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Oral Answers to Questions
(12 years, 1 month ago)
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Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)
1. What recent assessment he has made of the security situation in Northern Ireland; and if he will make a statement.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
11. What recent assessment he has made of the security situation in Northern Ireland; and if he will make a statement.
The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr Owen Paterson)
As I stated last week in my first biannual statement on the security situation in Northern Ireland, the threat remains severe. Tackling terrorism in all its forms and within the rule of law remains the highest priority for this Government. We will continue to work as closely as possible with our strategic partners in the Police Service of Northern Ireland, the Northern Ireland Executive and the Irish Government to counter this threat.
Pauline Latham
I welcome the steps being taken to reduce the number of terrorist attacks in Northern Ireland, but as my right hon. Friend said in his recent written ministerial statement, violent activity is still being undertaken by loyalist organisations. What measures are being taken to address this issue?
Mr Paterson
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that question and would immediately like to pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Minister of State, who has done a huge amount of work, talking to a number of loyalist groups. There is absolutely no place for organised crime or violence in Northern Ireland. I would appeal to everybody to work closely with the PSNI and to pursue whatever political aims they have through peaceful, democratic means.
Robert Halfon
Does my right hon. Friend share my concern that, in what will be a high-profile year for the United Kingdom—and for Harlow, given the number of Olympic events happening in and around my constituency—the security threat in Northern Ireland remains at “severe”?
Mr Paterson
My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to the Olympics, which present us with a wonderful opportunity to sell this country. Northern Ireland-related terrorism in Great Britain is graded as “substantial”. I work closely with my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, and I saw the Minister for Justice in Northern Ireland on Monday. Together we are determined to ensure that there should be no threat to a peaceful and successful Olympics.
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)
The Secretary of State will be aware of a murder in Londonderry in recent weeks and the continuing targeting by dissident republicans of a number of people, and not just in the border area, but across Northern Ireland. Is he content in his discussions with the Chief Constable and the Minister for Justice that the necessary resources are in place to deal with the escalating problem?
Mr Paterson
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for mentioning that disgusting and deplorable murder. I spoke to the Chief Constable this morning, and I would remind the hon. Gentleman that we agreed a special package of £200 million at the request of the Chief Constable, who said in April last year:
“We have the resources, we have the resilience and we have the commitment.”
Paul Goggins (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)
When he recently acquitted those charged with the murder of Tommy English, Mr Justice Gillen reminded us that the use of accomplice evidence is long established and, in the words of his judgment, is
“a price worth paying in the interest of protecting the public from major criminals”.
Will the Secretary of State confirm that the relevant provisions of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 will remain available to the PSNI?
Mr Paterson
I will check the exact details of those provisions and get back to the right hon. Gentleman.
Jack Lopresti (Filton and Bradley Stoke) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is impossible to engage in dialogue with dissident organisations that show no signs at all of renouncing their violent or criminal ways?
Mr Paterson
My hon. Friend is quite right. As I said a few moments ago, there is absolutely no excuse for pursuing political aims by anything other than peaceful democratic means, through the Assembly and representation in this Parliament. There are small numbers of groups that do not accept the current settlement, and we are determined to bear down on them.
Vernon Coaker (Gedling) (Lab)
May I say again to the Secretary of State that we will stand with him in tackling any threat to security in Northern Ireland? In tackling terrorism, resources for the police and security services are obviously paramount. Does he also agree, however, that the many community and voluntary organisations in Northern Ireland contribute hugely to a peaceful and stable society? Can he therefore update the House on progress with the Peace IV funding bid to the European Union, which is so helpful to maintaining security?
Mr Paterson
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his continued support on these serious security issues, which must remain a bilateral matter. I entirely agree with him about the community projects and funds. What we are putting into security can only contain the problem; the long-term solution is to get deep into those communities. I called a meeting with Eamon Gilmore and the First Minister and Deputy First Minister to look at the Peace IV funds, which we think would come from our existing budgets.
Vernon Coaker
I thank the Secretary of State for his response. The financial support for communities, currently almost £300 million, is crucial to combating paramilitarism, maintaining security and ensuring that we continue to build the peaceful future in Northern Ireland that we all want. Will he ensure that he gives this matter the urgent attention that it deserves?
Mr Paterson
I would genuinely like to reassure the hon. Gentleman that we talk about this matter frequently, not only with the First Minister and Deputy First Minister but with the Justice Minister, whom I saw on Monday. A lot of these projects are now in devolved hands—many of them in the hands of the Department of Justice—and we entirely agree that they need to carry on.
Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty) (Con)
2. What recent assessment he has made of the benefits to Northern Ireland of remaining part of the UK.
The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr Owen Paterson)
This Government firmly believe in the United Kingdom. We believe that what we can achieve together will always be much more than we can ever do apart. As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has made clear, we will always back the democratic wishes of the people of Northern Ireland.
Nigel Adams
I am extremely grateful for that reply. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Union ensures that all parts of the UK can be part of a larger and stronger economy?
Mr Paterson
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Having only 2.8% of the UK population, Northern Ireland benefits enormously from being part of the United Kingdom. I was interested to see a poll yesterday that had been conducted by Queen’s university, which showed that 82.6% wanted to remain in the UK, and only 17.4% wanted a united Ireland.
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
Does the Secretary of State agree that, in addition to there being enormous advantages and benefits for Northern Ireland being part of the United Kingdom, the United Kingdom itself has been strengthened and enriched by the contribution of the people of Northern Ireland—and, indeed, of the other constituent nations of the United Kingdom—not least through the willing and voluntary service of many generations of Ulstermen and women in Her Majesty’s forces?
Mr Paterson
I entirely endorse the right hon. Gentleman’s comments. Right across every sphere of national life, there are glorious examples—spectacularly so in golf this week—of individuals from Northern Ireland who have shone.
Mr Dodds
I am grateful for the Secretary of State’s endorsement of the Union of Northern Ireland and the rest of Great Britain. He rightly refers to the great sporting success of our golfers, and let us not forget our snooker player who won the world championship. The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the opinion poll conducted in the highly respected Queen’s university survey, which showed that more than 80% of people wanted to stay within the United Kingdom. Will he now confirm to the House that he has no intention whatever of organising any kind of border poll in Northern Ireland, given the settled position of the people there and the levels of satisfaction with the present constitutional settlement?
Mr Paterson
I can reassure the right hon. Gentleman on that. As Secretary of State, I have the right to call a poll when I feel like it; I have an obligation to call a poll when there is a clear indication that there would be a vote for a united Ireland. Given that only 17.4% were in favour of that option, and the fact that I have received hardly any phone calls, e-mails or letters on the issue, I have no intention of calling a poll at the moment. We should concentrate on the economy and on building a shared future; that is the real priority for the people in Northern Ireland.
Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con)
In addition to what my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has said about the economy and the many great advantages to all parts of the United Kingdom of being part of the Union, will he confirm that the present level of public expenditure in Northern Ireland could not be sustained under any other constitutional arrangements, regardless of the destination of the Province?
Mr Paterson
The Chairman of the Select Committee makes a telling point. Public spending per head in Northern Ireland is currently £10,706, which is about 25% higher than it is in England. That is a huge advantage for Northern Ireland. It gives us time to rebalance the economy as well as showing the key role that membership of the UK plays for the people in Northern Ireland.
Stephen Pound (Ealing North) (Lab)
Further to the words of the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds), one of the advantages and benefits of the United Kingdom is a common defence policy, to which men and women of Northern Ireland have contributed greatly. How does the Secretary of State feel, on today of all days, about men and women who are military personnel being made compulsorily redundant?
Mr Paterson
I am a strong supporter of the military in Northern Ireland. I wear the Royal Irish wristband, because that regiment is stationed at Tern Hill in my constituency. [Interruption.] What I feel is that we inherited a complete mess from the last Labour Government. We are currently borrowing £232,000 a minute, so, sadly, the Government have had to take very difficult decisions.
Paul Murphy (Torfaen) (Lab)
3. What meetings he has had with political parties in Northern Ireland on a Bill of Rights for Northern Ireland.
The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr Hugo Swire)
In September, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State wrote to party leaders suggesting the possibility of the Assembly taking forward work in this area; we have yet to receive a response. Ministers and officials have continued to discuss this issue with human rights organisations since.
Paul Murphy
The Minister will know, of course, that the establishment of a Bill of Rights for Northern Ireland was part of the Good Friday agreement, and that it is a matter for all people in Northern Ireland. Will he not accept, however, that both he and his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State have a duty to bring about consensus rather than simply to listen to what people are saying without doing what is right and proper to ensure that we get consensus among all the political parties in Northern Ireland?
Mr Swire
The House will want to acknowledge the right hon. Gentleman’s part in the Good Friday agreement in trying to pursue the Bill of Rights. Frankly, however, that was when he should have pursued it, instead of squandering the good will that he and his Government had generated at that time. Let me give the right hon. Gentleman a couple of quick examples of our problem. First, the Secretary of State wrote to the First and Deputy First Ministers and all the party leaders back in September, but he has had no reply to his letters. Secondly, the Secretary of State for Justice wrote to the Office of the First Minister, asking it to nominate someone for the commission. It is now March, but no reply has been received. We thus face a problem, as we see no way forward without consensus.
Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)
Does the Minister agree that this important work towards a Bill of Rights in Northern Ireland—and, indeed, human rights more generally there—might have a useful role to play in the Government’s determination to do something about significant reform of the European Court of Human Rights?
Mr Swire
As my hon. Friend knows, a UK commission is being set up to look into the matter. We want Northern Ireland to be represented on it. Equally, we believe that this commission could provide the necessary vehicle for the inclusion of rights particular to Northern Ireland.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
Has the Secretary of State had any meetings or correspondence with other stakeholder groups that might be interested in or concerned about a Bill of Rights for Northern Ireland—Churches, advice bureaux or Women’s Aid, for example?
Mr Swire
We meet Church leaders frequently, and this is one of the matters we discuss with them. It is fair to say that the Secretary of State and I recently met the United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights—and we discussed this matter with her. We cannot get much higher than that.
Lady Hermon (North Down) (Ind)
As well as corresponding with the leaders of political parties in Northern Ireland, will the Minister kindly tell us whether his right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General actually believes that Northern Ireland needs a separate Bill of Rights?
Mr Swire
My right hon. and learned Friend came to Northern Ireland several times when we were in opposition. He was always of the belief, as we are, that any rights particular to Northern Ireland should be tagged on to any UK Bill of Rights. I alluded earlier to a lack of consensus. The hon. Lady will be aware that in a debate in the Assembly last year, Members voted by 46 to 42 against a motion calling for a robust, enforceable Bill of Rights. As I said in answer to the right hon. Member for Torfaen (Paul Murphy) earlier, that is a perfect example of the problem we face. We cannot impose; this has to come from within Northern Ireland. When it does, we will respond accordingly.
Valerie Vaz (Walsall South) (Lab)
4. What representations he has received from the Finucane family since his announcement of the Pat Finucane review.
The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr Owen Paterson)
I have not received any representations from the Finucane family since the establishment of the Pat Finucane review last October.
Valerie Vaz
The Secretary of State will know that the Finucane family, Madden and Finucane Solicitors, Judge Cory, the Irish Government, the United Nations special rapporteur and the Weston Park agreement have all called for a public inquiry. May I urge him to meet the Finucane family and Madden and Finucane Solicitors, so that the truth of the murder of Pat Finucane can be established and the reconciliation can be completed?
Mr Paterson
We have gone into the issue in some detail in written statements and in an oral statement made a couple of months ago. I wrote to Mrs Finucane soon after we came to power, and when I met her in November 2010—I was the first Secretary of State to do so for some years—I established with her that we wanted to get to the truth. I think that the method we have chosen, a review of a huge archive that is more extensive than that available to Saville, is a quicker way of getting to the truth, and will deliver satisfaction to the family. I am more than happy to meet them, and I hope that they will work closely with the de Silva review.
Mr Speaker
Order. These are extremely serious matters, but we need to speed up the exchanges somewhat.
Stephen Mosley (City of Chester) (Con)
When does my right hon. Friend expect to receive Sir Desmond de Silva’s final report?
Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)
When was the Secretary of State made aware that the legal representatives of the Finucane family were indicating that they would accept a public inquiry under the Inquiries Act 2005, based on the Baha Mousa standards and principles? Did he inform the Prime Minister, and who decided to head off that credible option at the pass at the Downing street meeting?
Mr Paterson
We discussed all sorts of options for arriving at the truth as fast as possible. My public statement is on the record, and a judicial review is in progress. I think that the full details will be revealed in that.
Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)
In the context of victim issues such as the Finucane murder, is the Secretary of State alarmed by what has happened in relation to other cases, such as the murder of Tommy English? In that case, the police appointed an independent oversight team consisting of a political appointee and an English barrister. It was the first time that such a team had ever been appointed in connection with a British case involving a police investigation. Does the Secretary of State agree that that was a reckless act which must never be repeated in an independent police investigation?
Mr Paterson
I think that in all these areas we must be very careful to respect the independence of the police in operational matters, the independence of the prosecuting authorities and the independence of the judiciary, and I would apply those principles to the hon. Gentleman’s comments.
Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)
The case of Pat Finucane is one of many cases in Northern Ireland that reflect the tragic legacy of our past, and we believe that a comprehensive process is needed to address that. Can the Secretary of State update us on his recent discussions with local parties about how to proceed with that approach?
Mr Paterson
As the hon. Lady knows, I established that there was no consensus at my meeting with her and other members of her party on Monday. Some parties want to draw a line in the sand and cease all activity, while others favour the establishment of an extensive international legacy commission. We will continue to work, and talk to individuals and local parties, but at the moment I see no consensus.
Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con)
5. What discussions he has had on promoting inward investment in Northern Ireland.
The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr Hugo Swire)
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I regularly meet the First and Deputy First Ministers and their colleagues in support of the Executive’s efforts to attract foreign direct investment, and I have just returned from accompanying the Minister of Enterprise, Trade and Investment on a trade mission to the Gulf states in support of two Northern Ireland businesses.
Andrea Leadsom
On the eve of the Budget, and in the light of the clear need to improve our economy and opportunities for inward investment, what assessment has my hon. Friend made of the co-operation between Invest NI and UK Trade and Investment?
Mr Swire
I have made a very good assessment. I am a member of the Economic Affairs (Trade and Investment) Cabinet Sub-Committee, and I am glad to say that it is to discuss ways in which UKTI and the devolved Administrations can co-operate better. There will be a meeting later in the year, which I think will benefit both organisations.
Mr William Bain (Glasgow North East) (Lab)
Despite the best efforts of the Northern Ireland Executive, rates of business formation in Northern Ireland are lower than in the rest of the UK. What plans do the Government have to make good their fault as identified by the Business Secretary that they lack a compelling vision on the economy?
Mr Swire
As this is Northern Ireland questions, I think I should limit myself to Northern Ireland. We have a very clear idea of the economy in Northern Ireland. We want to support it, and we believe it needs to be rebalanced. [Interruption.] This afternoon the joint ministerial working group on rebalancing the economy will meet to examine the possible devolvement of corporation tax to Northern Ireland, which we believe would be a significant move. [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. There are far too many noisy private conversations taking place in the Chamber. As a matter of courtesy to the people of Northern Ireland, it would be good to have a bit of hush.
David Simpson (Upper Bann) (DUP)
I am sure the Minister will agree that inward investment into Northern Ireland is always welcome, but we must not forget small indigenous businesses that have been there for many years. [Interruption.] Will he join me in welcoming the £30-million investment by the Asda group in one site in my constituency, which is in an area that has not had investment for 35 years? [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. It would be good if we could hear the reply. The House must come to order.
Mr Swire
Of course I welcome that investment. The hon. Gentleman is a doughty champion of business in his constituency, and I look forward to spending a day with him shortly. He will be aware of the growth fund, which will help small and medium-sized enterprises with strong potential for growth, particularly in the international markets. We believe these moves by the devolved Administration are the right ones.
Dr Alasdair McDonnell (Belfast South) (SDLP)
Has any progress been made on the devolution of corporation tax responsibility? When can we expect something to happen on that front?
Elizabeth Truss (South West Norfolk) (Con)
6. What discussions he has had with Ministers in the Northern Ireland Executive on economic development.
David Rutley (Macclesfield) (Con)
7. What discussions he has had with Ministers in the Northern Ireland Executive on economic development.
The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr Hugo Swire)
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I regularly meet the First and Deputy First Ministers and their colleagues in support of the Executive’s efforts to develop the economy. We also work closely together on the joint ministerial working group on rebalancing the economy, which—I now say for the third time—will meet this afternoon.
Elizabeth Truss
Manufacturing exports from Northern Ireland rose in the last quarter, which is great news in respect of the effort to rebalance the economy. What further steps is the Minister taking to ensure our exports increase?
Mr Swire
It is good news that Northern Ireland sells £12.4 billion-worth of manufactured goods abroad, and has almost recovered to the pre-recession level in sales to Great Britain—indeed, sales to GB achieved a new record. Those are very positive trends, on which we seek to build.
David Rutley
Investment in research and development is crucial for economic development in Northern Ireland, just as it is in Macclesfield. Will my hon. Friend therefore join me in congratulating the Northern Ireland Executive on the 6% increase in research and development investment over the past year?
Mr Swire
Yes, I will. Research and development is crucial to the development of the economy, and investment in it increased by 6% in Northern Ireland last year, to £334 million. The Northern Ireland Minister of Enterprise, Trade and Investment is keen to continue with research and development, not least for small and medium-sized enterprises, which both she and I believe are vital.
Ms Margaret Ritchie (South Down) (SDLP)
Given the need to pump-prime the economy in Northern Ireland and given the fact that the Finance Ministers met on Monday, are the disputes about the £18 billion allocation to Northern Ireland as part of the devolution dividend near resolution, and if not, what are the areas of disagreement?
Mr Swire
That was not raised officially at the meeting, but later on I had my own bilateral over a cup of coffee with the Northern Ireland Finance Minister, the hon. Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson), who is in his place. We discussed progress on this matter, and he informed me that it continues, but it is slow. The Chancellor is now in his place, too, and he may be interested to learn of what the hon. Lady has just said. This is still being discussed, and it will take some time.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
Economic development in Northern Ireland is being held up by the reluctance of banks to lend to viable businesses and their withdrawing of capital from existing businesses. What discussions has the Minister had about whether banks in Northern Ireland are meeting their Merlin targets? Also, why is it that the Merlin target figures can be published for Scotland, but not for Northern Ireland?
Mr Swire
The hon. Gentleman makes an extremely good point, which he also made in the Finance Ministers quadrilateral last week. We need to get more lending to companies in Northern Ireland, where we are fishing in a smaller pool because we do not have so many banks to lend. We want to see those figures and to work together to see how we can get more lending to smaller companies.
Simon Kirby (Brighton, Kemptown) (Con)
8. What recent discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Defence on the contribution of soldiers from Northern Ireland to UK defence capability; and if he will make a statement.
The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr Owen Paterson)
I would like to pay tribute to all those from Northern Ireland and, indeed, from all regions of the United Kingdom who serve in our armed forces. I speak regularly with ministerial colleagues across Whitehall on matters relating to Northern Ireland, including my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence.
Simon Kirby
Does my right hon. Friend agree that much can be learned from the Royal Irish Regiment, which recruits from all sections of the community?
Mr Paterson
My hon. Friend is absolutely spot on. I am very proud to have the Royal Irish stationed in my constituency. I went to the Barossa dinner on Monday, celebrating the capture of the first French eagle with the cry:
“By Jaysus, boys, I have the cuckoo.”
The regiment is a glorious example of an organisation that brings people together from all parts of the community, including from south of the border.
Dr William McCrea (South Antrim) (DUP)
In recognising the tremendous sacrifice of our brave soldiers from Northern Ireland in contributing to the defence of the United Kingdom, does the Secretary of State acknowledge that there is a time bomb of mental health problems facing those who return from the field of conflict? What steps are being taken to assist those people?
Mr Paterson
I entirely endorse the hon. Gentleman’s comments and I pay tribute to the three rangers of the Royal Irish who sadly lost their lives in the Helmand campaign last year. He is absolutely right to draw attention to the mental health problems that can occur and I discuss this with my right hon. Friends in Cabinet. He should also discuss it with the local Ministers who are responsible for delivering those services in Northern Ireland.
Nick Boles (Grantham and Stamford) (Con)
Q1. If he will list his official engagements for Wednesday 7 March.
The Prime Minister (Mr David Cameron)
I hope you will permit me, Mr Speaker, before I answer any questions, to make the following announcement. Yesterday, a Warrior armoured fighting vehicle on patrol near the eastern border of Helmand province was struck by an explosion. It is with very great sadness that I must tell the House that six soldiers are missing, believed killed. Five of them are from the 3rd Battalion the Yorkshire Regiment and one is from the 1st Battalion the Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment. Our thoughts are with the family and friends of those brave servicemen. This will be the largest loss of life in a single incident in Afghanistan since 2006. It takes the overall number of casualties that we have suffered in Afghanistan to more than 400. Every death and every injury reminds us of the human cost paid by our armed forces to keep our country safe. I have spoken this morning to the Chief of the Defence Staff, the Chief of the General Staff and the commanding officer of 3rd Battalion the Yorkshire Regiment. They each stressed the commitment of our troops to the mission and to getting the job done. I know that everyone will want a message of support and backing for our troops and their families to go out from this House today.
This morning, I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others, and in addition to my duties in the House I shall have further such meetings later today.
Nick Boles
I echo the Prime Minister’s tribute to the fallen. Their service and their sacrifice humbles us all. With this terrible news in mind, will my right hon. Friend use his meetings next week with President Obama to co-ordinate a prudent draw-down of allied forces in Afghanistan and to ensure that Afghan forces get the training and equipment they need to take over?
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. Next week is an opportunity to make sure that Britain and America, as the two largest contributors to the international security assistance force mission in Afghanistan, are absolutely in lock-step about the importance of training up the Afghan army, training up the Afghan police and making sure that all NATO partners have a properly co-ordinated process for transition in that country, so that the Afghans can take responsibility for the security of their own country, and we can bring our forces home.
Edward Miliband (Doncaster North) (Lab)
I join the Prime Minister in expressing profound sadness at the terrible news of our six soldiers who are missing, feared dead. Today, we are reminded of the ongoing commitment and sacrifice that our service personnel make on our behalf. By putting themselves in harm’s way for our benefit, they demonstrate the utmost service and courage. We owe them and all those who have lost their lives in Afghanistan an immense debt of gratitude, and our thoughts are with their family, friends and colleagues at this terrible time.
At moments like these, does the Prime Minister agree that we must restate clearly the reasons for our mission in Afghanistan? A more stable, self-governing Afghanistan will produce more stable outcomes in that region and ensure greater safety for our citizens here at home.
The Prime Minister
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his words. He is absolutely right. Our mission in Afghanistan remains vital to our national security. We are there to prevent that country from being a safe haven for al-Qaeda, from where they might plan attacks on the UK or our allies. Our task is simple: to equip the Afghan Government and the forces of Afghanistan with the capability and capacity to take care of their own national security without the need for foreign troops on their soil. That is our aim. We are making progress. The Afghan national army stands at 184,000, on target for 195,000 by the end of this year. The Afghan national police, standing at 145,000, are on target for 157,000 at the end of this year. We are making progress. It is absolutely essential for bringing our troops home, but I agree with the right hon. Gentleman: we need to restate clearly why we are there and why it is in our national interest. The commander of the battalion told me today that his men have high morale, they know they are doing an important mission for the future of this country and the future of the world, and they want our support as they go about it.
Edward Miliband
I thank the Prime Minister for that answer. He and I also agree that it is essential that we build now for a political settlement in Afghanistan for when our troops are gone. Can he take this moment to update the House on what diplomatic progress is being made on securing the broader and more inclusive political settlement needed for a stable Afghanistan? Does he further agree that the whole international community must up the pace of progress towards that political settlement, to ensure that we do all we can to make concrete progress between now and the departure of our combat troops at the end of 2014?
The Prime Minister
We are clearly planning the increase in the army and the police—the physical forces that will take over—but the greatest difference we could make is a stronger political settlement that will ensure that Afghanistan has the chance for real peace, stability, prosperity and security in the future. There are some good signs, in that there are now proper discussions between the Afghan and Pakistan Governments. A clear message is coming out of Afghanistan and Pakistan to all those who are engaged in violence to give up that violence and join a political process. There is strong support for that across the Arab world, particularly in the middle east. We need to give that process every possible support and send a clear message to the Taliban: whether it is our troops or Afghan troops who are there, the Taliban will not win on the battlefield. They never win on the battlefield, and now it is time for a political settlement to give the country a chance for peaceful progress.
Jack Lopresti (Filton and Bradley Stoke) (Con)
I, too, echo the Prime Minister’s tribute—as do other Members across the House—to our brave men and women who are asked to make sacrifices on a daily basis to keep our country safe and ensure a peaceful Afghanistan. Will the Prime Minister confirm that, despite those tragic events, ISAF will remain in Afghanistan in one form or another for as long as it takes to complete the mission for a safe, secure and stable Afghanistan, with the Afghan people taking responsibility for their own security?
The Prime Minister
We have a clear timetable, which is all about transitioning parts of Afghanistan to Afghan security control, to allow our troops to move into the background and eventually out of the country. In Helmand itself, where we have been for all these years—one of the toughest parts of Afghanistan—Lashkar Gah, the effective capital, is now controlled by Afghan forces. The process is ongoing. I believe it can be properly completed by the end of 2014, so that we leave in a proper and orderly fashion, handing over to Afghan troops. Let us be clear: the relationship between Britain and other countries and Afghanistan will go on. It will be a relationship of military training, of diplomacy, of support, of aid and help for that country. We must learn the lesson of the past, which is what a mistake it was to turn away from Afghanistan.
Mr Virendra Sharma (Ealing, Southall) (Lab)
Q2. The Prime Minister’s Business Secretary says of the Government’s action on economic growth:“Our actions are, frankly, rather piecemeal.”Does the Prime Minister agree?
The Prime Minister
Obviously, I do not agree with that. What this Government are doing is cutting corporation tax, investing in apprenticeships, building enterprise zones, making sure that right across our economy the rebalancing is taking place that is necessary for sustained economic growth.
Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con)
Q3. My constituents have to wait longer to get a hospital appointment than they would in England, they are five times less likely to get certain cancer drugs than they are in England, and if they get to hospital, they are twice as likely to get an infection as they are in England. Does this prove to the Prime Minister that we cannot trust Labour with the NHS?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend makes an important point, which is that, if you look at the NHS in Wales, it shows what happens if we do not put in the resources—the money—because the resources are being cut in Wales, and also if we do not reform the NHS to make sure that there is a proper chance for people to get the treatments they need. There is not the cancer drugs fund in Wales, there are much longer waiting times, and there are much longer waiting lists, and that is an example of what happens without the money and without the reform.
Dame Joan Ruddock (Lewisham, Deptford) (Lab)
Q4. The Prime Minister is proud of his welfare reforms. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] Can he look me in the eye and tell me he is proud of the decision to remove all disability benefits from a 10-year-old child who can hardly walk and who cannot toilet herself because she has cerebral palsy? Is he truly proud?
The Prime Minister
This Government are not cutting the money that is going into disability benefits. We are replacing disability living allowance with the personal independence payment. As someone who has actually filled out the form for disability allowance and had a child with cerebral palsy, I know how long it takes to fill in that form. We are going to have a proper medical test so that people who are disabled and need that help get it more quickly.
Mr Speaker
Order. I say to the hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Simon Kirby) that he will stay silent. That sort of noise is not acceptable in this forum.
Nadhim Zahawi
On Friday, PC Trevor Hall and PCSO Claire Miller, two of the best from Warwickshire police, came to see me about the life-threatening effects of a new legal high called black mamba on the life of a 13-year-old in my constituency. I am informed that black mamba is the latest legal high being sold on our streets in the UK. Now that we have regulations that allow us to act swiftly to ban potentially dangerous legal highs, will my right hon. Friend act on this substance immediately and—
Mr Speaker
Order. We are grateful to the hon. Gentleman, who should resume his seat. The question is too long.
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend raises an important issue. We are determined to stamp out these so-called legal highs. The Home Office is aware of this particular drug. We now have the drugs early warning system which brings these things to our attention, but as he says, a decision needs swiftly to be made and I will make sure that happens.
Edward Miliband
Tim Howes is a delivery driver from Dartford. He is a married father of three and the sole earner in his family. He currently works 20 hours a week. From next month, under the Prime Minister’s proposals, unless he works 24 hours a week he will lose all his working tax credit, some £60 a week. He says:
“I have approached my employer to possibly increase my hours but I have been told there simply aren’t the hours there. I would love to work full-time.”
What is the Prime Minister’s advice to Tim Howes?
The Prime Minister
First, let me set the context for this—[Hon. Members: “Answer!”] I will answer the question very directly, but we need to reform the tax credits system because we have a massive budget deficit. When we came to office, tax credits were going to nine out of 10 families, including people right up the income scale, including Members of Parliament. What our changes do, in terms of this specific case, is deal with the basic unfairness that we ask a single parent to work 16 hours before getting access to the tax credit system, so it is only right to say to couples that between them they should work 24 hours—that is, 12 hours each. If that is the case, and they do that, they will be better off.
Edward Miliband
I have to say to the Prime Minister that that answer is no use to Mr Howes and his family. He cannot find the extra hours and so will lose his—[Interruption.] The Defence Secretary shouts from a sedentary position, “What about his wife?” Let me tell him that his wife is looking after their three school-age children and cannot find hours that are consistent with that. Tim Howes and 200,000 couples will lose as a result of this. Before the election, the Prime Minister said in the TV debates that for Labour
“to say that actually the changes we’re making would hit low income families is simply not true.”
Why has he broken that promise?
The Prime Minister
We have increased the child tax credit that goes to the poorest families in our country. To answer the right hon. Gentleman very directly, when we say to a single parent that they have to work 16 hours to get access to the tax credits system, I do not think that it is unreasonable to ask a couple to work an average of 12 hours each. That is what we are asking. In a way, this relates to a bigger picture. We have a massive budget deficit. If he is not going to support the welfare cap, the housing benefit cap, cuts to legal aid or cuts to tax credits, how on earth would he deal with the deficit?
Edward Miliband
In case the Prime Minister did not realise this, in Dartford, where the Howes family live, five people are chasing every vacancy. It is just not good enough for him to say, “Well, they should go out to work.” If they cannot find the work, they will find that they are better off on benefits than in work because of the Prime Minister’s changes, which is something he said he wanted to avoid. It is also about this matter of trust. He made a clear promise, just like he made a clear promise on child benefit. Before the election, he said:
“I’m not going to flannel you. I’m going to give it to you straight. I like the child benefit. I wouldn’t change child benefit. I wouldn’t means-test it. I don’t think that is a good idea.”
We have already established that he has broken his promise to low-income families. Why has he broken his promise to middle-income families, too?
The Prime Minister
Here we go: another change the right hon. Gentleman does not support. He seems to think that people on—[Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. The question has been asked. The Prime Minister’s answer must be heard.
The Prime Minister
Does the right hon. Gentleman really think that people earning £25,000 should pay for his child benefit? I do not agree with that. We have to make savings, so not giving child benefit to the wealthiest 15% of families in our country—of course it is a difficult decision. Life is about difficult decisions. Government is about difficult decisions. It is a pity that he is just not capable of taking one.
Edward Miliband
First of all, we are talking about families on £43,000 a year. Secondly, it is no good the Prime Minister saying that he now supports the principle that people on high incomes should not get child benefit, because before the election he supported the opposite principle and said quite clearly to families up and down this country, “I’m not going to take away your child benefit.” In my book there is a very simple word for that: a broken promise—it is a broken promise by this Prime Minister. [Hon. Members: “That’s two.”] They are right: there are two broken promises. The reality is that lower-income families are losing their tax credits and middle-income families are losing their child benefit. Does the Prime Minister understand why people just do not believe him when he says, “We’re all in this together”?
The Prime Minister
I think that it is time the right hon. Gentleman listened to his own shadow Chief Secretary, who said that
“we must ensure we pass the test of fiscal credibility. If we don’t get this right, it doesn’t matter what we say about anything else.”
She is absolutely right. Reducing our deficit takes tough decisions. He has opposed every single cut. He has opposed the welfare cap, the housing benefit cap and legal aid cuts. It is no wonder that when people dial up a radio phone-in and eventually work out who he is, they all say the same thing: he is not remotely up to the job.
Mark Pritchard
Following last week’s statement on the use of wild animals in circuses, can the Prime Minister inform the House whether a ban will be introduced in this Parliament and before the next general election?
The Prime Minister
I do want to see a ban introduced. It is the overwhelming opinion of Members in this House. We are putting in place a regulatory scheme in the short term, but my right hon. Friend the Environment Secretary made it absolutely clear that it is our intention to introduce a ban in full as well.
Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)
Q6. Today, the Business, Innovation and Skills Committee published a major report on consumer debt. Last November R3 reported that 60% of people were worried about debt and 3.5 million were considering payday loans. In the year since the Government concluded their consultation, no action has been announced. Will the Prime Minister commit to act now to protect vulnerable families, or will he accept that he is simply out of touch with the financial reality facing them as a result of his policies?
The Prime Minister
I think, as the last exchange just proved, we are worried about debt. The whole country needs to be worried about debt, and the problem is that the Labour party does not seem to understand that there is a debt problem. There has been a debt problem in our economy, there is also a debt problem for many households, and we do need to make sure that they get help. That is why we are making sure that citizens advice bureaux continue to get help, as they are one of the most important services for helping families in that way.
Mr Douglas Carswell (Clacton) (Con)
Q7. The coalition agreement contains many bold and brilliant proposals to give Britain the change that we need: open primaries, a bonfire of the quangos, and radical localism. Sometimes, however, progress has been a little slower than some of us on the Government Benches would have hoped: sometimes the radicalism has been ever so slightly blunted. Is that because of the constraints of coalition, or because of the Whitehall machine?
The Prime Minister
It was good to have such a helpful start from my hon. Friend. I think that this Government have done a number of radical things, right across the board, whether it is welfare reform to make sure that it always pays to work, education reform to give greater independence to our schools, or tax reform to give us competitive tax rates. Of course I always want us to go further and faster. I do not blame the Whitehall machine; in the end the politicians must always take responsibility.
Mr Tom Harris (Glasgow South) (Lab)
My constituent James Toner was arrested in Goa almost three years ago on drugs charges. He was subsequently released when it turned out that the police officers who arrested him were themselves under investigation for corruption. He has spent the past 22 months in legal limbo, his passport has been confiscated, he cannot travel, he cannot work and he does not even know when his case is going to go to court. Does the Prime Minister agree that justice delayed is justice denied, and will he make sure that a Foreign Office Minister meets me urgently to discuss the case of my constituent?
The Prime Minister
I will certainly do that. It is very important that the hon. Gentleman and others feel that they can stand up for their constituents on the other side of the world who are being treated in this way, and that we can take up these cases. The work of Fair Trials International and other organisations is very important in that respect, and I shall make sure that the Foreign Office meets him soon.
Mr Lee Scott (Ilford North) (Con)
Q8. Will the Prime Minister join me in congratulating the project that is starting a pilot in my constituency in September, funded by the private sector, the London borough of Redbridge, and various charities, and in congratulating also the co-chairs, Richard and Philippa Mintz, and the inter-faith group on their work to get young people with special needs into employment?
The Prime Minister
I will certainly join my hon. Friend in supporting that project. It is important that we help children with special needs through not only their schooling time but that transition after school and into college, and then try to help them to find work. It sounds like this is an excellent project that deserves his support.
Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab)
Is it true:
“The problem is that policy is being run by two public school boys who don’t know what it’s like to go to the supermarket and have to put things back on the shelves because they can’t afford it for their children’s lunchboxes. What’s worse, they don’t care either”?
Those are not my words, but the words of a Conservative Member, the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries).
The Prime Minister
I would have thought that, coming from the north-east, the hon. Lady should be celebrating the fact that Nissan is going to build its new car in Britain—instead of whatever nonsense it was that she read out.
Oliver Colvile (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Con)
Q9. May I add my personal tributes to our fallen? On Monday, Clare’s law came into being. Would my right hon. Friend be willing to meet me and Sergeant Carney-Haworth to learn at first hand how his team’s groundbreaking initiative in Devonport, Operation Encompass, is helping to make sure that children in my Sutton and Devonport constituency grow up in an area where there is no longer any domestic violence?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise this constituency issue and to do so this week, when tomorrow we have international women’s day. The move that has been made on Clare’s law is important; it is a breakthrough to give women this information if they seek it. I want us to follow that by looking into a specific offence of stalking. I want us to continue to support the rape crisis centres, as we are under this Government, and to make sure that we act on domestic violence right across the board.
Mr Brian H. Donohoe (Central Ayrshire) (Lab)
Q10. When he next expects to visit Central Ayrshire.
Mr Donohoe
I know that the Prime Minister is coming to my constituency very soon indeed—in fact, later this month to attend his Tory party conference in Troon. However, I want to know whether he agrees that the uncertainty that is being created by the Nats around the separatist idea of a referendum that is being delayed for longer than it should be is leading to uncertainty about inward investment in my constituency and elsewhere. While he is in Troon, will he come with me to see some of the potential for inward investment? That is a promise that he made to me at a meeting a year ago.
The Prime Minister
When the hon. Gentleman asked me that question a year ago, I did in fact meet a delegation from his constituency. I agree with every word that he said, and I make him this offer: as I am going to be in Troon, he can make the short trip from his constituency and we can share a platform together to point out the dangers of separatism and the nationalist agenda. Are you up for it?
Louise Mensch (Corby) (Con)
Q11. Labour-controlled Corby borough council—[Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. I want the hon. Lady’s question to be heard in full with a bit of quiet and perhaps a bit of respect.
Louise Mensch
Thank you, Mr Speaker.
Labour-controlled Corby borough council is trying to suppress a report into the scandal at the Corby Cube. Twenty-six million pounds of Corby people’s money has been wasted, and now councillors are being threatened with disciplinary action if they blow the whistle. Does the Prime Minister agree that the council should come clean with Corby people?
The Prime Minister
I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend, who raises an important point. There are now proposals for total transparency in local government so that expenditure over £500 should be separately documented and so that all the salaries, names, budgets and responsibilities of staff paid over £58,000 should be published, including councillors’ allowances and expenses and all the organisational charts. We want the wind of transparency to go right through local government, Corby included.
John Cryer (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab)
Article 16 of the European fiscal compact says very clearly that it will be incorporated into the European treaty in five years’ time. Will the Prime Minister promise to veto that, or does he not expect to be here in five years’ time?
The Prime Minister
The treaty says very clearly that it can be incorporated only with the permission of all 27 member states of the European Union, and our position on that has not changed.
Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty) (Con)
Q12. Will the Prime Minister join me, along with the thousands of families with missing loved ones, including the family of missing York woman Claudia Lawrence, in supporting the sensible recommendations in the Justice Committee’s report into missing people’s rights and the presumption of death?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend raises an important issue. I pay tribute to Peter Lawrence and his support for the Missing People campaign. The Justice Committee has produced an important report on this issue. We acknowledge that the current law is complicated. I recognise all the emotional and practical difficulties faced by those whose loved ones are missing. We are going to consider the recommendations very carefully, and perhaps I will write to my hon. Friend when we come up with the answer.
Sheila Gilmore (Edinburgh East) (Lab)
Q13. If the Prime Minister manages to persuade his Chancellor to remove some of the anomalies in his child benefit policy to help people earning over £43,000 a year, will he then take action to help the couples on the minimum wage who are set to lose £3,000 from April?
The Prime Minister
I think that we dealt with that earlier. Quite apart from the point about the unfairness of a single person having to work 16 hours, we are making a long-term reform with universal credit, which will mean that everyone is always better off in work, no matter how many hours they work. Labour had 13 years to put that in place; we will have it done in 18 months.
Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)
On Saturday, 2,000 of us marched through Kendal to present a petition of 11,000 people calling for radiotherapy services at Westmorland general hospital in Kendal. Will my right hon. Friend meet me, the commissioners and cancer campaigners to ensure that we bring cancer treatment to Kendal, so that local lives can be made longer and people’s journeys shorter?
The Prime Minister
I know from having visited the hon. Gentleman’s constituency how important the issue of the hospital is. My right hon. Friend the Health Secretary is fully engaged in this issue. Perhaps I can fix a meeting between the hon. Gentleman and my right hon. Friend to ensure that the issue is dealt with.
