In Conversation With Rt Hon Dr Liam Fox MP

Overview

Ryan Henson, CEO at the Coalition for Global Prosperity spoke with the Rt Hon Dr Liam Fox MP, about ‘Global Britain’, international development and the UK’s national interest.

Opening remarks

Ryan Henson, CEO of the Coalition for Global Prosperity, welcomed guests to the hybrid event. He stated that the Coalition for Global Prosperity had started over 3 years ago, and that its purpose was to bring together people who believe that leveraging a development budget would ensure that the UK prospered. 

Henson introduced Dr Liam Fox, stating he had served, among other positions, as defence secretary and international trade secretary. 

Dr Liam Fox said he regarded himself as an “unreconstructed free market, Thatcherite atlantacist”. He said the concept of “over there” was increasingly redundant as it would soon impact us. He stressed that politics had some catching up with business in terms of how it views the world and collaboration.

Whitehall, he said, must be re-engineered for the ‘Global Britain’ agenda. 

Fox said there was a very strong link between prosperity and trade, and if the UK was unable to offer people in the developing world the promise of prosperity, then you would get more mass migration and radicalisation. 

Challenges facing UK and the West

Dr Liam Fox said the first duty of government was security, and the UK had just become much less secure than it was a few weeks ago due to Afghanistan. He said he had been angry about the betrayal of Afghanistan by the US administration, both Trump and Biden’s. 

“We are less secure, and it will go down as a major mistake”, Fox stressed.

Instability was also driven by political ideology and by availability of commodities, he said. He doubted whether the UK was good at predicting where instability was coming from and said that during the Arab Spring the UK’s analysis had been wrong and it was, in fact, a commodity driven crisis rather than a demand for democracy. “Our failure to understand the cause of the instability… left us to blunder into a conflict where we had no strategy”, Dr Fox said.

Afghanistan

Dr Fox said the withdrawal was a “policy made in the US” and it was important not to be too UK centric about it. He said that it would have been difficult for NATO to fill the gap and accused NATO members of “hypocrisy” for not spending adequate amounts on defence (2 percent of GDP) and then complaining about being too reliant on the United States. 

However, Fox said the collapse of Afghanistan to the Talban was “unforgivable”. He said there would be problems within NATO as the US had acted unilaterally. This, he said, may foster fears amongst NATO allies for future conflicts. 

It would “undoubtedly” be perceived as weakness in Iran, Russia and China, Dr Fox said. 

Dr Fox said the Ukrainians would probably be the biggest “loser” from this fall out, as Russia would be emboldened to think they could act with impunity.

Taiwan would also suffer, Fox predicted, and it would lead to increased instability in the Gulf. 

Should the decision by Biden administration be seen as a one off? And where should the UK look for its alliances? 

Normal American posturing is isolationist, Dr Fox said. It was unusual for them to act as an outward looking country. 

He said he could understand why the US didn’t want to be global policemen, but said they were the biggest economy and military and therefore had a global role. 

Fox said the UK should “stick with the United States” and said they were our biggest and strongest ally. He said our response should be to “redouble” relationship with US counterparts. 

International Development in achieving UK strategic objectives

Dr Fox said it was in everyone’s interests that other people can access prosperity in their own country. They needed developing countries to have access to services, he said, and stressed that the focus should be in making them self-sustaining. 

Outward direct investment, he said, was very important and said there was still work required on links between trade, development, and investment. Africa, he said, would be the world’s biggest middle-class market soon and questioned why UK had issue with “marrying up” economic connections.