The Liberal Democrats have today called upon Deputy PM Dominic Raab to apologise for hosting a party at Chevening House for local Conservative activists as Afghanistan fell to the Taliban.
Raab is reported to have held the party for 50 association colleagues on the 4th of September – the same time at which MPs, their offices and the Afghan Special Cases Team were working tirelessly to assist in evacuating Afghans.
It comes after the testimony of whistleblower Raphael Marshall, who claims that the then Foreign Secretary delayed decision-making by inserting himself as a bureaucratic block.
The Liberal Democrats have also called upon the Deputy PM to urgently update Parliament on the progress of the FCDO’s internal inquiry into the evacuation.
Layla Moran MP, Liberal Democrat Spokesperson for Foreign Affairs, commented: “From his holiday in Crete in early August to his constituency bash at Chevening a month later, Raab’s eye was not on the ball during this crisis.
“While my office were trying to evacuate the four hundred Afghans on our books, Raab was entertaining fifty of his Conservative association colleagues in Chevening.
“As happy as I was that Raab was removed, it is regrettable that the Prime Minister allowed him to ‘fail upwards’ to the role of Deputy Prime Minister.
“The Foreign Secretary’s decision to down tools and host a Chevening party was a major error of judgement at best and sheer incompetence at worst. He must apologise to those he let down.”