The legal costs in terms of Counsels’ fees incurred by the UK in defending the proceedings brought by Mauritius were £681,220. As the award has been handed down by the Arbitral Tribunal, we do not at this stage expect there to be any significant future legal costs.

The Tribunal has concluded that Mauritius and the UK should share the costs of the Tribunal in hearing this case. In that regard, the UK has made a payment of 1.3 million Euros (approximately £957,000). We will shortly be receiving a final note of fees of the Tribunal. We understand that it is likely that the UK’s payment exceeded the UK’s share of the Tribunal’s costs and that accordingly, a proportion of the UK’s payment will be remitted back. We therefore cannot at this stage give a final indication of the Tribunal’s total costs.

I refer the noble Lord to the Written Ministerial Statement I made on 24 March on Progress in reviewing policy on resettlement of the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT), (HLWS440). In relation to the Arbitral Tribunal, it remains the case that there is no question about the UK’s sovereignty of BIOT and we have always maintained that the Marine Protected Area is not a bar to resettlement.

Work to combat violence and discrimination against Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) people forms an important part of our wider international human rights work. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office works through our Embassies and High Commissions, and through international organisations, including the Commonwealth, the EU and the UN, to promote tolerance and non-discrimination against LGBT people and to address discriminatory laws, in particular those that criminalise homosexuality.

The UK has been a member of the LGBT core group in Geneva since 2011, playing a key role in passing the UN’s first ever resolution on LGBT rights and recently joined its counterpart group in New York.

Within the Commonwealth we continue to encourage the Secretariat and the Secretary-General to do more to promote the rights of its LGBT people. The former Foreign Secretary, my Rt hon friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks (William Hague), wrote to the Commonwealth Secretary-General in March urging him to take concrete action to address this issue within the Commonwealth.