Ben Wallace should resign – but he won’t

There are two kinds of people in this life: people who say Gavin Williamson is the least capable member of the Cabinet and people who have heard of Ben Wallace. The Secretary of State for Defence, in an intemperate answer in the Commons, claimed the UK waged ‘illegal wars’ under Labour. 

Wallace was speaking during the second reading of the overseas operations (service personnel and veterans) bill, which is intended to protect British soldiers from lawfare. It was rather unfortunate, then, that in the middle of trying to pass such a piece of legislation, the Defence Secretary would make a jibe about ‘illegal wars’ to the Labour benches. Steerpike has the video, in which Wallace shouts: 

‘Much of the mess we are having to come and clean up today is because of your illegal wars, your events in the past and the way you have run this, the, the, the… the safety for our forces.’

The legality of Operation Telic (the UK’s military campaign in Iraq) — and, to a lesser extent, Operation Herrick in Afghanistan — is the subject of political and academic debate, but neither operation has been determined to be contrary to international law by a court or other relevant body, such as the United Nations.