Lindsay Roy (Glenrothes) (Lab)
Q14. The Royal Bank of Scotland recently axed another 300 jobs, mostly in Edinburgh and London. However, the jobs have not gone completely, but have been outsourced to India. The Prime Minister and the Government act on behalf of the biggest shareholder, so when will they stand up to RBS and prevent the needless job losses in the UK?
The Prime Minister
We must recognise that the Government put £45 billion into the Royal Bank of Scotland on behalf of the country. That is £2,500 for every working family in the country. The most important thing is that we get that money back. We need RBS to return to health. It has to deal with its bad loans and the trouble that it got into, and it has to grow the rest of its business. We will then be in a position to return to people the money that they put into the bank. That is what matters most.
Kris Hopkins (Keighley) (Con)
May I offer my sympathies to the families and friends of the six soldiers who have been killed, five of whom served in 3rd Battalion the Yorkshire Regiment, the Duke of Wellington’s, with which I had the privilege to serve? I recognise and support the vital role that our troops are endeavouring to undertake, but we need to bring them back in 2015. I ask the Prime Minister to ensure that we do everything that we can to support the families of those who have been lost.
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend speaks with considerable experience, because of his service in our armed forces. It is important that we have the date for our troops coming home from Afghanistan, which I set. We will not be there in a combat role and will not be there in anything like the current numbers by the end of 2014. It is also important to ensure that, between now and then, our troops have all the equipment that they need to make them as safe as possible. I pay tribute to the previous Government, who started putting extra money into vehicles in 2006. Since then, we have spent about £2 billion on better-protected vehicles and an additional £160 million on counter-IED equipment. He is right that we need to do more for the families of our armed forces at home. That is what the military covenant process and the Cabinet Committee, which I chaired for the first meeting, are all about.
Ms Gisela Stuart (Birmingham, Edgbaston) (Lab)
Using Applied Language Solutions was supposed to save West Midlands police £750,000 a year, and yet last week we heard that the shortage of translators leaves the police unable to quiz suspects for weeks. Is that the kind of service we can expect when our police forces tender out services to private security companies?
The Prime Minister
I do not think that there is anything wrong with the police getting back-office functions carried out by private sector organisations. Indeed, when the shadow policing Minister was asked about that at the Select Committee on Home Affairs, he said that he was quite relaxed about it. I think that that is right. I am delighted that the hon. Lady is considering whether to become a police and crime commissioner. That will be an excellent way of calling the police to account, and I hope that many other hon. Members will consider it as a career change.
Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend do all that he can to support Mayor Boris Johnson in London, who is pleading with the Pru, our biggest insurer, not to leave the City of London because of the attack by the European Union on the competitiveness of the City? I invite my right hon. Friend to block the fiscal union treaty by making an application to the European Court of Justice that it is illegal, until we get the City safeguards that he was demanding in December.
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is entirely right to raise the case of the Prudential, because it is an example of ill-thought-out EU legislation endangering a great British business, which should have its headquarters here in the UK. I recognise the importance of this matter. We are working extremely hard at the European level and with the Prudential to deal with it. I know that we have the full support of Boris Johnson in doing that.
Post Office Services (Torphichen, West Lothian)
Michael Connarty (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (Lab)
The village of Torphichen has one shop, and in that shop there was a sub-post office. Sadly, because of family circumstances, the previous owner closed the shop and returned the licence for the sub-post office to the Post Office. The Post Office has stuck a notice on the window of the shop but consulted absolutely no one. The shop has been bought—thank goodness—but unfortunately it appears that the Post Office is not prepared to put back the sub-post office that was previously part of the network.
The petition, signed by 340 residents, states:
The Petition of residents of Torphichen, West Lothian,
Declares that the Petitioners are concerned about the provision of Post Office services in Torphichen, following the closure of the Post Office when the previous sub-postmaster gave up the lease on the premises; declares that the Post Office had said that the closure would be temporary; that no consultation has been carried out on any proposal to close the Post Office permanently; and declares that the Petitioners believe that a reduced service is not justifiable or acceptable.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to take all possible steps to ensure that the Torphichen Post Office is reopened.
And your Petitioners remain, etc.
[P001011]
Diamond Jubilee
(12 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Prime Minister (Mr David Cameron)
I beg to move,
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty on the occasion of the Sixtieth Anniversary of Her Accession to the Throne.
That the said Address be presented to Her Majesty by the whole House.
On her first address to the nation as Queen, Her Majesty pledged that throughout all her life, and with all her heart, she would strive to be worthy of the people’s trust: this she has achieved beyond question. The nation holds her in its heart, not just as the figurehead of an institution but as an individual who has served this country with unerring grace, dignity and decency.
The reign of Queen Elizabeth has been one of unparalleled change, from rationing through to the jet age, to the space age, to the digital age. At her first investiture as Queen, the very first decoration she presented was a Victoria Cross for heroism in the Korean war. Since then, members of the armed forces—her armed forces—have been in action all over the world, from Aden to the Falklands, the Gulf, Iraq and Afghanistan. Around the world, dictatorships have died and democracies have been born, and across the old British empire a vibrant Commonwealth of nations has expanded and flourished.
Throughout this extraordinary change, the longest-lived monarch in our history has remained resolutely unchanged in her commitment and studious in her duties. It does not matter whether it is something we suspect she enjoys, such as the highland games at Braemar, or things we suspect she might be less keen on, such as spending new year’s eve in the millennium dome, she never, ever falters. She has always done her duty, and that stability is essential for our national life.
While the sands of culture shift and the tides of politics ebb and flow, Her Majesty has been a permanent anchor, bracing Britain against the storms, grounding us in certainty. Crucially, simultaneously, she has moved the monarchy forward. It has been said that the art of progress is to preserve order amid change and change amid order, and in this the Queen is unparalleled. She has never shut the door on the future; instead, she has led the way through it, ushering in the television cameras, opening up the royal collection and the palaces and hosting receptions and award ceremonies for every area of public life. It is easy now to take these things for granted, but we should remember that they were her initiatives. She was broadcasting to the nation every Christmas day 30 years before we let cameras into this House.
In doing those things, the Queen ended a 1,000 year distance that existed between British monarchs and their people. Indeed, while much of her life has been governed by tradition and protocol, the Queen has always taken a thoroughly pragmatic view of such matters. On arriving at one engagement in Scotland, she noticed that the local lord lieutenant was having considerable trouble extracting both himself and his sword from the official car in order to perform the introductions. While embarrassed civic dignitaries cleared their throats, the Queen cut straight through the seemingly insoluble ceremonial problem by walking up to the greeting line, hand outstretched, with the words, “My lord lieutenant appears to be having difficulty in getting out of the car, so I’d better introduce myself. I’m the Queen.”
That human connection is a hallmark of the Queen’s reign. Over 60 years, according to one royal biographer, she has met 4 million people in person, which is equivalent to the entire population of New Zealand. At garden parties alone, she has invited some 2 million people to tea. She is, of course, Queen of 16 countries, and has surely travelled more widely than any other Head of State in history. As she herself has been heard to say—it is a lesson, perhaps for all of us in this House—“I have to be seen to be believed.” All this has given her remarkable insight. Like her previous 11 Prime Ministers, I have been struck by Her Majesty’s perspective on world events, and like my predecessors I am truly grateful for the way she handles our national interests.
Last year’s visit to Ireland was a lesson in statecraft. It showed once again that the Queen can extend the hand of friendship like no other. She was the first monarch to visit China, the first to visit Russia and the first to pay a state visit to the Vatican, and her trip to post-apartheid South Africa was a statement that resounded across continents.
And, of course, there is the Commonwealth. It is doubtful whether that great alliance would ever have thrived without the dedication of Her Majesty. When the Queen became head of the Commonwealth in 1952, it had eight members; today it has 54. No one has done more to promote this unique family of nations spanning every continent, all the main religions and nearly a third of the world’s population. In all her realms, from Tuvalu to Barbados, from Papua New Guinea to St Vincent and the Grenadines, from Britain to Jamaica, she is loved because she is a Queen of everyone—for each of us and for all of us.
The diamond jubilee gives us the chance to show our gratitude. By the time she opens the Olympics, the Queen’s jubilee tour will have taken her and Prince Philip to every part of the United Kingdom. In June, London will see a huge pop concert, a great procession and the largest gathering on the Thames for more than three centuries: barges and cutters, narrow boats and motor boats, square riggers, naval vessels, the little ships of Dunkirk—all will be there to pay tribute to our magnificent Queen.
“Diamond” is the appropriate epithet for this jubilee. For 60 years, Her Majesty has been a point of light in our national life—brilliant, enduring and resilient. For that, she has the respect of the House and the enduring affection of all her people.
Edward Miliband (Doncaster North) (Lab)
May I second the motion and associate myself and my party entirely with the sentiments that the Prime Minister has just expressed?
As the Prime Minister has so accurately described, Her Majesty the Queen has dedicated herself tirelessly and constantly to the people of our country and the Commonwealth for 60 years. Her Majesty has led an extraordinary life of service, which sets an example to us all.
Truly remarkable though her reign has been, it is striking that it is in keeping with the reputation and spirit of the young Princess Elizabeth before she ascended the throne. During the second world war, her work with the Auxiliary Territorial Service gave inspiration and hope to millions, especially young women desperate to play their part while their loved ones were fighting at the front.
Almost 65 years ago, as the House marked Her Majesty’s wedding to the Duke of Edinburgh, Clement Attlee observed that Princess Elizabeth was already celebrated across the globe for her “unerring graciousness and understanding”. His words echo down the years.
We have learnt so much more about Her Majesty: selfless, tireless in duty, unflinching in service, unerring in her commitment to the people of Britain, stoical in the face of personal loss, and proud, as the Prime Minister said, of the extraordinary reach of the monarchy and its values to the Commonwealth.
With Prince Philip at her side, she has shown the most extraordinary dedication to duty. When we tell each other her remarkable story, we speak, too, of the timeless characteristics of our country and all the people who have served us.
Her Majesty’s life reminds us of the true value of service. Her reign is a golden thread that links people within and across the generations. For the generation that emerged from the war, the coronation provided the opportunity to come together in celebration. There was often only one house with a television set on a street, and people crowded round to watch, sharing in community with one another.
For our generation growing up, the event was the silver jubilee in 1977. I remember being in Hyde park as a seven-year-old as part of those celebrations. Then came the golden jubilee on those glorious summer days in 2002. This year in June, it will be the next generation’s turn to share in the excitement.
In these moments, we are reminded that we are far more than just disparate individuals and communities: we are a nation with a shared sense of purpose and integrity. When we celebrated the golden jubilee, it fittingly became not only a celebration of the Queen’s reign, but of the very best features of our country.
As the Prime Minister said, in her 60 years the Queen has witnessed an astonishing array of changes throughout our society. Some have brought huge improvements to our lives; others have been more challenging.
On one occasion, I attended a meeting of the Privy Council shortly after Buckingham palace had shown its commitment to fighting climate change by adopting energy-saving light bulbs. I believe that I was the Minister responsible. Unfortunately, the transition had not been entirely smooth because the light was pretty dim—in fact, it was almost dark.
As Her Majesty valiantly struggled through the gloom to read the names of the Bills being passed, she caught my eye fixedly and remarked on the impact of “these new bulbs”. As Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, I confessed my responsibility, but I am pleased to say that she broke into a smile. Her reaction showed once again her great capacity to put people at ease, no matter what the circumstances.
Whatever she has been confronted with, Her Majesty the Queen has responded with genuine spirit. That spirit means that the Queen is received with reverence, respect and genuine affection wherever she travels in the world. In respect for that spirit, we all come together to celebrate in this, the year of her diamond jubilee.
Sir Peter Tapsell (Louth and Horncastle) (Con)
At the time of the last diamond jubilee, the Father of the House was Charles Villiers. He had started his distinguished political career in the Parliament of King William IV, had sat in this House continuously for 63 years, and was aged 95. By comparison with him, I am a mere parliamentary debutante.
However, I vividly remember the fireworks that celebrated the silver jubilee of Her Majesty’s grandfather, King George V, in 1935. The hit tune of the time was “The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze”, a prophetically accurate description of Prince William today.
Shortly before the debate on the Loyal Address in 1897, Villiers sent Queen Victoria his personal gift as Father of the House of a parasol. I have presumed to follow his example. His parasol was dressed in Chantilly lace. Mine has not been dressed in French lace; it has been dressed in Nottingham lace, from the city that first sent me to this place 53 years ago.
For my generation, the abiding memory of our Queen is her stunning beauty when she came to the throne. There is nothing more inspiriting in the whole world than a beautiful woman.
The bedrock of her success has been the constitution—not our constitution but hers, because she has always had the most astonishing stamina. In 1953, accompanied as always by the indomitable Duke of Edinburgh, she travelled 53,000 miles. In 1977, the year of her silver jubilee, she travelled 56,000 miles. I once asked a courtier how she did it, to which I received the characteristic reply: “By not eating salads, shellfish and water melon while travelling.”
The Queen’s great-great-grandmother was Empress of India at a time when one quarter of the globe was painted red. She has lived through years of worldwide and often revolutionary change. In the single year of 1960, 16 African countries achieved independence and became sovereign member states of the United Nations. What was to be the role of the Crown in this new world? Her Majesty saw the challenge and seized the opportunity. She made the monarchy mobile. In the second year of her reign, she delivered her Christmas message to Britain and the Commonwealth from New Zealand.
Although always impeccably attentive to her duties in the United Kingdom, she threw herself, with wholehearted energy and commitment, into a new world role as the Head of the Commonwealth. She has visited nearly every member of it, many of them tens of times, from the north Atlantic to the south Pacific. Since her visit to Tuvalu in the south Pacific, sea levels around that threatened island have actually fallen. How jealous King Canute must be!
Her Majesty has presided over 18 Commonwealth Heads of Government meetings. These have not always been plain sailing. In 1979, the choice of Lusaka as a venue was a matter of controversy. Zambia was surrounded at the time by warring countries—Mozambique, Southern Rhodesia and Angola—and some thought it dangerous or politically unwise for her to go. Her Majesty made it publicly clear that whoever did or did not go, she was determined to be there. The Lusaka conference was a great success. It was even widely reported that Her Majesty’s only female Prime Minister in Britain had much enjoyed her foxtrot with Kenneth Kaunda.
Of a reign spanning nine Prime Ministers and 12 Presidents of the United States, and notwithstanding her triumph among us here at home, I believe that future historians will record that the impetus and character that she has uniquely given to the Commonwealth will be remembered as her greatest achievement. How fortunate we have been to be reigned over for 60 years by a lady of such poise, grace and beauty—the exemplary daughter of an enchanting mother.
I conclude by repeating the exquisite words of a poet and parliamentarian composed in honour of a queen of hearts of an earlier era—words that are absolutely true of our own beloved Queen:
“Tell me, if she were not designed
The eclipse and glory of her kind”.
Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)
It is a great honour to speak in this debate and particularly to follow the right hon. Member for Louth and Horncastle (Sir Peter Tapsell), the Father of the House. I hope, Mr Speaker, that you, the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition, having listened with care to the address by the Father of the House, will have it in mind that the next diamond jubilee to be organised should be the one to celebrate his 60th year in the House—such has he become a national treasure and an entertainment to us all.
Of the many privileges that go with the best job in the British Cabinet—that of Foreign Secretary—the greatest is that the whole office is expected to accompany Her Majesty the Queen on state visits abroad. During my five years as Foreign Secretary, I went with Her Majesty to, among other places, Germany, France, Malta and Nigeria. Those visits gave me the opportunity to witness at close hand the extraordinary preparation, dedication, commitment and time that Her Majesty and Prince Philip devoted to these sometimes very difficult public engagements. The pace that the Queen and the Prince set for these visits would have tired somebody half their age.
In Nigeria, the arrangements for the day-to-day engagements showed a little flexibility—to be delicate about the matter—and Her Majesty and Prince Philip had to accommodate that flexibility. She had taken part in one engagement at which I thought she did stunningly well. I said to her afterwards, “Ma’am, if I may say so, that showed extraordinary professionalism.” There was a pause. She looked at me and said, with a benign motherly smile, “Foreign Secretary, it should have been professional. I’ve been doing this for long enough.”
As Home Secretary and then Lord Chancellor, I had a rather less public duty—that of administering the oath of homage, which all new bishops of the Church of England have to make to the sovereign, and have done since the age of Henry VIII. Through that prism, I was able to observe the profound seriousness with which the Queen treats her duties as Head of our established Church, as well as her encyclopaedic knowledge of the parishes and personalities of the Anglican communion.
As Member of Parliament for Blackburn for the past 33 years, I have seen the excitement and, more importantly, the sense of recognition that visits by Her Majesty and other members of the royal family have brought to the people of my area, as they have to every constituency and to people of every ethnic background and religion. These are but a handful of examples of the extraordinary, exemplary way in which Her Majesty has led our nation over the past 60 years.
Of the three most recent of the Queen’s dozen Prime Ministers, one was in nappies and two were not born when she acceded to the throne in February 1952. I guess that I am one of a diminishing band of Members who can recall that day and period. Food and clothes rationing were still in operation and, much more importantly for a six-year-old, so was sweet rationing. There was an acute housing shortage. Vast areas of our great towns and cities were still bombed wastelands, Britain was almost exclusively a white society and, at primary school, I can still recall, in the second year of infant school, the map of the world that our teacher had permanently fixed on the wall and to which he pointed with great regularity. It showed a quarter of the world’s land mass painted pink to signify the British empire.
Six decades on, the world is a very different place, and so is the United Kingdom. We are now a heterogeneous society, with people from many religious and ethnic backgrounds proud to call themselves British. The empire has gone, to be replaced by the Commonwealth. The rate of social, industrial and technological change has been breathtaking. But through all this change, there has been the Queen—constant, reassuring, providing a sense of security and stability in an uncertain world, yet, remarkably, remaining in touch. I am delighted to support the Prime Minister’s motion.
Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)
It is a great honour to join my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and other colleagues in the House’s tribute to Her Majesty the Queen on the presentation of an Humble Address.
On the night of Monday 4 April 1955, on the eve of his resignation as Prime Minister, my kinsman Sir Winston Churchill gave a dinner at No. 10 Downing street for the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh. It was attended by Churchill’s closest political and military colleagues and friends, and by members of his private office and his family. The Prime Minister, in proposing the Queen’s health, said this:
“I propose a health to Your Majesty which I used to drink in the days when I was a young Officer in the 4th Hussars in the reign of Your Majesty’s great, great grandmother, Queen Victoria”.
He ended with the following words:
“And I drink to the wise and kindly way of life of which Your Majesty is the young and gleaming champion”.
I am sure that this whole House will agree that Her Majesty the Queen has, throughout her long reign, indeed been a gleaming champion for her country and for the Commonwealth. Crowned in the same abbey church as William the Conqueror, at the same age—26—as the first Queen Elizabeth 400 years earlier, she embodies all the best qualities and the continuity that are so important to our country and its splendid, independent people. This diamond jubilee will thus be an occasion for the nation to thank the Queen, who has served us so professionally, so loyally and so conscientiously through these extraordinary 60 years of some of the most tumultuous social, economic and technological change that Britain has ever seen.
The Queen brings to our national life an experience and knowledge of politics and events all around the world which is truly unrivalled by any other person in the land. Throughout her long reign, she has displayed great, good judgment, tolerance and absolute political neutrality at all times. When she ascended to the throne, her first Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, was of an age to have charged with the 21st Lancers at the battle of Omdurman in 1898, while her present Prime Minister was not even born in 1952. Such is the scale and breadth of the life that she has so triumphantly lived through.
The Queen is a source of powerful influence for this country throughout the world, as my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said. She is the Queen of 16 countries, including Canada, Australia and New Zealand, and the Head of the Commonwealth, an organisation that includes more than a quarter of the earth’s population. She thus brings a vital and often unrecognised addition to our efforts and our influence overseas. We in this House in particular should recognise this as an irreplaceable national asset of the first importance.
Every country needs someone who can represent the whole nation. It may seem primitive—and indeed it is—but if nationhood is to mean anything, it has to have a focus. In our case, for 60 years that focus has been, and remains, the Queen. Nations do have values, and they should be proud of them and willing to express that pride. That is what we are able to do with our monarchy and our Queen, and what we will do this year.
The Queen, blessed with a happy marriage to a remarkable consort who has done so much to support her, does a job that demands tremendous physical and mental toughness and energy. Quite apart from her still extensive public engagements, her work follows her wherever she goes, and always has done. Her life has truly been one of selfless duty. Yet sadly, there is probably no day when she will not read something about her or her family in the media or see something on television that is untrue, cruel or just plain silly.
We are indeed blessed to have in the Queen someone who is truly a remarkable example of dedication, efficiency and common sense, with a tremendously good judgment of people and—last, but by no means least—an excellent sense of humour. Those attributes, added to a perfectly wondrous dislike of pomposity and vanity, and an absolute inability to pretend to be anything other than herself, make the Queen what she is: arguably the most respected and admired—indeed, loved—public figure in the world.
I conclude as I started, with Churchill on the Queen. Broadcasting to the nation on 7 February 1952, on the death of King George VI, he ended with these words:
“I, whose youth was passed in the august, unchallenged and tranquil glories of the Victorian Era, may well feel a thrill in invoking, once more, the prayer and the Anthem ‘God Save the Queen’.”
And, 60 years on, so do we all, Mr Speaker—with all our hearts.
Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab)
I rise to support the motion in the name of the Prime Minister and to associate myself with the comments that hon. and right hon. Members have made with great eloquence so far.
While I have the indulgence of the House, I want briefly to take only a few moments to report that the city of Leicester—and indeed, my constituency—is immensely proud, delighted, excited and honoured to be hosting Her Majesty the Queen, His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh and Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Cambridge tomorrow, for the start of the diamond jubilee tour. Tomorrow, Her Majesty will be visiting one of the country’s most dynamic universities—De Montfort, in the city of Leicester. Our cathedral will be hosting the Queen—I believe for her first visit—for a service led by the Bishop of Leicester, and our directly elected mayor, Sir Peter Soulsby, will welcome Her Majesty to the iconic clock tower in our city centre.
As well as celebrating Her Majesty’s diamond jubilee, tomorrow is also about celebrating the city of Leicester and the thousands of Leicester people, of all backgrounds, who make our city the strong, diverse and vibrant place it is today. Throughout the last 60 years, families have come from all parts of the Commonwealth and all parts of the world to make Leicester their home. Under Her Majesty’s reign, Leicester and Britain have become more diverse, and stronger, too. Although we are diverse, we are united as a city. Tomorrow, people from Leicester, of all backgrounds, all communities and all faiths, will welcome their Queen—their Head of State. Perhaps they will welcome her in the varied dialects spoken in our city: “A Salaam O Alikum”, perhaps; “Namaste”, perhaps; “Sat sri akaal”, perhaps; or, more simply, perhaps the more familiar “Welcome to Leicester, your Majesty.”
Michael Ellis (Northampton North) (Con)
The preamble to every Act of Parliament that has received Royal Assent in the last 60 years refers to the fact that it is enacted by
“the Queen’s most Excellent Majesty”,
as well as by the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and by the Commons, in Parliament assembled. That is indeed fitting terminology, in that there has been a real excellence in Her Majesty the Queen’s devotion, integrity, honour, service and duty to her people over the past 60 years. The Queen serves as an indefatigable unifying influence in an increasingly diverse nation and a Commonwealth of Nations composed of a plethora of countries with different languages, cultures, religions and forms of government.
Her Majesty’s commitment and public service are without parallel. When she was on a tour of Africa at the age of 21, the then Princess Elizabeth declared that her
“whole life, whether it be long or short, would be dedicated to the service”
of her people. And it has been. I venture to suggest that Queen Elizabeth’s ancestors would be proud of her—her late father particularly so—and that her heirs and successors will be driven to follow her example. The Queen is a model sovereign, who has performed her demanding constitutional functions with extraordinarily consistent good judgment. She has touched millions of lives through her innumerable visits. She inspires utter devotion from her regiments and the Church of which she is supreme governor. In the Commonwealth, the Queen has made an enduring contribution to the lives of millions of her people around the world. By her side throughout this period of change has been His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh, who has been in her heart and mind since she was 13 years of age.
In 1977, for the silver jubilee, and in 2002, for the golden jubilee, peers and Members of Parliament contributed to a gift on the parliamentary estate to be enjoyed by hundreds of thousands of visitors. Late in 2010, in keeping with that tradition, I established an all-party group. With the help of the then Serjeant at Arms of this House, Jill Pay, the Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod, Lieutenant-General David Leakey, and the conservation architect of the estate, Adam Watrobski, I was soon able to approach you, Mr Speaker, and the then Lord Speaker, Baroness Hayman, in order to seek, through your good offices, a request to any Member of this House or the other place who wished to contribute, to make such private donation as they saw fit to a stained glass depiction of the royal arms, to be placed in the north window of Westminster Hall. After renovations have been completed in the coming months, that window will show the first royal arms to be displayed in the north window since the time of King Henry VIII. They will be opposite the arms of His late Majesty, King George VI, the Queen’s father.
No public funds whatever have been used for the manufacture of the stained glass window, or for its monumental display case or its forthcoming installation. That is thanks to the generosity of hundreds of parliamentarians from all sides in both Houses who, in response to your letter, Mr Speaker, have donated a total of £98,396 for this gift, which will allow a modest surplus to be remitted to the Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Trust charity. That generosity is a manifestation of the enormous respect and profound gratitude felt by this Parliament for the selfless and uninterrupted service of our beloved sovereign. God save the Queen.
Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)
In supporting the motion, I know that I speak on behalf of the bulk of the people in my beloved city of Sheffield in offering my congratulations and reflecting on the respect and affection in which Her Majesty has been held over the past 60 years. Reference has been made to the enormity of the change that has taken place in that time. I was reminded, listening to the radio this morning, that the first edition of the New Musical Express, published 60 years ago, featured Paul Robeson. I do not know what Her Majesty will make of this year’s Eurovision song contest, but some things never really change. Some changes have been very much for the better, in regard to tackling discrimination and gross inequality, and creating a care across the world that did not exist 60 years ago. Some of them have illustrated a loss, however, including the loss of the mutuality and reciprocity that were a feature of many of our communities 60 years ago.
One thing is absolutely certain: over those 60 years, I have managed to achieve the dishonour of making mistakes in front of the Queen on a number of occasions. The first was not, in fact, in front of Her Majesty. It involved a little boy, coming up to the age of six, in a school for the blind, when we were celebrating the coronation. Elgar was blaring out from a loudspeaker, and I rushed across the playground only to smash into a little four-year-old girl, spilling lemonade all over her skirt and blouse, which resulted in her bursting into floods of tears. That was the first, but not the last, occasion on which I have made people cry over the past 60 years.
Many moons ago, as leader of Sheffield City Council, I tasted the tea before Her Majesty arrived and described it as “absolutely disgusting”. I had it changed, only to discover that I had set aside her favourite brew. On another occasion when I was leader of Sheffield City Council, I made the mistake of declining Her Majesty’s help at lunch, when she offered to help me with a Barnsley chop. Had I accepted her help, I would have been spared the embarrassment of being told, at the end of the meal, that she was quite used to cutting up the meat for the corgis.
Dogs are a feature of Her Majesty’s life, and I could not let this occasion go by without recalling how much dogs’ instincts affect us, in the political arena as well as in their capacity as pets and social companions. My right hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) will remember our hosting an official visit by President Putin, in his first incarnation as President of the Russian Federation. As the arms were presented, my then dog, Sadie, uttered a deep growl from her chest which developed into a bark. That was obviously a precursor to the political change that we have seen in the Russian Federation.
My right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition referred to the Queen’s ability to put people at their ease. Perhaps I should mention the way in which she put me at my ease when I made another blunder. It was when I was being inducted as a member of the Privy Council in 1997. My right hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn will recall that he had set me in the right direction to kneel on the cushion, but I missed it slightly. I was put right, and the Queen gently assured me that I did actually brush her hand with my lips, rather than her elbow with my mouth, which was the direction in which I had been heading.
These have been 60 years of a Queen for her people here and in the Commonwealth. She has been a Queen who has touched the hearts of those of all classes, distinctions, races, ethnicities and religions. We have had a Queen who has been able to hold our nation together, and I hope that her life will be long and that, in the years to come, she will be able to hold the United Kingdom together in the way that many of us wish for.
Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)
It is a privilege and a pleasure to support the Prime Minister in his motion to send an Address to the Queen on the occasion of her diamond jubilee. Like the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett), and everyone else in the House and beyond who have met her on a one-to-one basis, I have been daunted by the prospect as well as humbled by the experience. That is not surprising, given the record that she has achieved. She is not only the second-longest serving monarch we have ever had on these islands, but the second-longest serving Head of State in the world at the moment. I suppose if this were a primary school, I would offer a prize to anyone who could tell me who the longest serving Head of State is—
Simon Hughes
I will tell you later.
Picking up on the comments made by the Father of the House, I find it extraordinary that we have a monarch who has met nearly a quarter of all the Presidents of the United States throughout its history, and who has known a fifth of all British Prime Ministers. Those are extraordinary records.
In paying tribute to the Queen, I should also like to pay tribute to Prince Philip, who has stood alongside her for every month of those 60 years, and more.
Unlike the Father of the House, I am not old enough to remember the accession or the coronation, although I must be honest and tell the House that I was just alive at the time, and I am sure that my family were celebrating. Other events have been significant throughout the Queen’s life. When she has visited our communities, those visits have been really important. There have been conventional events, such as her visit to Llandaff cathedral when I was a little boy. It had been restored after sustaining bomb damage during the war. There have been conventional events relating to past jubilees. She came to the King’s Stairs gardens in Bermondsey, by Edward III’s manor house, to mark her silver jubilee, for example. There have also been some esoteric events. She came to an event near London Bridge a few years ago, in which she unveiled a stone in honour of a native American Indian who was buried there—a fact that came as a surprise to us all. It was a slightly unexpected mixture, seeing the Queen next to a red Indian chief somewhere near London Bridge station.
As the Prime Minister indicated, the Queen has certainly also gone beyond the call of duty on many occasions. The example that most comes to mind is indeed the blessed millennium eve celebrations at the dome. I think that she was reassured by stopping off at Southwark cathedral first, which she enjoyed and found highly appropriate. That visit probably also gave her the spiritual strength and courage to go on to the events that straddled midnight.
People have rightly paid tribute to the Queen’s international as well as national service. It is extraordinary that she is Queen of 16 countries, and of about 130 million people around the world. She is Queen of the second-largest country in the world—Canada—as well as of Tuvalu, a country of only 10,000 people. It is absolutely consistent with her service that the trust set up to mark the jubilee is intended to serve the poorest peoples of the Commonwealth—exactly the sort of mission she has always supported herself.
The Queen has been pre-eminent in making sure that people in the public service, and particularly those in military service, have been honoured and supported by her. We thank her for that, because they do the bravest and most difficult of jobs. She has also always gone out of her way to support those in voluntary service, commending that non-paid activity in our country and beyond. She has also been particular in making sure that she has supported and encouraged people of all faiths and backgrounds.
People have paid many tributes in this place on occasions during the 60 years. They have highlighted the Queen’s unassuming virtues and her faultless example. In fact, she has stood like a rock in a sea of troubles, she has lived out the promises made at her accession and coronation and she has exemplified dignity, experience, wisdom and, above all, her incomparable sense of duty.
As we say our grateful thank you to a Queen who has been our monarch for 60 years, it is also fair to say that she has also been our servant—the people’s servant—for 60 years. She has been a servant monarch, which is what she said she would be when she took the coronation oath.
Let me finish with two short personal comments. I am a member of the Christian Church. There are people in this Parliament of many faiths and of none. Speaking as someone of faith, may I say on behalf of those who have faith in general and of Christians in particular that when the Queen has expressed her views about the truths and good news of the Christian gospel, as she did in her Christmas broadcast last year, she has done so more honestly, more simply and more clearly than probably any other Christian leader in the world? People of all faiths should be thankful for that. She has absolutely got it right in expressing the faith in which she so clearly believes.
I am privileged to be the MP whose constituency includes the Old Kent road. The Prime Minister alluded to a relevant description earlier. We regularly call people—we are not the only people to do so—“diamond geezers”. I am not sure that the Queen would be overly keen on the second part of the description, but in the vernacular of Bermondsey, the Old Kent road and everywhere else: she is a diamond; she has been a diamond; and for the many more years we hope she reigns, she will go on being a diamond. On behalf of all my colleagues—and so say all of us.
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
On behalf of my right hon. and hon. Friends, it is a great privilege and pleasure to endorse and to be associated with the statements of the Prime Minister and of other right hon. and hon. Members in support of this motion. For most of us and for most of the country, Queen Elizabeth II is the only monarch we have ever known. Only one other monarch, Queen Victoria, has reached this tremendous milestone. It is not just the length of service that has been so impressive, but the manner in which Her Majesty has served the people of this country. Dedication, commitment, judgment and sacrifice are words that spring to mind when we think of the Queen’s service to our country and to the Commonwealth over the course of her entire life.
At 21 years of age, Her Majesty pledged that
“my whole life whether it be long or short shall be devoted to your service.”
That promise has been well and truly fulfilled. During Her Majesty’s reign, she has of course been supported superbly by His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh, who has obviously been a great source of strength to Her Majesty, as well as serving our country in his own inimitable right.
We from Northern Ireland appreciate deeply the commitment that the Queen has shown to our part of the United Kingdom over the course of her reign. Her Majesty has visited Northern Ireland on some 15 official visits over the last 60 years. She has travelled even during very difficult and dangerous periods when her visits brought with them severe risks to her personal security. I well recall one particular visit when, during very dark and troubled days indeed, I had the great honour as lord mayor of the great city of Belfast of welcoming her to the city. Her intense concern for and interest in the welfare of all of the people of Belfast and Northern Ireland was evident. People in our Province have always enjoyed visits by the Queen and members of the royal family. We look forward eagerly to Her Majesty’s visit later this year, so that once again we can show our respect and affection for her and the royal household.
On the first occasion that Her Majesty visited Northern Ireland as Queen in 1953, she spoke to the Northern Ireland House of Commons, saying:
“I assure you that I will always strive to repay your loyalty and devotion with my steadfast service to you.”
The then Speaker responded by saying:
“It is our heartfelt prayer that Your Majesty may be blessed with health and strength, long to reign over us.”
As we give thanks to almighty God today for the life and service of Her Majesty, we affirm that this continues to be our sincere prayer today. God save the Queen.
Adam Afriyie (Windsor) (Con)
As the Member of Parliament for Windsor, I wholeheartedly associate myself with the words of the Prime Minister and of other right hon. and hon. Members. During 60 years of service, there have been 60 years of change, but one thing has not changed and has remained constant—Her Majesty’s dedication and sense of duty towards our country and its people. On behalf of the people of Windsor, I wish to express my thanks and my best wishes to Her Majesty and the royal family. She is as welcome in her home in Windsor as she is throughout the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth.
Sir Gerald Kaufman (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)
I join my fellow former member of Oxford university Labour club, the Father of the House, in paying tribute to Her Majesty. What has impressed me about her, among many other noble attributes, is her knowledgeability and her imperturbality.
I attended a meeting of the Privy Council, at which Her Majesty had the responsibility to prick sheriffs. She held an object that looks like a large knitting needle and in front a parchment roll, not dissimilar to another kind of roll, was unrolled before her. As the official read out the names, the Queen leaned forward and stabbed the roll. On one occasion when a name was read out, Her Majesty said, “But he’s dead,” to which the official’s response was, “Yes, Your Majesty, but if you will prick it, I will explain later.”
Her Majesty goes to enormous pains to obtain information in order to carry out her duties. When I attended the investiture at Buckingham palace, the Queen tapped me on the shoulder. She then made comments to me, which made it clear that she had taken the trouble to find out something about me. What I found even more encouraging and remarkable was that as each person being honoured came before her—there were a very large number—she had something to say to each one of them. It struck me as impressive that she went to all that trouble to make the day memorable for the people attending at Buckingham palace.
I want to pay tribute to the Duke of Edinburgh, too. I have been involved in a number of events with His Royal Highness. I particularly remember meeting His Royal Highness at Farnborough air show at the time when I was shepherding through legislation to nationalise the aircraft industry and to create British Aerospace. He had some extremely forthright comments and pieces of advice to offer about how British Aerospace should be nationalised. I took due account of what he said when we carried the legislation through Parliament.
While there are Presidents in countries all over the world, this country has what some might regard as an anomaly, whereby the Head of State is an hereditary monarch. The greatest achievement of Her Majesty is that she has proved by the way in which she has presided over this country for 60 years that hereditary monarchy provides a better basis for genuine democracy than any of the presidencies we see in different parts of the world. Her impartiality and knowledgability have demonstrated to all of us that we, who have the best democracy in the world—despite occasional electoral aberrations—owe that democracy, in which all of us are free, to Her Majesty. What she has done in making this United Kingdom a permanent democracy, a democracy that is impregnable, is perhaps the greatest of her many achievements.
Mr Speaker
I call Mr Steve Brine.
Mr Brine was on the list of those wishing to speak, but apparently he does not wish to do so, so I call Mary Macleod.
Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)
I am honoured to have the opportunity to contribute a few words to this humble Address to Her Majesty on the 60th anniversary of her accession to the throne. I strongly support the words of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, who gave a powerful and poignant summary of what the Queen has done for this country.
When Queen Elizabeth II became our monarch in February 1952, the United Kingdom was a pretty austere place. It was only seven years after the end of the second world war, and tea rationing was still in place. The Queen was faced with a crisis almost immediately when the great smog of London killed about 12,000 people in December 1952, an event that shocked the world into starting the environmental movement. In her first Christmas message, aged just 26, she called on her people to
“set out to build a truer knowledge of ourselves and our fellowmen, to work for tolerance and understanding among the nations and to use the tremendous forces of science and learning for the betterment of man’s lot upon this earth.”
Those are wise words even today, as they were then.
As others have already pointed out, the Queen has witnessed some incredible innovations during her 60-year reign: the discovery of the structure of DNA in 1953, the first man on the moon, the first and last supersonic flights on Concorde, the first test-tube baby, the first personal computer and the world wide web, and the introduction of the mobile phone. About 90% of people in the United Kingdom now have mobile phones.
Her Majesty has also been a constant presence during many significant world events, such as Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech, the construction and fall of the Berlin wall, the recessions of the 1970s and 1990s, and the economic crisis of more recent years. She has discussed the politics of the day with 12 Prime Ministers, from Sir Winston Churchill in 1951 to my right hon. Friend our current Prime Minister. That makes her probably the most experienced and well-briefed person in the country today. She has been at the heart of what has been important to Britain, and the challenges that we have had to face as a country over these 60 years. Our world has changed more in the Queen’s lifetime than in those of any of her predecessors, but she has remained a calm presence at the centre, earning the respect and affection of everyone.
I first met Her Majesty in May 1998 at Balmoral castle, beside the beautiful banks of the River Dee, in my role as part of the royal household. On that first evening, over dinner, I saw her wonderful humour, heard story after story of experiences that she had been through, listened to the pipes being played by Pipe Major Jim Motherwell, and talked about Scotland, which, of course, I consider to be an important part of the United Kingdom.
During my time as policy adviser, I saw at first hand the unbelievable work load that Her Majesty undertook daily as part of her unstinting service to this country and the Commonwealth. Her devotion to duty is unparalleled, and is reflected not just in her work load, but in the number of engagements that she attends and the visitors to this country whom she entertains. The Queen is patron to more than 600 wide-ranging organisations that support children, sport, the arts, health, science, animals, industry, education and the military, to name just a few. She takes a particular interest in all the armed forces in both the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth, and is, of course, the wife, mother and grandmother of individuals who have served, or are currently serving, in the armed forces.
For me, the Queen represents the best of British values—loyalty, respect, family, volunteering—and reminds us of what it means to be British. In her diamond jubilee message, she asked us all to remember
“the power of togetherness and the convening strength of family, friendship and good neighbourliness.”
All those things are so important at the moment to everyone in the United Kingdom and throughout the Commonwealth.
The Queen even has the ability to transcend boundaries. I flew in this morning after looking at emerging and high-growth markets and businesses in Asia, and spoke to an American gentleman who said to me enthusiastically, “We love her, and we feel that she is our Queen too.” When I pressed him to tell me why, he said, “She embodies dignity, stability and grace.” I could not have agreed more.
