Quotes from Crispin Blunt

Any deeper involvement, including the use of airstrikes against Islamic State positions, will require parliamentary approval. The government anyway needs to get over its fear of discussing this with parliament and, if necessary, to seek authorisation at the appropriate moment.

King Abdullah gives a level of insight that we don't get from our own governments.

U.K. policy in Libya before and since the intervention of March 2011 was founded on erroneous assumptions and an incomplete understanding of the country and the situation.

The committee accepts that, as the government response suggests, U.K. policy in Libya was initially driven by a desire to protect civilians. However, we do not accept that it understood the implications of this, which included collapse of the state, failure of stabilization and the facilitation of Islamist extremism in Libya.

My ministerial career is 100 percent behind me, so I can be slightly braver about taking positions which I did argue for while in office, but was constrained by collective responsibility.

Frankly, everyone knows that Iain Duncan Smith is not making the impact we would all like him to be as our leader and is not making the necessary impact to carry credibility with the electorate as the alternative prime minister.

I accept of course we're in deep trouble and deep difficulty. But if we, under a new leader, reinvent ourselves properly as a Brexit party, we will be faced with the inevitability at some point of a general election in order to deliver Brexit because this Parliament is stopping the delivery of Brexit.

When the air forces of the U.S., Russia, France, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and others are already engaged with Isis in Syria, it's a shortage of targets rather than of aircraft that is the coalition's principal military constraint.

We don't comment on special forces operations. And if you run an operation for a long time as we have here, and in Libya, eventually newspapers like the Times report it.

To say that the U.K. could have no part to play in improving a justice system different to our own, but which was seeking advice on how to deliver more internationally compliant standards, was a betrayal of our international humanitarian duty.

I have known Damian Green for over 20 years, since we were elected together in 1997. He stands out among us with the highest standards of public service, probity and integrity.

I am a unionist. But I'm a unionist up to the point of, if other people don't want to be in a union with me then, well, fine.

Huwaei receives significant funding from the Chinese government and is run by a former director of the telecoms research unit of the People's Liberation Army. The components are feared to have given China the ability to disrupt or shut down key parts of the U.K.'s critical national infrastructure.

The cyber security strategy for the United Kingdom is a master of the formulaic jargon we have come to associate with the Labour government, and is almost totally devoid of substance.

Unity among like-minded liberal democracies is paramount.

The Conservatives as a Brexit party, being very clear about their objectives are almost certainly going to have to go into some kind of electoral arrangement with the Brexit Party, otherwise Brexit doesn't happen.

The FCO must help Turkey reinforce accountable state institutions, while also developing ties far beyond them: the UK needs a deeper and therefore more durable relationship with the Turkish people, whichever background they hold, while working to uphold the values of human rights and democracy that benefit them all.

It always had occurred to me that drugs misuse was obviously a major driver of demand in the criminal justice system.

Large numbers have been punished on the basis of a broad and vague definition of terrorism and a worryingly low threshold of evidence.

I strongly believe that we would be amiss to cut ourselves off from Saudi Arabia without expending every effort to avert disaster.

Is there an alternate role for the U.K. outside the E.U? I think absolutely there is. It shouldn't be something we should be worried about.

Refusal to engage with the Russian government is not a viable long-term foreign policy option for the U.K.

I accept that speculation, cheerful or otherwise, about the private life is something public figures must expect, but I am lucky enough to continue to enjoy the love and support of Victoria and my children, Claudia and Freddy, and to finally be at ease with myself.

The requirement for military force is clear when looking at the first of the nine points agreed in Vienna, which states that 'Syria's unity, independence, territorial integrity and secular character are fundamental.'