Labour vows to give UK citizens abroad legal right to Foreign Office help

David Lammy: ‘Too often the government’s efforts to secure the release of British nationals unjustly detained abroad have been arbitrary, haphazard, uncoordinated.’ Photograph: Tayfun Salcı/Zuma Press Wire/Rex/Shutterstock

British citizens abroad will have a statutory right to receive Foreign Office consular assistance under a Labour government in plans proposed by the shadow foreign secretary, David Lammy.

The proposals come in the wake of repeated complaints by British prisoners abroad of Foreign Office indifference, or determination to put British diplomatic interests ahead of individual citizens.