His Royal Highness the Duke of Cambridge, Prince William, spoke recently of how his grandmother had
“carved her own way completely”
and had managed to deal with the difficult balance between public demands and private life. At the same time, the Queen has not been afraid to listen to feedback from the general public, and to take action when it is needed. She has personally overseen a radical modernisation of the royal household to reduce spending, support female succession and embrace technology. Grants to the Queen and the royal household amount to less than 70p per person in the country, a figure that is far outweighed by their payments to the Treasury and the benefits of tourism to the economy. The Queen has also opened up the way for the royal household to share information. More than half a million people like her Facebook page, which I suspect is more than most Members of Parliament can say.
In 1897, on the day of her own diamond jubilee celebrations, Queen Victoria wrote in her diary:
“The streets were beautifully decorated, also the balconies of the houses, with flowers, flags and draperies of every hue.”
I look forward to similar festivities throughout the country during the celebration weekend in June, and encourage all local communities to hold the street parties and other events that do so much to bring us together in our own communities. Let us use this year of the diamond jubilee and the Olympics and Paralympics to regain our sense of Britishness. Let us be proud to be British. Let us talk up British business and, most of all, our people: those who really make Britain what it is today, with the Queen at the helm.
I want to join everyone here today in paying the warmest possible tribute to Her Majesty the Queen. Her devotion to duty and her energy are inspirational, and we cannot thank her enough for all that she does for our country and the Commonwealth. If we all did a fraction of what she does, our communities would surely be stronger and better. Members of Parliament are elected to serve our constituents and to make a difference to our country. What better example of service could they follow than that of Her Majesty the Queen? She has made an impression on so many people. She is a role model and an inspiration, for me, for women, for citizens of the UK and the Commonwealth, and for generations to come.
In supporting the Prime Minister’s motion and thanking the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh, I end my speech with words from our national anthem:
“God save our gracious Queen”.
Long may she reign over us!
Liz Kendall (Leicester West) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to contribute to the humble Address, and to support the motion.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth) told us earlier, tomorrow morning Her Majesty the Queen, His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh and Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Cambridge will visit Leicester on the first stop of the diamond jubilee tour. That is a great honour for our city. Under the Queen’s reign, Leicester has prospered and changed. We have welcomed people from throughout the United Kingdom, the Commonwealth and the rest of the world. It is therefore fitting that tomorrow’s royal visit will begin with a dance that celebrates our city’s diversity.
Leicester has a long history in textiles, hosiery and shoemaking. Students on De Montfort university’s world-renowned footwear design course have been busy making a pair of shoes for the Duchess of Cambridge, and the royal party will watch a fashion show at the university. They will also hear about De Montfort’s Square Mile project, which aims to help local residents in Newfoundpool, Fosse and Woodgate, which are in my constituency. Students from Leicester college, including my constituent Amrik Mudher, will then help to make the royal lunch at St Martin’s house before the visitors proceed to Leicester cathedral and our historic clock tower.
We in Leicester treasure our history, we celebrate our present and we are confident about the future. There is a huge sense of anticipation and excitement about tomorrow’s visit. I know that tomorrow the citizens of Leicester will give the Queen, in the 60th year of her reign, a welcome of which our whole city, and country, can be proud.
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
It is a great privilege to be called to speak in this debate and thereby have an opportunity to pay tribute to Her Majesty the Queen, both on my own part as her humble subject and on behalf of the residents of Suffolk Coastal. For so many of us, she is the only monarch we have ever known, and what a wonderful example she has set of service, of family and of true commitment to our United Kingdom. Members of my family proudly serve in the armed forces, and the Queen also served during world war two, showing that what was good enough for her subjects was good enough for her. The example she set then was an important part of the national war effort.
I also pay tribute to the Queen’s steadfast consort, His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh. It is fantastic that he has recovered from his recent minor illness, and I am delighted that he will be starting the jubilee tour with his wife tomorrow in Leicester.
I pay tribute to the Queen for her visit to the Republic of Ireland last year. I wonder whether Her Majesty will ever realise the true extent of the impact she made. It may be a little controversial to say that it was a great parliamentarian, Cromwell, who tore Ireland apart. I think that the Queen’s visit last year will have gone a long way towards restoring the relationship between our two great nations.
I do not pretend to have had any contact with Her Majesty, but we have heard some wonderful insights and amusing anecdotes today. I do know, however, that the people who receive honours from her and those who attend her garden parties are thrilled to do so, as are all the people who queue up as I did as little girl in 1977—I also got a commemorative mug—and line the streets of Liverpool, Wrexham and other places because we want to see our monarch. The only times that I have had any contact with Her Majesty are when she was gracious enough to grant Royal Assent to a private Member’s Bill of mine, and thereby make it an Act of Parliament, and, of course, when I swore the oath to take office here in Parliament for the first time.
I think it is fair to say that Her Majesty has also touched the world. She is the Head of State for over a quarter of the world’s population. That is celebrated in Commonwealth week and at the Commonwealth games—and I hope she will open the Olympic games later this year. I encourage colleagues to take the opportunity of diamond jubilee week to host a Commonwealth day reception in their constituencies, to mark the Queen’s contribution not only to our country, but around the world.
As my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Sussex (Nicholas Soames) said, there have been many changes during Her Majesty’s reign. When the Leader of the Opposition, the right hon. Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband), mentioned TV sets, I remembered my mother telling me that the coronation was the first time she watched television. In Wrexham, people crowded into one particular shop, because the shopkeeper had bought a television just to be able to watch that ceremony, which changed history. Many other things have changed—one of my favourite dishes, coronation chicken, was invented for that day and is one of its lasting legacies.
We cannot praise Her Majesty’s service to our country too highly. She is a mother, a grandmother and a great-grandmother. As has been said, she enjoys the company of dogs and horses, and on a visit to Suffolk earlier in the year, she went to Newmarket. On Her Majesty’s special weekend, we will all join her in celebrating what is great about our country. I am sure that she will continue to serve us for years to come.
Sir Stuart Bell (Middlesbrough) (Lab)
The hon. Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey) made a fine comment about His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh, who will begin the royal tour tomorrow on schedule. We all welcome that news.
It is a great pleasure to attend this debate and to listen so many fine and noble speeches. I was impressed by the speeches of the right hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Nicholas Soames) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw). I remember the death of George VI, but not the radio broadcast by his kinsman the following night. I certainly remember the Queen’s coronation and the feeling in the country that we were entering a new Elizabethan era. That era has lasted longer than anyone would have imagined and has been to our country’s credit and honour.
Many right hon. and hon. Members have described their personal experiences of the Queen, the Duke and the rest of the royal family. I first visited Buckingham palace in 1984, accompanied by my wife. I saw the very first copy of Disraeli’s “Sybil, or The Two Nations” in an exhibition of manuscripts from Windsor castle. Her Majesty and Prince Philip came along and talked to us all very nicely. Dame Angela Rumbold, a former Minister of the Crown and Member of Parliament, was also there. Her husband, John, died recently, which is a great sadness to us all. Angela and I were officially paired in the House, and when I proudly told the Duke that, he turned to my wife and asked, “And you have an official pair, my dear?” He had that twinkle in his eye that I am not quite sure about. Fortunately for me, however, my wife held her peace.
Her Majesty visited Middlesbrough in 1992, when she and the Duke were touring the British isles for the last time on the royal yacht Britannia—former Prime Minister Tony Blair came to regret the decision to abandon the yacht. The yacht was docked in Hartlepool, but Her Majesty visited my Middlesbrough constituency, where she opened a children’s playground at Pallister park. The Queen clearly has greater knowledge of our parliamentary system than some Members, because she looked at me and said, “The Whips have let you off today, have they?”
One of my constituents asked me if I had been invited to a dinner on the royal yacht that evening. I somewhat shyly and diffidently said that my wife and I had, indeed, been invited. My constituent said, “I sent her a cruet set for her 40th anniversary. Will you ask her if she received it, and if she uses it?” It is always wise to seek to do a constituent’s bidding, of course, but I must admit that my courage failed me on that occasion.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett) described various mistakes made in the Queen’s presence. I have often said to people that one thing we must never do is address the Queen; we must wait for her to address us. On one occasion, commanded again to Buckingham palace, I stood in line to be introduced. When my turn came, I blurted out: “Your Majesty, I am your Second Church Estates Commissioner.” She replied, “Oh, really.” It took me some time to get over that. Later on, however, she came up to me and asked what the General Synod had been discussing last weekend—the right hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) will have taken note of that—which made me feel a lot better.
I was Her Majesty’s Second Church Estates Commissioner for 13 years, and I saw very clearly her dedication and devotion to her duties to state and to Church—my right hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn also mentioned that. I remember her opening the General Synod at Westminster abbey. She is, of course, Supreme Governor of the Church of England through her coronation oath, which dates back to the time of Henry VIII. I saw how she looked at the people around her and took in the atmosphere. It was clear that she enjoyed the event; she was smiling in enjoyment and pleasure at her role as Supreme Governor—in marked contrast to what happened at the opening of the millennium dome, to which the Prime Minister referred.
My hon. Friend the Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth) mentioned the Queen’s interest in other faiths. When she visited Lambeth palace on 15 February, she talked of nine families of faith. She referred to the significant position of the Church of England in our nation’s life and its duty to protect the free practice of all faiths in this country.
I have referred to various visits to Buckingham palace, and I would not wish to omit the final visit I made to see Her Majesty there with other Members of Parliament. We do get invited to Buckingham palace from time to time. On this occasion I was with a group of MPs that included the hon. Member for Epping Forest (Mrs Laing), who I am sure would not miss this occasion today, when Her Majesty came to talk to us. Three years later, it was our time again, and the hon. Member for Epping Forest— now a friend—said, “Wouldn’t it be nice if Her Majesty came along and spoke to us again?” I spoke to the equerry and he managed to get Her Majesty to come and speak to us, and the hon. Lady said, “Your Majesty, we were together three years ago and you spoke to us then.” Her Majesty uttered the immortal words, “And we are all still here,” and so, 60 years on from her coronation, are Her Majesty and the Duke. It has been a mighty achievement for a monarch to reign for 60 years and that is why we pay tribute to Her Majesty and the Duke. We wish her well in her reign and we look back in satisfaction and gratitude at the service she has rendered to this country.
Mrs Eleanor Laing (Epping Forest) (Con)
I am very happy to verify the story of the hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Sir Stuart Bell). In supporting the Humble Address may I say that those of us who strive to show that there should be no barriers to a woman being able to achieve all that a man can achieve have in Her Majesty a shining example and a wonderful inspiration?
Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)
May I add my support to the sentiments expressed by the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition following recent devastating events in Afghanistan? We must never forget that those who serve are the lions of our country. We owe them all an enormous debt of gratitude and I am sure that the thoughts of the whole House will be with the families of those who have tragically lost their lives in Afghanistan.
It is an honour to speak in today’s Humble Address to celebrate the diamond jubilee of Her Majesty the Queen. As Her Majesty prepares to begin the next chapter in her remarkable history, it is right that we remind ourselves of the changes to the country and the world that have accompanied her most distinguished reign on the British throne. While the world has changed at a rapid rate, the Queen has struck the balance perfectly between stability and tradition versus change and modernisation. She reigns steadfast in her belief in duty, commitment and loyalty, steadfast in her belief in peace and prosperity both at home and overseas, and steadfast as a mother and grandmother who works tirelessly for her nation and her family. The Queen has served her country dutifully and with a quiet dignity and grace. I know that the Queen’s support for our armed forces really does matter to them and their families, especially on days such as today. I believe that the Queen’s service is best defined by one word—duty.
Her Majesty is undoubtedly formidable, but we know that she also has a sense of humour. I recall a story about a mayoress from a town that shall remain nameless, although I will say that it was not Barnsley, who showed the Queen around a refurbished town hall. During the tour, the Queen and mayoress arrived at an open cabinet containing a rather formal robe, which prompted the Queen to ask, “What is that robe for?” The mayoress replied, “This is our ceremonial robe, but we only use it for very special occasions.” A wry smile from the Queen said all that needed to be said.
In complex and challenging times for Britain and the world, the Queen has remained a reassuring constant. Her Majesty has worked tirelessly to support all her Prime Ministers and to build strong working relationships with countless foreign Heads of State and leaders of the Commonwealth countries. The Queen is well placed to head a country that has culture, the arts, heritage, design and technology at its core. Around the world, portraits of the Queen have become synonymous with the traditions of the British monarchy. Rolf Harris and Lucien Freud, to name just two, have had the opportunity to paint Her Majesty. Oh to have been a fly on the wall during one of Freud’s sittings with Her Majesty!
As we move into 2012, Her Majesty will inspire her nation again. In July, she will become the third British monarch officially to open the London Olympic games, following in the footsteps of her great-grandfather, Edward VII, in 1908 and her father, George VI, in 1948. Before that, the nation will gather to celebrate the diamond jubilee. In South Yorkshire, we will celebrate with festivals and street parties. Over the next 12 months, the eyes of the world will be on the Queen to inspire her people. I am confident, as, I am sure, are the whole House and the whole country, that she will, as ever, with a grace and devotion to duty that is admired and respected the world over, once more make this country very proud.
Priti Patel (Witham) (Con)
It is a great privilege to have this opportunity, on behalf of the Witham constituency, to support the Humble Address to Her Majesty the Queen.
In October 2010, my constituency was honoured by the first visit of Her Majesty to that part of Essex for a generation. She came to visit Wilkin and Sons in Tiptree, which has a royal warrant. As right hon. and hon. Members will know, the company makes the finest jams and preserves in the world. In the weeks leading up to the visit, the air of excitement and anticipation was immense. That seems unimaginable in today’s era of short-term celebrity culture, but business men, schoolchildren and pensioners were all enthused and excited about her presence in Tiptree. The visit brought everyone together as nothing else could and blew us all away on the day. It is a testament to her remarkable character that everyone who met her felt inspired and delighted that the Queen had engaged in conversation with them. Despite the fact that that visit was only one of the hundreds she makes each year, everyone felt special to have spent time with Her Majesty.
Just as Tiptree celebrated Her Majesty’s visit, people across my constituency are now embracing the diamond jubilee celebrations. Witham town council has organised a competition for local schoolchildren to design a logo to mark this momentous occasion. With so many events, street parties and activities taking place in her honour, we can see that Her Majesty is perhaps the only living person who can command this level of respect and loyalty and bring our great nation together.
It is absolutely fitting, with the celebrations taking place across the country and the Commonwealth, that the House should pay its own tribute to the 60 years of selfless service that Her Majesty has given to the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth. She has relentlessly promoted Britain throughout the world, and there is barely a corner of the earth that she has not reached. Her Majesty has supported numerous charities and great causes throughout our country. She has acted as a confidante to a dozen Prime Ministers throughout her reign and done tremendous work. Her strong work ethic is inspiring, and her eternal optimism for this country is a great source of comfort in an era of change. As her visit to my constituency demonstrated, our sovereign lady is a true believer in the people and businesses that make our country the greatest in the world. Her Majesty is the embodiment of the British spirit, and long may her reign continue.
Paul Flynn (Newport West) (Lab)
My reason for speaking is that I have lived under four monarchs, and I would like to present a view that will represent a diversity of opinion in the country, which probably has not been expressed so far in the debate. A Head of State wearing a green dress and bowing her head to Croke Park was a very powerful symbol of reconciliation, which I believe will have a profound effect on healing the wounds that have disfigured life in the island of Ireland for generations.
The Queen is still working, doing a full-time job, having been born in 1926. What a splendid example to the nation and to the House, which has just two hon. Members who are octogenarians. Their distinguished contributions should ensure that we encourage greater diversity in the House. It is one area where we fail. Great progress has been made; there is a larger proportion of women Members and more Members from the minorities, although not yet enough, but we fail dismally on the number of people who can remember what it was like before there was a health service, for instance. We should look with gratitude to the Queen for providing a magnificent example.
My third positive point is from the writings of Robert Rhodes James, a former Member for Cambridge and a respected historian. He raised a fascinating point about the feelings in the Conservative party when Mrs Thatcher’s premiership was coming to an end. He wrote of concern in Conservative circles that Mrs Thatcher might decide to call a general election, acting in her own interests rather than those of the nation, and that the Conservative party, the House and the Cabinet would not be able to stop her. The only person who could have stopped her was the Head of State, and I believe all of us agree that the Queen’s strength of character and the fact that she had served many other Prime Ministers would give us full confidence that she was the best person in that situation or any situation when a Prime Minister decided to act in his or her interests rather than the interests of the country.
Another tradition is represented in this country, certainly in my constituency when, in 1839, a group of Chartists demonstrated and their purpose was not entirely benign towards Queen Victoria. Twenty of them were shot. It is right that we look at the relationship between the sovereign and ourselves in a modern Parliament. One welcomes the fact that a new coat of arms will be added to the many already displayed in the House, but sadly there is virtually no pictorial depiction of the struggles for democracy by the Chartists, the Tolpuddle martyrs, the suffragettes and others who shaped the rich and strong democracy we have today. We should put that right.
The speeches that have been made so far have been sincere and heartfelt, and virtually all were true, but if someone wants to be critical, they are not allowed to be. If a monarch, or just a relative of the monarch, strayed from the paths of sainthood and perfection, it would be impossible for a Member of the House to be critical of that person. That is not sensible. If that circumstance should arise, we should be allowed to talk freely if words of criticism are necessary.
It is right, too, that the quarter of the population who describe themselves as republican should have their views heard. We know that figure is reflected in the membership of the House. When there was a debate some years ago about whether there should be an alternative Oath, more than 100 Members voted for it. To avoid the verbal rigmarole that republicans have to go through when taking the Oath, we should have an alternative.
Finally, I am sure that even with the history of my city, where republicanism has existed for at least 200 years, all the people I represent, whether they see themselves as subjects or citizens, royalists or republicans, will wish the Queen well on this occasion.
Andrew Rosindell (Romford) (Con)
On behalf of my constituents of Romford and Hornchurch, I rise in support of the Prime Minister in the Humble Address to the Queen, and add my congratulations and heartfelt thanks to her Majesty for her service and dedication to our nation in this, the 60th year of her reign as our Head of State, sovereign and defender of the faith.
The diamond jubilee of Her Majesty the Queen will be a wonderful celebration for all the people of these islands, and a truly historic occasion for British people throughout the world. Let us remember that although Her Majesty is dear to all of us in this country, she is also loved by millions across the globe. The Queen reigns over not only the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland but 15 other realms, five Crown dependencies and 16 overseas territories, and 11 external territories of which Australia and New Zealand are sovereign; in total, 135 million people throughout 48 realms and territories, representing more than 18.8 million square miles of the world remain under the Crown.
From the Arctic north of Canada to the British Antarctic Territory at the most southerly end of the planet, from Norfolk island on the eastern side of the Pacific to the Pitcairn islands on the western side, from the Caribbean to the Indian ocean, and from the Falkland Islands of the south Atlantic to the Rock of Gibraltar, people across the world will be celebrating this joyful occasion. Today, in this mother of Parliaments, let us remember all Her Majesty’s loyal subjects from every corner of the globe, and together celebrate our shared heritage, represented so magnificently by Queen Elizabeth II.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
On behalf of the Scottish National party and Plaid Cymru, I add our congratulations to the Queen and wish her well on the tremendous occasion of her 60th jubilee.
This is my second speech on an Humble Address; the other was six years ago on the occasion of the Queen’s 80th birthday. Of the six Members who contributed that day, only two have done so again today: the Prime Minister did so from a different position, but I speak from the same place and am happy to provide continuity for the Humble Address.
Her Majesty has had a long and impressive reign. I noted from a recent TV documentary that 60 years ago she pledged to serve the “imperial family”. Time has moved on, and so has the Queen, although not her inner gracious qualities and decorum. The imperial family has changed into a Commonwealth, as the Prime Minister noted earlier, and Her Majesty is now Queen of 16 independent states, a number that may be added to in coming years—a veritable growing family.
In the year of Her Majesty’s 80th birthday, six years ago, she cruised around the Hebrides—my constituency, Na h-Eileanan an Iar—perhaps her favourite destination in all her realms. Before she becomes our longest reigning monarch—God willing—on 9 September 2015, I hope that she may again have the opportunity to cruise around the Hebrides, as this year may be a bit busy for her.
In my childhood it was always a high point when Her Majesty visited the islands south of Barra, and travelled there in peace, and the three masts of the royal yacht Britannia were visible behind the hills when it was anchored in Vatersay bay.
Finally, I say in Gaelic—the old but also the modern language of Scotland—“Meallaibh ar naidheachd a Bhanrighinn Elasdaid is tha mi an dochas gum bi ioma Bliadhna sona roimhibh.”
Sir Robert Smith (West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine) (LD)
Opening today’s debate on the Humble Address, the Prime Minister mentioned how much Her Majesty enjoys the Braemar gathering, which takes place in my constituency. The secret of the success to which we have paid tribute today is the royal family’s ability to recharge the batteries in the highland retreat of Balmoral in the heart of my constituency. On behalf of the many neighbours who live in West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine, I associate myself with the remarks made today. I wish Her Majesty well in her diamond jubilee and support the Humble Address.
Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)
I support the very gracious words of the Prime Minister and my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition.
It seems to me that if we were political scientists creating a state, as we did after the second world war, we would not begin with a monarchy in this day and age. It is an irrational, arbitrary, often deranged institution that depends upon the luck of genes, and it does not always work out well for the country, but not in this case. We must also, it seems, be careful about aligning too closely the history and identity of Britain with the history and identity of monarchy. Royal families come and go; some have very strong connections with the nation, others very weak ones—indeed, some do not even speak the same language as we do.
But there is no doubt that in the post-war years the monarchy of Queen Elizabeth II closely aligned itself with the changing history and identity of Britain, and often for the most curious reasons. On the one hand, Her Majesty was lucky. History is clear that those who do not wait around for the throne—those who have it thrust upon them at an early age—often prove to be among the most successful of our monarchs. In terms of longevity and achievement, being a queen rather than a king also plays well, particularly for the history of England. Added to that have been the remarkable personal virtues that have been spelled out so effectively by right hon. and hon. Members: patience, dignity, resolve, discretion, duty.
What has been so remarkable in Her Majesty’s reign has been the ability to let the monarchy assist in the transformation of post-war Britain. On her watch, Britain has changed from a predominantly Protestant, white and hierarchical society to a multi-cultural, mixed-race, secular nation inherently hostile towards privilege and inherited position. And yet, through all these extraordinary social and cultural upheavals, which have seen monarchies come and go on the continent, Her Majesty has managed to retain the nation’s abiding affection and provided some sense of the unity of values that we have discussed.
This is partly the product of the nature of monarchy, which is non-sectarian, imperial and then Commonwealth in its reach, curiously suited for the identities of a diffuse, globalised age. Similarly, as the right hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) suggested, one of the ironies of the Queen’s strength is her sense of faith in a multi-religious age, a deep commitment to the Church of England and its teachings; providing that official sanction for faith provides space for other faiths to express themselves. At times of repeated difficulties, the Queen has wisely kept the monarchy outside politics and stuck to the old royal aphorism that Ministers are king in this country.
But the work goes on. The monarchy and Her Majesty’s Government are going to have to deal very deftly with the growing calls for republican autonomy in former colonies, as we heard so recently in Jamaica and, inevitably, in Australia. The House of Windsor will also have to confront the challenge of separatism within the UK and perhaps the return to a fully federal vision of monarchy. There is certainly more to be done on both physical and intellectual access to the royal estates, their archives and their histories, but none of this should be an insurmountable challenge.
Finally, I am always wary when the House is too reverential towards monarchy. We should, as my hon. Friend the Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn), who has departed, suggested, also speak to our different traditions. We should have a healthy respect but also a critical eye on the actions of the sovereign and on the sovereign’s finances, power and estate. We have our own history and identity in this place, a democratic rather than monarchical heritage that Britain also speaks to. As such, we can all pay deep respects to the enormous personal contribution of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.
I can say that particularly from my constituency, Stoke-on-Trent, where the order books are strong and employment is up on the back of this summer’s celebrations. In the Potteries the kilns are hot for the diamond jubilee and, on behalf of my constituents, I am delighted to add my support to the Humble Address.
Mr Ben Wallace (Wyre and Preston North) (Con)
May I associate myself with the comments of the Leader of the Opposition and my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister about the sad loss in Afghanistan today? One of the soldiers was a member of the Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment, and my thoughts are with the family and all those who have given their lives—the ultimate sacrifice—in fighting for Afghanistan.
I support the Humble Address today. Before I came into the House, I served Her Majesty the Queen and Duke of Lancaster as a member of the Scots Guards for nine years, and I am currently a member of the Queen’s bodyguard for Scotland. Now that our colleagues, the Scottish National party, have become monarchists too, perhaps there is less cause for me to use that body to guard Her Majesty in future.
I saw behind the scenes of the monarchy in my time before entering politics. We in the House know more than most that it is not easy to make people feel special on their occasion. It is not easy to show interest in the things they do every day, which they take to be so important. It is not easy to live under the daily gaze of the media, both in private life and in public life. We do this on occasion, but Her Majesty the Queen has done it for 60 years. Her family does it every day.
Not only does Her Majesty do that to the highest standard, but she leaves everybody she meets with the feeling that they have been touched by the monarchy and by the nation. When people are given an award by Her Majesty the Queen, it is not because of politics or favour but because our nation values what they do. That is something that she herself embodies. She also leaves with all of us a story of our encounters with the Queen or members of the royal family.
On one occasion I was the officer of the guard at Buckingham palace and I had to accompany Her Majesty the Queen to an investiture. I was at that time seeking a seat in the Scottish Parliament and I had been for the selection meeting on the Monday at Balmoral, in Crathie, to try and stand for the seat of West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine in the Scottish Parliament. I was not lucky and did not get through to the final round. However, Her Majesty the Queen asked me what I had done and I said that I had been up in her neck of the woods, but unfortunately I thought that members of the selection board thought I was a bit too young. She said, “I think they should think again.” The next day I got a phone call, to be told that the shortlist of two was too small and would be expanded to five. I was then selected as the Conservative candidate for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine, and elected to the Scottish Parliament, and perhaps that is why I am standing here today.
The Queen also embodies the Sandhurst tradition of serve to lead, which is all about public duty. She taught me at Sandhurst that you give yourself to lead your country. Perhaps she is the true inspiration of the big society. We forget so much about the value and importance of public duty. People today need more stability. They need less politics, not more, and they need impartiality. Her Majesty the Queen has provided all that for our nation, and she has allowed our nation to feel secure in itself and to continue to achieve the greatness that this country achieves and stands for throughout the world.
On behalf of all the armed forces that I served with and the veterans whom I now represent in Lancashire, and my constituents in the Duchy of Lancaster and my constituency, Wyre and Preston North, I wish Her Majesty a happy and successful diamond jubilee, and long may she reign.
Naomi Long (Belfast East) (Alliance)
I add my support to the motion in the name of the Prime Minister and express my best wishes to Her Majesty the Queen in her diamond jubilee year. I recognise the very important contribution she has made to this country over that time and also to our relationships with other nations around the world. It is a remarkable and inspiring achievement that 60 years on from her accession to the throne, she continues to serve with undiminished energy, vigour, dedication and grace.
Other Members have highlighted the Queen’s service and dedication in many spheres of national life, but in my brief remarks I wish to focus on just one example that is of particular importance to me and those I represent, and to which the Prime Minister has already referred. Other Members have spoken of the changing times during which the Queen has reigned. Even during my lifetime we have witnessed some remarkable improvements in relations between Ireland and Britain, particularly over the past few years. However, the state visit to Ireland last year, hosted by the former President, Mary McAleese, which was the first state visit by a British monarch to that state in 100 years, lifted those relationships to an entirely new level and, I believe, have helped to make a tangible contribution to the building of a more shared and prosperous future in Northern Ireland.
Although the success of that historic royal visit was the result of detailed planning, careful management, sensitive choreography and strong political leadership, it was also in no small measure due to the unique warmth of the relationship between those two female Heads of State, who engaged with each other and with the hugely emotive and sensitive issues raised by the visit with the kind of dignity and humility that should mark our approach to all such difficult issues. The transformational effects that the powerful images and thoughtful reflections on our nations’ shared history generated by the visit had on healing the wounds of our difficult past are significant not only in their own right, but in laying out a template and a tone for our future engagement with each other. It was a vivid demonstration of the power of reconciliation and the generosity required for real leadership.
Although that special contribution was a very small part of her past 60 years of service to this country, I believe that it was nevertheless of huge value in Northern Ireland and in these islands and therefore deserves particular recognition as we mark this historic occasion. I pay tribute to the Queen and to Prince Philip for their service to date and wish them God’s richest blessing in the years ahead.
Alec Shelbrooke (Elmet and Rothwell) (Con)
On behalf of my constituents, I want to describe how the Queen comes across to a great many of us. I have never met Her Majesty, and until I attended a garden party last year I had never seen her in the flesh. Indeed, even then I saw her only from a distance. That is the great experience of many of my constituents and many in this country. However, one thing overrides all that. Many people regard Her Majesty almost as a member of the family, because they know her so well. In a time of crisis she is always there on our television screens. Indeed, Christmas day simply would not be Christmas day without Her Majesty’s 3 o’clock address.
One thing that shines out about having a monarch who is well above the political process is what she does when we have disasters and tragedies in our country, such as the tragic events of 7 July 2005. When she was able to visit the hospital and meet the people who had been so tragically and grievously wounded, the country was able to share in its mourning behind Her Majesty, a lady who is in no way linked to political organisations. During the Falklands war, when some suggested that it was simply too dangerous for her son to be sent into conflict, Her Majesty, never one to shy away from responsibility, would hear nothing of it. She said that he was a serving member of the armed forces and so would go and do his duty. With that comes the respect of the nation and of those who serve Her Majesty and this country. I will keep this short: on behalf of my constituents in Elmet and Rothwell, I simply say “God save the Queen.”
Sir Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD)
As the Member of Parliament for Britain’s oldest recorded town and the first capital of Roman Britain, I wish to be associated with the Address and much of what has been said. I can recall being a five-year-old at Myland primary school when King George VI died. I can also remember 16 months later seeing television for the first time and watching the coronation at a family friend’s house in Mile End in Colchester.
Like others, I wish to pay tribute not only to Her Majesty the Queen, but to the Duke of Edinburgh for all his support over the years. In particular, I want to mention the support that both have given to many youth organisations over the past 60 years. As a Queen’s scout, I will mention the scout movement and the guide movement. Of course, as Princess Elizabeth, our Queen was a girl guide, and there are other youth organisations that she and Prince Philip have supported. Of the many charities and organisations that she is directly associated with as a patron, I wish to mention LEPRA, the international charity tackling leprosy around the world, whose international headquarters are based in my constituency.
The Queen has made three visits to Colchester in her glorious reign, and I have had the pleasure of witnessing all of them: first as a pupil at St Helena secondary modern school for boys; secondly as deputy mayor of Colchester; and thirdly as the town’s MP. On two occasions the Queen has also visited the university of Essex in Colchester, an institution of which you, Mr Speaker, have fond memories as both a graduate and an honorary graduate. You will know that it is the most international of Britain’s universities. I think it is a safe bet that every Commonwealth country will at some stage be represented there, if they are not already, because over 120 nationalities are represented there. The Queen has also been a great supporter of our armed forces. As I represent the garrison town of Colchester, I wish to associate the garrison with my greetings to Her Majesty.
I am a constitutional monarchist. When we look at Presidents of the United States and of France, I think we see that constitutional monarchy has more than the edge. Finally, 2000 years ago Colchester was a Roman city. In the mists of time, somehow that status was lost. It would be marvellous if in this the diamond jubilee year the city status could be restored.
Mr Speaker
I am sure that the hon. Gentleman can be relied upon to send a copy of his speech to that magnificent institution, the university of Essex, and probably to a good many other institutions besides.
Mr Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)
When the first Queen Elizabeth made her golden speech back in 1601, she acknowledged that, more than anything else, it was the affection of her people that had sustained her through her long reign. Addressing one of your predecessors, Mr Speaker, she said:
“And, though God hath raised me high, yet this I count the glory of my Crown, that I have reigned with your loves.”
Over 400 years later, in our age of constitutional monarchy, we are fortunate indeed to have a monarch who, like her illustrious predecessor, has always understood that it is the affection of her people that is most important. The solemn oath that Her Majesty took at her coronation has been and is being fulfilled in every possible way. May I, on behalf of my constituents, offer praise and thanks for her 60 years of service as our Queen and head of the Commonwealth? She has truly lived a life triumphant. May God save our diamond Queen.
Mr David Amess (Southend West) (Con)
I join others in congratulating Her Majesty the Queen on the occasion of her diamond jubilee. As you know, Mr Speaker, this is a unique occasion, because normally we are not allowed to mention members of the royal family in this place. For 60 years Her Majesty, beyond all call of duty, has managed to be charming to her subjects. Having spent half that number of years in public service, I certainly find it a strain to be pleasant to people morning, noon and night. As I represent the constituency with the largest number of centenarians in the country, I can tell the House that they greatly look forward to the telegram they receive from Her Majesty the Queen—my own mother, Maud, is looking forward to her telegram on 2 May. Finally, I have a question for your good self, Mr Speaker: when Her Majesty celebrates her 100th birthday, who will send her a telegram? Long may she reign over us.
Question put and agreed to, nemine contradicente.
Resolved,
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty on the occasion of the Sixtieth Anniversary of Her Accession to the Throne.
Ordered,
That the said Address be presented to Her Majesty by the whole House.
Health and Social Care Bill
Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)
To the House of Commons, this petition of residents of the United Kingdom, collected in Marton, Coulby Newham, Guisborough, Saltburn and Redcar over a period of one week, amounts to more than 700 names.
The petition states:
The Petition of residents of the United Kingdom,
Declares that the Petitioners are opposed to the Health and Social Care Bill.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to withdraw the Health and Social Care Bill.
And the Petitioners remain, etc.
[P001012]
Points of Order
Mr Liam Byrne (Birmingham, Hodge Hill) (Lab)
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. This has been an important day, and we have just had an excellent debate. It is therefore disappointing that the Department for Work and Pensions chose this occasion to release, after the Prime Minister sat down, an announcement stating that two thirds of Remploy factories in this country will now close. That is a matter of great concern to Members on both sides of the House. Have you, Sir, received any request for an oral statement on this subject, and if not how may we now bring Ministers to this House to account for that callous decision?
Mr Speaker
Order. May I just establish whether colleagues are seeking to come in on the same matter? I think Mr Bryant is.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. I am seeking to do so, because you know that earlier this week I raised the matter of the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the hon. Member for Basingstoke (Maria Miller), coming to the Remploy factory in my constituency. All the staff there, many of whom are very vulnerable members of society, have been deeply disturbed by the way in which she came into the office and left. They did not know whether there was going to be an announcement today; the written ministerial statement is simply called “Employment Support”. This has been sneaked out, it is unfair to treat disabled people in this country in that way, and the Minister is wandering around all the radio studios this afternoon. It is a disgrace. We should be treated better, and disabled people in this country should be treated better.
Mr Speaker
I will take one or two more points of order, then I really must respond.
Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)
Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. This afternoon, in the Welsh Assembly, Labour’s Minister, Leighton Andrews, who is not responsible for this policy, will be standing, will be making an oral statement and will be open to questions from democratically elected Members of that Assembly. Yet here, in this place, we have the disgrace of a Minister who sneaks out a written statement. I am unable to question that Minister on the 47 loyal staff in Bridgend. My hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) is unable to question her about the 74 staff in Porth, who also serve my constituency, or about the nine other factories throughout Wales which are threatened.
That is a disgrace, and I genuinely seek your guidance, Mr Speaker, because on a day when we have just spent, quite rightly, some time on an Humble Address to Her Majesty, an institution as venerable as Remploy—with people as loyal as its workers—has not received the courtesy of being addressed within this place. I know that you are a guardian of this House. I hope that you can help us.
Ann Clwyd (Cynon Valley) (Lab)
Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. Just a few weeks ago we had a Back-Bench business debate about Remploy. Dozens of my colleagues took part in it, and it is extremely discourteous of the Minister to fail to come to this House and explain to us exactly what is happening to the organisation. At my local Remploy factory in Aberdare, 42 people are going to lose their jobs, in a job market where there are no jobs. It is an utter disgrace to do that to disabled people at the moment, as it is for the Minister to offer a briefing in room W4 between 3 and 4 o’clock this afternoon, out of sight of all the people in this Chamber and away from the television cameras. It will not do, and I ask you to call the Minister to this House to explain what the policy is all about.
Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)
Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. Those people are some of the most vulnerable workers in my constituency, and they were sacked by the Minister at 12.36 pm today through a written statement that was sent to the Library. Offering a briefing in private, when my constituents want to hear the justification for their losing their jobs, is not good enough, and the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the hon. Member for Basingstoke (Maria Miller), should be ashamed of herself. She should come here and, if she is making the right decision, make the arguments.
Geraint Davies (Swansea West) (Lab/Co-op)
Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. Yesterday I raised the future of Remploy with the Chancellor at Treasury Question Time. There was no inkling of any sudden announcement of a mass closure of 36 factories, with the Swansea factory closing down and 1,200 disabled people losing their jobs. Is it in order to make such a statement through the Library, without even a debate about the future of individual factories and their financial viability, given that we have lots of orders coming in, and without even an oral statement? At a time when we have spent so long, quite rightly, celebrating the diamond jubilee of our Queen, Remploy, along with the future job prospects of hundreds of disabled people, is subject to a clandestine, cloak and dagger assassination. It is an absolute disgrace.
Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)
Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. I am very concerned to hear that the Remploy factory in Spennymoor is to be closed. Surely it is possible for the Minister to come to the House at 7 o’clock.
Mr Speaker
I am grateful to Members for their points of order, and I note what the hon. Lady has just said, and what the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) said, about the possibility of something being offered to the House by way of a statement later in the day. I can offer no encouragement on that front. I simply make the following points. First, the House knows the importance I attach—the premium that I attach—to statements being made to the House, and to a proper judgment being made as to the merit of the case for scrutiny, there and then, of that statement; secondly, the Treasury Bench is heavily populated, and representatives of it will have heard the strength of feeling that has been expressed in the House this afternoon; and, finally, there are well established procedures for Members to raise the matter in the House tomorrow—procedures of which they will themselves be very well aware.
Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. What can be done to clarify the Government’s position on the national planning policy framework? Last night’s “Newsnight” programme reported a very clear understanding that no significant changes would be made to the document, despite vociferous campaigns being run by the National Trust and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds in the consultation process. If no changes are to be made, that will be a matter of great concern for many people, so have you been approached by the Government wanting to make a statement on the matter, and if not what can be done to allow the House to question Ministers on it?
Mr Speaker
I have not been so approached. The hon. Lady has at least started to provide a solution to the dilemma that she has identified, by airing her concerns in the House and by placing the matter on the record, and knowing her as I do I have a sense that her efforts will continue and accelerate in a variety of ways.
Speaker’s Statement
Mr Speaker
I have a very short statement to make about the arrangements for Tuesday 20 March.
The House will meet for Prayers at 9.45 am. I will then suspend the sitting until 2.30 pm. Members attending the ceremony in Westminster Hall should be in their seats by 10.25 am. The Speaker’s procession with the Mace will enter Westminster Hall shortly before the arrival of Her Majesty the Queen. After the ceremony the Mace will be returned to the Chamber, so the Chamber will be closed to visitors until the sitting is resumed at 2.30 pm. I hope that that is helpful to the House.
Opposition Day
Changing Perceptions of Northern Ireland
(12 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Dr William McCrea (South Antrim) (DUP)
I beg to move,
That this House welcomes the NI 2012 campaign to change perceptions of Northern Ireland and to encourage many more visitors to come to Northern Ireland; notes that, despite current economic difficulties, this campaign takes place in the context of a momentous year for the UK when the nation will celebrate the Diamond Jubilee of Her Majesty The Queen, and will host the Olympic Games; further notes that, in Northern Ireland, 2012 is the centenary of the Titanic tragedy, an event that remains seared into the world’s consciousness and culture, and the centenary of the signing of the Ulster Covenant and Declaration, often described as the foundation document of Northern Ireland; welcomes the enormous progress that has occurred in recent years in moving Northern Ireland forward; and looks forward to the programme of events and activities which will help make Northern Ireland the place to visit in 2012.
