I agree fully with right hon. Gentleman. I try my hardest to push that as leader of the delegation. It is essential to get across what the Council is about, how it can help, and the role it now plays in—I have to use this expression—a post-Brexit Britain. It plays a vital role in ensuring that we have good relations with parliamentarians in other parts of Europe.
I will conclude by saying that putting down written questions after each debate at the Council of Europe brings home how wide those debates are, and how they affect policy across Government. Debates that relate to the Foreign Office account for about 30%. The rest cover a range of Ministries, from the Department for Work and Pensions to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. I ask those questions I put to them to show the range of debates that we conduct, partly to ensure there is a written answer on record for the issues that have been discussed, and so that we understand what Government are doing. That is welcome, at least by members of the delegation, but we would welcome the Minister’s help in ensuring that the
Government’s position can be put across when rapporteurs visit the country on behalf of the Council and need to see a Minister. I know that that is a pain, but without it the result does not look good and can leave us in an embarrassing position.
I am extremely grateful not just for the work of all members of the delegation—we try to operate on a genuinely cross-party basis wherever possible, and the number of Members here for the debate illustrates that—but for our utterly brilliant secretariat led by Nick Wright, to whom we would all like to pay our thanks.