Coffee House Shots: why we left the Foreign Office | Ben Judah & Ameer Kotecha

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🗓️ 8 March 2026

⏱️ 36 minutes

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Summary

Does Britain still have a coherent foreign policy? James Heale and Tim Shipman are joined by Ben Judah, former special adviser to David Lammy, and Ameer Kotecha, who recently resigned from the Foreign Office.

Together they discuss why Britain’s diplomatic establishment is under growing criticism – from accusations that the department has become bloated and distracted by DEI, to Chagos and deeper concerns that Whitehall no longer has the expertise or strategic clarity needed in an increasingly unstable world.

With wars raging from Ukraine to the Middle East and tensions rising with China, they ask whether Britain has adapted to a more chaotic global order – or whether the country is still operating with the assumptions of a different era. They also debate the future of the ‘special relationship’ and whether we would be better served by distancing ourselves from our increasingly erratic American cousins.

Produced by Oscar Edmondson and Patrick Gibbons.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Transcript

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0:00.0	On Tuesday the 24th of March, our speakers will debate the motion,
0:04.0	this House believes we should abolish the licence fee.
0:07.2	Spectator Chairman Charles Moore and the telegraphs Alison Pearson
0:10.2	will propose the motion with Spectator editor Michael Gove
0:13.4	and former BBC America editor John Sopel opposing.
0:16.8	I'm Isabel Hardman and I'll be in the chair to maintain decorum and take your pressing questions.
0:22.2	Join us on Tuesday the 24th of March at 7pm and book your tickets at spectator.com forward slash debate.
0:35.8	Hello, welcome to Coffee House. I'm James Heel and I'm Tim Schittman. And today we're going to be talking about the Foreign Office. And we're delighted to be joined by two excellent guests. We've got David Lammy's former Spad, Ben Judah, and Amir Ketcher, who resigned this week from the Foreign Office over the various criticisms. Amir, could have summarise a piece for us you wrote in The Times. Yeah, thanks, James. Essentially what I said in the Times is that the foreign office is hopelessly distracted by the peripheral,
0:59.0	and that is all to the neglect of its core mission.
1:03.4	So I give sort of woke examples, woke distraction.
1:06.8	So I say that I was invited to a wild Afro Day celebration five years ago when Kabul was falling to the Taliban and, you know, right up to the present when the main story on the foreign office intranet, and I think that's a good sort of sign of the senior messaging or good example of the senior messaging to staff is about, again, some corporate irrelevance, you know, how to seize your
1:29.5	self-development. So, you know, it does feel like sort of fiddling while Rome Burns. You know,
1:34.3	we've got a war raging in the Middle East. And I just worry that the foreign office is distracted by
1:40.6	corporate issues, by insular naval gazing, by sort of woke excesses.
1:47.8	And as I say, it's all kind of, I think, to the abandonment of a focus, a really ruthless focus,
1:53.5	on the real foreign policy issues of the day.
1:55.8	What was the last straw for you then, Amir?
1:58.0	It's a big deal to resign for a job like that.
2:00.5	Why did you do it ultimately?
2:01.6	Chegos was the final straw for me, but, you know, the frustrations have been building for a long time.
2:07.6	But I just see in Chegos an example of all of these problems coming together.
2:12.6	There's lots to say about Cheagos, but ultimately, I think, however you look at it,
	...

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