I count it as an honour to open this debate this afternoon, but it is correct and right, on behalf of my right hon. and hon. Friends, to acknowledge the great shadow that has been cast not only over this debate, but across the United Kingdom, with the tragic news that the Prime Minister announced earlier today of six soldiers missing presumed dead in Afghanistan. We remember their families in our prayers, and we trust that they might find comfort in knowing that people are remembering them at this very difficult time.
There is an old cliché in marketing and public relations which states that perception is everything. Regardless of the whys and the wherefores, and even independent of the reality of events as they happen on the ground, a bad perception can be extremely difficult to overcome. Once tarred with such an impression, the tar can be exceptionally difficult to remove and sticks for a long time. For many people beyond the shores of Northern Ireland, their impressions of our corner of the United Kingdom were shaped by the nearly constant stream of negative headlines that were regularly beamed all across the world. With depressing regularity, our television screens were filled with images of carnage, human suffering and murder.
We must never forget the fortitude of our people in these years, for they did not bow to the scourge of IRA terrorism. We regret the tragic loss of life of every innocent victim of terror, and again we express our sympathy to their loved ones. Indeed, this is the anniversary of the murder of three men in a local village beside my home in Coagh, and also the two young soldiers who were murdered in Antrim. We think of their families also this day.
For many people, including investors and business leaders, the perception of Northern Ireland was of a region stuck down in the morass of intractable divisions and beset by problems that could never be resolved. It is therefore worth placing it on record that even in the midst of the darkest days there were glimmers of hope, and a few bright stars shone on the otherwise dark horizon. One area in which Ulster has always punched, sometimes literally, above its weight is in the realm of sport. Ulster people enjoy little more than applauding the success of one of their own. So the triumph of Mary Peters at the 1972 Munich Olympics raised people’s spirits in one of the worst years of the troubles of Northern Ireland. The sporting skills of George Best on the football pitch, Wayne McCulloch and Barry McGuigan in the boxing ring, or Alex Higgins in the snooker were sources of local pride. These people were sporting legends who, in their own ways, challenged people’s perception of what it meant to be from Northern Ireland.
Moving forward to more recent days, it is right that we acknowledge the incredible fact, seeing that we are a people of some 1.6 million, that we have stormed to the very top of the world of golf. Everyone in Northern Ireland is so proud of the success of Graeme McDowell, Darren Clarke and Rory McIlroy, who has recently reached the pinnacle of golf success, being named No. 1 in the world. These three giants of world golf are tremendous ambassadors for Northern Ireland, as indeed is my local snooker champion, Mark Allen from Antrim. Northern Ireland people are thrilled by their incredible success. In this Olympic year, I hope that Northern Ireland will reap the benefits of the Olympic games and will host a number of competitors and visitors from across the world.
There is no doubt that, in common with all other United Kingdom regions, we are experiencing the effects of the global economic recession. This has been the longest and the toughest recession in living memory. However, the great majority of people to whom I have spoken in my constituency and beyond are convinced that we must do all in our power to ensure that 2012 becomes a lift-off point for the community. There is absolutely no doubt that this year’s expansive programme of events will provide a useful means of dismantling the old perceptions about Northern Ireland.
Ulster people are sometimes known throughout the rest of world as being a little on the serious side and prone to a dose of pessimism. I suppose that, to a certain extent, that criticism is valid. We are, after all, the only people I know of in the United Kingdom who express happiness in a negative way. If one asks someone from London, “How are you?” I suggest that they would probably answer, “I am well, thank you.” Ask an Ulsterman, and one will usually be told two words: “Not bad.” Despite our perceived negativity, I am pleased to report that there is much good news from our small yet vital corner of the United Kingdom, including that we are the happiest people in the United Kingdom. I noticed what the Prime Minister said in response to my right hon. Friend the Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds). I wish that the Prime Minister could see what we sometimes see on his Benches when we look at some of the faces there. I must confess that I understand what he says, but I am doing my best and playing my part in encouraging Social Democratic and Labour party Members to be more bright and cheerful in this House.
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)
To reassure my hon. Friend, this morning I passed on to the Prime Minister the compliments of the Northern Ireland section of this House to ensure that he would get the message about the Ulster sense of humour—that it pervades Northern Ireland and knows no distinctions or boundaries whatsoever. I look forward to the Prime Minister taking on board that lesson, and perhaps next week at Prime Minister’s questions we will see an end to the angry man and perhaps one of an even more pleasant disposition.
Dr McCrea
I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention.
The Ulster humour has helped Northern Ireland through its most difficult days. Many others would have gone into the depths of despair; Northern Ireland was able to plough through over 30 years of continual terrorism and to come out at the other end having beaten the terrorists and ready to put Northern Ireland on a better footing. That says much for the character of the people of the Province.
Chris Ruane (Vale of Clwyd) (Lab)
Last week the Prime Minister commented on the happiness levels of the Democratic Unionist party, and this week the DUP has commented on the happiness levels of the Tories. What assessment has the hon. Gentleman made of the happiness levels of the Liberal Democrats?
Dr McCrea
I have to say to the hon. Gentleman that words would often fail me in describing the misery that I see on the faces of Lib Dem Members, but we will leave them for another occasion. I see from their vacant Benches that their level of interest in Northern Ireland affairs is really wonderful today.
Let me return to the good news from our small yet vital part of the United Kingdom. Northern Ireland’s unemployment rate is the lowest of any country in the UK. After London, Belfast is the most attractive city in the UK for foreign direct investment. Belfast is among the top 10 cities in the world for financial technology investments, ahead of Glasgow, Dublin and Toronto. Ulster pupils constantly turn in the best GCSE and A-level results of any UK region. These are things that we should rightly be proud of.
I suspect that very few people inside, let alone outside Northern Ireland are aware of those startling facts. That highlights the crucial importance of campaigns such as Northern Ireland 2012. Years of negativity have taken their toll, but I genuinely believe that people are starting to feel good about being from our wee country once more. The slogan for the NI 2012 campaign is “Your time, our place”, and that perfectly encapsulates the rising tide of optimism that exists in the Province. This year will be a tremendous boost for Northern Ireland, with so much going on that it is hard to keep track. Key events in the Province will include the opening of Titanic Belfast, the Olympic and Paralympic torch relay, the Irish Open at Royal Portrush, and the arrival of the Clipper round the world yacht race. The stated aims of the NI 2012 campaign are to change the perception of Northern Ireland, to raise our profile, to drive visitor numbers, to generate economic impact, and to underpin civic pride and self-respect.
I am proud to be from Northern Ireland, and I believe that more and more people from Northern Ireland are starting to feel likewise. We shall reap a remarkable reward. Just as Mary Peters and George Best played such an important role in showing the people of Northern Ireland, and the rest of the world, that hope was not lost during the dark days, imagine the positive impact that hundreds and thousands of ambassadors made up of local people can have in this wonderful year. As the Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office observed recently,
“if you are not in Northern Ireland this year, frankly, you are no one.”—[Official Report, 25 January 2012; Vol. 539, c. 287.]
I heartily concur with that sentiment.
History is probably more important in Northern Ireland than in any other part of the world. It is certainly a deeply contested subject, which leads many observers to believe that the people of Northern Ireland are utterly consumed by history. That is a mistaken assumption. There is a new spirit throughout the Province, whereby people are prepared to look at history not in a dispassionate way, but in a way that threatens nobody and that allows people from different backgrounds to learn about our glorious history. It is our aim that everyone will more fully develop their understanding of the forces that have played such a role in shaping our society in Northern Ireland.
As a Unionist, I welcome the development of greater understanding and learning, because all too often, history books are written about the Province by people who have never been there and who know little of the circumstances about which they are writing. The biased and one-sided evaluation of history has caused great annoyance among the people whom I represent.
I am pleased that this year, we shall see a wide range of events to mark the centenary of the signing of the Ulster covenant and declaration. The men and women of Ulster who answered the call of Sir Edward Carson to oppose Home Rule from Dublin laid the foundation stone of the Northern Ireland state. Although officially, Northern Ireland’s year one is 1921, in a real sense 1912 was actually the starting point, because after the signing of the covenant and the declaration there could be no doubt in the mind of Lloyd George’s Administration that the Unionists of Ulster were not prepared to accept Home Rule from Dublin. From 1912, the irreversible slide towards the establishment of the state of Northern Ireland commenced.
It is important to note the significant role that women played in the organisation of the campaign against Home Rule, which culminated in the massive Ulster day demonstration on 28 September 1912. Women were the backbone of the campaign against Home Rule. Indeed, more women than men signed the declaration in Ulster. In many towns and villages, it was the local women’s organisations and individual women who delivered the logistical support required for the mammoth undertaking of gathering more than half a million signatures. That important aspect of the history of those significant events has not, in my view, received the coverage that it deserves. I hope that it will be more evident in the forthcoming centenary celebrations.
When I think of the ordinary Ulster women who gave so much for the cause that they believed in, motivated by a sense of patriotism and principle, my mind inevitably turns to the most remarkable woman of the last three generations: Her Majesty the Queen. I remember her coronation. I remember a fancy dress competition in my local town of Stewartstown. I was dressed as a little sailor. My sister won the competition and we were very proud of her.
The Queen is a constant background presence in the lives of many of our citizens, and comes to the fore on great national occasions such as Remembrance Sunday, the trooping of the colour and Christmas. The Queen has been the one fixed point in an ever-changing world. It is remarkable to think that this Prime Minister receives advice and counsel from a monarch whose first Prime Minister was Sir Winston Churchill. There is no doubt that Her Majesty has made good her vow that her whole life would be devoted to the service of her people. This year we mark 60 remarkable years of service, and we give thanks to Almighty God for all that Her Majesty has accomplished on behalf of our United Kingdom. We are proud to say, “Long may she reign.”
Many people in Northern Ireland, even people from a nationalist background, hold Her Majesty in high regard. I wish that their elected representatives would represent that position. I hope that the Government, within the obvious constraints of security, will afford as many Ulster people as possible the opportunity to say a big thank you to Her Majesty in her special year.
Finally, this year also marks the centenary of the maiden voyage of the RMS Titanic. It is impossible to understate the strength of the iconic Titanic brand. From San Diego to Singapore, everyone has heard of the famous vessel, but how many people know that she was built in Belfast? As the locals have been known to remark, “The boat was fine when it left Belfast.” I know that the Executive at Stormont are working hard to ensure that people feel the full benefit of this significant anniversary. I urge the Government to work closely with the devolved Administration in that regard.
Edmund Burke said:
“People will not look forward to posterity who never look backward to their ancestors.”
This year, we pause to look back in thankful remembrance at all that our ancestors and earlier generations achieved, but we do so with a resolute determination to build on the inheritance bequeathed to us. I hope that posterity will record 2012 as a year of even greater progress in Northern Ireland. I commend the motion to the House.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
I inform the House that Mr Speaker has not selected the amendment.
The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr Owen Paterson)
I congratulate the Democratic Unionist party on its choice of the motion for today’s debate. As ever, it is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea), who spoke with his customary eloquence and passion for Northern Ireland. I entirely endorse his comments about the six soldiers who have been killed in Afghanistan today.
Before I continue, I apologise to the House that I shall have to miss some of the debate. Shortly after my speech, I have to attend a meeting of the ministerial working group on rebalancing the Northern Ireland economy under the chairmanship of my hon. Friend the Exchequer Secretary. I know that the House debated that issue last week, when I was unavoidably absent due to a long-planned public meeting in my constituency. I have been going to Northern Ireland and visiting businesses nearly every week for almost five years, and have campaigned to put rebalancing the Northern Ireland economy right at the top of the political agenda. That became a firm commitment in the Conservative party manifesto and was included in the coalition’s programme for government, which resulted in a public consultation last year on a Treasury paper and the establishment of the ministerial working group. That all demonstrates that rebalancing the economy remains one of the highest priorities for me and my Department. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State will of course be here throughout the debate to respond to the points made by right hon. and hon. Members.
I welcome the choice of subject for this debate. Let me say at the outset that the Government support the broad thrust of the motion. The Government will support the Northern Ireland Executive in their efforts to make Northern Ireland a better and more economically successful place. The Northern Ireland 2012 campaign is an excellent example of that endeavour.
The debate is also extremely timely. There has long been a complaint that the world does not get to hear about the many great things about Northern Ireland, not least the tremendous quality of life there. Only last week, a survey found that people in Northern Ireland are the happiest people in the United Kingdom. I am pleased that DUP Members are taking their lead from my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and smiling today, reflecting the sunny disposition for which they are well known. While I am on the subject of humour, I should pay tribute to that other Carson, Frank, who sadly died last month. He put Northern Ireland on the map for all the right reasons during some difficult times.
In the major events that are to take place in Northern Ireland during 2012-13, we have an opportunity to reflect on how far we have come in recent years, how we can capitalise on that and how we can build on the remarkable international good will that Northern Ireland enjoys. In that context, I pay tribute to the contribution made by successive US and Irish Administrations and a number of key individuals, without whom much of the progress made might not have been possible.
Let us not forget just how dramatic that progress has been. When I first entered the House, debates about Northern Ireland were still dominated by security-related issues or the latest crisis in the peace process. Decommissioning, alleged breaches of the ceasefires, suspensions of the Assembly, the postponement of elections and emergency legislation were the main Northern Ireland issues that came before the House. Now, we have stable, functioning and inclusive political institutions. Responsibility for delivering the key public services rests in local hands and Northern Ireland is viewed across the world as an example of hope rather than despair. I pay tribute to politicians from all parties, both here and in Northern Ireland, for their efforts to ensure that that process of building stability and reconciliation continues.
With that hard-won political stability, we now have to focus even more resolutely on the challenges ahead, in particular rebalancing the economy and overcoming community division to build a genuinely shared future. I shall briefly say a word about each of those.
We all know that the Northern Ireland economy is too dependent on public spending—even the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) might agree. We understand the historical reasons why that is the case, but it is not sustainable. We have to revive the private sector to secure sustainable jobs and prosperity for the future. We shall discuss how to do that in the meeting that I am about to attend at the Treasury. One matter under consideration is the possibility of giving the Executive the power to vary the rate of corporation tax in Northern Ireland.
As I have said time and again, Northern Ireland has some truly world-class companies, including Wrightbus, which is delivering the new Routemaster bus for London, F. G. Wilson, Norbrook and Randox, to name but a few; and let us not forget world-renowned Northern Ireland brands such as Bushmills. Northern Ireland also has a growing reputation for the quality of our creative industries. The hugely successful “Game of Thrones” is filmed in Belfast, and Northern Ireland’s latest Oscar winner is Terry George, for his short film “The Shore”. There are bands such as Snow Patrol, which provided the soundtrack for the brilliant video that helped Londonderry to win the right to be UK city of culture next year, and who can forget the buzz around the MTV awards at the Odyssey in Belfast last November?
We have some great companies, some great brands and some dynamic sectors, but we need more of them, so the Government will do everything we can to create the conditions for the private sector in Northern Ireland to grow, and we will support the Executive in the areas that are devolved to it. One example of where we can work very closely together is in our efforts to secure foreign direct investment. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State recently joined forces with the Northern Ireland Enterprise Minister on a trip to the Gulf. I trust that that will be one of many joint initiatives in pursuit of our shared objective of building a new, dynamic, 21st-century, private enterprise-led economy, rather than one based on unsustainable public spending and debt.
One of the sectors where huge potential remains is tourism. Northern Ireland is a place of outstanding natural beauty, from the Giant’s Causeway right across to the Fermanagh lakes. We have some world-class attractions, from Derry’s walls to the new Titanic project in Belfast. As the motion reminds us, next month will be the centenary of the tragic sinking of the Titanic, and the eyes of the world will be upon Northern Ireland.
The eyes of the world were also on Northern Ireland this week, when Rory McIlroy became officially the world’s No. 1 golfer—a magnificent achievement. Northern Ireland is the golfing capital of not just the UK but the world, as the Irish Open at Portrush will reinforce. Let us hope that we can use it as a launch pad to get the British Open to Northern Ireland soon—we should all campaign together for that. In the week before Cheltenham, let us not forget Tony McCoy, champion jockey for 16 incredible years. Northern Ireland is now being energetically promoted in overseas markets through the agency of Tourism Ireland, a happy example of co-operation with the Administration in the south for mutual benefit.
The second area where we really need to see solid progress in Northern Ireland is the building of a shared future. According to one report, the costs of division, be it segregation or the duplication of services, amount to a massive £1.5 billion, and there are 85,000 empty school places. It is encouraging that the First Minister and the Education Minister agree that that cannot go on. In the new Northern Ireland, those issues have to be tackled—we cannot have a society in which everything is carved up on sectarian grounds—and most of the powers to tackle the problem rest with the Executive. We acknowledge the steps that they have taken so far, and we will support them when they have to take difficult decisions in the future.
I acknowledge that in a society that has been beset by deep-seated division, none of that work is easy and it will take time. However, if we are to change the long-term perceptions of Northern Ireland we must, in the words of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, work to build a
“shared future; not a shared out future.”
For many people, the events that we have lined up over the coming years will cast Northern Ireland in a completely different light. I shall briefly mention two of them.
First, the House has just presented an Humble Address to Her Majesty the Queen marking her diamond jubilee, which will be celebrated across the United Kingdom, including in Northern Ireland. As the hugely successful visit to the Republic of Ireland last May demonstrated, Her Majesty is hugely admired and held in great affection throughout these islands. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister rightly referred to her at the weekend as “our magnificent Queen”, and I want everybody in Northern Ireland who wants to participate to have the opportunity to do so, be it through a street party, lighting beacons or planting trees.
Last November, I joined Her Royal Highness the Princess Royal at the Northern Ireland launch of the Woodland Trust’s jubilee woods project in Carrickfergus. I also recently met the Lord Mayor of Belfast and discussed a number of matters, including arrangements for the jubilee. I acknowledge the constructive and positive way in which politicians and parties from across the community, such as those on Belfast city council, have approached the issue. I hope it is a sign of how far we have moved on in Northern Ireland that one can be generous and respectful towards other traditions without in any way undermining one’s own beliefs. That has been seen recently in attendance at sporting events, for example. Last month, the First Minister attended a Gaelic Athletic Association match, and this week the Deputy First Minister was at the home of Northern Ireland football, Windsor Park. Those events are not in themselves particularly significant on this side of the Irish sea, but in Northern Ireland they are of enormous symbolism and evidence of progress.
The motion also mentions the centenary of the Ulster covenant, which falls in September. The catalyst for the covenant was the introduction in this House 100 years ago next month of the Government of Ireland Bill or, as it is more commonly known, the third Home Rule Bill. The passions that it generated are well known, and my own party played no small part in the parliamentary and constitutional battles from 1912 to 1914. The task for this generation is to mark centenaries such as that of the covenant in a way that is respectful and promotes a broader understanding of events, such as the fact that of the 470,000 signatures on the covenant, some 30,000 were from what is now the Republic of Ireland. To that end, the Government have been working closely with the Northern Ireland Executive and the Irish Government on adopting a co-ordinated approach to the covenant and other centenaries to follow in the next decade. On Monday, we shall launch an exhibition in Westminster Hall to mark the centenary of the third Home Rule Bill, and we very much hope the exhibition will be able to travel to Dublin and Stormont.
The issues that we are discussing are hugely important to the future of every single person in Northern Ireland. As the motion makes clear, Northern Ireland has changed for the better. The events to which it refers, which I have touched upon this afternoon, will go a long way towards changing perceptions. However, as I have made clear, there are still significant challenges ahead if we are to build a truly peaceful, stable and prosperous Northern Ireland in which everyone has a shared future. The Government, working with the Executive, will do everything in their power to meet those challenges. In that spirit, I once again commend the hon. Member for South Antrim and his party for the motion, which we strongly welcome.
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)
I concur with the motion and the comments made so far: 2012 will be a significant year for the communities in Northern Ireland. I note with interest the Secretary of State’s comments about several productive and beneficial events, and his recommendation of wider participation in them, but I raise a point of concern about that. It is unfortunate that Conservative and Labour participation in this debate is not as wide as the participation in this year’s events that he recommends to the people of Northern Ireland. Hopefully, lack of Conservative and Labour participation will be remedied in the coming weeks and months.
My hon. Friend the Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) outlined a series of events that are to be celebrated this year. The covenant is of considerable historical and cultural interest across the community. People want to be able to look back at, recommend and acknowledge the origins of the state of Northern Ireland, which many trace back to 1912 and the signing of the covenant.
The Titanic and other matters that are signally important to Northern Ireland’s tourism infrastructure have already been mentioned, as has the golfing greatness of Rory McIlroy, and of Graeme McDowell and Darren Clarke from my constituency. It would appear that Portrush is now the golfing capital of the world. I hope that that will be case not just in the Irish Open this year, but in the preparations for the Open in a few years.
I emphasise that 2012 is a year of preparation as well as commemoration. We are beginning a decade of commemorating centenaries. Up to 2021, we have a series of commemorations in which to participate and to acknowledge. I concur with all those who have said that the commemorations should be inclusive so that everyone can enjoy and celebrate. Many preparations have been made to ensure that that happens.
We are also preparing for next year, when Londonderry will be the first UK city of culture. In the next few months, there will be considerable interest and work to ensure that it becomes the template for all the others that follow. We have a small window of opportunity in which to prepare and organise to ensure that world sees what we all know is the case. Last week, my right hon. Friend the Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds) alluded to the survey that shows that Northern Ireland is the happiest region of the United Kingdom. We all knew that. I was somewhat surprised in last week’s Prime Minister’s questions that the Prime Minister thought otherwise. I recommend that he attends some of the DUP’s parliamentary parties. He will find out that there is humour every day of every week of every month of every year. I understand that some correspondence is winging its way to him as we speak to ensure that he knows and acknowledges the type of humour that we have all expressed in the past 20 or 30 years, even in the darkest days.
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
Does my hon. Friend agree that perhaps the Prime Minister was not aware of the happiness in the DUP because he and some of his colleagues have spent the past number of years flirting and conniving with the Ulster Unionist party? Perhaps some of that has rubbed off and caused a perception that all Ulster politicians and all Unionists are somehow dour and miserable, whereas that applies to only one section of the Ulster Unionist party.
Mr Campbell
“More tea, vicar?” as they say in the best circles, as we move swiftly on. However, I concur with my right hon. Friend.
As we look forward, particularly over the next two to three years, we see important landmark decisions and historical events that need to be commemorated. In recent years, monumental and historically significant events came and went without advantage being taken of them to ensure that Northern Ireland plc benefited from them. We must not make that mistake this year or next. I therefore commend my friend in the Northern Ireland Assembly, Arlene Foster, the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Investment, for marketing this year and emphasising that Northern Ireland is the place to be. We need to ensure that the rest of the world sees—hopefully they will see it during the Irish Open—the marvellous, fantastic scenery on the north coast, the golfing that is beyond compare, which is why we get so many champions, and the culture of Northern Ireland.
The world needs to come to Northern Ireland, and I am glad that the Minister of State has said that on previous occasions in the House. We need to drive the message home to ensure that the whole United Kingdom will benefit. We are approaching the Olympics, in which the entire nation will participate. I hope that there will be medal winners from Northern Ireland. Many people have suggested that that will be the case particularly in boxing. I do not know why fighting seems to bring out the best in Northern Ireland, but it does. The boxing regime seems to deliver medal winners.
Dr McCrea
Does my hon. Friend agree that the warmth of the welcome that visitors will receive in Northern Ireland is beyond compare? Will he also acknowledge that when people come to the Olympics and to London, which will be the focal point, it is vital that they are encouraged to cross to Northern Ireland to see the beauty of our Province?
Mr Campbell
I thank my hon. Friend for that. As he represents the constituency where Belfast international airport is, I expect him to ensure that the red carpet is rolled out as people arrive.
Many Departments in Northern Ireland are preparing for the various commemorations. Of course, like every other part of the United Kingdom, we are hamstrung to some extent because of the austere times. None the less, they must not prevent us from marking and marketing the events so that the people of Northern Ireland benefit.
I not only pay tribute to those who are preparing for the events, but point out to the rest of the United Kingdom and Members who represent constituencies in England, Scotland and Wales that a good, peaceful, progressive and prosperous Northern Ireland is in the interests of the United Kingdom. Just as we have exported many of our sports people and produced many engineers and inventors who have taken their expertise to an international level, we want to participate in the life of the nation, so that Northern Ireland’s place is secure not only in the United Kingdom but in UK history and for future generations.
Jack Lopresti (Filton and Bradley Stoke) (Con)
First, I echo the comments of the hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) about the tragic events in Afghanistan in the past 24 hours and the six servicemen killed in action. Their service and their sacrifice is an inspiration to us all.
I congratulate the Democratic Unionist party on securing this most welcome debate. It is timely to have such a debate. As the motion suggests, it is indeed a momentous year for Northern Ireland, with the diamond jubilee, the Olympics, the 100th anniversary of the Titanic disaster and, of course, the same anniversary for the signing of the Ulster covenant and declaration.
It is my pleasure to serve on the Select Committee on Northern Ireland Affairs. The Committee has visited Northern Ireland on many occasions in the past 18 months, which I have found fascinating. For somebody who first became active in politics in the time of the troubles, it is remarkable to see what has been achieved and what progress has been made since the Good Friday agreement in 1998.
Although fantastic progress has been made and although I am in complete support of the Democratic Unionist party motion, it would be naive at best to ignore the ongoing challenges of the security situation in Northern Ireland. Let us be clear that although we all want to promote Northern Ireland’s economy, tourism and future, the threat level remains at severe. The fact remains that there have been 13 separate attacks against national security targets, and the intent and capability of organisations such as the Real IRA, Continuity IRA and others remains malevolent.
Furthermore, it is impossible to engage in dialogue with dissident organisations that show no signs of renouncing their violent or criminal ways. The Secretary of State has made it clear on many occasions in this House that the British Government will never compromise on the security of our citizens in Northern Ireland, and I pay tribute to the work that he and the Minister are doing to ensure that our citizens are protected, and to the security services, the police force and everybody involved on the ground.
Improvements are being made. There were fewer attacks in 2011 than in 2010 and I hope that trend will continue. Another positive is that both the leaderships of the Ulster Defence Association and Ulster Volunteer Force remain committed to their ceasefires, albeit that members of both groups are still involved in unsanctioned violent activity. On a larger political scale, normality is slowly but surely emerging. Last year, the Northern Ireland Executive published its programme for government. As the First Minister, Peter Robinson, has said, it is a statement that Northern Ireland is prepared for the future, prepared to modernise and reform, and ready to move forward as one community.
Looking to the future, the security situation is a challenge facing Northern Ireland, but the economy is a challenge facing Northern Ireland and Britain as a whole. The UK Government and the Northern Ireland Executive are taking steps to improve the situation. As hon. Members will know, the coalition Government have delivered on a commitment they made to consult on rebalancing the Northern Ireland economy. As the Secretary of State has just said, the ministerial working group on rebalancing the Northern Ireland economy met at the end of last year and will do so again today. That cross-departmental approach is most welcome and has been praised by the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister.
Tourism will play a crucial part in rebalancing the Northern Ireland economy. Northern Irish business is set to benefit this year in particular because of the Olympic games, including to the tune of £18 million from games-related contracts alone. That is why I also welcome the announcement in January this year that Arlene Foster, the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Investment, who has responsibility for tourism, had reallocated £3.5 million from her Department’s budget to prioritise the promotion of tourism this year. Along with other hon. Members, I hope for a successful year for Northern Ireland tourism this year while the eyes of the world are focused on Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
This year begins a decade of commemorations for Northern Ireland and we should of course look forward to them, but, as the Secretary of State has said, we must not be complacent and must remain vigilant. Let us remember that the dissidents have virtually no local support and that all the political parties are united against them. Long may that continue.
I am in full support of the DUP motion. From my own experience, I know the Province to be a wonderful place to visit. It is steeped in history and its friendly people have aspirations and hope for the future. One of my closest and oldest friends in my constituency is a former councillor called David Bell, who is from Bangor. He was very helpful when I joined the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee in explaining some of the complexity and history of Northern Ireland politics, which I have found very useful.
We must accept that there are challenges with the ongoing security situation, political progress and rebalancing the economy, but, as the motion states, this year of commemoration and celebration should be the catalyst to realising the aspirations held by so many.
Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)
I am happy to join my regional colleagues in extolling the virtues and wonderful attractions of the region that we represent and that we are all very happy to call home. When I listen to them, I am conscious of the need for us all to have a constantly happy deportment—there is an onus on us to go about this place with the demeanour of Aer Lingus cabin crew, smiling at everything we meet. That was hard to sustain during my many long hours on the Financial Services Public Bill Committee yesterday.
The Social Democratic and Labour party tabled an amendment to the motion not because we disagree with the thrust of it—it recognises the significance of the opportunity that 2012 represents for Northern Ireland—but because we believe other points could have been made. I do not wish to dwell on this, but parts of the motion are perhaps gratuitously partial for some of us and could have been left out. SDLP Members wanted to make the motion a little less exclusive to Northern Ireland by dealing with the tourism and hospitality sectors more generally, and to make it a little less exclusive within Northern Ireland by ensuring some of its narrower and more partial references were not included.
Nevertheless, I have no umbrage to take with points that have been made by honourable colleagues from the Democratic Unionist party on the events that we will mark this year and in coming years. We must also deal with the inter-meshing and layering of those events, hopefully in a spirit of purposeful inquiry, which is one of the terms used in the context of Derry’s bid for UK city of culture in respect of dealing with the past, including the recent past. We should acknowledge those issues up front, deal with them in a spirit of purposeful inquiry, and engage visitors in that regard.
As we commemorate, we need to remember that, in the next decade, we will have not only a series of centenary anniversaries, but significant half-centenary anniversaries, which might be a lot more sensitive. We must manage all of them positively. We should handle the past sensitively—our commemorations should not make potential visitors sensitive, wary or inhibited about coming to any part of Northern Ireland. One great benefit of the 2012 promotion is that it has been fully embraced and well marketed by Tourism Ireland as well as by the tourism industry in Northern Ireland, which is very much behind that effort. We saw that in recent events in London—a very good event took place in St James’s palace. A team of devolved Ministers was there, including the First Minister, the Deputy First Minister and the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Investment. That wide representation was important and positive.
Rather than just ensuring that we have positive events that people who already know Northern Ireland and are from Northern Ireland can celebrate positively, it is important that we get much more market reach. That is why this year is so important. It is not that it is the only year that people should come to Northern Ireland, but it is the year when people most wake up to the fact that they should come. I have no doubt that anybody who comes this year will come back and make many repeat visits.
It is important to ensure that people coming to the island of Ireland from any part of the world ensure that they experience the benefits of the whole island. In the past, many tourists to the south did not trickle over the border to the north, as they should. We want to ensure that in the now more benign context people are given every encouragement to do that.
My party’s amendment on the VAT issue was not selected, but we previously tabled an early-day motion that has the support of all parties. In the build-up to the Budget, we encourage the Minister to suggest to the Chancellor that it would be timely to consider giving the tourism sector, not just in Northern Ireland but everywhere in the UK, a boost through targeted relief on VAT rates. That was used very successfully in the south of Ireland last year and this year, and has been used in other parts of Europe as well. It is entirely consistent with EU rules and would be a good way of encouraging people to holiday at home. Unlike wider VAT reductions, it would trap the multiplier in our own economy by benefiting a home sector instead of paying for imports. We want to do that because it would support tourism more widely.
Mr Dodds
The hon. Gentleman alluded to the fact that Members from the Democratic Unionist party fully support his suggestion about what the Government should consider in the run-up to the Budget. There is no doubt that in terms of wins in the Northern Ireland economy and boosting employment, tourism is one sector where relatively rapid progress can be made, and targeted interventions, as he suggests, would be extremely helpful.
Mark Durkan
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that intervention. Of course, many in the media say that more people are likely to holiday in the eurozone this year because of the weakness of the euro, which is an added reason there should be a timely intervention from the Chancellor—to encourage people to holiday here within the sterling zone.
The changed perceptions of Northern Ireland are welcome but have been hard-earned and hard-won. They are a result of the changed context created by many political efforts over the past few years. I am certainly proud of the role that my party has played in consistently opposing violence from any quarter and standing up for shared institutions and political arrangements within Northern Ireland, within Ireland and between these islands. That, of course, has been vindicated in what we now see working so well. Many of the naysayers and detractors—those who were totally opposed and said that it would or could never happen—are now among those happily showing how well it works and doing so well. It is great to see that proof and vindication, although some of us, of course, have learned that vindication in politics does not always translate into reward, but so be it—we have learned to empathise with the prodigal son’s brother and get over it.
This is an important time for Northern Ireland. The hon. Member for East Derry—I mean East Londonderry (Mr Campbell) before he corrects me—made this point not just about 2012 but about 2013 and beyond. In 2013, my city will be the designated city of culture in the UK. Furthermore, some of the efforts building up to that, including marking its successor role in the cultural Olympiad, will take place this year. It is important, therefore, that we see 2012 not just as a stand-alone occasion but as part of a platform or springboard into the future.
It is important, if we are to attract tourists, that we offer them not just value for money but value for time, which the tourism and hospitality sector in Northern Ireland has increasingly been developing—and has had to develop. In the past, there have been questions about whether visitors have had value for time. The Sunday problem has raised questions about what experiences and opportunities visitors have had, and in some cases, there has even been the Monday problem, because some visitor amenities are not open on Mondays.
We have to do more. We have to invest in our attractions and distractions for visitors, if we are to maximise the extraction of money, which is what we need out of tourism. There is more for different Departments to do—it is not just the job of the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment in Northern Ireland, and there is not just the Chancellor’s role in respect of VAT; there is also a role for other Departments and local councils.
Members are used to hearing Northern Ireland Members plead that we are a special case because we are at the bottom of so many of the wrong league tables and so need special derogations and exemptions. In many instances, that will be true and valid for particular sectors, sections and interests in our community, but it is also important to recognise that increasingly sectors, industries and locations in Northern Ireland are getting to the top of the right tables, and not just in sports or whatever. When I listened to the hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) refer to the range of sporting achievements in Northern Ireland, I was reminded of a time when, as Deputy First Minister, I was going into the Assembly for questions. A civil servant came up to me hastily and said, “Great news! You get to announce this!” I was then given a note that told me that I could announce to the Chamber that Northern Ireland had just won a gold medal in the Commonwealth games—for shooting. I was somewhat reluctant to go in with that news, and when hon. Members are talking about boxing and other things, one can understand my trepidation.
I do not want to appear to avoid what the motion says about the Queen’s diamond jubilee, because the wrong thing might be read into it if I did. I have mentioned that I served as Deputy First Minister, some 10 years ago. When the Queen visited the south last year, I was reminded that during that time I became the first nationalist Minister on the island of Ireland officially to receive the Queen on the island, when, I officially received her during the Stormont part of her jubilee tour. I am not British; I am not a Unionist, a monarchist or a royalist. However, I respect any Head of State, and I particularly respect someone who is valued and esteemed by so many people, including my fellow countrymen. In that context, I have no issue with respecting others. We have to learn the ethic of respect and being respected, and that acknowledging other people’s loyalties and affinities does not compromise the integrity of one’s own. Not only is the way in which we can share, appreciate and celebrate each other’s beliefs and values together better for us; it also makes us a more attractive and comfortable place for visitors to come and engage in.
I just hope that, in recognising that, people recognise that there are other views, sensitivities, outlooks and affinities in Northern Ireland, and that people should not always make sweeping presumptions. I hope that everyone currently involved in the institutions in Northern Ireland can find comfortable ways of accommodating each other and showing mutual respect in an appropriate way. That was helped greatly by the manner of the Queen’s visit last year. All credit should go not just to Her Majesty and everyone associated with her remarks and gestures at that time, but to the previous President of Ireland, Mary McAleese, and her husband, Martin, for all the great work they did to improve not just relations between these islands, but relations within the island. That work was all solid investment in ensuring that perceptions of Northern Ireland would change and that our perceptions in Northern Ireland of each other and of our place would also change.
In that context, I have no hesitation in accepting the overall, underlying point of the motion, which is about the tourism drive and the welcome to visitors. I appreciate that there might not be a big attendance in the Chamber; indeed, I should put on record the fact that other Northern Ireland Members are conflicted, because we have an “Upstairs, Downstairs” situation in this place today. The Select Committee on Northern Ireland Affairs is currently meeting upstairs, so before someone starts twittering to the “Nolan” show or somewhere else asking, “Where were these people?”, I should point out that Members are conflicted and compromised, with some caught there and unable to be here.
Those who tire of us in Northern Ireland getting together to lobby for our special case may have an opportunity today to recognise that we have been able to get together to sell our special place through tourism. However, tourism and our visitor attractions are not the only things we have to offer. In terms of industry, sport, and academic and research achievement, Northern Ireland is moving ahead. It is surfing all the opportunities available to it, in the context of Europe and the wider island of Ireland, and maximising those opportunities that arise from its being well placed within these islands to gain things in the United Kingdom context and maximise things in an Irish context. It is in that spirit that, although I have cautioned the House about certain parts of the motion, I do not want that to eclipse the underlying endorsement of the worth of Northern Ireland as a place to go in 2012, and not just this year, but many more years thereafter.
David Simpson (Upper Bann) (DUP)
I rise to speak in support of the motion tabled in my name and those of my colleagues in the Democratic Unionist party. The motion unashamedly blows the trumpet and beats the drum for Northern Ireland, and we are well known for beating the drum there. I was raised in a house in which, unless we could beat or put up a Lambeg drum, we knew nothing. That was when I was a small boy. I have grown slightly since then—[Hon. Members: “Upwardly or outwardly?”] In more ways than one. It was a great childhood and a great part of my life and my culture.
Of course we on these Benches would say that Northern Ireland was the best place on earth, and that the greatest people in the world were those from Northern Ireland. Our motion announces to the world that Northern Ireland is open for business, and invites the world in its entirety to come along and join us. Whether they want history, culture, performing arts, spectacular scenery, activity holidays, sporting holidays or just lazy day holidays—which would suit me very well—there is something for everyone, and it is all served up by the people with the warmest hearts and the warmest welcome to be found anywhere.
It is a tradition in homes in Northern Ireland—as it might be in the rest of the United Kingdom—that the kettle is put on as soon as someone enters the house, and they are given a cup of tea. I am well used to that in my constituency. When I visit all the old ladies that I have to talk too, the buns are put on the table—
David Simpson
Absolutely. I was brought up in the country, and my background is in the meat industry, so I believe that I should be a good advertisement for that industry. Also, I have to say that it took a lot of money to put this physique in place, and it would be a shame to lose it.
We also have the best golfers in the world, and a good few of the best golf courses as well. We produced the greatest footballer that ever lived, and the greatest ship that ever sailed. We helped to build America and gave it many of its Presidents, including Andrew Jackson, whose family originates from my constituency, Ulysses S. Grant, Theodore Roosevelt and Bill Clinton. We also gave it Richard Nixon, but we will move on pretty quickly. John Dunlap, who printed the American declaration of independence, was also from our shores.
Jim Shannon
My hon. Friend will be aware that we also gave America hillbilly music, which came from the hills of County Antrim. That country-style music swept across all the southern states of America. I think that Elvis Presley’s ancestors also came from Northern Ireland.
David Simpson
I was trying to avoid mentioning the fact that hillbilly music originated in Northern Ireland, but it is certainly part of the legacy of the Ulster Scots, and I will allow my hon. Friend to deal with that side of things, although I trust that he will not try to sing.
Joseph Scriven, from Banbridge in my constituency, gave the world one of the sweetest hymns in the English language when he wrote “What a friend we have in Jesus”. We have produced great inventors, too—Harry Ferguson, who produced the Ferguson tractors that can be seen all over the world; and Frank Pantridge, who invented the portable heart defibrillator, which saves thousands of lives across the world each year.
We heard about other contributions at a recent Prime Minister’s Question Time. The Prime Minister was asked about Northern Ireland’s ranking and whether Northern Ireland had the happiest people in the United Kingdom. He did not seem to think it applied to us; I do not know why. One of my honourable colleagues—he is no longer in the Chamber—mentioned the Social Democratic and Labour party. I do not know why he did, but I see that SDLP Members are smiling today, so things are looking up.
Let me assure right hon. and hon. Members that, although it sometimes seems that we in Northern Ireland have the worries of the world on our shoulders, there is a joy deep down in the hearts of the people of Northern Ireland—and we are very glad to represent them in this mother of all Parliaments.
