Well, well, well. Baroness Chapman of Darlington – the international development minister – turned up to the House of Lords to address the UK government’s Chagos deal. Last October, Sir Keir Starmer’s government decided to cede sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius, a move that has sparked outrage in several quarters – not least among the Chagossians themselves. Last month, polling by the Friends of the British Overseas Territories revealed that, er, 99.2 per cent of Chagossians want the isles to remain British. Talk about decisive!

Not that Chapman appeared to acknowledge this when she spoke in the second chamber on the subject. Although concerns have been raised that the views of Chagossians had not been taken into account, the Labour peer insisted that:

This House clearly fee

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