David Cameron Blames Foreign Office And Home Office Disconnect For Historic Failures On Immigration

Foreign Secretary Lord David Cameron said he "blamed" his own government for allowing the Foreign Office and Home Office to pull against each other when trying to tackle illegal migration.

Cameron appeared in front of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee on Tuesday afternoon for the first time since being reappointed to government, the session having been postponed from its original date in December. As he is a member of the House of Lords and therefore cannot speak in the House of Commons, committee hearings are one of the only opportunities for MPs to scrutinise the foreign secretary directly.

Asked by members of committee what he was interested in doing differently as foreign secretary, the former prime minister praised his predecessor James Cleverly, now Home Secretary, but said he wanted to prevent the two departments pulling against each other on domestic issues such as migration.

“Too much in the past – and I blame my own government for this – the Foreign Office is going in one direction and the Home Office is going in another," he said.

He said that he would be looking at "trying to get them to work together on things like stopping migration upstream and helping stabilise countries and using all the tools you’ve got in the toolbox".

Cameron said he also wants to use his position to help the Department of Trade deliver "important trade deals" and get inward investment into the UK.

He set out the Foreign Office's top priorities as supporting Ukraine, aiming for a stable Middle East, enhancing UK security, helping international development, and boosting prosperity and jobs.

Cameron added that he wanted to see the "merger" between foreign affairs and international development within the FCDO work better, as he claimed there