Northern Ireland is not yet at the end of the journey. There is no doubt that we have come a long way in recent years. Just 10 years ago, the Province was a very different place and was in a different situation as the Assembly lurched from one suspension to another. Public confidence in the political structures was low, while public uncertainty about the future of Northern Ireland was high. The last 10 years have seen very significant change and positive progress—so much so that a recent Northern Ireland Life and Times survey showed 73% of the community favouring Northern Ireland’s remaining in the United Kingdom. That figure included a slim majority of the Roman Catholic community, which is encouraging.
It is not over-egging the pudding too much to suggest that such has been the progress made in recent years that Northern Ireland is more settled in this United Kingdom at present than Scotland is. Perhaps what is needed in Scotland is a second flank of Democratic Unionist party MPs, so that we could help the Scots to maintain their stand. That might not be a bad idea, and it is worth looking at. After all—here I go into a history lesson—King Fergus had the old kingdom of Dalriada, which eventually united the Scots under Kenneth McAlpin, and gave the land its name, while St Columba and his successors in the old Celtic Church gave it its heart, its vision and its passion.
As part of the generation that grew up amid all the troubles that we have come through, I can look back to very dark days. Like many people in Northern Ireland, I can look back to days when members of my own family circle were killed during those years. I can also look back over more recent years and trace the progress that has been made; and I can lift my eyes and look around me at the situation in the Province today and look forward to days yet to come. I can see the path and the upward curve that we are on.
Turning to wider issues, I am pleased to say that Northern Ireland has had many sporting heroes down through the years, and we have already heard about many of them today. For example, Kennedy Kane McArthur won the Olympic marathon 100 years ago in 1912. I have two gold medal winners from the Commonwealth games in my constituency—as one hon. Member mentioned, they won their gold medals for shooting. We also have Dame Mary Peters, who went to school in my constituency, and still comes to the constituency to get her hair done.
David Simpson
Not at the same place as me.
When Dame Mary Peters won the gold medal I was still at school, and I remember walking down the street in one of the towns in my constituency, Portadown, alongside the car. Like my hon. Friend the Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea), I also remember the celebrations for the Queen’s silver jubilee which took place throughout Northern Ireland. I have to say that my hon. Friend goes back a bit further than I do, and that I certainly did not take up the challenge to dress in a sailor suit. I do not think that my hon. Friend will live that one down for a day or two.
Other people have already been mentioned, but I think it is worth mentioning them again. We have had great legends like Joey Dunlop, who won five consecutive motorcycle TT Formula 1 world titles in the 1980s. We have also had many boxing champions down the years, and I know that many in the next generation will be as good as the greats that we have had in the past. More recently, our very own transatlantic rower, Kate Richardson, who comes from my constituency, set the world record as part of the Row For Freedom challenge. What a great event that was.
This year, Northern Ireland is the capital of the world when it comes to golf. Who would have thought five or 10 years ago that we would have the world’s number one golfer in the Province? All three who have recently won championships are great ambassadors for the whole Province, and for all the people of Northern Ireland as well.
That brings me to the wider elements of the motion, which refers to the anniversaries and events that are sprinkled throughout 2012. The Olympics will be a showcase for London, but—as other Members have requested—they should be for the whole United Kingdom as well. The world will descend on London for this, the greatest sporting show on earth, and it is vital for there to be a legacy: for London, of course, because that is where it is being held, but also for the whole United Kingdom. I urge the Government to ensure that that happens.
This year is also the centenary of the sinking of the Titanic and the signing of the Ulster covenant. The maiden voyage and sinking of the Titanic gave birth to a legend that has held a fascination for the world ever since, and the new signature Titanic project in Belfast promises to be a world-class project that will not only fascinate but attract visitors to Northern Ireland from all over the world.
The sinking of the Titanic gave birth to an enduring legend, but the signing of the covenant in many ways helped to give birth to Northern Ireland itself; but not before the flower of Ulster was cut down amid the mud and the death of the Somme and elsewhere. They died in their tens of thousands. Many who had signed the covenant volunteered and died in those fields of France. To many today, sadly, they are but names on some historic document, but they are sons and husbands who were never to return home again, and those who were lost were mourned: they were mourned in every parish, every village and every hamlet throughout Northern Ireland.
Also, of course, this year we will celebrate the diamond jubilee of the reign of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. What a monarch she has been! I had the privilege of meeting Her Majesty when she paid a visit to my constituency. It was a remarkable time for me and my wife. I remember that we attended an exhibition in the town of Banbridge in County Down. Her Majesty and Prince Philip were walking around the exhibition, and when they came to a display that was termed “abstract art”, Her Majesty looked at me and asked, “What is that?” I replied, “Your Majesty, you’re probably wiser than me.” We did not have a clue what it was—but it attracted a lot of people to the art gallery.
When Her Majesty addressed Parliament on 4 May 1977 at the time of her silver jubilee, she said:
“I cannot forget that I was crowned Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Perhaps this jubilee is a time to remind ourselves of the benefits which Union has conferred, at home and in our international dealings, on the inhabitants of all parts of this United Kingdom. A jubilee is also a time to look forward. We should certainly do this with determination, and I believe we can also do so with hope.”
As representatives from Northern Ireland, we, too, cannot forget that she was crowned Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. We want to take this opportunity to wish Her Majesty a joyous year of jubilee, and many more years yet to come, and to assure her of a warm welcome in our part of the United Kingdom.
Mr Dodds
My hon. Friend refers to Her Majesty’s forthcoming visit to Northern Ireland, and various Members have mentioned visits that the Queen will pay to their constituencies. Those visits are generally known about; they have been publicised and preparations have been made. However, although we must be conscious of the security issues, does my hon. Friend agree that as much notice as possible of Her Majesty’s visits should be given, so that everyone knows about her itinerary and can celebrate?
David Simpson
I entirely agree. We understand that there are security issues, but, in this year, it is important that as much notice as possible is given to the communities that Her Majesty will visit. People want to come out and see her when she visits Northern Ireland, so that they can express their loyalty and the love that they have for her. She has been a unique monarch in many ways. The royal family is sometimes given a hard time by the press, but the Queen has been a wonderful exemplar of the office she holds on behalf of all the people of this United Kingdom.
We are looking forward to welcoming Her Majesty to Northern Ireland. In my constituency, many street parties are planned. We have to put up with so much nonsense, however. I have read in the press that we will have to get approval from the health and safety people before we can put up bannerettes and so forth. Things have gone beyond what is common sense, but the celebrations will happen. I know that celebrations are planned right across the three towns of Lurgan, Portadown and Banbridge that I represent and in other parts of the 200 square miles of my constituency. We are looking forward to having a wonderful time, and we wish Her Majesty well. I note that, as someone mentioned earlier, Queen Victoria is the only monarch who has reigned for longer, but I think Her Majesty will overtake Queen Victoria’s reign. We hope, trust and pray that she does.
I know that my constituents were proud to be part of this United Kingdom when they returned me at the last election. My constituency is the second largest manufacturing base in Northern Ireland outside Belfast. In Northern Ireland questions today, I spoke about the investments that have been made in my constituency, one of which is a £13 million investment at one site in Portadown by Asda. Many other investments are pending and we look forward to good days in Northern Ireland.
I believe there are good days ahead. Yes, we have dissidents who do not seem able to live without the troubles and who just want to drag us back to the bad old days, but the Unionist people and others stood fast against the Provisional IRA and won the day, and we will continue to do that. Yes, we have lost a lot of good friends and a lot of people who were tragically taken by the bomb and the bullet, but we want to leave a legacy in Northern Ireland for those people who put on the uniform of the Crown forces. I can say in this House without any contradiction that when it has come to donning the uniform of the Crown forces, our young men and women have never been found wanting. We supported the Crown forces in whatever situation they found themselves in. Tragedy has hit Northern Ireland for many years but we thank God that we are starting to move in the proper direction. Northern Ireland is moving on. It will take a little more time but we have come a long way over a number of years.
Let me end on a more political note. We Unionists would repeat the words that Her Majesty spoke in 1977 and say that this jubilee is perhaps a time to remind ourselves of the benefits of the Union. We hear so much today about Scotland and the referendum, but I believe that the United Kingdom is better as one, with no division. We have heard for many years about legacy—together we stand, divided we fall. I believe that the UK will be better staying as it is today without the nonsense of this referendum and of Scotland being removed from the Union. I do not think the Scottish people want that, but time will tell; we will know when the so-called referendum takes place. I wish Her Majesty well and I congratulate all my colleagues who have spoken. We will continue, to the best of our ability, to keep Northern Ireland moving forward.
Vernon Coaker (Gedling) (Lab)
I am grateful to have a few moments of the House’s time to make a contribution to the debate, after the interesting and insightful comments we have heard from a number of Members.
It is a privilege to hold my position. With the hon. Member for Belfast East (Naomi Long), I have already visited the Titanic quarter, and with the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), I saw the wonderful beauty of Strangford lough. I am looking forward to visiting South Down on Friday.
Vernon Coaker
The hon. Gentleman is ahead of me. I was about to say that I was looking forward to visiting all the other constituencies, but I think I shall have to start with the hon. Member for Upper Bann (David Simpson) who has been persistent in his desire for me to visit his constituency. Now that I have heard about the tea that is available at every stop, I shall make sure to go there. However, there is a serious point. From the visits I have made, it is abundantly clear that Northern Ireland is a place of stunning beauty and offers much to the visitor.
I am grateful to the Secretary of State for his apology that he would not be in the Chamber to hear my remarks. His point that the life of Frank Carson and his funeral represented all that is good about Northern Ireland was well made.
Notwithstanding the story about the little sailor, which will stay with many of us for a long time, the hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) was right to remind us today of all days, when we heard the news about the six soldiers, that we should remember all the victims in Northern Ireland over the last few years.
The hon. Member for East Londonderry (Mr Campbell) is not in the Chamber. He said that we should all—not just the Northern Ireland parties—encourage the broadest participation in these debates. That is important and it is incumbent on me and others to do so. I take the point made by the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan). We should realise that many Members, from Northern Ireland and elsewhere, who wanted to contribute to the debate are actually at a meeting of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee.
I do not want to say too much about the economy, although I have made considerable play of it over the past few months because it is extremely important. Indeed, the Secretary of State talked about it in much of his speech. I do not agree with the specifics of the cut in VAT mentioned by the hon. Member for Foyle, but as the Minister of State will know, the Opposition have called for a temporary general cut in VAT to help boost domestic demand, which would help job creation in Northern Ireland.
I congratulate the Democratic Unionist party on securing the debate. It is always good when Northern Ireland matters are discussed on the Floor of the House. I shall concentrate largely on the well chosen title of the debate, which welcomes the NI 2012 campaign to change perceptions of Northern Ireland. The work of Tourism Ireland has helped enormously in that respect.
Many Members recently attended the fantastic event at St James’s palace to launch NI 2012 in Great Britain. It was significant that both the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister and their colleagues from all parties in the Executive were there to show their support. There was a real mood of optimism at that event, and a spirit not just of hope but of expectation. The progress made in Northern Ireland was noted by every speaker, every performer and every guest. It was no longer a guarded, anxious, whispered aspiration that things would get better, but a confident, proud message shouted aloud that things are better and getting even better, and that Northern Ireland is a great place to live, to work, and in this instance to visit.
That is not to take anything for granted, and no Member who has spoken in the debate has done so or would do so. There is a huge belief in Northern Ireland that things which only a few years ago would have seemed impossible have been and are being done, as we continue to build a peaceful Northern Ireland. The overwhelming majority of people in Northern Ireland and across Ireland and the UK have supported the political process and those who have driven it forward, including many in the House today. I say without fear or favour to hon. Members that it is a privilege to recognise the contribution that they and others in all parts of the House have made to enable us to get to where we are today.
It is the people of Northern Ireland who make it such a great place to visit. Their legendary welcome, their friendliness, their creativity, hard work, pride in their community and willingness to share their beautiful region with visitors are what I have most enjoyed about being the shadow Secretary of State. One of the privileges of holding this position is that it enables me, as I said, to visit Northern Ireland regularly and see at first hand the vibrant dynamism of the arts and culture, the spectacular scenery, the historical sites and the wonderful food and drink that make Antrim, Armagh, Derry, Down, Fermanagh and Tyrone the six must-visit destinations for 2012. As I have promised hon. Members from Northern Ireland, I intend to visit them all myself over the coming months.
But of course we still have to work to challenge the lingering stereotypes and perceptions that many outside Northern Ireland still harbour about the place. The remaining challenges include how we deal with the past and legacy issues, how to maintain security, and of course how to overcome the continuing economic and social problems. I do not see Northern Ireland as a special case; that would be demeaning to Northern Ireland, but there are certainly special circumstances that need to be recognised.
As other hon. Members have said, we are at the beginning of a decade of commemorations that will mark important events in Irish and British history. The motion mentions, of course, the Ulster covenant, which was a response to the third Home Rule Bill which came before the House 100 years ago next month. One cannot help but feel aware of a great sense of history when discussing these matters in the place in which they were debated a century ago, and when thinking of the great figures who took part in those debates and are remembered as giants of Parliament, politics and state.
I know that there are many differing perspectives on the history of that period, but ultimately that history is a shared one, so we can choose to use the different perspectives of it to entrench division, or we can use them to learn about history, ourselves and each other, bring communities together in a new understanding of what happened in that decade, and perhaps create some fresh perspectives which will help to bring about a better future in the decade ahead. I know that is the wish of the vast majority of people in these islands, and of all Members in this place.
We also mark this year the diamond jubilee of Her Majesty the Queen. As the House heard earlier, during the 60 years of her reign she has displayed tremendous service, great dignity, selflessness and a dedication to all of the people of the United Kingdom, including those in Northern Ireland. Her visit to Ireland last year was truly remarkable. It opened up not just a new chapter, but a new volume in British-Irish relations. I join others who have done so today in paying tribute to her today, and I know that we all look forward to her visits to Northern Ireland throughout this year.
In 2012, this year of centenaries and jubilees, we celebrate all that is good about Northern Ireland. NI 2012 gives us the chance to showcase all that is good about Northern Ireland and indeed the island of Ireland. Northern Ireland is open for business, investment and tourism, not just this year but next year, with the city of culture in Derry-Londonderry and the world police and fire games, and beyond.
As an English MP, one of the questions I am most often asked by colleagues, friends and constituents is what Northern Ireland is like. I can confidently say to them now, as other hon. Members have done, to go and see for themselves. It is often said that perception is reality. The reality is that Northern Ireland is a great place, a changed place, and a place that wants people to come and visit it. I know I speak for all my colleagues when I say that we will do our very best to ensure that that becomes the perception as well. I say to everyone that it is time to put Northern Ireland firmly on the global map.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Order. I now have to announce the result of a Division deferred from a previous day. On the motion relating to the safety of offshore oil and gas activities, the Ayes were 308 and the Noes were 183, so the Question was agreed to.
[The Division list is published at the end of today’s debates.]
Ms Margaret Ritchie (South Down) (SDLP)
On what is a sad day, 2012 promises to be an action-filled year. The SDLP welcomes the progress that has been made in the north of Ireland over the past 10 to 15 years, of which we were very much part. We shaped the character of that progress and its development. In fact, we were particularly innovative in the political developments.
There has been much to celebrate in Northern Ireland, particularly with regard to our sporting heroes right across the sporting arena, whether in rugby, athletics, golf or the Gaelic Athletic Association. There is much there, and we must not forget that we are talking about a shared and inclusive society. There is much to celebrate in the film industry. Only two weeks ago a person from Northern Ireland won an Oscar for “The Shore.” Only last year the same director produced a film in Downpatrick, in my constituency, called “Whole Lotta Sole”, which will have its debut later this year. That film was centred on a fish and chip shop, but it was not necessarily about fish. In fact, it might have had more to do with the political turmoil out of which we have emerged.
There has been considerable movement away from violence and conflict and towards a more peaceful and harmonious society. We are all very glad about that and want to see the institutions that emerged out of the Good Friday agreement and the principles that were laid down in the agreement fully realised. Therefore, we believe that the institutions should be fully functional, that the Northern Ireland Executive should have a detailed programme for government and a full programme of legislation and that the North/South Ministerial Council must become fully operational. We also believe that it should be cross-sectoral in its approach, by which we mean that it should have a north-west focus, which my hon. Friend the Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan) would welcome, and a south-east focus, which would accommodate the interests of my constituency of South Down and those of north County Louth. We want more north-south bodies to be created, for the review of the north-south dimension to be published and for the Irish identity to be not only recognised and acknowledged, but given political weight.
That brings me to the motion. We welcome the fact that the Northern Ireland 2012 campaign is intended to change perceptions of Northern Ireland and encourage many more visitors. We want people to see the beauty of Northern Ireland, the scenery and the attributes of the people, which are already demonstrated through their inventions and sporting prowess and in many other fields. However, I am a bit afraid and will be looking to the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds) and the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) to clarify some points for me, because it could be construed that the motion—how shall I say this?—focuses on a single identity and is one-track or single-dimensional, because it contains no reference to an Irish identity or Irish nationalism, which is also very much part of the north of Ireland and is represented in this House by the three SDLP Members.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
The events of 2012 are the events of 2012: there is the centenary of the Titanic, the centenary of the Ulster covenant and the Queen’s diamond jubilee. So the motion, and its writer, did not dictate those dates, but does the hon. Lady agree that all those events, given that they will improve and provide opportunities to add to economic activity in Northern Ireland and can be enjoyed by all, should be seen not as single-identity events but as something that can unite all the people in Northern Ireland, who will be able to enjoy them and, indeed, benefit from them economically?
Ms Ritchie
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I say to all Members present that it is important that we look to all events and at all the attributes of the people of Northern Ireland. It is not enough simply to look through the narrow prism of one identity, but this motion could be construed as such, and I say that more in sorrow than in anger, and more with regret than anything else.
So I look to the right hon. Member for Belfast North—
Ms Ritchie
But I will be quite happy to give way a little later, when I have progressed with my contribution.
The motion underpins a Unionist agenda, it honours the foundation of a Northern Ireland state, and there is no recognition of my identity and where I come from. A growing proportion of those who reside in Northern Ireland are Irish, hold Irish passports, support the south of Ireland’s soccer team, support and participate in football and hurling, as part of the Gaelic Athletic Association, and speak the Irish language. That is part of our ethnicity and background.
I am not denigrating the views or the identity of others; I am saying that there must be parity of esteem, respect for both traditions on the island, and that when we are talking about the north of Ireland, or Northern Ireland, we should take into account everybody’s attributes. That is what moving forward means and what the new political institutions are all about: they are about moving forward together. I am quite happy to give way now to the right hon. Gentleman, who I hope will be able to elucidate that issue.
Mr Dodds
In an intervention, I shall not be able to do what the hon. Lady invites me to do, as I am conscious of Mr Deputy Speaker, but if she feels so strongly about the issue, why in the amendment to which her name is attached is there no mention of any issues to which she has referred or of any aspects that she has just discussed? Why, if she feels so strongly, did she not table such an amendment?
Ms Ritchie
No, I would know the answer anyway; I do not need anybody to tell me.
The right hon. Gentleman can, however, see what we have clearly done. We have concentrated on the practical politics that needs to be concentrated on, namely a reduction in VAT on tourism, because our tourism industry is being undermined. The amendment would also delete the partisan elements of the motion.
Ms Ritchie
Absolutely not. It is our duty as public representatives to try to heal divisions.
Ms Ritchie
No, I will not.
The political institutions that emerged from the Good Friday agreement were based on respect for political difference and identity, and around the three sets of relationships. There is no reference in the motion to that, to inclusion, to respect for political difference, or to the development of the shared society, to which the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland has already referred.
For me, as the Member for South Down, this is also a Belfast-centred motion. I represent a constituency that holds two of Northern Ireland’s signature tourism projects—the Mourne mountains and St Patrick’s country. We in the SDLP want to ensure—hence our amendment—that where tourism is central to our economy, it is allowed to grow and prosper, because it is one of the major drivers of the economy. The tourism and hospitality sectors will be better placed to contribute to growth and employment if supported by targeted reductions in VAT, as permitted under EU rules. We call on the Chancellor to consider such timely concessions in the forthcoming Budget on 21 March.
There is little doubt that the outstanding character and assets of my constituency’s tourism offering are unsurpassed. In this month of St Patrick, I ask all hon. Members, as I ask my hon. Friend the Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker), to come and walk in the footsteps of Patrick. Contrary to the real spirit of this motion, Patrick was, and remains for us, the epitome of unity and diversity. [Interruption.] Patrick belonged to everybody. Patrick was head and shoulders above everybody else. We celebrate unity and diversity on 17 March. We celebrate the person who is the epitome of unity and diversity, and a symbol of partnership and inclusion, and we reject and resist calls for the domination of one form of nationalism over another.
I make those comments in order to highlight the fact that Northern Ireland and the island of Ireland have much to offer, but we have come from one place to another, and we must move ahead in terms of parity of esteem by respecting political traditions and respecting each other. This is not about a narrow form of nationalism; it is about a broader form of nationalism that embraces everybody on the island, both Unionist and nationalist. Only last year, I was very happy to be in Dublin to meet the Queen, and I met her on two separate occasions. [Interruption.] Despite the comments that have been made from a sedentary position by those on the DUP Bench behind me, I want, like my hon. Friend the Member for Foyle, to place that on the record. We should always be very conscious of where we come from and do everything in the best interests of the people of Northern Ireland and the best interests of all the people of Ireland.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I should like to associate myself with the comments of my right hon. Friend the Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds), my hon. Friend the Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) and others in the Chamber about the six soldiers who lost their lives in Afghanistan. Last year I went to Afghanistan twice, and on one of those occasions, I was in Lashkar Gah, where it seems that the six soldiers lost their lives. One could not fail to be impressed by the courage, dedication and sacrifice of our soldiers. I suspect that many, if not all, of those in this Chamber pray for our soldiers every day, as I do before I start my work.
It is with great pleasure that I support the motion. I talked to my right hon. Friend about it beforehand, and one cannot fail to get excited about it. Unlike the hon. Member for South Down (Ms Ritchie), I feel that it says all the good things about Northern Ireland and epitomises all the issues. It is exciting to have a proposal that promotes the whole of Northern Ireland, brings together all elements of political opinion, and ensures that we have something that we can all support. That is surely why people will, I hope, be flocking to our shores very shortly.
I am unashamed to promote my beautiful constituency. Other Members say that their constituency is the best, and that may be their opinion, but that is said of my constituency by people who do not represent Strangford. When the shadow Secretary of State was in my constituency, he said, “Jim, this is the most beautiful constituency that I have ever seen.”
Jim Shannon
That puts me in second place, but first place in Northern Ireland.
Recently, my right hon. Friend the Member for Belfast North, my hon. Friend the Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley) and I attended a Tourism Ireland event at St James’s palace. Everybody was happy to go, including the Deputy First Minister. He had no issues with the event; he was pleased to support it, as were other Members. I sometimes wonder why people make some of the points that are made when progress is going forward steadily, as it should be. My right hon. Friend and I were privileged to have our photograph taken with Christine Bleakley—I happen to be her MP. It was a smashing occasion. Barry McGuigan and Paddy Kielty were there, and there was a smashing end to the evening with Van Morrison. All the good things about both Northern Ireland and southern Ireland were made clear by Tourism Ireland.
This is an exciting time for us all. It is time to put Northern Ireland on the tourism map as the home of a rich cultural history, mingled with modern facilities and a shopping haven. We should be secure in the knowledge that once people get a taste of Ulster—in every sense of the word—and our unique hospitality and warmth, they will always come back for more. The “Lonely Planet” tour guide states that Northern Ireland is
“abuzz with life: the cities are pulsating, the economy is thriving and the people, the lifeblood that courses through the country, are in good spirits”.
That is how it is in Northern Ireland. I am sure that when the Minister replies, he will agree. Another part of the guide says that Belfast is one of the top 10 cities on the rise. Plenty of people are playing us up, encouraging us and telling the truth about Northern Ireland.
We now have the impetus of a new dawn, with little threat of violence and few fears over safety. In fact, Northern Ireland is now one of the safest places in the United Kingdom. That is how much progress we have made—that is the progress that the party that I am privileged to represent and the other parties in Northern Ireland have worked to achieve. There is a shared future for us all and we accept that idea. Some people may not be able to accept that, but we do and we are moving forward. This opportunity has to be exploited.
Our beautiful, natural and historic landscape, coupled with the vivacity that is integral to everything that originates in Northern Ireland, cannot help but draw people to our shores. Whether people come for rest and recuperation in our superior salons and five-star hotels; to tour the country on nature holidays; to reside in the quaint bed and breakfasts across Strangford and in many other parts of Northern Ireland; to tour in caravans, using the many caravan parks in Strangford and across Northern Ireland; or to go shopping in the city, followed by dinner and a show, Northern Ireland has it all. There must be a sincere and earnest push to show that to the rest of the world.
I could go on and on, but it seems that the only people who are fully aware of all that Ards, Strangford and Northern Ireland have to offer are those who are blessed to have been born there and those who have passed through. That is a loss to the people not only of my constituency, but of the Province. If Strangford was marketed to its full potential, people would know about its provision for nature lovers, with its cycling and walking routes aplenty and beautiful shores rife with birds and wildlife; for the weekend visitor who wants to shop and be pampered and to have a nice meal and a night out; for the caravanner who wants to take in the beauty of the countryside; and for those who want a base from which to tour Northern Ireland, but want to get away from the city. Belfast is a mere 20 minutes away and the seaside town of Bangor, with its carnival atmosphere around the pier, is only 10 minutes away.
I mentioned birds and wildlife, and shooting tourism—in the legal, correct sense—has great potential in Northern Ireland. The Minister of State is well aware of that, having shot game and pheasants at Rosemount and Greyabbey. It was the biggest shooting day there for many years, and I was told afterwards that much of it was down to his own gun and shooting prowess.
As I said, the shadow Secretary of State visited my constituency just a few weeks ago. Afterwards, he stated that he would be back. We encourage him to return, this time with his cheque book, so that he can buy for his family many of the nice things that are available. We look forward to that.
It would be remiss of me not to use this opportunity to talk about Strangford’s place in Northern Ireland. The breathtaking view from Scrabo tower in Newtownards to the moors on one side, Scotland and the sea on another and Belfast city behind cannot be surpassed and is rarely matched, as those who have been there, such as the Minister of State and the shadow Secretary of State, will acknowledge. In the town of Newtownards itself, there are superior hotels and a superior night life, a weekly market, cinemas, a great shopping centre complex and beauty salons aplenty, including an all-Ireland beauty salon finalist.
History and culture are rich around the Ards, with the well known Scrabo tower and Mount Stewart house and gardens. The area also has the only fully working fishing village in Strangford—I know that there are fishing villages in other areas, including Portavogie. Strangford has some of the best game fishing, with Strangford lough and the Irish sea. That potential is being realised, but we can do more. Tourism Ireland should push game angling.
In Portaferry, we have the Exploris aquarium, which attracts more than 100,000 visitors a year. It is an excellent venue and has the capacity to do much more. If someone takes the ferry from Portaferry across to Strangford village, in the neighbouring constituency—it takes eight minutes, cutting off more than an hour and a half of driving—they will be taking the route that Princess Alexandra took in 2003 as part of a themed day to recognise excellence in tourism across the UK.
For the more modern culturalist, we also provide the Battletown gallery in Newtownards, which is gaining an international reputation and shows that craft, painting and other fields are progressing well. The Eden pottery in Millisle in my constituency provides the opportunity not only to purchase superior pottery but to make it, as part of a tourism experience. We should do more of that sort of thing.
We also have antiques shops, coffee and tea shops and superior places to eat. The humble Comber potato has been recognised by Europe, and in Strangford we can give people a meal that no one else can—starting with Portavogie prawns, the Comber potato, the Ards steak and Willowbrook Foods vegetables, all to tickle the palate and give people the opportunity to have food that they cannot get anywhere else in the whole UK.
If someone takes a drive down the other side of Ards, they will come across Castle Espie wildfowl and wetlands centre near Comber. My right hon. Friend the Member for Belfast North and myself both spoke on behalf of Exploris and the Castle Espie wildfowl and wetlands centre in a debate in Westminster Hall, and we expounded the pluses of those venues and the excellent tourism potential of the area.
We can also mention the historic and archaeological sites. There are links to monastic life in the area, and St Patrick was there. Before anybody else says it, I point out that he is the patron saint of the whole of Northern Ireland and everyone of all persuasions. Last Friday night I attended an event in Ballynahinch at which the Minister for Social Development, Nelson McCausland, spoke. It was organised by the Orange district lodge, and it was about St Patrick and his history. It was smashing to have it. That is the St Patrick I look to, and everyone should look to.
Ms Ritchie
I was careful to emphasise that Patrick is the epitome of unity and diversity. Patrick belongs to everybody on the island of Ireland. It is well known that, after landing in the River Slaney at the mouth of Strangford lough, he sailed up to Nendrum, which is in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, and established a monastic settlement with his disciples. Patrick is the origin of everything and the symbol of partnership.
Jim Shannon
He is not the origin of everything, but he is certainly accepted by everyone.
Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)
For the record, it is clearly documented that St Patrick was a Welshman who came to Ireland and farmed in the hills around Slemish.
Jim Shannon
He certainly travelled around Northern Ireland and he tended sheep in Slemish. That was clear from the historical talk that I heard last Friday. There is 7,000 years of history in County Down. Any history buff could not help but be enthralled by the preservation of days gone by in relation to St Patrick that is so evident in the area that I, my hon. Friend and other hon. Members represent.
The film industry in Northern Ireland is moving forward by leaps and bounds. More companies than ever are coming to Northern Ireland to take advantage of the opportunities for the film industry. Northern Ireland is quickly becoming a centre for the film industry in the UK and Europe.
We are looking forward to the celebrations of signing the Ulster covenant 100 years ago. Every council in Northern Ireland is arranging a special event to commemorate signing the covenant, which was the first step on the road to the creation of Northern Ireland. There are not many people in Northern Ireland who do not have a relative who signed the covenant—indeed, one of my constituents, an elderly lady called Mrs Simpson, whom I had helped with a few constituency issues, came in one day and said, “Jim, there’s my grandfather’s covenant.” It had pride of place, but she said, “You take that, because I know that you will appreciate it.” That now has pride of place in my home.
The Somme centre is on the edge of my constituency, which borders North Down. It preserves the memory and recalls the efforts of the Ulster Division in the first world war. It is an excellent venue that now attracts more people than ever. We have a wealth of history and a wealth of attractions. Clearly, tourism must be the way to take that forward. Celebrations this year will attract many visitors on 28 September. I hope that the re-enactments that are planned will draw those who have come to the UK for the Olympics.
Our little country with the big heart has a definite place in the 2012 Olympics and I want to ensure that we step up to the mark and claim our rightful place as an integral part of the UK, and a jewel in the crown of great British attractions. I believe that we can and must do that. We have world-class athletes who are already drawing attention to Northern Ireland in Olympic circles. It is no secret—other hon. Members have mentioned it—that we excel in boxing and shooting in Northern Ireland. That does not mean that we are violent people. It just means that we are good at certain sports, and those happen to be two of them. We bring medals home from Commonwealth games and Olympic games. Two members of the Comber rifle club in my constituency have consistently won gold and silver medals at the Olympic games and the Commonwealth games. We have an opportunity this time to hold some of the training camps for those who are going to the Olympics in the Province. No. 1 world golfer Rory McIlroy is proud to wave his Ulster flag at his victories, and that has already created great media attention. We also have great facilities to offer people who travel to the UK.
The first main event on our calendar this year is the Queen’s jubilee. It is set to become some event, with the councils in my area preparing themselves for a record number of street parties and events as we celebrate 60 years of our sovereign’s reign over us. It is good to have SDLP Members making a contribution to the debate; it is a pity that they could not do so when we discussed the humble address, as they were standing guard outside the door.
Our Queen has provided stability and continuity through changing Governments, changing ideals and a changing world. She has selflessly given of herself, with a diligence that is difficult to match, and she has maintained a quiet dignity through the journey of life in the public eye. She has given 60 years of dedicated service to our nation and is the epitome of a great lady—she exemplifies the best of British: kind, industrious, wise and respectful. Other members of the royal family are taking that tradition over. We notice from the news today that Prince Harry has become the fastest man in the world. According to the news, it is official that Usain Bolt was in second place in that sprint.
People will fly their flags with pride while bonding as communities to celebrate the reign of our Queen. That will happen in many places across the Province. If the high level of interest in and excitement at Prince William and Kate’s wedding last year are anything to go by—I am talking about the whole community across the whole of Northern Ireland—no one will want to miss the Queen’s jubilee.
Northern Ireland is moving forward in a way that no one could have foreseen 10 years ago. Even I could not have foreseen the progress that we have made, but I and the Democratic Unionist party are pleased with that progress. We are moving forward in leaps and bounds to deliver something for everyone, including the young boys and girls who have yet to grow up and get jobs.
It is time for us to take our place on the world tourism stage and to allow others to see, enjoy and be involved in everything that we have to offer—great lodgings, fantastic scenery, wonderful shopping, world-class golf and, indeed, world-class golfers, salons, and most importantly, that unique Northern Ireland hospitality that beckons people in and makes them feel part of the family. A holiday in Northern Ireland will refresh and renew. This year, it will give people a rich insight into our vast culture and heritage, of which we are so proud. One visit, and their opinion will be set for ever. Northern Ireland is the place to come this year and every year.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. Before I call the remaining speakers—there are two—I should tell them that I intend to call the wind-ups at 5.8 pm. If they could share the time, that would be very acceptable to all Members in the Chamber.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
May I first apologise for not being present for most of the debate? Unfortunately, I had a meeting to discuss the devolution of corporation tax to Northern Ireland, which is a very important issue.
I gather that the debate has been fairly lively. The only two speeches I heard were from the hon. Member for South Down (Ms Ritchie) and my hon. Friend the Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon). I did not know we had to parade the benefits of our constituencies in the debate. The shadow Secretary of State said that Strangford is the most beautiful constituency he has been to, but he said that before he had even been to my constituency, adding that he wanted to visit.
I think I can trump everything my hon. Friend the Member for Strangford said about his constituency. He has the Scrabo tower, which was built a mere 150 years ago; I have Carrickfergus castle, the oldest Norman fort, I believe, in the whole United Kingdom. He talks about St Patrick wandering around his constituency; King Billy landed in mine. He talks about the Ards shopping centre; I have a cathedral of consumerism at the Abbey centre. For goodness sake! For his mere Comber spud, I can offer Glenarm salmon, which is famous the world over. I could go on, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I know you want me to move on.
The debate is important, but I was a bit saddened by what I heard from the hon. Member for South Down. I like her, but her speech was not worthy of her. This debate was not meant to be about boasting about the Unionist tradition in Northern Ireland; it was about promoting Northern Ireland, whose people have different backgrounds, national aspirations, outlooks and huge historical differences. Nevertheless, I believe that 2012 offers an opportunity to all people in Northern Ireland to gain from the economic benefits that will arise from the unique events and anniversaries this year. Those events and anniversaries will also help us to understand some of our own traditions, background and history.
I was saddened, therefore, by the contribution from the hon. Member for South Down because this should have been a positive debate, and I hope that it will be seen as such. We are proud to live in Northern Ireland and proud that it has come through the dark days that have probably dominated most of our lives—certainly most of our political lives—and is moving on. The motion states that we are moving forward not because of what Unionists alone have done but because of what we have all done and the compromises we have all had to make. I believe that those decisions will ensure that the next 30 years are not blighted like the past 30 years. I was a bit saddened, then, by her negative approach.
Mark Durkan
The hon. Gentleman said that he had not heard the whole debate. On the positive changes made, the motion and 2012, does he acknowledge the particularly strong and positive role being played by Tourism Ireland—a body whose creation his party persistently opposed for many years and whose budget it tried to have aborted? Will he accept that he got that wrong and was negative, but that now it is doing good things?
Sammy Wilson
I would prefer to consider what all of us now have to do to promote Northern Ireland not only next year but in all the years ahead. And one area we have to offer and which has been identified as a growth industry is the tourism industry: it is labour intensive; we have a good natural resource that we can exploit to the benefit of tourism; and there is huge interest in past events in Northern Ireland. So we have the industry, the history and the architectural heritage, and we should exploit that.
Sammy Wilson
All of it, yes. That includes the features in the hon. Lady’s constituency that people visit and into which money has been poured to develop some of that tourism infrastructure, and the celebrations of St Patrick and that whole tradition—some claim St Patrick for the Roman Catholic community, some claim it for the Protestant community. It really does not matter! If St Patrick is a marketable commodity, let us make him a marketable commodity and benefit from it. [Interruption.] Yes, and a neutral flag as well.
It is disappointing that this is seen as divisive rather than unifying. There are huge opportunities for us in the celebration of the Titanic, of the Ulster covenant and of Her Majesty’s 60th anniversary. We have not been selective about these events. They are outside our control. This year is the 100th anniversary of some of these events, and we cannot dictate which ones we include and which we do not. They just happen to be there. We need to ensure, however, that we get the maximum benefit from them and that they are used in a way that is not divisive but unifying so that the whole community can benefit from the economic opportunity.
The motion recognises, at the very end, that we want to see Northern Ireland moving forward, and moving forward together. We recognise the progress made and we do not see these events as exclusive. They are to be enjoyed by people in Northern Ireland. Most importantly, we want them enjoyed by people outside Northern Ireland. I will not go through, as I am sure other hon. Members have, all the benefits of my own constituency, although I mentioned some of them in the introduction.
Mr Dodds
I very much welcome the tone and content of my hon. Friend’s remarks about the nature of the events that we are highlighting. However, while we are on the subject of events happening in his constituency—I think he referred to the “cathedral of consumerism”—I should just make it clear that the Abbey centre is actually in Belfast North.
Sammy Wilson
It is near the border, and I could not think of a cathedral in my constituency. Just as my right hon. Friend—the Member for Belfast North—purloined part of my constituency at the last review by the Boundary Commission, I have taken in some of the shopping in his. Indeed, those facilities are used mostly by people from East Antrim anyway, and would probably not be able to survive were they unable to go and shop there, so I suppose we share it to that extent—I knew it was probably a mistake to let him intervene.
I know that others want to speak, so let me say in conclusion that I hope that 2012 will be a year in which we see a further turning of the corner in Northern Ireland. Those of us who live in Northern Ireland know that there have been changes; after 2012, because of the international interest, people further afield will know that there have been changes in that part of the United Kingdom too.
Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)
Like my hon. Friend the Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson), I have not been here for all the debate, because of my attendance at a Select Committee sitting. However, I welcome the opportunity today to celebrate and debate some of the wonderful things that are happening in our country and across our kingdom this year.
I notice that my colleagues have been boasting about their constituencies. How dare they, when they know that North Antrim exists! Someone once said that in North Antrim we have the manufacture of tobacco at one end, the manufacture of Bushmills whiskey at the other, and all the vices in between. I want to make it absolutely clear for the record that I represent everyone in North Antrim, and I am delighted to do so, including all those factories.
When people travel to the Olympics and celebrate the games this year, they will be travelling on a wonderful new bus. It has been dubbed the “Boris bus”, but it is actually the Ballymena bus, because it is made in my constituency. Indeed, this wonderful, iconic piece of engineering should be celebrated—indeed, I hope it will be—as people enjoy what is an environmentally friendly bus, a little bit of Ballymena travelling through London every day. That gives me a huge amount of pride about what we can achieve in our constituencies and what we deliver to the kingdom. We also have some wonderful areas for tourism, which I hope people will come and enjoy as well, not least the majestic Giant’s Causeway. Indeed, we look forward to seeing a new visitors’ centre opening there and to more tourists coming to see the constituency.
However, I want to focus my brief comments this afternoon on the latter part of the motion before the House, which draws attention to the centenary of the signing of the Ulster covenant and declaration—or, the Ulster solemn league and covenant. It was a seminal moment, not only in the history of Ulster and the history of Ireland, but in the history of these islands. It is an inspirational moment, and it should continue to inspire the people of these islands today. We should acknowledge the significant role that the signing of the league and covenant played, not only for the kingdom, but in helping during the great war in 1914. To put it into historical context, in 1916, seven men signed the proclamation for the republic in Dublin. In 1776, the American declaration of independence had 56 signatories. The Ulster covenant of 1912 had 218,216 men signing it in one day, with 228,991 women signing a parallel, uncompromising declaration of association with the Ulster solemn league and covenant. A further 19,162 men and 5,055 women of Ulster birth signed in Dublin, Edinburgh, Glasgow, York, Liverpool, London, Manchester and Bristol.
