa’s case and in relation to the wider human rights and social situation in Egypt.”
