G7 leaders should be wary of taking bombastic lectures from Boris Johnson – Liz Saville Roberts MP

Plaid MP writes in Sunday Times that values of ‘openness, freedom, democracy’ must start at home

Plaid Cymru’s Westminster leader, Liz Saville Roberts MP, has today (Sunday 13 June 2021) said that international leaders “should be wary of taking bombastic lectures” from Boris Johnson until he starts leading by example.

Ms Saville Roberts was responding to an article written by the Prime Minister in The Times on Thursday 10 June in which he wrote that “the G7 summit is a chance to show the world our values: openness, freedom, democracy”.

In a column in the Sunday Times, Ms Saville Roberts says that the UK Government are “doing anything but demonstrate the UK’s openness or respect for individual freedom“, highlighting the Home Secretary’s threats use force against desperate migrants, EU nationals detained and fingerprinted on arrival, and asylum seekers housed in uninhabitable barracks.

She also said that by “illegally dismissing parliament to avoid scrutiny“, and “breaking the law by awarding contracts to their friends“, Mr Johnson had not espoused democratic values at home. Referring to recent legislation that seeks to undermine devolution, Ms Saville Roberts said that Mr Johnson had “steamrolled Welsh democracy and institutions through the Internal Market Act”.

The Dwyfor Meirionnydd MP warned the international community therefore against “taking bombastic lectures from a Prime Minister who has spent the last few years undermining our vaunted, alleged values at every turn.”

Ms Saville Roberts writes:

“According to the Prime Minister, the G7 summit is a chance to show the world our values: ‘openness, freedom, democracy’. But for Mr Johnson to have any credibility, he must start at home.

 “His government and party are doing anything but demonstrate the UK’s openness or respect for individual freedom, with the Home Secretary threatening to use force against desperate migrants, EU nationals detained and fingerprinted on arrival and asylum seekers housed in uninhabitable barracks.

 “It is fair to say that Boris Johnson is hardly known for his respect for democracy either. From illegally dismissing parliament to avoid scrutiny, to his government breaking the law by awarding contracts to their friends, democratic values are shown scant respect in Westminster. Tory donors are being ennobled to take their place in an unelected second chamber, while taxpayers’ money is funnelled to affluent Tory seats in the name of ‘levelling up’.

 “The UK government steamrolled Welsh democracy through the Internal Market Act, undermining our ability to develop our economy, support our local communities and implement meaningful environmental protections with any cohesive sense of strategy or long-term direction. More pertinently to the summit, the UK Government has issued new guidance to UK diplomats instructing them to erase Welsh nationhood and instead refer solely to the United Kingdom as one ‘country’.

 “Put simply, the international community should be wary of taking bombastic lectures from a Prime Minister who has spent the last few years undermining our vaunted, alleged values at every turn.”