The Ulster covenant was truly an impressive demonstration of the resolve of early 20th century Ulstermen and women to remain citizens of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, as it was then. It also demonstrated a spontaneous solidarity in defence of the Union. Furthermore, it showed that Unionism was a popular, broadly based, democratic movement. Today, that resonates with me, as an Ulsterman and a Unionist and as one who is passionate about recognising that the Union is richly made up of all its component parts. The Union is only as strong as each and every one of those component parts. It is strong because of its association with Ulster, with Scotland, with Wales and, of course, with England.
Dr McCrea
Does my hon. Friend acknowledge the findings of the highly respected Queen’s university survey of public opinion that has just been published, which shows overwhelming support for the Union? It found that 82.6% of people in Northern Ireland want to live in the United Kingdom and are proud to be British.
Ian Paisley
My hon. Friend makes that point well. What a year for that survey to come out!
The word “covenant” has important meanings. In modern parlance, it refers to a barter or bargain, but it also has the Hebrew meaning of a divine promise linked with a human obligation. Its literal meaning is a bond or fettering—something that should not be broken. So convinced were people of the need for the Ulster covenant that some of them even signed it in their own blood, to demonstrate that their passion for the Union was not something that could easily be torn up, and that it was part and parcel of their very soul and their very being. We should take inspiration from that passion and inspiration.
I have a wonderful book written by a guy called Colonel Crawford, which has a foreword written by Lieutenant-Colonel Sir Wilfrid Spender that outlines the importance of the covenant in the history of the Union and of the first world war. He wrote:
“Looking back, the British have reason to be grateful to the Ulster people for their stand for the Empire, and more particularly to Colonel Crawford, who brought from Germany, before the first Great War, more than sufficient arms to equip a division in Northern Ireland, and this was a large factor in releasing all six regular divisions for the Expeditionary Force. Germany lost those weapons at a vital time, and they proved invaluable in training the 36th Ulster Division, of which I was the acting general staff officer before its departure to France in 1915.”
The lieutenant-colonel goes on:
“The Ulster Division won undying fame at Thiepval in 1916, because it was largely composed of men who, like Colonel Crawford, had the true Crusading spirit. I hope that the younger generation in Ulster may be inspired by his…example”.
That was an example of boys’ own heroism, and boys’ own determination to do whatever had to be done to save something that people believed in.
I am glad that this Parliament is going to celebrate, support and endorse the covenant and the declaration. Even if a Parliament were to try to turn the will of a people on its head, the people would ultimately be right, and their determination should be recognised at all times. I want to put on record the words of Ulster’s solemn league and covenant. It states:
“Being convinced in our consciences that Home Rule would be disastrous to the material well-being of Ulster as well as the rest of Ireland, subversive of our civil and religious freedom, destructive of our citizenship and perilous to the unity of the Empire, we whose names are underwritten, men of Ulster, loyal subjects of His Gracious Majesty King George V, humbly relying on the God whom our fathers in days of stress and trial confidently trusted, do hereby pledge ourselves in solemn Covenant throughout this time of threatened calamity to stand by one another in defending for ourselves and our children our cherished position of equal citizenship in the United Kingdom and in using all means which may be found necessary to defeat the present conspiracy to set up a Home Rule Parliament in Ireland. And in the event of such a Parliament being forced upon us we further solemnly and mutually pledge ourselves to refuse to recognise its authority. In sure confidence that God will defend the right we hereto subscribe our names. And further, we individually declare that we have not already signed this Covenant.”
This was a seminal moment in British history that was determined not by the will of a Parliament or by the outcome of an election, but by the will and the mass movement of people power in that part of Ireland—in Ulster, the part that we cherish most—that said, once and for all, that it is the people that really matter. I hope that when we celebrate these wonderful events this year, we will recognise that these events are wonderful because of one thing—the unique peoples that make up these countries in Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England. We should recognise that we are a unique and wonderful people with unique and wonderful ideas, and that we have a right as a people to come together and to celebrate our diversity, to celebrate who and what we are, to celebrate the differences also, but to hold steadfastly to the fact that we have a proud and recognisable tradition—and that nothing should make us ashamed of it.
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
I am happy to conclude the debate, and I am grateful to everyone who has participated in it. As has been said, we have had a good, lively and generally good-humoured debate—with one or two exceptions. I am grateful to my hon. Friends the Members for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) and for East Londonderry (Mr Campbell), the hon. Member for Filton and Bradley Stoke (Jack Lopresti), my hon. Friends the Members for Upper Bann (David Simpson), for Strangford (Jim Shannon), for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) and for North Antrim (Ian Paisley) and the hon. Members for Foyle (Mark Durkan) and for South Down (Ms Ritchie) for their contributions, as well as to the shadow Secretary of State and the Secretary of State for theirs. I know that the Secretary of State has had to leave the Chamber to engage in an important piece of work on behalf of Northern Ireland.
References were made in the early part of the debate to the natural humour of people in Northern Ireland. Some of that might have been lost in recent exchanges in this debate, but by and large I think it is right to say that the good humour and character of people in Northern Ireland—on both sides of the community—were a factor in bringing Northern Ireland through the darkest and deepest days of challenge and trouble to where we are now.
The very fact that we are having this kind of debate on the Floor of the House—and, indeed, those we regularly see taking place in the Northern Ireland Assembly—dealing with matters to do with the economy and social affairs, and how to attract more people by celebrating the opportunities for increased tourism, stands in marked contrast, as the Secretary of State said, to the sort of debates we were having 10 years ago, when we lurched under previous dispensations of political leadership in Northern Ireland from political crisis to political crisis, when we were debating suspensions of devolution, round table talks and all the rest of it. Under the current leadership in Northern Ireland, we now see steadfast and sure progress being made in a stable political environment.
As we know, the Northern Ireland Assembly has entered its second full term of devolution. That is no mean feat, but we sometimes take it for granted. Sometimes the House needs to be reminded of just how far we have come. Things that were unthinkable even a short time ago are now accepted as commonplace. We do well now and again to take stock and pause, and to reflect on and celebrate how far we have come, not to forget the challenges and difficulties, but to say that things have improved considerably.
Many people will take credit for that. Mention has been made of the work of political leaders. I join the tributes to them, but the true tribute, of course, goes to the people of Northern Ireland—the ordinary, decent people of Northern Ireland on all sides, the vast majority of whom, despite the violence and pressures on them during those times of trouble, voted consistently for parties that were opposed to violence and stood against violence, saying clearly that they wanted a democratic and peaceful way forward. Some people who were engaged in violence had to realise that and reach a point at which instead of trying to tear down the state of Northern Ireland, they gave their support to the police, the rule of law and the courts. That is a measure of just how far we have come.
As we heard earlier, on Monday a report from Queen’s university, which is highly respected, showed that some 82% of people want Northern Ireland to remain within the United Kingdom on the basis of the political agreements that have been made. That is an amazing turnaround, and contrasts with the debate that is currently taking place in Scotland.
Central to the tributes that should be paid are tributes to our security forces. We should pay tribute to members of the police, including the part-time police. The other day I took a delegation to meet the Minister of Justice. Those men and women served in the RUC part-time reserve during the darkest days of the troubles, under serious threat of death and for very little monetary reward. They contributed to the bringing about of the circumstances that we all enjoy today. We should pay tribute to members of the Army—members of the Ulster Defence Regiment and the Royal Irish Regiment—and to members of the emergency services. All those people made an immense contribution, and should never be forgotten—and, of course, we should never forget the victims who live daily with the pain and suffering of all those years of violence, as do their families.
We can view 2012 as a fantastic year of opportunity and we can reflect on the progress that has been made, but it is always important to bear in mind the sacrifice that is being and has been made by so many. As was pointed out by my hon. Friend the Member for South Antrim, we should be conscious that we are speaking today in the shadow of the loss of six brave servicemen in Afghanistan, and obviously our thoughts and prayers are with their families at this time.
The motion is broadly drafted: we tabled it in good faith to celebrate the events that are taking place in 2012. It refers to the diamond jubilee, on which we had a good and positive debate earlier today, when the House was virtually united. It also refers to the Olympic games, the amazing Titanic centenary, and the centenary of the Ulster covenant. All those events are mentioned in tourism literature that has been published in Northern Ireland and is widely available.
We do not seek to be divisive in any way, but, as my hon. Friend the Member for East Antrim pointed out, the motion refers only to events that are happening this year. Next year, 2013, Londonderry will be the city of culture, and the world police and fire games will come to Northern Ireland. Those will of course be celebrated, and there will be other events in 2014 and 2016. No doubt the whole issue of the Somme, and events that took place in Dublin, will also be discussed and commemorated.
We should commemorate events as they happen, in a positive way. My hon. Friend the Member for Strangford and the hon. Member for Foyle referred to a tremendous event that took place not long ago in, of all places, St James’s palace—a royal palace that could be described as the heart of the British monarchy. It was an amazing situation. Ambassadors to this country are appointed to the Court of St James’s, the seat of the monarchy, but on that occasion the palace was taken over and branded with the images of Northern Ireland. The First Minister was there, as was the Deputy First Minister, Martin McGuinness. He entered a royal palace and talked about the positive aspects of Northern Ireland. He did not make any of the points that the hon. Member for South Down has made in this debate, because he recognises that it is positive for Northern Ireland to commemorate events as they happen.
We should pay tribute to the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment, the Northern Ireland Tourist Board and, indeed, Tourism Ireland for the work that they are doing. We must also acknowledge the budget that has been given for tourism in Northern Ireland. Tourism Ireland has responsibility for marketing Northern Ireland to the rest of the United Kingdom and to the wider world. The NITB has responsibility for marketing within Northern Ireland and in the Irish Republic. Some of us could certainly happily have a discussion about how best to market Northern Ireland, but that is a debate for another day. All I want to say now about the budget for tourism in general is that we need to get the biggest bang for our buck, whether through the NITB or Tourism Ireland, in promoting Northern Ireland. I am sure we all agree on that.
I have enormous respect for the hon. Member for South Down, but—in contrast to the remarks of her party colleague, the hon. Member for Foyle—her contribution was a little jarring. As she talks so much about inclusion, I hope she will use her influence and best endeavours in respect of a decision made today by Down district council, on which she and her party have enormous influence. There is consternation about the council’s decision to move away from a good and agreed model for the St Patrick’s day celebrations. Belfast and other councils have been looking to Down district as a model to follow, but that has been ended by its decision to adopt a flag for the St Patrick’s day parade that is exclusive, instead of inclusive. That has undone all the good work of the past 25 years, and I hope something will be done about it.
Mr George Howarth (Knowsley) (Lab)
I grew up in a community that had similar divisions to those in Northern Ireland, although they did not result in the same regrettable outcomes. On the changing perceptions of Northern Ireland, although division once characterised the region, does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the respect he has shown to the hon. Member for South Down (Ms Ritchie) reflects the respect that the different communities now have for each other?
Mr Dodds
I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his intervention. He served as a Northern Ireland Minister for several years during difficult times, and I pay tribute to him for the work he did then.
I like to think that politicians in Northern Ireland did respect each others’ positions, although that might not always have come across. Indeed, there is growing respect, even in the debates we are now having about commemorations and celebrations and the decade of centenaries. I believe that greater maturity is now being shown on all sides than was the case 10 or 20 years ago. People are now looking at issues in ways that are intended to create the maximum consensus, rather than maximum division. We will not always agree on everything. There will still be disagreements; we do not hide that fact. Members hold different views about the best long-term future for Northern Ireland and where we want it to be—we, as Unionists, firmly say we want to be within the United Kingdom, for instance. That should not stop us working together in the best interests of Northern Ireland, however, to promote the economic and social betterment of all our people.
I want to reiterate the point I made about the diamond jubilee. We have debated that, and I do not want to rehearse the sentiments that were expressed, but I ask the Minister to ensure that as much notice is given to the people of Northern Ireland of Her Majesty’s visit.
We face many challenges. The dissidents and the troubles have been mentioned. There are terrorists out there who still want to derail our process and we face grave economic challenges. I am well aware that there are still high levels of deprivation and poverty in my constituency and high levels of youth unemployment in particular. However, if all of us work together we can try to make things better. We must take advantage of the opportunities that exist in 2012 to build a fantastic future for our province. I am delighted to commend the motion to the House.
The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr Hugo Swire)
This has been a lively—at times very lively—debate, but it has been an informative one and, on the whole, a good one. The hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea) was early out of the traps and talked about the perception of Northern Ireland and how there was a job to be done dismantling people’s false perceptions. That is a good description of what we are seeking to do in this watershed year. He also alluded to the sporting heroes Mary Peters, whom we all see as the lord lieutenant of Belfast—no doubt she will play her part during this diamond jubilee year—George Best, who one might argue is somewhat different to Mary Peters, and Barry McGuigan. Those are all great heroes—to say nothing of Graeme McDowell, Darren Clarke and Rory McIlroy. The opportunities with the Olympics have also been mentioned. I have said before in this place that I am slightly disappointed that we are not having more teams in Northern Ireland for the Olympics. We have got the Chinese gymnasts and so forth, so we have got some teams, but we want to make sure that Northern Ireland shares in the Olympics before, during and, critically, in the aftermath.
We all know of the economic challenges facing Northern Ireland—we are not inured from those—but I shall not rehearse them today. Some Members referred to the happiness league, which I might come back to. However, I must say, given the general demeanour of right hon. and hon. Members this afternoon, I think their happiness is a given fact. It is quite proper, as the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds) said in his concluding remarks, to have this sort of debate on the Floor of the House. Is it not wonderful, as he said, that this debate is about the agenda we have been discussing rather than about the troubles and the whole issue of devolution and suspension that so bedevilled discussions in this place for too long? Perhaps one day all democratically elected Members of Parliament will take their rightful place here and speak up for their constituents and their part of the world, as hon. Members have done so well this afternoon.
Inevitably, we have heard much discussion about the signing of the covenant. We should remember that that came after the third Home Rule Bill, in reaction to it, and I am pleased to say that we are in co-operation and co-ordination with Dublin. I pay tribute to the Minister Jimmy Deenihan with whom I have been working on creating the architecture within which we can set this decade of commemorations. That starts next week in Westminster Hall with an exhibition on the third Home Rule Bill. We hope it will then travel on to Dublin and to Northern Ireland.
We have rightly heard a lot about Her Majesty the Queen all afternoon and we want to play our part in Northern Ireland in the diamond jubilee. I shall come back to her visit in a minute. On a lighter note, we heard the amazing revelation—if I had not been here to hear it, I might not have believed it if I had read it in Hansard—about the hon. Member for South Antrim being dressed in his little sailor suit. There is now a £100 bounty for photographic evidence of that. I have to confess that there is—not in circulation I am pleased to say, but in existence—a photograph of me in a sailor suit, but hon. Members would probably expect that.
The hon. Member for East Londonderry (Mr Campbell), who is not in his place—I know that various people have had to go to different Committees—talked about the Irish Open and how he wants to open things up, as do we, and about the decade of commemorations. He talked about Londonderry—about Derry being the first UK city of culture—and he knows, as does the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan), that I have been working quietly behind the scenes and with them to see if I can add any value to the city of culture efforts because we want to make that a huge success not only for the city but for the surrounding area.
Hon. Members also dwelled on a little bit of political history and the alliance between my party and the Ulster Unionist party before the election. I do not read blogs or tweets but I am aware of noises on the street and believe that even the Democratic Unionist party has been in discussions of one sort or another—deniable or otherwise—with the Ulster Unionist party. All I can do is refer to that old British Telecom campaign, “It’s good to talk.”
There was some discussion of rebalancing the economy, growing exports and inward investment, all of which we want to do.
My hon. Friend the Member for Filton and Bradley Stoke (Jack Lopresti) is the only member of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee who was able to attend this debate. That is in no way to impugn the keenness of others to be here, but I am grateful to my hon. Friend. He talked about the security situation, which has not been much mentioned this afternoon. Of course, we need to be ever vigilant, particularly in a Chamber that displays the shields of Airey Neave, Ian Gow and Sir Anthony Berry, all of whom gave their lives to Northern Ireland. We will never forget the role played by parliamentarians of all persuasions in Northern Ireland’s troubled past.
We bitterly condemn, as a united House, all the attacks, not least in Derry-Londonderry, made by those who are trying to upset the city of culture, NI 2012 and the real progress that we have made. I give them a message from the House, loud and clear: they will not be successful.
My hon. Friend said that 2012 is a catalyst to realise the aspirations of many people. We can all concur.
The hon. Member for Foyle talked about a purposeful inquiry. There have been some good comments this afternoon about how we should address the decade of commemorations, and I rather like “purposeful inquiry.” Next week, I hope we can set the tone with the third Home Rule Bill exhibition. We heard about the launch of NI 2012 at St James’s palace, which I was able to attend. That, too, set the tone. Talking of tone, no one struck a better one than Van the Man—Van Morrison, who does not necessarily convey the Ulster sense of happiness and well-being that we now all recognise as the defining characteristic of Ulster men and women. None the less, he is one of my great heroes.
We heard a request for the targeted reduction, or even the abolition—temporary or otherwise—of VAT on tourism. I have looked into the subject, not least because my constituency is East Devon and tourism is extremely important in the south-west, and I have had a discussion with the Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport, my hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose). However, at the moment we need more revenue, to fill the black hole unfortunately left to us by Labour. I do not think the Chancellor is short of ideas for cuts—from fuel duty to income and corporation taxes—but I fear we shall have to wait until we have managed to restore some sanity to the UK economy.
We heard about the Commonwealth medal for shooting, and about Northern Ireland’s boxing prowess, both of which we celebrate, but we want to diversify slightly into other sports better to reflect Northern Ireland in the 21st century.
The Secretary of State had to absent himself to attend the joint ministerial working group on rebalancing the economy. I imagine that the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister were there, as was Northern Ireland’s Finance Minister, the Member for North Antrim, who is now in the Chamber—[Hon. Members: “East Antrim.”] There has been so much gerrymandering this afternoon that every Northern Ireland Member has laid claim to part of another Member’s constituency, so I hope the hon. Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) will forgive me for that slip.
To make a serious point, the fact that people have come and gone during the debate does not show lack of interest. It shows that occasionally we are conflicted, particularly Ministers, which is why the Secretary of State and I were not at the Treasury debate held in Westminster Hall last week, a point that I hope is not lost on those who sought to suggest otherwise.
The hon. Member for Upper Bann (David Simpson) gave us a rich diet of tea, buns and meat; he is no longer in the Chamber—he has probably gone to lie down. I can testify to Ulster’s legendary hospitality; the Ulster fry is the antithesis to the Jane Fonda workout. The hon. Gentleman was a veritable Wikipedia on Northern Ireland, listing many things that we never knew, but we certainly know now.
The hon. Gentleman said that Northern Ireland’s place in the UK is settled, as we also heard in Northern Ireland questions this morning, so I think we can take it as a given. We no longer hear so much from the First Minister of Scotland, Alex Salmond, about his arc of prosperity reaching from Iceland to the Republic of Ireland. Perhaps our sisters and brothers in Scotland would do well to look at Northern Ireland’s settled place in the Union and how it prospers as an equal, contributing and vital part of our great United Kingdom.
There were some questions about the visit of Her Majesty to Northern Ireland in her diamond jubilee year. Of course the Queen’s subjects wish to see her, but that must be balanced against other considerations. We hear what has been said and the Palace is aware that her subjects in Northern Ireland wish to express their loyalty.
The hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker), the shadow Secretary of State, referred quite properly to the six soldiers killed in Afghanistan, as did other speakers this afternoon. It is horrific. For those of us who are from a military background, as I am, and those of us who have been to Afghanistan, as have so many of us in the Chamber, every time we hear of losses our heart goes out to the families, but six in one go is something that we have not got used to. Our hearts and our thoughts are with the families this afternoon.
The hon. Gentleman repeated the call for a targeted cut to VAT. I point out—it may be an issue to which the Opposition Front-Bench team wish to return in the Budget—that such a cut is costed at £8 billion UK-wide, so if he is genuinely calling for that, it will have to be factored into any assessment that we make of Labour’s plans for the economy.
The hon. Member for South Down (Ms Ritchie) spoke about sporting prowess, including the Gaelic Athletic Association. I am very pleased, as are we all, that the GAA says it will play a role in all the commemorations over the next decade, as it should. The hon. Lady also spoke about film in Northern Ireland, to which the Secretary of State referred earlier. I am disappointed that the new “Titanic” series was not filmed in Northern Ireland. I raised the matter with various people, but the series was made in Hungary. That is a cause for sadness and I hope we can avoid such a mistake in future, but endless good productions are being made in Northern Ireland as we speak.
Then things all started to go so horribly wrong, when the issue of who owns St Patrick came to the fore once more. It was amazing. Just as the hon. Lady was claiming St Patrick for the mountains of Mourne and her own constituency, as if from nowhere the hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley) appeared, Mephistopheles-like, from some Committee to claim yet again that Slemish was St Patrick’s natural home and that he came from Wales. [Interruption.] The shadow Leader of the House—
Mr Swire
The Deputy Leader of the House—I will make him into a shadow quite soon—is now claiming St Patrick not for Wales, but for Somerset, when my notes tell me quite clearly that St Patrick actually came from north Devon. I hope the good people of Northern Ireland and particularly their political representatives care so much about the right hon. Member for East Devon that they fight about him as much as they are fighting about St Patrick. We claim him for Devon, the Deputy Leader of the House claims him for Somerset, the Welsh no doubt claim him for Wales, but we know that he was at some stage in Northern Ireland. We will leave it to others to decide where.
I thank the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) for revealing my relationship with some of the wildfowl on the peninsula. I am most grateful to him for revealing what I do in my private time. I can tell him that when I am in Northern Ireland and armed, it is with the proper authorisation of the Chief Constable. I wish that was always the case.
I know the hon. Gentleman’s part of the world extremely well. It is a beautiful constituency. I would not make the rash statements that the shadow Secretary of State made to every Member of Parliament from Northern Ireland that theirs is the most beautiful constituency, because there are 18 constituencies in Northern Ireland, and when he gets to about 17, he will be rumbled. It is safe to say that they are all utterly beautiful. Some are more beautiful than others, but if I were he, I would not say which.
The hon. Member for East Antrim is a larger-than-life figure in politics in Northern Ireland, where he has to wrestle with economic troubles daily. He came from a meeting of the joint ministerial working group today and gave an upbeat and typically positive speech. He gave a virtual tour of his beautiful constituency, and so successful was he in doing so—I rather hoped you would stop him, Madam Deputy Speaker—that I do not think there is now any need for anyone to visit Northern Ireland; they could simply download the Sammy Wilson app and stay at home, which is not what we want at all. He also talked about Glenarm salmon, which is delicious and I can recommend to everyone.
I was particularly pleased to hear about the hon. Gentleman’s support for tourism, both Tourism Ireland and tourism as an enterprise, on which he has been working closely with the Northern Ireland Enterprise Minister, Arlene Foster, because 2012 presents us with a huge opportunity. Of course we start the decade-plus of commemorations, a time when we will look back, but it is also a time when we will look forward and present Northern Ireland as it is in the 21st century to a world that is largely ignorant of Northern Ireland. I have said it before and will say it again: if you are not in Northern Ireland in 2012, you are no one.
The hon. Member for North Antrim, who has had to leave to attend a Committee meeting—he sent me his apologies—having made his intervention about St Patrick, rightly made a public relations puff for Wrightbus, and we can see the evidence of its workmanship on our streets. Ken Livingstone probably calls it the Ballymena bus, but we will call it the Boris bus as we want to see Boris properly returned as Mayor of London. The hon. Gentleman talked about the excellent visitors’ centre at the Giant’s Causeway, which is a must on anyone’s to-do list. Of course, he did not talk about the new golf resort at Runkerry, which we all look forward to. It was 10 years in the planning, which we cannot allow to happen again, but at least it is happening. It will be another attraction that puts Northern Ireland on the map. We have had various discussions about starting soon to market the island of Ireland as the golf states, rather than the Gulf states, because we will be rich in sport, if not in oil. He also spoke passionately about the signing of the Ulster covenant, and no doubt he will play an active part in the commemorations as and when they occur.
We heard from every corner of Northern Ireland this afternoon. There have been some disagreements, but if we compare those to the kinds of disagreements there might have been in a similar debate seven, eight or 10 years ago, we can see that it is remarkable how far we have come. From my perspective, we have a lot further to go. We are going there pretty quickly, and 2012 is the year we will start.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House welcomes the NI 2012 campaign to change perceptions of Northern Ireland and to encourage many more visitors to come to Northern Ireland; notes that, despite current economic difficulties, this campaign takes place in the context of a momentous year for the UK when the nation will celebrate the Diamond Jubilee of Her Majesty The Queen, and will host the Olympic Games; further notes that, in Northern Ireland, 2012 is the centenary of the Titanic tragedy, an event that remains seared into the world’s consciousness and culture, and the centenary of the signing of the Ulster covenant and Declaration, often described as the foundation document of Northern Ireland; welcomes the enormous progress that has occurred in recent years in moving Northern Ireland forward; and looks forward to the programme of events and activities which will help make Northern Ireland the place to visit in 2012.
Backbench Business
Sergei Magnitsky
(12 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House notes the passage of the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Bill through the United States Senate, the Bill to condemn corruption and impunity in Russia in the case and death of Sergei Magnitsky in the House of Commons in Canada, the approval of the resolution of the Dutch Parliament concerning Sergei Magnitsky dated 29 June 2011, and paragraphs I and 20 to 21 of the resolution of the European Parliament of 14 December 2011 on the EU-Russia Summit; and calls on the Government to bring forward equivalent legislative proposals providing for a presumption in favour of asset freezes and travel bans for officials of the Russian state and other countries, wherever the appropriate UK authorities have collected or received evidence that establishes that such officials:
(a) were involved in the detention, physical abuse or death of Sergei Magnitsky;
(b) participated in efforts to conceal the legal liability for the detention, abuse or death of Sergei Magnitsky;
(c) committed the frauds discovered by Sergei Magnitsky; or
(d) are responsible for extrajudicial killings, torture or other gross violations of human rights committed in Russia or any other country against any individual seeking to obtain, exercise, defend or promote basic and internationally recognised human rights, including those set out in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights 1966.
I first thank the Backbench Business Committee, chaired by the hon. Member for North East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel), for granting the debate, and the sponsors of the motion representing all three main parties, who include five former Foreign Ministers. I also commend the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), who has consistently raised the matter.
The debate was inspired by the brutal death of Sergei Magnitsky, a young Russian lawyer. Between 2007 and 2008, while working for Hermitage Capital, he exposed the biggest tax fraud in Russian history, worth $230 million. His legal team was then subjected to varying forms of intimidation. While other lawyers left Russia, fearing for their lives, Magnitsky stayed on to make a stand for the rule of law in Russia and strike a blow against the breathtaking corruption there. That bravery cost him his life.
Magnitsky was arrested in 2008 on trumped-up charges of tax evasion. In Putin’s Kafkaesque Russian justice system, the very tax investigators that Magnitsky had exposed turned up to arrest him. He was dumped in a filthy, freezing and overcrowded cell for eight months and fed putrid meals such as porridge with insect larvae and rotten fish, if and when he was fed at all. In such squalid conditions, he suffered acutely painful bladder and pancreatic problems. Eventually, a year after his arrest, he was transferred to hospital for emergency surgery, but when he arrived he was not treated at all. Instead, he was handcuffed to a bed and beaten by riot police. Doctors found him an hour later, lying on the floor. He was dead.
The Russian authorities blocked all attempts to bring those responsible to justice. Sixty people have been implicated in the persecution of Sergei Magnitsky, his client or in the original tax fraud, and they have been named by the US Commission on Security and Co-operation in Europe. They include senior officials such as the former deputy Interior Minister and the deputy prosecutor-general. The Moscow Public Oversight Commission, a watchdog mandated under Russian law, concluded that Magnitsky was tortured to death, but all the suspects were cleared by Russian investigators, some have been promoted and some decorated. In fact, the only people on trial are Magnitsky’s employer and Magnitsky himself, who is now the subject of Russia’s first ever posthumous prosecution.
Sergei Magnitsky joins that noble Russian tradition of dissidents who stood up for the rule of law, democratic reform and free speech—the tradition of Solzhenitsyn and Sakharov through to Anna Politkovskaya—but like many others who have been silenced for defending just causes throughout the world, Magnitsky stood for more than just Russia. Such people include Chinese human rights lawyer, Gao Zhisheng, tortured for defending property rights and free speech and currently held incommunicado at an unknown location; photographer Zahra Kazemi, arrested for taking pictures of the families of missing protesters in Iran, who gathered outside Tehran’s notorious Evin prison—she was jailed, tortured and beaten to death; and Hamza al-Khateeb, who was arrested during the Syrian protests last year. A month later his mutilated body was returned to his family. He was just 13 years old.
This motion is about keeping the flame of freedom alive for those brave souls. It calls on the Government to produce legislative proposals similar to the Bill going through the United States Senate with bipartisan support. It targets Sergei Magnitsky’s tormentors, who left a documentary trail of their crimes, but it would apply wherever there was evidence that a state official anywhere was responsible for torture, extrajudicial killing or some other gross human rights abuse, or was complicit in covering up such activities.
The evidence would need to be independently assessed by the Director of Public Prosecutions, by the Attorney-General or by some other appropriate authority. The designated person would be named and shamed, a stain on any regime that left him or her in post and a spur for reformers at home; they would be banned from entering Britain; and their assets here would be frozen. Of course there would have to be due process to allow anyone to challenge their designation, and the Government could make exemptions on the grounds of national interest, but the Secretary of State would have to publicly justify exempting anyone—a safeguard against misuse.
We would in effect be creating a presumption that targeted sanctions be imposed on those responsible for the worst international crimes against those who defend the freedoms we take for granted in this House and in this country. We would be sending a clear message that those responsible for such atrocities should not be able to fly into Britain, buy up property in Knightsbridge or head off down the King’s road for a bit of light Christmas shopping, as if nothing had ever happened.
This motion is not anti-Russia. It is pro-Russia. It is an unequivocal affirmation of our solidarity with those Russians who are suffering for having had the temerity to question the mafia-ridden practices of Putin’s nasty regime.
Malcolm Bruce (Gordon) (LD)
The hon. Gentleman is making a very powerful case. Does he accept that one of the problems in Russia is that although those in positions of leadership can perpetrate crimes against individuals by using the full undercover agencies of the state with absolute impunity, the one thing they most value and would not want to lose is the freedom to travel and to use their money, often stolen from the Russian people, in a life of luxury outside Russia?
Mr Raab
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that explanation of and rationale for what we are trying to achieve. It is precisely that. We are not seeking to exercise extraterritorial jurisdiction by depriving anyone of their freedom; we are merely saying, “You cannot come into this country if you have that kind of blood on your hands.” So the motion is not anti-Russia, but pro-Russia.
Mr Raab
I will not, because time is limited and many others want to speak.
The motion is an expression of solidarity not only with freedom fighters around the world, but with legislators in the United States, in Canada, in the Netherlands, in Sweden, and now in Italy, who are also scrutinising legislation or calling for Government action to hold to account those responsible for these terrible crimes.
Let me be clear about this. If we enacted this law, it would not end impunity overnight in Russia or anywhere else in the world, for that matter, but it would help to puncture it. It would express Britain’s disgust and our resolve not to turn a blind eye to such heinous crimes, and it would honour those such as Sergei Magnitsky, who died struggling to keep the flickering light of freedom in his country alive.
Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) on securing this debate and commend all right hon. and hon. Members who have supported the motion.
In all parts of the House, there is strong and unequivocal condemnation of the brutal treatment and alleged murder of Sergei Magnitsky. Mr Magnitsky, as the hon. Member for Esher and Walton has explained, was a young Russian lawyer working on behalf of a British firm in Moscow. He is thought to have uncovered the biggest corruption case in Russian history—a case that implicated politicians, the police, judges, and members of the Russian mafia. Days after Mr Magnitsky filed a criminal complaint and testified on the involvement of the tax police, among others, he was arrested on spurious tax charges by the same tax police officers against whom he had testified. He was held in pre-trial detention for nearly a year. In prison, he was mistreated, denied medical treatment and beaten. He died just days before the one-year limit within which he could be held without trial expired.
As the motion underlines, this is one of several cases in Russia in which human rights defenders and those exposing corruption have been brutally murdered. World-renowned journalist Anna Politkovskaya, human rights activist Natalya Estemirova, and human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov have all been killed in cold blood for pursuing the truth. The brutality of the killings has even extended beyond Russia’s borders, with the murder of political exile Alexander Litvinenko on British soil five years ago.
Jo Swinson (East Dunbartonshire) (LD)
The hon. Lady mentions cases including that of Natalya Estemirova. A couple of years ago, I was fortunate enough to be able to travel to Chechnya and, unfortunately, to see at first hand some of the appalling human rights violations there, including what had happened about the assassination of Natalya Estemirova. We may know who is responsible in the case of Sergei Magnitsky, but does the hon. Lady agree that one of the major problems is that investigations into such cases to get to the root cause of who has committed these appalling crimes are not undertaken, and that we need to use all diplomatic efforts to encourage the Russian authorities to do so?
Emma Reynolds
I do agree, and I will turn to the so-called investigation very soon.
I have given a shameful list of crimes in which justice never seems to be done. While those who bring to light allegations of corruption and abuse by the Russian state run a high risk of being murdered, those responsible for their murders appear to run little risk of being caught and punished. On the contrary, they seem to operate in a climate of impunity. These cases must be accounted for by the Russian Government.
The case of Mr Magnitsky has rightly been condemned around the world. Motions similar to the one that we are debating are being considered in other Parliaments in Europe, notably in Italy, Poland, the Netherlands and Sweden; and the European Parliament has agreed on a resolution. A private Member’s Bill has been presented to the Canadian Parliament, and in the US, Senators Cardin and McCain have introduced a Bill in the Senate. Our debate is about what the British Government are able or willing to do about the Magnitsky case and others in which a culture of impunity prevails.
In the UK, we have a long and proud tradition on human rights. A Conservative politician, David Maxwell Fyfe, was instrumental in drafting and introducing the European convention on human rights. Right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the House have been outspoken on the Magnitsky case and on other human rights abuses. Britain cannot turn a blind eye to the Magnitsky case.
I sincerely hope that the Minister, in responding to the motion on behalf of the Government, will not repeat the same line that that we have heard countless times—namely, that it would be inappropriate to comment on this case until the official Russian investigation has reached a conclusion. That goes back to the point made by the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson). In June last year, a Home Office Minister, the hon. Member for Ashford (Damian Green), said that the British Government were waiting on the report of the Russian investigation, which was due in August last year. In January this year, the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, the hon. Member for North West Norfolk (Mr Bellingham), restated that position and said that the investigation was now expected to report on 24 January.
Given that the investigation into Mr Magnitsky’s death opened in November 2009 and has been delayed 11 times since, I hope that the Minister now accepts that the delays are unacceptable. Will he assure me and the House that we will not hear the same wait-and-see policy from the Government today? There are good reasons to doubt that the investigative committee will ever get to the truth of who killed Sergei Magnitsky. A delaying tactic by the Russian Government must not be allowed to become a convenient delaying tactic for our Government. In the light of that, what measures will the Government take to increase the pressure on the Russian Government in the Magnitsky case and many others?
Beyond that case, it is important that this debate takes account of the broader concerns about the horrific conditions in Russian prisons, which are well documented. According to Russia’s Federal Penitentiary Service, 4,423 people died in Russian prisons in 2010, and a huge number of Russian prisoners suffer and die from tuberculosis.
In July last year, President Medvedev’s human rights council reported that Sergei Magnitsky’s arrest was unlawful and that his detention was marked by beatings and torture aimed at extracting a confession of guilt. The only action of the Russian authorities in response to that evidence has been a decision to put the dead victim back on trial. That is unprecedented in Russian legal history. It is not only a grotesque parody of justice, but a gesture of contempt for the international community and the human rights norms on which it is built.
The motion refers to the international covenant on civil and political rights, reminding us that raising human rights issues is not about interfering in the affairs of the Russian Government, but is a way of holding Russia to its international obligations. Russia has signed the European convention on human rights, the universal declaration of human rights, the charter of Paris and the EU-Russia partnership and co-operation agreement, to name but a few. In signing each of those agreements, Russia made a solemn commitment to respect human rights. As a result, it has enjoyed the privileges that go with being a member of the international community. It is therefore reasonable to ask whether the Russian Government are living up to their side of the bargain.
Turning to foreign affairs, Russia is a permanent member of the UN Security Council and is soon to become a member of the World Trade Organisation. It has a key role to play in foreign policy in aiding the stability of Afghanistan and preventing Iran from becoming a nuclear power. Russia’s role is also important in the case of Syria. As the Minister said this weekend, its refusal to co-operate with the international community is prolonging the horrific situation in Syria.
In conclusion, we recognise that only 22 years have elapsed since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the 70-year domination of communism, and that a period of deep economic turmoil accompanied the transition. We want to see Russia back on the path of reform, not going backwards, which is what the cases of Sergei Magnitsky and many others demonstrate. We want a successful, open, democratic Russia, free of endemic corruption, where the rule of law is protected, not eroded; a Russia that has a strong voice in the world and that works with the international community, not against it.
In the run-up to Sunday’s presidential elections, Vladimir Putin promised to root out corruption and to guarantee human rights. We want to see those promises delivered. If the Russian Government do not put Russia back on the path of reform, their economy is likely to stagnate, their population will continue to decline, discontent will grow, and Russia’s stability will be at risk. That is not in Russia’s interests, nor is it in ours.
We support the motion as a signal of our condemnation of the impunity for those who disregard human rights in Russia and our condemnation of those who are responsible for Sergei Magnitsky’s death. We urge the Government to continue to press the Russian authorities using all the available channels and all the upcoming opportunities, including through the European Union. It is important to note that the motion sets out steps that go beyond the precedents set by this and previous Governments in acting on such matters. We are less convinced by those points and urge the Government to reflect on how best to exert influence on the Russian Government to encourage them to meet their human rights obligations, including in the Magnitsky case. However, we share and echo the overriding emphasis of the motion. It unites the House in its condemnation of the criminal and brutal acts perpetrated against a brave and committed man. It rightly calls for pressure to be increased on the Russian Government to deal with the case in a fair and just manner, without delay and without equivocation.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Alistair Burt)
I begin by thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) and others for raising this important subject and securing the Back-Bench debate. I also thank the hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East (Emma Reynolds) for her remarks. I will listen carefully to Members who speak in the debate. I am conscious that many colleagues wish to speak, so I will try to keep my remarks to 10 minutes or so, but I assure Members that I will stay for the rest of the debate and reflect carefully on the matters raised.
I express my profound sympathy, on behalf of the Government and all Members, to the relatives and friends of Sergei Magnitsky. The circumstances of his death are deeply troubling, as my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton set out. The fact that no one has been held to account for it is a matter of serious concern to the Government, and we raise the issue with the Russian authorities at the highest levels and at frequent intervals. It is important that those responsible are brought to justice, and we urge the authorities to do that. The issue is wider, however. The death of Sergei Magnitsky serves as a stark reminder of the human rights situation in Russia and the questions about the rule of law there. My remarks will cover both the specific and the general.
The presidential elections are now behind us. A new Government are coming in, and we shall engage with them with determination to secure justice for Sergei Magnitsky and to address the wider issues at stake.
Alistair Burt
I want to give way only a couple of times, in order to protect others’ time, but I will happily give way to the hon. Gentleman.
Chris Bryant
I will be very brief. I just want to know whether the Minister is going to support the motion.
Alistair Burt
I ask the hon. Gentleman to listen to my remarks, and then he will understand the position that the Government take.
Most Members are familiar with the circumstances of Mr Magnitsky’s death, but I will give the Government’s view. Mr Magnitsky, a Russian lawyer working for Hermitage Capital Management, was arrested in November 2008 and taken into pre-trial detention, where he died nearly a year later. Before his arrest, Mr Magnitsky had been working to uncover an alleged tax fraud against the Russian state by certain law enforcement officials. He had given evidence against a number of Interior Ministry officials accused of tax fraud, and a number of the same individuals are alleged to have become involved in Mr Magnitsky’s investigation and detention.
