David Cameron has said he plans to stage a quick Commons vote on extending airstrikes in Syria next week, saying he will make an oral statement to MPs this Thursday and then ask MPs to consider his proposals over the weekend before going to a full debate and vote.
The prime minister told MPs: “I don’t want to bounce the house into this. Members of parliament will be able to take it away, consider it over the weekend, and then we go to having a full day’s debate and proper consideration, and a vote. We shouldn’t take too long over it. Every day that we spend is a day that we’re not getting to grips with the Isil menace.”
Cameron’s timetable also gives time for the defence secretary, Michael Fallon, to brief individual MPs. Many Labour MPs and probably a majority of the shadow cabinet are open to airstrikes so long as it part of a wider political and diplomatic strategy, including ideally a ceasefire between Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, and most rebel forces apart from Isis and al-Nusra front.
Cameron, who visited the site of terrorist attacks in Paris on Monday morning, told MPs that the attacks in Paris showed Isis was not a remote threat thousands of miles away, and it was his firm conviction that Britain should join the air campaign in Syria.
He stressed: “My aim here is to bring together the biggest possible majority across this house for taking the action that I think is necessary.
“And I’m not saying that we will solve this problem simply by crossing a line from Iraq into Syria.
“We’ll solve this problem if we have a political strategy, a diplomatic strategy, a humanitarian strategy.”
source: theguardian