Sir Julian Lewis: As I believe the Foreign Secretary is an honest man, I am perfectly prepared to accept that he raised these matters of human rights as forcefully as he says he did, so there must be something wrong with the Foreign Office’s reporting, because that forcefulness does not find its way into its account of the visit. Is one reason why his officials are reluctant to relay what really happened the fact that we are overdependent on China, and has he made an assessment of what would happen in terms of our dependence on China were, heaven forbid, a conflict to break out over Taiwan?

[The Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs (Mr David Lammy): The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to raise dependency. One thing that the China audit will look at is that very issue, and the assessment that he refers to is being made not just by us, but by our closest allies.]