In July 2011 the Russian presidential council on human rights published a report, which found that Mr Magnitsky had been denied medical treatment and beaten while in detention. Both those abuses contributed directly to his death. No one has yet been held to account for his death by the Russian authorities. The Russian investigative committee, which leads the criminal investigation into his death, appears to have made little progress, which we regret. The publication of its findings on Mr Magnitsky’s death has been postponed four times in 2011 and 2012, and the findings are currently due to be issued on 24 April. The lack of progress on the case is deeply troubling for all who care about human rights and about Russia.
We raise our concerns about the case with the Russian authorities at all levels, as the hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East suggested we should. The Prime Minister discussed it with President Medvedev during his visit to Moscow in September, and most recently the Minister for Europe raised it with his opposite number Titov in late January. He urged the Russian authorities to complete a swift, thorough and transparent investigation into Mr Magnitsky’s death with no further delay, and that is the position of the UK Government.
There is no doubt that the case has wider implications on the rule of law and respect for human rights in Russia. Indeed, that is the premise of today’s debate. Mr Magnitsky’s death in pre-trial detention is not an isolated incident but a fate shared by about 50 to 60 people in Russia every year. The initiative behind the motion speaks to an instinct that we in government, and all of us in Parliament, share—to defend human rights, condemn those who abuse them and tackle a culture of impunity for those who do so, wherever it exists. The Foreign Secretary has always been clear that human rights are at the heart of the Government’s work around the world. As he has said, they are
“part of our national DNA and will be woven deeply into the decision-making processes of our foreign policy”.
The motion proposes that the UK should adopt a presumption in favour of travel bans and asset freezes for Russian officials allegedly implicated in Mr Magnitsky’s death. It starts with the Magnitsky case but goes beyond it, envisaging the application of that presumption to individuals charged with similar abuses in other countries. We are aware of the developments in other countries to which the motion refers. A Bill has been introduced to the US Congress, and in the Parliaments of the Netherlands and Canada there have been discussions in support of visa bans against officials allegedly implicated in Mr Magnitsky’s death. However, we are not aware that the Netherlands or Canada has taken action further to the discussions in their respective legislatures. I understand that the US Bill is still being discussed in the Senate. We cannot predict whether it will come into force or what form it might take if and when it becomes law. If Congress passes the Bill and the President approves it, we shall certainly look closely to ascertain whether there are lessons on which we might draw.
On travel bans, hon. Members will know that immigration rules enable us to refuse a visa when, for example, information on an individual’s character, conduct or associations makes entry to the UK undesirable. Entering the UK is a privilege, not a right. Equally, asset freezes can be deployed against individuals when those measures would effect meaningful change.
The House will also appreciate—here I must repeat words stated by the Government and previous Governments—that the UK has a long-established and globally consistent practice of not commenting routinely on individual cases. The Government and previous Governments have pursued that policy, and it remains our approach.
In the cases of Mr Magnitsky and others, we want the Russian Government to ensure that justice is done and measures to be put in place to prevent such cases from happening again. More broadly, the Government remain concerned about the rights afforded to ordinary Russian citizens and have been clear that more should be done to address them.
To that end, we have a twin-track approach to human rights in Russia. First, we promote dialogue bilaterally, raising cases at the highest levels. Our annual human rights dialogues with Russian officials give a clear opportunity to voice our concerns and track progress.
Secondly, we support non-governmental organisations that are working on those critical issues. For example, we are working with the Russian NGO, Social Partnership Foundation, to address the problem of deaths in pre-trial detention. This financial year, we have spent £1.25 million on projects supporting human rights and democracy.
Our work on human rights is wide ranging. Priorities include: better support and protection for human rights defenders; supporting increased monitoring and reporting of human rights abuses; and urging the Russian Government to investigate fully the unresolved murders of journalists and human rights defenders. The low success rate in prosecuting those responsible for the crimes perpetuates the perception of impunity.
This week, we were encouraged to hear that President Medvedev has asked for a review of the trial of Mikhail Khodorkovsky. We will follow progress on that with interest.
Political rights are an integral part of the picture. As the Foreign Secretary highlighted this week in his statement on the Russian presidential elections, while the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe and the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights election observation mission gave a positive assessment of voting on election day, it identified problems with counting at some polling stations, unequal campaign conditions and limitations on voter choice. Those issues should not be overlooked. A Russia with greater political freedoms, including the registration of political parties, freedom of assembly and freedom of the media, is in the interests of Russians and the wider world. I take the point of my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton that the motion is about and for the benefit of Russia, not a criticism of Russia.
It is a time of great opportunity for civil society in Russia to help bring about evolutionary change. Civil society has shown its considerable energy in recent months. We will work closely with the Russian authorities and Russian NGOs to encourage developments in a positive direction on human rights in the coming months and years, and we will continue to work at all levels to achieve justice for Sergei Magnitsky.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) on securing the debate. It is important that it is on a motion because the Government must decide what they will do. They must decide whether to support it, and thus take the action that it demands of them.
Several attempts have been made to try to ensure that the debate never came to pass. The Russian ambassador in London attempted to repress a previous debate, which my right hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Mr MacShane), a former Minister for Europe, led. I know that the Russian ambassador also tried to ensure that you, Mr Speaker, stopped today’s debate happening. That shows a complete misunderstanding of the political process in this country and the need for democratic and open debate. No ambassador should write to the Speaker of this House to try to prevent a debate. It is perfectly legitimate for us to debate what we choose to debate.
Mr Denis MacShane (Rotherham) (Lab)
This is extremely important. I have already had to intervene on this with Mr Speaker after the Russian embassy put on its website a statement attacking me as a parliamentarian for raising the Magnitsky case. Someone has to talk to this Russian ambassador and tell him crudely to butt out of House of Commons business.
Chris Bryant
I had already made that point, but I wholeheartedly agree with my right hon. Friend that we will discuss what we want. I very much hope that nothing is put in the way of the all-party group when we go to Russia so that we can meet not only members of the Government, but members of the opposition.
There are two basic problems in Russia at the moment, the first of which is the impunity that attends so much criminality. Hon. Members have referred to Anna Politkovskaya, but many other journalists have been murdered. Had journalists been murdered in this country, everybody around the world would have been howling and demanding justice. Similarly, we are unable to get justice for the murder of Mr Litvinenko, because Russia maintains that no extradition is allowed for any Russian citizen. That prevents justice and means impunity for those in Russia.
The second problem is the regular, systemic state abuse of the criminal justice system in Russia, which has meant that Mikhail Khodorkovsky has been imprisoned on spurious charges—Amnesty International has declared him and Platon Lebedev as prisoners of conscience. It is right that we pursue such issues to try to ensure that there is a proper criminal justice system in Russia, and one that does not depend on torture.
I must confess that the Government’s response tonight is very disappointing. For a start, I did not know that our foreign policy was to wait for the United States of America to make up its mind in its Senate and Congress on what it will do about immigration before we decide what we will do. We should be free to make our own decision, particularly because the one thing many significant Russians in the Putin regime value above all else is the ability to travel to London. London is the place where they like to do their banking and shopping, and where their families like to go for their education, and so on. Ensuring that the people involved in the murder of Sergei Magnitsky and the corruption he unveiled are unable to come to this country is a vital part of ramming home to the Russian Government that we want better relations with them and that we want to do more business with them, but that we can do so only when human rights are respected and corruption weeded out.
Mr Burley
The hon. Gentleman makes a powerful case. On exactly that point, is not the other advantage of the motion that it will help to counter the impression that is forming among many British people that we are becoming a safe haven for all sorts of Russian crooks and gangsters?
Chris Bryant
That cuts both ways, because another problem with how the Russians use the criminal justice system is that they try to extradite many people from this country whom they claim are criminals. One such person is Mr Zakayev, who was accused of murdering a Russian Orthodox priest. The said Russian Orthodox priest stood up in court and gave evidence that he had not been murdered. In all cases thus far in which extradition from the United Kingdom has been sought, the judge has decided that the case has been proceeded with not on the ground of seeking justice, but on purely political grounds. That is something we must deal with.
I am certain that the Government are not allowing any of those people in. From all the nudge-nudge, wink-winks I have had—[Interruption.] I got a nod from the Minister just now—[Interruption.] No, he is just brushing his nose. It is clear from other Ministers and from those nudges and winks that the Government have no intention of letting any of those people into this country, but it is now time for them to say so openly. That would make a significant difference. Ministers trot out the line that no Government ever talk about whether people are being refused entry to this country, but that is not true.
Chris Bryant
I am not asking the Minister to do it routinely. I am asking him to do it in this specific set of circumstances, because I think it would be profoundly successful in transforming the views of the Russian regime.
The Minister’s speech, in effect, was a speech against the motion. [Interruption.] It certainly was not a speech in favour of the motion, and in this House a Member can only make a speech in favour or against a motion, because, in end, we either allow the motion to pass, which means voting for it, or we vote against it.
Alistair Burt
To clarify, the Government are not opposing the motion, as the hon. Gentleman knows.
Chris Bryant
I am delighted with that. I think, in that case, the hon. Member for Esher and Walton has secured an important victory. However, it is regularly the case now, in these Back-Bench business debates, that the Government allow the motion to pass because they know they would lose the vote, and then do absolutely nothing about what the House has resolved. That brings the House and the Government into disrepute. I hope, therefore, that if the motion is agreed to—it sounds as though it will be, if the Government are supporting it—the Government will take forward everything laid out in the motion. I hope that they will have a timetable for implementing that by the end of the year.
Everybody in the House wants to do better business with Russia. Every businessman I have known who has done business in Russia has said that the biggest problem is the financial and political corruption, which makes it difficult for them to do clean business, and no business, especially since the Bribery Act 2010 was passed, wants to do dirty business. I say to Mr Putin that now is a unique opportunity for him to show a change of mind and of tack on human rights and political rights, and it is a unique opportunity for this Government to move forward and ensure that the Russians seize that opportunity.
Mr Speaker
I am extremely grateful to the hon. Gentleman. There is great interest in the debate, so to maximise the number of contributors in the short time available, I am afraid that I must impose, with immediate effect, a six-minute limit on Back-Bench contributions.
Sir Malcolm Rifkind (Kensington) (Con)
May I first reassure the right hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr MacShane) that the Russian ambassador knows perfectly well that he will have no influence in the House of Commons? He is anxious that his bosses in Moscow see that he has done everything in his power to make their views known.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) on giving the House the opportunity to consider a matter that has already been debated in many other Parliaments around the world. That is much to his credit. This debate is primarily about the personal tragedy of Sergei Magnitsky and his family. Magnitsky was a man of extraordinary courage and integrity, a symbol of the new Russia, both in his life and, sadly, in his death. He was a representative of the new Russia. The people who murdered him were symbols of the old Russia and, in some ways, the old Soviet Union.
To a significant degree, in some ways I am more disturbed by what happened to Magnitsky than by what used to happen in the old Soviet Union. The Soviet Union made no pretence of being anything other than a totalitarian state. It had no interest in the rule of law as we understand it. Indeed, on this issue, I suspect that it would have reacted quite differently from Mr Putin and Mr Medvedev. The Politburo would not have tolerated the state theft of $230 million from the Treasury by public officials acting in a criminal fashion.
President Medvedev would have us believe that Russia is now a country of the rule of law, but we know very well that in practice that is sadly not the case. Instead of moving towards belief in the rule of law, Russia is moving towards being a society that might very well be tolerating a relationship between the Russian state and organised crime that is deep and serious, and which extends to the highest levels of Russian society. That is a serious accusation to make, but the facts seem to point in that direction.
First, as I indicated, this has been no minor act of theft from private individuals, companies or some local department. The theft involved, by public officials, was from the Russian Treasury of $230 million. Of course, scandals happen in other countries. The test is the reaction of the Government to such situations. Not only has no serious effort been made to identify, try and punish those responsible for the theft, but the opposite has happened: the person who exposed the fraud was himself persecuted, and at the end of the day was murdered. That is a very sad situation. Medvedev and Putin have gone through the motions of punishing some minor officials, but instead of praising Magnitsky for what he did, he has been persecuted.
I do not necessarily suggest that Mr Putin or President Medvedev were personally involved, but there are only two possible explanations for their failure to respond. The first is that they are impotent to do so. That may be true of Medvedev, but I frankly cannot believe that Mr Putin is anything other than able to have responded, if he had so wished, in the most fundamental way, to identify not only the perpetrators of the crimes against Mr Magnitsky, but the theft from the Russian state. The only other explanation has to be that, for reasons of their own, those at the highest levels of the Russian Government are prepared to tolerate criminality of the most serious kind, because there is a sufficient common interest between those who have political power and those who wield power through organised crime to make doing what they did preferable to taking action of the kind that should have been taken.
I do not underestimate the seriousness of what I am saying, but if we could see Magnitsky’s fate as an isolated incident, one might be more charitable about the policy of the current Russian Government. However, as has been said, from the Opposition Front Bench and by others, there are so many cases of flagrant disregard for the rule of law. It is the blatant political interference in the judicial system—which goes way beyond the tragedies of the Magnitsky case—that is important. For some time now, Mr Putin and Mr Medvedev have been alleging that the fate of Khodorkovsky was nothing to do with politics, but entirely to do with his breach of the criminal law. The timing of the decision to review his case could not have been more political, and illustrates that those who were responsible for putting him in prison may now be realising that the reaction that that created throughout the world means it is time to allow him to be released.
The final thing that I would like to say in this short debate is simply this. By approving the motion of my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton, we are not only showing solidarity with all those fighting for the rule of law in Russia, which is just as an important as the creation of a pluralist democracy, but saying to Mr Magnitsky’s family—we cannot say it directly to Mr Magnitsky himself—that we honour his memory and his achievements, and we are doing what we can to help what he tried to achieve.
Mr Denis MacShane (Rotherham) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. and learned Member for Kensington (Sir Malcolm Rifkind), because my heart soared when he spoke in Foreign Office questions in January to call for the public naming of the 60 officials associated with Magnitsky’s death. I congratulate the hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) on securing this debate on the Floor of the House.
Just as my heart soared when I heard the right hon. and learned Gentleman, it sank when I heard the official Foreign Office brief read out at the Dispatch Box this evening. The Minister of State knows that I am a fan of his, but in this case I urge him and the Foreign Secretary to make it clear that they are Ministers with a democratic duty to speak up for the House of Commons, which now wants clear action to be taken. It is nonsense to say that we have not named people banned from coming into this country. We have named Martha Stewart, the cook, for goodness’ sake. We also named George Raft, the actor, and Pablo Neruda, the Chilean Nobel prize laureate. If they were good enough to be named, so too can some of these Russian thugs.
I am not proposing a policy of latter day Palmerstonian “advocatus Britannicus sum”, or “Because I am a lawyer representing British interests, I must have some special protection.” I am saying that, as we develop and shape our diplomacy in challenging and difficult times, we have to leave some rusty old tools in the Foreign Office toolbox firmly locked up and sharpen our approach.
I am not going to repeat the comments on the nature of the Russian state that have already been well made by other hon. Members. I am not sure that it consists solely of a relationship between politicians and criminals. Russia is not a functioning constitutional, democratic state that observes the rule of law. There is no distinction between political and business life there, or between state employees and those who run enterprises of any sort. Mr Putin is the chief executive officer of an enterprise, and his Russia exists in order to enrich him and those associated with him, going right down through the state machine. This is vertical power, and what happened to Magnitsky was not a sequence of accidents; it was authorised at a very high level.
The campaign is important, but where are the British lawyers? In the 1970s, when Russian psychiatrists were abusing their medical professionalism by signing off on dissidents being imprisoned for being mentally disabled, the British and American legal and psychiatric professions rose as one to condemn them and expel them from international associations. Where are the British lawyers today? Why are they not standing up for their fellow solicitor or fellow silk in Russia?
We need to look at the broader question of how we deal with Russia. The snow revolution might have petered out on Sunday, but Russians have lost their fear and passivity as they look upon Putin as another long-serving leader. Such leaders exist in western, democratic countries too but, as with Helmut Kohl, Mrs Thatcher and Mr Mubarak, there comes a moment when the fear has gone. I believe that Britain should also lose its fear of speaking up for democracy in action, and take consequent actions.
Under the 70 years of sovietised Russia, very few Russians could travel, but during the Yeltsin and Putin years, we have gone back to the pre-1917 tsarist days when the rich of Russia came here, bought villas and were educated at Oxford, and Prince Obolensky scored great tries for England. Now, they are back in town. I have no particular objection to them, but the one thing that they will understand is being told that they no longer have an entry ticket into London.
I want to make a tiny party political point. I do wish that the Conservatives would quit their alliance with Putin’s stooges at the Council of Europe. They are there for different reasons, and I am not going to go into any of that now, but it is embarrassing that some of our colleagues and friends sit with the Russians in our main human rights body in Europe, at which the Russians are present and can be held to account. The Russians get a free ride there.
I would also like to ask some of our journalists to stop being Putin’s little helpers. If our poor Prime Minister goes for a ride on a horse, it makes the front page of The Times, and everyone mocks him and scorns him and says it is very serious. If Putin pulls on an ice hockey shirt and does a bit of midnight ice hockey, the editor of The Times is there, swooning at the feet of this majestic specimen of manhood. I do not expect the Chelsea football club programme, or The Independent or the Evening Standard, to be tough on Russia, but I think that the rest of our papers could be a bit harder on it.
I finish by quoting Anna Politkovskaya. At the end of her book, “A Russian Diary”, published after her murder in 2006, she wrote of Putin:
“So far there is no sign of change. The state authorities remain deaf to all warning from the people. They live their own life, their faces permanently twisted by greed and by irritation that anybody should try to prevent them from getting even richer. Our state authorities are only interested in making money. If anyone thinks they can take comfort from the optimistic forecast, let them do so. It is certainly the easier way, but it is also a death sentence for our grandchildren.”
Nadine Dorries (Mid Bedfordshire) (Con)
I am not a member of the all-party group, and I have never spoken in this place about anything to do with Russia. However, I recently chaired a meeting at which Sergei Magnitsky’s former employer spoke, in detail and with emotion and depth, about Sergei’s life and death. It was impossible not to be moved, which is why I have come to speak in the debate today and to make a case for our Government to support the motion. That man died in the most horrific circumstances and he was the most principled of people. Sergei Magnitsky was killed by corrupt officials because he was a principled man who exposed officials as thieves, when a huge amount of money to be paid in tax to the Russian state disappeared overnight. Overnight, those officials, politicians, police officers and tax inspectors suddenly became very rich individuals indeed. That is the simple, tragic background to what we are discussing today, but the ramifications reach far further.
A ruling elite has sprung out of the chaos in Russia during the 1990s, and it preaches to the masses nationalism and pride in a powerful Russian state. At the same time, this ruling elite is weakening its own country through corruption, nepotism and greed. That contradiction is not for us in this House to solve. It is not our affair; we have no powers over Russian business. Proud Russian people, furthermore, do not take kindly to foreign interventions into their domestic affairs. The British Council would be able to inform us about that.
The British Government and this House, however, have influence over who enters this country and who crosses our borders, and over our domestic affairs, particularly in respect of foreign visitors. We do not have an entirely open border policy for Russian citizens. Indeed, I have been told that the visa regime between the two countries can make for an incredibly tiresome process. On rare occasions, we reserve the right to say to particular citizens of the Russian Federation that they are not welcome in the UK and we can deny them a visa.
Is there any greater indication that someone’s presence in the UK is not welcome or desired in this country than the fact that we are dealing with thieves, murderers, torturers and corrupt individuals? Yet, as my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) said, the fact that these people can just pop into our country to do a bit of Christmas shopping is distasteful in the extreme. At the very least, we need to put some process in place to make sure that they are refused entry at the border.
On Sunday, Vladimir Putin was elected President of the Russian Federation for a third term. Mr Putin is known and recognised for his patriotic pride, and the right hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr MacShane) spoke about how Putin often displays this in taking off his shirt, attending ice hockey events or throwing in curling events to show us what a big proud man he is. He resents interference in Russian politics from anywhere outside Russia, which makes it ironic that the Russian ambassador thinks that this matter is unique to Russia. These Russians feel that they can interfere in what happens in our politics by trying to prevent this debate from taking place.
Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Did the Russian ambassador write to you to try to prevent this debate?
Mr Speaker
I am grateful for that point of order. I hope that the clock will be held so that the time available to the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) will not be reduced.
I can tell the House that I received a letter from the Russian ambassador, drawing my attention to what he regarded as the errors contained in the motion and the merit of what he thought to be that fact—I emphasise that this was what he thought to be that fact—being communicated to the sponsors of the debate. I replied to the ambassador, noting his letter and underlining to him that he must not expect me, as an impartial Speaker, to comment on the contents of either the letter or the motion. I reminded him of the date of the debate, and indicated that if he wished to communicate his views in writing to the sponsors of the debate, it was open to him to do so. I hope that my meaning was clear—that this House debates what it wants to debate and that if other people wish to send letters, they can send letters, but it is not the responsibility of the Speaker to act as a post person.
Nadine Dorries
Mr Putin does not want Russia to be treated any less fairly than any other country in respect of trade, defence or intelligence. That is fair enough, but he cannot expect Russia to be given any special treatment. Criminals—thieves, and those who have committed gross violations of human rights—are not welcome in the United Kingdom, no matter what passport they hold, and such criminals who happened to be British would be pursued to the full extent of the law.
Russia is held in deep affection in my office. Culturally, I am in awe of the country. Ilya Repin is one of my favourite artists. He was introduced to me by a master at Winchester college, Paul Thomas, when I went to speak there some years ago, and ever since then we have taken an interest in Russia—perhaps not quite as deep an interest as is taken in a certain Liberal Democrat Member’s office, but a deep interest none the less. However, that does not blind me to the faults of the Russian Government. What greater fault can a Government have than not only failing to protect their citizens, but being the agent through which they suffer, and protecting those criminals instead of the victims? I support the motion wholeheartedly.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I too support the motion, and thank the hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) for initiating it. It is surely not a coincidence that the debate is taking place just after the Russian election. Indeed, it could be said to be pertinent, given that claims of corruption and vote-tampering seem to be legion.
When I began to research the case of Sergei Magnitsky, I felt as though I was reading a far-fetched conspiracy theory novel by someone like John le Carré. The difference is that this is not fiction but fact. It happened, but as yet it has remained unchecked and unpunished. I am a great believer in the sovereignty of individual countries. I believe that Europe interferes in our judicial system far too often, and it is not often that I would try to make contact with another judicial system, but when the corruption is as blatant as this, and when those involved are as unrepentant as they are, I believe that it is my duty as a Member of Parliament—and, let me respectfully add, the duty of the House as well—to stand up and be counted, and to say, “This is not right.”
What happened in the case of Sergei Magnitsky was and is not right. This young man of 37 was simply doing his job when he came across intrigue at the highest levels, and instead of taking a step back, he stood up and paid the ultimate price. The father of two was a hard worker, an intelligent man who believed in truth, and when he uncovered a criminal web as a result of 14 months of solid investigation and was able to point, with evidence, to those involved in the theft of $230 million from Russian taxpayers, he made a statement naming those involved. That did not happen by the way; it happened after months of investigation and discussion with many witnesses. The evidence that Sergei had would clearly have put people in jail if it had been heard in a British court, but it did not do so in Russia.
Sergei was arrested by the subordinates of those whom he had named as being involved within the police, but refused to back down and retract his allegations. He was imprisoned in a cell with eight inmates and four beds—a cell with no windows in the cold November Moscow winter—and was then moved to cells with no toilets, containing raw sewage. After continuing to refuse to withdraw his allegations, he was moved from prison to prison approximately 10 times. With each move, his property—not that he had much—disappeared, including, on the occasion of his last move, a water boiler that was essential to purify the harmful drinking water.
After six months of that mistreatment, Sergei became ill, lost almost 3 stone in weight, and was diagnosed with pancreatitis and gallstones. Both are treatable conditions, and in a British jail he would have lived, but because in the Russian jail it did not suit the authorities for him to get better, he did not. When he again refused to withdraw his complaint, he was denied medical treatment despite 20 formal requests, and was sent to a maximum-security prison with no hospital where, after screaming in agony for days, he was eventually moved to solitary confinement, chained to a bed, and beaten to death by eight men on 16 November 2009.
I ask Members to think about that date. I remember clearly what I was doing on 16 November 2009. I was doing my former job in the Northern Ireland Assembly, debating child poverty and trying to move Northern Ireland forward, while that young man was being beaten to death for being an honest man and for daring to stand up to those in power. I ask Members, “What were you doing on that date?” They may not recall exactly where they were on 16 November 2009, but I ask the question for a reason.
Just as I stood up for children's rights to live a life without poverty in the Assembly in 2009, today I must stand up in the House of Commons for a man who told the truth. I stand up against those who perpetrated the act, and who, rather than being punished, have been rewarded and promoted. I stand up against those who now seek to continue the torture of Sergei's family by charging him after his death with the very crimes that his evidence showed others to have committed, and I hope that the House will do the same. I stand here as a proud British man who is not prepared to continue to reward those who perpetrated this act against this young man—and against the people of Russia—and who believes we must take our place on the global stage and condemn what has happened. We must ensure that those involved do not have immunity and will not be free to travel to, or engage in enterprise in, our country, as the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) said.
There are times when the world must condemn another country’s decisions. This is one such time. We must condemn Russia’s determined protection of those who were involved in either perpetrating or facilitating the theft of $230 million in taxes and the unjustified imprisonment, torture and eventual murder of Sergei Magnitsky.
I fully support the motion and ask that we all uphold the ethics of this young, courageous man who said that he would not allow such things to happen in his country. We must not allow those involved to enter, or benefit in any way from, our country. We must send out the clear message that we will side with the United States, Canada and Holland in standing up for what is right. The British Government must act on behalf of Sergei Magnitsky.
Mr Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
I am glad that we are having this opportunity to discuss this disturbing case, as it is very important that we do so. The death of Sergei Magnitsky in prison, when guilty of no crime, makes us appreciate living in a society where we enjoy rule of law. That he was ever imprisoned in the first place shows that Russia still has a long way to go if it is fully to leave behind the stark inhumanity of the Soviet period and reach the sunlit uplands of being a well-constituted, constitutional state.
There has been progress, however, although it has been limited. We should welcome the Russian investigative committee’s acknowledgment that Sergei died because of the conduct of the authorities who imprisoned him, and a criminal case has opened against the two doctors involved. It is disturbing, of course, that there have been delays, and it is ridiculous that Mr Magnitsky is now posthumously back on trial.
However, this debate also gives us an opportunity to discuss what is going on in Russia at present. Ever since marrying my half-Russian wife, I have taken a deep interest in Russia. I have no interest to declare, as she is not linked in any way with anyone associated with Putin or the Soviet era. Her family was expelled in 1917, despite donating the Michael palace—or, perhaps, because of that—where my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) can see the Repin masterpieces.
I have long been interested in Russia, therefore, which is why I was delighted to be asked by the Council of Europe to go there this week as one of its official observers. I think I am the only Member to have been in Russia this week; I have been there for the past five days. I travelled there full of cynicism about what is going on in Russia, and with concerns about Mr Putin’s party, and I should state at the outset that I do not condone in any way the restriction on the number of candidates or the lack of airtime for opposition candidates—they had some airtime, but not in prime time.
On Sunday, I spent 13 hours visiting polling stations in a rather drab suburb of St Petersburg, and I was impressed. Frankly, there is democracy working there. I was out at the polling stations before dawn, seeing the transparent ballot boxes being opened. The count was operated not by party officials, but by local people, mainly teachers. As far as I could see, it was done properly, according to the rules. I talked, through an interpreter, to many observers from all parties, who were present at all times. I saw the votes being counted. Generally, the atmosphere was good, and I saw no intimidating police presence.
I therefore want to rebalance the debate slightly. There has been a lot of Russia-bashing and Putin-bashing so far. I make no defence of the regime, but we must bear in mind that in my own lifetime Russia was a terrifying Stalinist dictatorship where people could be shot for expressing their point of view, so let us at least acknowledge that there has been some progress. Even 22 years ago it was a stultifying one-party state.
Chris Bryant
So was Spain, but the changes in that country have been much more dramatic and serious. Did the hon. Gentleman not see the reports of people who work for the Russian state being told that if they did not hand over a postal ballot form for somebody else to vote on their behalf, they would lose their jobs?
Mr Leigh
Well, we had accreditation and we were allowed to go and see all the absentee voting rolls. In the polling stations I visited, the absentee voting rolls were only about 10% of the total. Even if 10% of them were fraudulent or represented votes made under pressure from others, that could not significantly have affected the result. I am afraid that, whether we like it or not, in the polling station where I saw the count Putin won clearly. That leads to the question we have to ask ourselves: is Putin the bar to liberal pluralist democracy that my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington (Sir Malcolm Rifkind) described in his excellent article earlier this week in The Daily Telegraph, or is there some evidence that the reason why he is quite popular in Russia is that not all Russians want pluralist liberal democracy? I make no defence of that point of view; I just ask that question. In his article, my right hon. and learned Friend said that
“the only opponents permitted to stand in the election were the Communists and an unelectable oligarch”,
but all the parties represented in the Duma were allowed to stand. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) laughs; I do not pretend that the election was perfect, but progress is being made. We have to acknowledge that there were other candidates.
Martin Horwood (Cheltenham) (LD)
I think the hon. Gentleman is putting too positive a gloss on this. May I remind him of the case of Grigory Yavlinsky, the candidate of the Liberal Democrats’ sister party in Liberal International in Russia, Yabloko? He was simply denied the opportunity to stand by an electoral commission. It was not a fair election.
Mr Leigh
I immediately acknowledge that, and I do not condone the exclusion of any candidate from standing or the lack of prime-time airtime for Opposition candidates. I do not pretend it is a perfect democracy, but the House of Commons has to appreciate that this is still an infinitely freer election than has happened in the past in Russia. At least some progress has been made; let us not knock that.
There has been talk about the case of Mikhail Khordokovsky. I do not defend the tumbling and the show trial of that oligarch, but we have to remember what happened under Mr Yeltsin’s rule. He sold off the family silver to his friends, cronies and supporters, and there was no limit to the power of the oligarchs under him. I do not defend the trial, but Mr Putin was clearly sending a political message to the Russian people that no oligarch is above the rule of law.
Sir Malcolm Rifkind
My hon. Friend might make that argument regarding the first conviction, but what message was Mr Putin sending by bringing Mr Khordokovsky to trial a second time, after he had served his sentence, and having him sentenced to many more years in prison?
Mr Leigh
Straight away, I make no defence of that, but we have to appreciate the internal politics going on in Russia. That is all I am trying to do. I do not think we should indulge ourselves, pleasant as it may be, in Putin phobia, which is sometimes nourished in our own commentariat. There are double standards and the democracy is not perfect, but unfortunately many of the Russians to whom I and others have spoken conclude that the west would rather see a Russia that is poor, weak and unstable as long as it subscribes to our notions of liberal democracy—and it is not for us to lecture them—instead of a Russia that is rich, influential and stable. That is primarily what they want. They might not share all our views about liberal democracy, but ordinary Russians whom one can talk to in the street are primarily interested in their pensions and their quality of life, which has improved immeasurably in the past 10 years. I therefore support the moderate tone that the Minister has taken today. We have to have an environment of respect for the Russian Government and we have to encourage dialogue with them rather than continually giving them lectures that, I am afraid, have absolutely no resonance with the Russian people. It is true that Russia is changing too slowly, but at least President Medvedev has attempted to reform the police service and get rid of the Soviet “people’s militia” system, so some progress is being made.
The death of Sergei Magnitsky leaves one cold and those guilty of it are thoroughly contemptible. Of course we condemn what is going on, but I think our Government are taking a measured and sensible approach in seeking to prevent any of those people from coming to this country and in not seeking to predetermine the outcome of trials that are taking place in Russia. My hon. Friend the Minister’s attitude in seeking to preserve good relations with an essential trading partner is a balanced and right approach, which I support.
Mr Speaker
Order. With three remaining colleagues wishing to contribute and a short winding-up speech by the hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) still to come, I am afraid that the time limit must be reduced with immediate effect to four minutes.
Martin Horwood (Cheltenham) (LD)
Although it is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Gainsborough (Mr Leigh), I rise from the Liberal Democrat Benches of the coalition to support the motion unequivocally. I am pleased that there has been such cross-party unity—from the hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) to the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant). The motion was also signed by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for North East Fife (Sir Menzies Campbell). That cross-party unity is important, not least because the UK bears a special responsibility in the case of Sergei Magnitsky. He was working for a British company, Hermitage Capital, and the gentleman who has spearheaded the worldwide campaign for justice, Bill Browder, is a British citizen. Our country therefore has an obligation to lead the campaign. The example being set by legislators in the United States, the Netherlands and Canada is one that we should and can follow.
The world has changed since the 1970s and the 1980s—the hon. Member for Gainsborough is right about that. Democracy has flourished in Latin America, eastern Europe, the Caucasus, Africa and Asia, and we hope that it will now flourish in the middle east and north Africa, too. Russia has been part of the process. It is undoubtedly a freer country than was the Soviet Union, yet the implication of all the issues we are discussing is that democracy is, if anything, in danger and potentially going in reverse in Russia, in a way that it is not in eastern Europe, Latin America or even Africa.
It is right that we are increasingly intolerant of human rights abuses worldwide, whether committed by monsters such as Joseph Kony of the Lord’s Resistance Army in central Africa, or murderous regimes such as that of Bashar al-Assad. Some mechanisms are useful against that kind of leader—for example, the International Criminal Court. In the case of Sergei Magnitsky and cases like it, however, the situation is more complicated. Russia is a country with democratic structures and space for opposition and pluralism; nevertheless, the state and the judicial system are being used as a mechanism for oppression. People are acting with impunity and assuming that they can get away with it indefinitely. We need mechanisms that will target not just the leaders but the accomplices, to discourage people from participating in such activity all the way down the food chain. For that, we need a faster and more effective process than referrals to the ICC.
I agree with the hon. Member for Rhondda: we should not necessarily be waiting for measures to be implemented in other countries before we recognise that it might be right to act in this country. I accept that there are constraints on what the Minister can tell us, and I absolutely accept his personal commitment to human rights and democracy. He has done extraordinary work to raise those issues even when it was inconvenient to do so, not just with the Russian Government, but with many other Governments worldwide. I certainly give him credit, but it is important that we support the motion and seize our opportunity.
It is important, too, that we do not send mixed messages, for example in our suggested reforms to the European Court of Human Rights. There is danger in saying that national Governments can pick and choose which cases go forward. If we do that, it might be possible for Russia to do it too, which in the context of the Magnitsky case would be very dangerous. I am happy to support the motion. I recognise the constraints, but the time has come to speak out and to act.
Mr Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) on initiating this important debate. I am happy to support the motion, which I signed along with 40 other Members.
Such is the strength of feeling in the House that the debate is a welcome addition to the growing chorus of concern both in this country and internationally about the scandalous case of Sergei Magnitsky. I speak as a fellow lawyer who worked for many years in a free and open legal system, where justice was done and seen to be done. It chills me to the bone to think that a fellow lawyer who was doing his job had to suffer the most appalling indignities and death at the hands of the very authorities he was trying to expose.
For those of us who have heard the account of the life and death of Sergei Magnitsky, the sense of shock and outrage never lessens. For those who are hearing the case for the very first time, I would characterise it in this way: an independent lawyer was arrested, imprisoned, ill-treated and killed for blowing the whistle on the massive theft of tax revenue from the Russian state by its own officials. A simple recitation of those facts underlines the seriousness of the case. It is sadly indicative of the state of kleptocracy, plain and simple, into which the Russian state seems to be descending.
The Conservative party human rights commission, which I have the honour to chair, heard evidence from Bill Browder and others about the Magnitsky case as part of our ongoing inquiry into the role of professional people in countries around the world with poor human rights records. As my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton said, this debate is not just about Russia—it is about freedom itself. The motion is not anti-Russia. Those of us who love Russia and its people, who have visited the country on several occasions both before the end of communism and after, want to see it thrive and march down the road to freedom. At present, though, Russia is sadly far away from that road. That is why the approaches taken in other countries and other legislatures, most notably the United States Senate, are commendable. They point a clear way to concerted international action to deal with the perpetrators of such crimes in a way that affects them most significantly: by limiting their freedom to visit countries such as Britain and by freezing the assets that we know they own internationally. That is not interference in the domestic affairs of another country, but international action designed to express our disapproval, our disgust, at the role of officials in concerted and organised state corruption.
It is time for Russia to have its chance to reach freedom. All we are saying today to the Russian state and to those responsible for these crimes is that they should turn away from oppression and corruption, acknowledge the sins of the past, deal with them properly and join the free world in the fullest sense.
Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)
Sergei Magnitsky was born on 8 April 1972 and died on 16 November 2009, so he would have been younger than two of my children.
On 4 June 2007, Colonel Kuznetsov went with other people to take documents from Hermitage’s offices. On 24 December there was an application for a refund of capital taxes, which was approved in 24 hours. That was the stealing of the $230 million. The best description of what happened is on the website http://russian-untouchables.com/eng/. The Wikipedia article on Sergei Magnitsky is also pretty good. We have talked a little about the Cardin list, on which Benjamin Cardin, a senator for Maryland, lists 60 people who have been involved in the Magnitsky case. Two have been prosecuted. Of the lawyers who have been trying to help the investigation, one has been killed and five have been exiled. A colonel was put in charge of the investigation when complaints were made. It seems incredible that the head of tax office No. 28 in Moscow ends up with millions of dollars abroad when she and her husband together were earning about $38,000 a year. The colonel, who officially earns the equivalent of $10,000 a year, has more than £1 million in property in various countries.
I could go on, but the point is better made by reference to the full 75 pages of documentary evidence. There have been 3,500 articles in the Russian media on the case. It is not a question of only the west being interested; people in Russia are, too. Within about a month of the tragic death of Sergei Magnitsky, the Moscow public oversight commission reported on 28 December 2009 what it thought had happened, but two years later, the Moscow authorities have not reacted. A Russian investigative committee has extended its term nine times and has still not reported.
My view is that Russia has a chance to recognise what it got wrong. Stealing $230 million was one crime, but arresting, maltreating and then murdering Sergei Magnitsky was a second, and then there was the cover-up. I pay tribute to the Russians for allowing many other Russians to find out much of what has happened, and the documentary trail is listed in the russian-untouchables list. Then there is the official position of the Russian Government. I believe that the former President understood that things had gone dramatically wrong, and the current President might understand that as well. I call on both to say what they will now do to give justice in Russia to a Russian, and give hope to those who work with them. Russia will either get worse or get better, and I hope that this debate will be part of helping it get better.
Mr Raab
I rise for a second time to wind up this timely debate, in which we have heard 12 powerful speeches from right hon. and hon. Members both sides of the House. The shadow Europe Minister, the hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East (Emma Reynolds), raised the wider human rights situation in Russia. The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) spoke of the state abuse of the Russian justice system. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington (Sir Malcolm Rifkind) talked powerfully about the deep link between the Russian Government at the highest levels and organised crime. The right hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr MacShane) called for sharper diplomatic tools to address the situation and create some accountability. My hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) talked about the damage corruption is doing to Russia itself. We heard other powerful and eloquent speeches, for example from the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Mr Leigh), who talked about his recent experience of monitoring elections, the hon. Member for Cheltenham (Martin Horwood), and my hon. Friends the Members for South Swindon (Mr Buckland) and for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley).
