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Iraq

I think that the right hon. and learned Gentleman misrepresents the position in Iraq. Our forces, and those personnel who support them from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the Ministry of Defence and the Department for International Development, have been making significant progress, not only in training the Iraqi security forces, but in helping the democratically elected Iraqi Government, after decades during which the country was destroyed by the tyranny of a dictatorship, build an Administration who are increasingly becoming more competent and able to serve their own people. With respect, it is a gross misrepresentation to suggest that those achievements have not been made by those people, who have put their lives on the line. The right hon. and learned Gentleman asks me how long it will be acceptable for me to come to the Dispatch Box to express condolences for the deaths of troops in operations. I do not think that it will ever be acceptable for me to do that—that is not a word that I would use. I find it deeply difficult—not for me, but for the people who I know grieve over the people who have lost their lives. That will never be acceptable as far as I am concerned. As the right hon. and learned Gentleman will understand, I would much rather not have to do it at all. During my time as Secretary of State for Defence, I have had some difficult statements to make from this Dispatch Box, but I do not recollect that I have had to make a series of statements of the type that the right hon. and learned Gentleman describes. I have never made a statement at this Dispatch Box of that nature. This is the point at which provincial Iraqi control is being tested by the Iraqi Government themselves taking responsibility and taking decisions. It is a very difficult thing that that Government have chosen to do. There are many positive aspects to the fact that they are prepared to do it, not least the even-handedness of the Government's approach and the fact that the Prime Minister took responsibility for it. It is a difficult thing to do. We need to stay with these people and support them, in the way that we have been doing, to the extent that they need to see this through.