I thank the Minister for his welcome update on the Sergei Magnitsky case and what the British Government are doing about it. I am delighted that they share the instincts that underpin the motion and are shared by so many of its sponsors. I understand that it might be tempting to wait and see what happens with the US Bill as it goes through the Senate, but I hope that the debate might spur the Government to take a lead. I hope that the Minister will heed the will of the House and consider the legislative proposals that have been talked about in the context of the forthcoming Queen’s Speech, so that we can take a stand against the henchmen of tyrants and despots and deny them the privilege of setting foot on British soil or buying up British property, as we would a terrorist or gangster. I commend the motion to the House.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House notes the passage of the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Bill through the United States Senate, the Bill to condemn corruption and impunity in Russia in the case and death of Sergei Magnitsky in the House of Commons in Canada, the approval of the resolution of the Dutch Parliament concerning Sergei Magnitsky dated 29 June 2011, and paragraphs I and 20 to 21 of the resolution of the European Parliament of 14 December 2011 on the EU-Russia Summit; and calls on the Government to bring forward equivalent legislative proposals providing for a presumption in favour of asset freezes and travel bans for officials of the Russian state and other countries, wherever the appropriate UK authorities have collected or received evidence that establishes that such officials:
(a) were involved in the detention, physical abuse or death of Sergei Magnitsky;
(b) participated in efforts to conceal the legal liability for the detention, abuse or death of Sergei Magnitsky;
(c) committed the frauds discovered by Sergei Magnitsky; or
(d) are responsible for extrajudicial killings, torture or other gross violations of human rights committed in Russia or any other country against any individual seeking to obtain, exercise, defend or promote basic and internationally recognised human rights, including those set out in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights 1966.
Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. During the debate you kindly answered a question about a communication from the Russian ambassador. If you feel that it would be suitable to invite the ambassador to a reception, many of us would like to come and listen to what he has to say about the matter we have just discussed.
Mr Speaker
It is very good of the hon. Gentleman, and very helpful, to seek to arrange my extra-Chamber calendar in the way he proposes, but I will reflect and digest—
The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr Iain Duncan Smith)
Speak for foreign policy, Mr Speaker.
Mr Speaker
If the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions put that proposition to the House, I think that it would be divisible and there would be a Division. I note what the hon. Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley) has said. As he knows, there is no secret about the communication from the ambassador to me or my reply.
On account of the notable succinctness of the hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) in winding up the debate, we are in a position to come to the statement at 6.59 pm, rather than the advertised time of 7 o’clock.
Employment Support
(12 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Maria Miller)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I should like to make a statement on the reform of specialist disability employment support.
Today, the Government have published a Command Paper, setting out our plans for specialist disability employment support and summarising our responses to the Sayce review. Let me make one thing clear: these are difficult decisions, but the current system is not working for disabled people. Employment rates for disabled people remain almost 30% below those of non-disabled people. Exclusion from the labour market leads to exclusion from society at large, and I do not think that anybody in the House wants to see that happen.
That is why, back in 2010, we asked Liz Sayce to conduct a review of how we might make specialist employment support for disabled people work better. The review was detailed and comprehensive, and it took views from disabled people, disabled people’s organisations and many hon. Members in the House today. Today, the Government have published their response to that report, outlining how we intend to reform specialist disability support for the future. It includes putting £15 million more into Access to Work, a scheme that has been proven to be extremely successful in supporting disabled people into mainstream employment.
I have agreed that the funding for residential training colleges should be extended until the end of the academic year 2012-13, something that I know many hon. Members present will support as well. That will allow those colleges time to determine and to implement future change. They provide support into employment which is clearly valued, although costly, and we need to take further time to consider the options for the future.
We have also taken a difficult but important decision on the future of Remploy. The responses to the consultation on the Sayce review strongly endorsed the idea that money to support disabled people into employment should follow individuals, not institutions, and that Remploy factories should be set free from Government control. The responses also supported the view that Government-funded, segregated employment is not consistent with the objective of disability equality, which is at the heart of what this Government stand for.
We know that roughly 2,200 disabled people are supported by Remploy’s enterprise businesses, at a cost each year of about one fifth of the total budget for specialist disability employment programmes. Despite significant investment in those businesses, the cost of each employment place remains some £25,000 per year, compared with an average Access to Work award of just under £3,000.
The current system is not using the money that we have available most effectively, and in these difficult economic times we have to look at that very carefully. The current situation is not sustainable, and it is simply not working for the majority of the 7 million disabled people who live in all our constituencies throughout the country.
If money is spent more effectively, up to 8,000 more unemployed disabled people could be supported into mainstream employment, something I am sure the House will agree is the right approach. That is why I have decided to accept and implement the Sayce review recommendations on Remploy. That will be done in two stages. In stage 1, the Government will reduce their current subsidy to Remploy from the beginning of the new financial year, so that we cease funding factories that make significant losses year after year and restrict funding to those factories that might have a prospect of a viable future without a Government subsidy.
Remploy’s board was asked to consider the impact of the decision before it was made, and as a result of the decision to reduce current funding the board is proposing—subject to important consultation with staff and unions—to close by the end of this year the 36 factory sites that it considers unlikely to be able to achieve independent financial viability.
Remploy will shortly begin collective consultation with its trade unions and the management forums on the proposed closure of those factories, and on the potential compulsory redundancy of 1,518 disabled people at those sites and those associated with them. In stage 2, the Department for Work and Pensions will work with the Remploy board to identify whether these potentially viable Remploy businesses can be freed from Government control, including by employee-led commercial exit or open-market sales, and how this might be achieved.
I recognise that this announcement will be difficult news for the staff in Remploy factories and understand that they have will have concerns about the future. As part of collective consultation, the Remploy board will consider all proposals to avoid compulsory redundancy. Moreover, we are absolutely committed to supporting Remploy employees with an £8 million comprehensive personalised package of support for all those who are affected by these proposals. Any disabled member of staff who is made redundant will receive an individual offer of up to 18 months’ help with the transition from Government-funded sheltered employment to mainstream employment. This support will include access to a personal budget—on average, £2,500—to aid that transition. We will also be working with employers and the Employers’ Forum on Disability to look to offer targeted work opportunities for all displaced staff. We will establish a community support fund to provide grants to local disability organisations to support Remploy employees in making the transition from sheltered employment to mainstream employment.
This decision commands the support of disabled people’s organisations and disabled people themselves. It is also a decision that I would have thought the Opposition wanted to support, because back in 2007 the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr Hain) said of Remploy:
“the reality is that it is simply not viable.”—[Official Report, 29 November 2007; Vol. 468, c. 449.]
We, as a Government, have taken forward his plan and have come to a natural point that he, too, would have come to in this process.
The Government’s commitment is to support many more thousands of disabled people into work, and the changes that I am announcing today will enable us to do exactly that. I believe that this strategy better fits the needs and aspirations of disabled people in the 21st century, and a more equal world where disabled people participate fully in the mainstream, not in Government-funded segregated jobs.
Mrs Anne McGuire (Stirling) (Lab)
I thank the Minister for her statement, but frankly it was a statement that she obviously did not want to give to this House in person. Let me give this advice to the Minister and to Government Members: even if the situation is difficult, it behoves a Minister to come to this House to explain it. [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. These exchanges have already been too noisy. The House must calm down. We cannot have a situation in which people trade insults across the Chamber, shouting out “Where is this one or that one?” Let us just cool the temperature and have a decent exchange. The House knows that I will want to facilitate such an exchange.
Mrs McGuire
It is fair to say that Remploy is not an ordinary organisation; it is one that has been part of Government’s provision for disabled people since the second world war. We all recognise, in all parts of the House, that it has had to adapt to changing conditions over the years, but there is no point in the Minister trying to hide behind the statement by my right hon. Friend the Member for Neath (Mr Hain). My right hon. Friend came to this House and answered questions in this House, and he made some of the difficult decisions that we hoped would set Remploy on the road to success. Recently, however, there has been only one debate in this House on the future of Remploy, and that was held, thanks to the courtesy of the Backbench Business Committee, in Westminster Hall on 15 December. Today, the Government have tried to abrogate their responsibility as the custodian of the Remploy legacy and as the ultimate employer of the 1,752 people who today found out by written statement, or in some cases from telephone calls from Members of Parliament, that they will no longer be in a job in three months’ time.
Nobody in this House disagrees with the Minister when she says that disabled people want to have a choice about where they work. Nobody argues that such opportunities have not opened up over the past few years for many disabled people. However, many of the opportunities have been offered by organisations such as Remploy that give disabled people a real job in the jobs market. It was clear even from the Sayce review that the best factories offer job satisfaction, a supportive and accessible environment, and a reasonable income for their employees.
I will not run away from the fact that my Government, and I as a Minister, had to wrestle with the issues relating to Remploy. We cannot rewrite history. However, our position on disabled people in 2007 was astonishingly different from what the Minister has put before us today. If she truly believes in co-production, why was there no co-production with the trade unions, the disabled people who work in Remploy and the Remploy board over the past few months? I have the greatest admiration for Liz Sayce and for some of the work that she has done, but to put forward a closure programme that will potentially put 1,700 on the dole on the basis of a report by an individual is not acceptable.
We must recognise the legitimacy of the position of the mainstream of the disability movement, which is that it does not like supported factories or Remploy. However, that does not mean that it is wrong to support people in these factories. Perhaps the mainstream needs to recognise that Remploy offers a real job in a supported environment.
I will put some questions to the Minister before you call me to order, Mr Speaker. In opposition, the Conservative party supported the five-year modernisation plan, so why did the Minister embark on a review nearly two years before that timetable had been exhausted? Why are the Government pulling the funding from the next financial year, which leaves a period of only a few days? Was warning given to the Remploy board before the last couple of weeks that it would have to manage this speed of change and a massive redundancy programme over the next few weeks?
When the modernisation statement was made to the House in 2007, the now Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, the right hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling)—[Interruption.] Please do not laugh if I pronounce “Ewell” wrong. I do not know how it is pronounced. He said at that time:
“Let me assure Remploy and its employees that the next Conservative Government will continue the process of identifying additional potential procurement opportunities for them and the public sector work force.”—[Official Report, 29 November 2007; Vol. 468, c. 451.]
What has the Minister done, now that the Conservative party is in office, to ensure that her ministerial colleagues fulfil that promise? What discussions has she had with the major procurement Departments, including the Home Office and the Ministry of Defence? Did she look at the procurement opportunities that her Department could have offered to Remploy? What discussions has she had with her colleagues in the Department for Communities and Local Government to encourage local authorities to consider opening up opportunities for their local factories? What efforts has she made to encourage her colleagues to identify procurement opportunities under article 19?
Given the Minister’s intention to embark on this course of action, how did she involve the board of Remploy and the trade unions in the discussions about the issues identified in the Sayce report? I am not talking about their responses to the consultation, but about what real co-production she was involved in. What recognition did she give to the trade union analysis of the current operation of Remploy’s enterprises and the questions that it raised about the company’s business practices?
There is a feeling around the House that the consultation was flawed from the beginning because the Minister said that she was
“minded to accept the recommendations of the Sayce review”.
A Government cannot start a consultation if they have already said they are minded to accept the recommendations.
By how much will the Minister reduce the subsidy to Remploy in the next financial year and the one after? She highlighted the fact that there may be options for the so-called stage 2 factories. What will those options be, and what criteria will she lay down for the transfer of any business and its associated assets to the open market?
The Minister says that the support that she will give to disabled people who are made redundant will last for up to 18 months and potentially be a personalised budget of £2,500. How is that £2,500 expected to meet the needs of many of the people in Remploy?
Where will the jobs come from? At the factory in Ashington, 35 people are chasing each job, and in Acton—
Mr Speaker
Order. I say to the shadow Minister that I know these are extremely important matters, but I feel sure that she is bringing her questions to a close. In fact, I am certain that she is in her last sentence.
Mrs McGuire
I am indeed, Mr Speaker.
I finish by saying to the Minister that in each constituency where there are factories at which redundancies will be made, there are tens of people chasing every job. She made a point about the increase in Access to Work, but that scheme requires jobs. Tonight, 1,700 people do not know whether they will have one in three months’ time.
Maria Miller
I am very happy to have come to the House today to discuss our proposals. [Interruption.] Communication is very important on this matter, and many Members have had many conversations with me about Remploy over the past two years. I have already laid a written statement and met many of the MPs affected. Indeed, I have spoken to the right hon. Member for Stirling (Mrs McGuire), and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has spoken to the shadow Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne), who is not in his place.
We take staff communications very seriously indeed on a matter such as this. It is not right for the right hon. Member for Stirling to call into question the way in which it has been managed, because my colleagues at Remploy have put great effort into ensuring that disabled people employed by Remploy are well aware of today’s process. Indeed, we have worked closely together throughout the consultation process. As I have said, there were 1,400 submissions, including from disabled people, Opposition Members and staff at Remploy factories.
Most important of all, this Government decided when we came to office to take forward the modernisation plan that Labour Members had put in place. In these very difficult economic times, we could have taken a different decision, but we chose not to. We chose to stick with that plan and see how things progressed. I am afraid that in year four of the modernisation plan, it is clear that the objectives that Labour set out were simply not going to come to fruition and were not realistic. I think some Opposition Members will know that.
The right hon. Lady asked a number of questions, some of which I believe I may have answered in my statement, but I want to ensure that I have covered every point she made. The Remploy board has been fully informed of all the procedures that we have gone through and all the decisions that have been made, and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has spoken to his Opposition counterpart to ensure that he was well informed in advance of today. We ensured that the procurement commitments that Labour put in place were taken forward. In fact, we have been working with Remploy for the past two years to attempt to make the modernisation plan work, but we are where we are and these difficult decisions now needed to be taken.
There has been a great deal of discussion by Opposition Members about the number of jobs that are available to disabled people. I should like to put it on record that the employment services arm of Remploy has done a magnificent job of helping disabled people into work. I believe that many hon. Members will agree with that. Indeed, last year, Remploy’s employment services arm supported 20,000 disabled people throughout the country into work, with 2,000 individuals with disabilities in Wales and another 2,000 in Scotland helped into work. Those jobs are available if individuals can get the support and training to access them.
The decisions are not easy, but we are continuing a policy that the previous Administration started. When we came into government, we confirmed that we would continue that plan. The truth is that the Opposition would have had to make those decisions themselves.
We enlisted the help of experts to try to ensure that our decisions were right. Liz Sayce, in her role in Radar, brings to the matter an expertise that many hon. Members will acknowledge. Today, we are taking forward her recommendations, and I am afraid that I cannot understand the tone or the nature of the right hon. Lady’s remarks.
Labour Members should remember that many factories were closed on their watch, and perhaps they did not make the right decisions then. They would have had to face the same choices. Today’s discussion is not about money because, as Opposition Members know, the money and support for specialist disability employment is protected under the Government—£320 million plus an extra £15 million to ensure that the changes that we are making today will result in more disabled people in work, with more money to support them to do that.
Mr Speaker
Order. There is much interest and I am keen to accommodate it, but brevity is of the essence.
Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)
I welcome the extra £15 million that the Under-Secretary has announced today for helping disabled people. Does she agree that we are likely to secure better value for money for that extra funding, and we will be able to help more disabled people, if it goes to individuals rather than institutions?
Maria Miller
My hon. Friend is right. In this day and age, we need to recognise that disabled people want to live independent lives. We are committed to that as a Government. To do that, we need to help more disabled people into work and we are more likely to achieve that if we can ensure that that money is used most effectively. The proposals that we are discussing will help an extra 8,000 disabled people into work.
Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)
As the Under-Secretary knows, my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea West (Geraint Davies) has been very successful in getting public bodies locally to buy furniture from the Swansea Remploy factory. Now that that factory’s order books are full, will she look again at its potential to be cost effective and drop her plans to close it?
Maria Miller
The hon. Lady makes an important point. It is important that factories have work to do. All too often in the past, factories have not had enough to do. Indeed, in the very recent past, half of Remploy employees in factories have had nothing to do. I do not find that acceptable, but if there are opportunities to avoid redundancies, we will work with hon. Members of all parties to do that.
Stephen Lloyd (Eastbourne) (LD)
I thank the Under-Secretary for her statement and the Opposition spokesperson for her response. The decision is difficult but I believe that it is right. The Under-Secretary knows my views—I have worked in this area for many years. I would like to get a couple of commitments in the House. Will every penny saved remain in the area to help many more thousands of disabled people into work? I do not want it to be a cost-cutting exercise. Secondly, if the Under-Secretary cannot do so this evening, will she bring to the House later some detail about the exact programme over the 18 months to ensure that people from Remploy move into employment?
Maria Miller
I can reassure my hon. Friend that every penny that is saved in the programme will be reinvested in supporting disabled people. Indeed, we will spend £15 million more as a result of the real, clear need to ensure that we have sufficient support in place. I can also reassure him that we already have the detailed programme of support for Remploy employees who are affected by today’s announcements. Several Opposition Members attended a meeting that I held earlier to ensure that people have the information to hand. I will continue to hold meetings with hon. Members to ensure that everybody is aware of the support that is in place.
Mr Pat McFadden (Wolverhampton South East) (Lab)
Seventeen hundred people will lose their jobs as a result of this statement, including 1,500 disabled people. The Minister’s case rests on the argument that there are better ways to help disabled people into work than through Remploy. Will she therefore guarantee to come to the House six months after the closures have taken place and detail exactly how many of the 1,500 disabled people who will lose their jobs have gained alternative employment?
Maria Miller
The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. We need to ensure that we know what happens to individuals who are affected by the measures announced today. Unfortunately, under the previous Administration, no such tracking was put in place. That was a mistake, and one that this Government will not be repeating. I hope that he is not advocating our retaining segregated employment, but I can absolutely undertake to him that we will monitor and keep track of these measures, because we want to ensure that as many people as possible can enter employment.
Mr Brian Binley (Northampton South) (Con)
I equally support the view that money should follow people and not institutions. As a past employer of excellent disabled people, I found that the support to help them to find us was variable to say the least. What can the Government do to improve that support to establish and build on those connections?
Maria Miller
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that employers have a vital role to play. All hon. Members will know that there is a great deal more work to do to help employers to understand the very valuable contribution that disabled people bring to the workplace. I am working hard with many disabled people and disabled people’s organisations. Through our new disability strategy, we will ensure that we continue to work with employers to ensure that they see the advantages of employing disabled people, and through our additional support for Access to Work there will be tangible financial support.
Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)
So the Minister’s big idea for getting people who are disabled back into work is to start by giving them the sack. There are three factors in Wales being hit hard: seven of the nine Remploy factories in Wales will close; 272 of the 752 employees are in Wales; and jobs are being lost in communities that already face mass worklessness, such as Merthyr Tydfil, Aberdare and Abertillery. What consideration did the Minister give to human costs before making her announcement, or was her only thought the cold logic of the balance sheet?
Maria Miller
The hon. Gentleman cannot have been listening to me earlier, because we are talking about supporting more disabled people into employment. As a result of the announcements we have made today, 8,000 more disabled people can seek the support that will make the difference between them being able to get into work and facing a lifetime on benefits. Disabled people in this country should not face a choice between a lifetime on benefits and a job in a segregated factory. They deserve to be able to work for employers such as BT, Royal Mail, Sainsbury and Marks & Spencer, all of which are actively working with Remploy employment services to get people—not only in Wales, but throughout the country—into employment.
Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)
We would all like to see more disabled in mainstream employment, but does the Minister accept that some people who work in Remploy factories will not be able to hold down a job in mainstream employment for the longer term? Given that so many people without a disability who are more than capable of working shy away from doing so, should we not do everything we can to support people who could sit at home on disability but who want to go out to work for their own dignity? No fair-minded person questions my hon. Friend’s commitment to improve the lot of people with disabilities, but will she ensure that none of those people from Remploy factories who wants to earn an honest day’s pay will be left behind by her changes?
Maria Miller
My hon. Friend and I have spoken about this before. I do not think that we should sell disabled people short. Many disabled people working in Remploy employment factories have excellent skills. I want to ensure that they have the support and opportunity to have the sorts of jobs that I know most disabled people want in their lives. Independent living, not segregation or inequality, is at the heart of the Government’s approach.
Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)
Does this statement not sum up this heartless Government inhabiting millionaires’ row? They are sacking hundreds and hundreds of disabled workers in areas of high unemployment. Some of them, in areas such as mine, previously made redundant by Remploy, still have not got jobs. It is time that this Government and their accomplices, these tinpot Liberals, understood that this is the most heartless thing that they have done since they came to power. It is time they went.
Mr Speaker
Order. Members can have their opinions. Let us cool it and hear the Minister’s answer. I say that to no particular individual but to the whole House. Let us hear the Minister.
Maria Miller
I suppose that I should remind the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr Skinner) that he supported a Government who closed 28 factories. What is inexcusable is that his Government did absolutely nothing on tracking to establish how to put in place the right support for individuals affected by their decisions. The simple truth is that as a result of the Labour party’s approach, the factories have lost £225 million since 2008. That is money that we should have been using to support more disabled people into work, and that is at the heart of our proposals today.
Margot James (Stourbridge) (Con)
I commend Waitrose in my constituency for its structured programme of employment opportunities for people with disabilities. I also commend my hon. Friend for taking this difficult decision to make the money go further. Will she say a little about the responses from the disability organisations about how to help more disabled people into mainstream employment?
Maria Miller
I thank my hon. Friend for that question. She is absolutely right: we have to make the money go further and, in these difficult economic times, ensure that the money is being used most effectively. Our consultation on the future of disability employment support received widespread—indeed, almost universal—support from disability organisations. Mind told us:
“We agree that Remploy should be radically reformed, with high quality support for everyone affected”.
Disability Rights UK said:
“We appreciate that the Sayce review has caused some concern… However, we believe segregated employment for disabled people is unacceptable.”
The simple truth is that the Labour party is out of step with the majority of the disability world. I urge it to consider more closely its response to the statement.
Ann Clwyd (Cynon Valley) (Lab)
I hope that the Minister, as she faces me, feels a little embarrassed for completely misleading me earlier this week. I, in turn, misled people in my factory, and I hope that she apologises for that. I am afraid, once again, that this is the nasty party at work. It has never changed. It has not changed in the 28 years that I have been in the House. It is an absolute disgrace.
Mr Speaker
Order. Before the Minister replies, I seek confirmation from the right hon. Lady that she was not suggesting the Minister misled her here in the Chamber.
Mr Speaker
No. We are grateful for that confirmation. The Minister will have heard the question, and she can answer.
Maria Miller
And I can say to you, Mr Speaker, that I would never want to mislead the right hon. Lady at all, here or in any other place. I would gently bring to her attention the fact that there are 37 disabled people employed in the Aberdare factory. The loss at that factory last year was £800,000, and that is against an estimated 13,600 disabled people in Cynon Valley who are of working age. Does she not believe that we should be doing more to support those individuals? The proposals in today’s statement will do just that.
Conor Burns (Bournemouth West) (Con)
May I thank the Minister for her conversations with me in recent months, as she has come to this difficult but, I believe, correct decision today? Many people at the Alder Hills site in my constituency and their families will be worried tonight, but that worry will not be allayed by the invective in the two contributions that we have just heard from the Opposition. Will the Minister say what more we might do to seek the advice of disabled people, so that as they try to access mainstream employment, we can learn from their bad experiences in the past of trying to do that?
Maria Miller
I thank my hon. Friend for that comment, and I think he is right that many vulnerable groups and individuals who are listening to this debate will be taking close note of who is trying to offer the support that is needed, and we on the Government Benches want that to be constructive support. He will be aware that we are putting in place a budget of some £8 million, half of which will be used directly for personal support budgets for individuals, both in his constituency and elsewhere—some £2,500 a head. I want that to give every individual who is affected the proper support, so that we do not have a repeat, perhaps, of some of the problems of the past to which Opposition Members have referred.
Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)
The Minister has repeatedly refused to give information to Members of Parliament about the viability of individual factories. She is now giving them at the Dispatch Box—she gave them to my right hon. Friend the Member for Cynon Valley (Ann Clwyd). That is a very deficient approach. Today, Liz Sayce said:
“I think it is really important that those factories should be given a chance to show if they can be viable”.
Will the Minister now—finally, on the day that she has announced its closure—give to me the figures about the viability of the Wrexham factory?
Maria Miller
The hon. Gentleman will be able to have sight of the report that we have put together, which looked at the whole network to see which factories we could put into a financially sustainable position. Again, however, I would gently remind him that the Wrexham factory in his constituency supports 41 disabled individuals, at a cost of £900,000 last year, against an estimated total of 7,400 disabled people in the Rhondda who are of working age. Does he not want to do more to support—[Interruption.] My apologies, Mr Speaker: in Wrexham—the Rhondda is in the south; Wrexham is in the north.
Mr Mike Hancock (Portsmouth South) (LD)
I have to say that once again I find myself in disagreement with my coalition colleagues on this matter. Can the Minister give an assurance that those companies that are not—[Interruption.] I have to apologise, Mr Speaker: that was a call from the Remploy factory. Can the Minister give an assurance that there will be sufficient help to enable—[Interruption.]
Mr Hancock
May I seek an assurance from the Minister that those factories that are happily not up for closure at present will be given all sorts of assistance? I would also like her to give an indication, if she can this evening, of what help will be given to those Remploy operations to stay in business. Does she also accept that some people employed by Remploy—many in my constituency have been there for 10 or 15 years—will find it difficult to find other employment?
Maria Miller
I am very happy to give my hon. Friend an undertaking that we will want to work together with individuals in factories that are in wave 2 of the process, because we want to find ways for those organisations to succeed. However, he should be aware that we are indeed able to support disabled people into employment, through the employment services programme, so although he rightly says that it can be difficult for people to make that transition, it is not impossible. With the right support, people can move from segregated factories into mainstream employment.
John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)
The Minister referred to the £2,500 of transitional funding for the workers, and I note that that is an average figure. If it is to make up the difference between benefits and the wages that the workers would have earned, it will last about six months. If they are still unemployed after that time, will there be further transitional assistance? If not, some of those families will plummet into poverty.
Maria Miller
I am sure that the hon. Gentleman knows that the money I am talking about will be on top of the quite significant provision that we make for redundancy in the process.
Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)
Local authorities in the former Humberside region struggled with a similar problem to that of Remploy involving B-line. In 2007, the then Labour council in North Lincolnshire decided to close B-line down. Since then, there have been far too many people with disabilities presenting to MPs and councils in the area and requiring support. What can my hon. Friend say to those people who will be affected by today’s decision? Specifically, will she assure me and the House that social enterprises will be engaged to help the individuals affected, and that there will be a guarantee that every worker affected will get the maximum support, rather than just the average sum?
Maria Miller
I can absolutely assure my hon. Friend that the individuals who are affected by these announcements will receive unprecedented levels of support from the £8 million package. We want to ensure that each individual is given the kind of personalised package of support that they have not received in the past, to enable them to make the transition from segregated employment to mainstream employment. We want to do as much as we can to improve the opportunities for more disabled people to live independent lives.
Tom Greatrex (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Lab/Co-op)
If the Minister has read the responses to the consultation, she will be aware that, following the last round of voluntary redundancies, a large number of people were still not in work 18 months later. Why does she think it is going to be different this time, when she is proposing compulsory redundancies at a time that she has acknowledged to be one of economic difficulty?
Maria Miller
The hon. Gentleman might not have heard me say earlier that, in the last major round of redundancies, which took place under the Labour Government in 2008, no process was put in place to track the progress of individuals who were offered support. Indeed, we found that some 40% of the individuals involved took retirement or early retirement. I want to ensure that people have the right support, and that they can see that there is an opportunity to move forward. Now, more than ever, it is important that we get this right. The last Government ducked these decisions; they did not take the difficult decisions and they did nothing to ensure that disabled people could get the job opportunities that they needed.
Nicky Morgan (Loughborough) (Con)
The Minister rightly recognises the success of residential training colleges such as the Royal National Institute of Blind People college in my constituency. Will she reassure me and other Members who have such colleges in their constituencies that departmental officials will make themselves fully available to the colleges as they explore alternative ways of working and being funded?
Maria Miller
My hon. Friend and I have had many conversations about the importance of the college in her constituency. The simple fact is that residential training colleges up and down the country provide important specialist support for disabled people to get into employment. I have already given a clear undertaking that we are going to provide funding for those residential training colleges through to the end of the 2012-13 academic year. Indeed, my officials are already meeting the heads of those colleges to ensure that we have a clear plan for retaining that expertise in the new funding environment.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. There are still a lot of Members wanting to get in. We therefore want short questions and short answers.
Mr Frank Doran (Aberdeen North) (Lab)
No one will be surprised to hear that the workers in my local factory were devastated by today’s news. They feel particularly angry because for the past two years, the management and the work force have been working together to try to develop a social enterprise that would include not only the Remploy workers but other voluntary organisations around the city. They have gone a long way down the road to achieving that, but there is now huge uncertainty. My reading of the literature that has been produced today is that the factories are to be closed, which means that—
Madam Deputy Speaker
Order. I will say it loudly this time: we want short questions, please, not speeches. Mr Doran, a question—now!
Maria Miller
We are going into a 90-day consultation on phase 1 factories. If individuals want to come forward because they feel that there are opportunities to reduce the level of redundancies, Remploy would obviously be pleased to look at them.
Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)
What conversations is my hon. Friend having with employers about increasing employment opportunities for disabled people?
Maria Miller
I am happy to reassure my hon. Friend that we have had extensive conversations with the Employers Forum on Disabilities, which is going to work closely with us on the employment support package that we are putting together for the individuals affected, particularly making sure that, through its first shot scheme, disabled people can get those interviews and get in front of employers, which can be so important in securing jobs.
Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)
Nobody would deny that mainstream employment is important for people with disabilities, but some people who are employed in Remploy factories are there because they cannot secure mainstream employment. Will the Minister give the House a commitment today that at the end of the 18-month period, she will produce a report showing the individual destinations of people in employment and, if she proceeds with this closure programme, what percentage of them have jobs?
Maria Miller
Again, the right hon. Gentleman will have heard me say that unlike the previous Government, we will track the destinations of the people affected today. I do not doubt his very real and important concern, but disabled people really have the capability of working in mainstream employment, and I think it is our responsibility to make sure that we give them the skills and support to be able to do that.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
Given that many of these employees will enjoy a lot of camaraderie and community, as well as jobs, will my hon. Friend confirm that the mentoring and support offered will be beyond what is currently offered to them? Will she also confirm that local charities and local organisations will work closely with these employees so that they can be involved in the community?
Maria Miller
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that the community aspect of Remploy is important. It is something that all who are involved with Remploy understand. That is why I have allocated £1.5 million to a community budget to make sure that the broader benefits of Remploy are taken into account so that that support is there not just for employees, but for their families and the broader community, too.
Mr Frank Roy (Motherwell and Wishaw) (Lab)
Is it not shameful that the workers in the Remploy factory in Wishaw did not even know that they were losing their jobs until I phoned the factory this afternoon? In Motherwell and Wishaw, there are 21 people going for every single job application, so what will happen to those Remploy people who do not get a job in the next 18 months?
Maria Miller
Communication is vital. The hon. Gentleman has to understand that this is part of a 12-month process. We have been in consultation, and 1,400 people contributed to it. It is well known that we have been in this process. Today, Remploy management took a great deal of time to make sure that that communication process continued. I challenge him to look at some of the facts and figures for his own region—to look, for example, at the number of disabled people who are getting into employment. That is something that we believe should be available for Remploy employees as well.
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con)
Everyone in the House will empathise with the people who are at risk of losing their jobs tonight; there is no question about that. Will my hon. Friend confirm that the support these people will receive will help a greater number of people to get into jobs and that the money will be used effectively? Does she share my surprise that the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne), who just five hours ago expressed his concern that the Minister should be here tonight, is not here tonight?
Maria Miller
Obviously, it is important for Members to take part in this debate. I can reassure my hon. Friend that as a result of the proposals that we have announced today, some 8,000 more disabled people will be helped into employment. This is not just about the £320 million that the Government have already announced that they have protected to support this important group of people; it is about an extra £15 million on top of that, and I think that our actions speak very loudly.
Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)
I think that the 54 disabled people who are losing the jobs at Remploy in Chesterfield will see through the Minister’s warm words and rhetoric. The fact is that more disabled people than able-bodied people are unemployed generally: it is a desperately difficult jobs market out there anyway. The Minister has already dodged this question twice. Will she commit herself to coming back to the House in six months and telling us where those who have lost their jobs at Remploy have gone, so that we can establish whether her warm words mean anything to the 54 people in my constituency who are losing their jobs?
Maria Miller
I do not doubt the hon. Gentleman’s genuine concern for his constituents, but I do not think that I have dodged that question. I have made it clear that we will monitor the progress made by disabled people, and I am always happy to come to the House and talk about the progress that the Government are making.
Roger Williams (Brecon and Radnorshire) (LD)
When the Ystradgynlais Remploy factory in my constituency was closed under the last Labour Government, a number of my constituents transferred to Baglan, which I think today’s written statement refers to as Neath. It is included in the stage 2 list as being potentially viable. Will the Minister ensure that the Remploy board is given all the encouragement and resources that are needed to ensure that that viability continues?
Maria Miller
We certainly want to help the Neath factory to realise what is clearly its potential. I hope that we can work with my hon. Friend as well, and that his support will ensure that the factory is the success that he feels that it can be in the future.
Julie Elliott (Sunderland Central) (Lab)
Will the Minister tell us what criteria will be used to determine whether factories on the stage 2 list, such as the one in my constituency, will remain open, and against what time scale they will be judged? Will she come back to the House at the end of that time and tell us how many of them will remain open?
Maria Miller
The stage 2 factories are factories that we believe, on the basis of independent reports, have the opportunity and potential to be financially viable. What we need now is an opportunity to talk to people who may be interested in taking them over. We are committed to what is in recommended in Liz Sayce’s report, which is the freeing of these factories from Government control, and we need to ensure that we have the right support and plans to be able to do that.
Gavin Williamson (South Staffordshire) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend agree that as a result of this tough and difficult decision it will be possible to help thousands more disabled people who do not currently live near a Remploy factory, such as those in my constituency?
Maria Miller
My hon. Friend speaks for the 7 million disabled people of working age in this country who do not have the opportunity to work at Remploy. We must use the £320 million of protected money, and the extra £15 million that is going into Access to Work, to ensure that many more of those individuals who are unable to be employed at the moment have the opportunity to be employed, and to lead independent lives as a result.
Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP)
I am particularly disappointed by the timing of today’s announcement. It stretches credulity that at a time of rising unemployment and fierce competition for every single job, the Government are planning to take supported jobs away from people who are already very disadvantaged in the labour market. What net financial savings does the Minister expect to arise from this policy? Once the redundancy bill, the benefits bill and the personalised support have been delivered, will creating all this uncertainty actually save any money?
Maria Miller
This is not a savings measure. I know that the hon. Lady is very concerned about this matter on behalf of those of her constituents who work in Remploy factories, but I assure her that we are trying to ensure that the money is used more effectively, so more of her constituents can get the support they need. It simply cannot be right for us to continue to let the factories lose £68 million a year—and cumulatively more than £200 million over the modernisation plan period—when we could be using that money more effectively to support more disabled people into employment.
Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (Con)
I thank the Minister for that answer, but I am concerned about the way this difficult decision will be reported. Will she make it clear that the decision has not been taken in order to cut public expenditure, and that instead more money will be going towards enabling disabled people to live and work independently, free of prejudice, with support, so they can do what they want to do in their lives?
Maria Miller
My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I put the following simple fact to the House: as a result of what we are announcing today, 8,000 more disabled people throughout the country will have the opportunity to move into work, compared with 1,500 people who work in Remploy factories and who will be affected. In these difficult economic times, we have to take tough decisions, but this is a decision that is about much more than that; it is about the sort of country we are—a country that wants to have disabled people included at the heart of our communities instead of in segregated factories.
Ian Mearns (Gateshead) (Lab)
I would agree with the Minister’s logic if we were in a period of full employment across the country or in regions such as the north-east of England, but the north-east is bearing 10% of the total cuts announced today. Sadly, I am convinced that very few, if any, of the people affected in my constituency and in the north-east in general will find other employment easily. What support will be given to the people of the north-east, so that they can get another job in the north-east?
Maria Miller
I do not doubt the hon. Gentleman’s sincerity, but he needs to look at the facts. Some 20,000 disabled people were helped into employment last year, and that was achieved not in easy economic times, but in the difficult economic times we inherited from Labour. We made sure that 20,000 disabled people were able to get into employment. I can reassure him that throughout the country we are very effectively getting disabled people into employment, and that the £8 million we have put aside for employment support will help ensure that his constituents get the sort of support that I know he would want them to get.
Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)
The acoustics in the Chamber are slightly awkward tonight, so I did not quite hear the Minister’s answer about how many Remploy factories were closed by the last Labour Government. I would therefore appreciate it if she would repeat it. We in the Public Accounts Committee found out today that 442,700 people started apprenticeships in the last year. Can she assure us that there is cross-departmental working to ensure that such opportunities are available to all people?
Maria Miller
I am very happy to be able to give that assurance to my hon. Friend. I apologise if Members did not catch the answer to which he refers: under the previous Administration, 68 factories closed—[Interruption.] I apologise; 28 factories closed under the previous Administration. [Interruption.]
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. If the House were a little quieter, we would all be able to hear exactly what is being said. May I also ask the Minister to give briefer answers and, once again, ask Members to ask a single, brief question?
Maria Miller
Twenty-eight factories were closed under the previous Administration, and some 1,600 people were affected.
Pamela Nash (Airdrie and Shotts) (Lab)
My constituents who work at Remploy in Wishaw in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell and Wishaw (Mr Roy) have been coming to me for the last year to express their fear that what has been announced this evening would happen. After having been sacked so unceremoniously today, without an earlier statement or even a phone call, I do not think they will agree with the Minister that they have been set free. If she has made this announcement from the goodness of her heart and to encourage more disabled people into mainstream employment, why is she not ensuring that each Remploy employee has a new job before she lays them off?
Maria Miller
There was a statement earlier and I just want to make sure that the hon. Lady is clear that what Remploy announced today is that it will be consulting on the future of the people who will be affected by the announcements. She used the word “sacked”, but that is not correct. I can absolutely assure her that the support that will be in place will be the support she would expect to be there for her constituents to make sure that every one of them has the support to enable them to get back into employment.
Gordon Birtwistle (Burnley) (LD)
Having anticipated this event I took the opportunity to discuss with the Remploy factory in Burnley the future of the site. Will the Minister confirm what will happen to the assets of that site? Will she be prepared to hand them over to the work force so that they can start up their own business? They tell me that without the present astronomical overhead costs from central control and Government interference, they will be very successful, but they need assurances that they can take it on as an individual business. Will they be able to take on the company’s assets?
Maria Miller
I assure my hon. Friend that I would very much like to work with him on that and look at the proposal he mentions. We have spoken at length about this and I am sure that, working with officials, we can make sure that the details are available to anyone who has a firm proposal to put forward.
Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)
I welcome the Minister to the Chamber this evening, but hon. Members will note that a Labour Minister in the Welsh Assembly saw fit to answer questions on this, with an oral statement, seven hours ago. In it he said:
“I regret that repeated requests by Welsh ministers for a constructive dialogue on Remploy factories in Wales have not been taken up by the UK Government.”
Will the Minister accede to the immediate request of the Welsh Assembly Government for discussions about the Remploy assets so that they can work with unions, social enterprises and others to make sure that we have viable ongoing businesses in all those premises?
Maria Miller
Officials have already met officials in the Wales Office and I am meeting with Ministers next week.
Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)
The Leeds Remploy office placed 307 people in work last year—a record to be applauded. I also applaud these efforts to end workplace segregation. Will my hon. Friend focus on monitoring the personalised support schemes to ensure that more people are helped into work in future and are not left behind as has happened in the past?
Maria Miller
I can absolutely give that undertaking to my hon. Friend. Again, I note that 8,000 more disabled people will be able to be supported into work as a result of today’s announcements.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
What will be the total cost of shutting down these Remploy factories, including the costs of redundancy and settling with suppliers?
Maria Miller
This is a protected budget and we will make sure that the costs involved will be covered within the budgets that are available and that as a result of the measures we are taking today more disabled people will be helped into employment over this spending review period. Any costs associated with the changes we have announced today will be included within existing plans.
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
Will my hon. Friend take every opportunity, particularly tonight and tomorrow, to stress in the media that the funding will go to the disabled individual rather than to the institution, so that the voices we hear on this are not just those of the unions?
Maria Miller
Many people listening to the debate will be somewhat surprised that in this day and age we still have this approach to supporting disabled people in this country. I know there is union involvement in the factories and perhaps that had some bearing on the problems that the previous Administration had in taking tough decisions on this issue. I assure my hon. Friend that we will take the right decisions for disabled people because we are listening to their aspirations for the future, not the unions.
Gemma Doyle (West Dunbartonshire) (Lab/Co-op)
Earlier, the Minister indicated that stage 2 factories such as the one in Clydebank in my constituency can expect no more support than stage 1 factories in finding a way forward to a sustainable future. Will she reconsider that position and put a taskforce into each of the stage 2 factories at least?
Maria Miller
The important point I made earlier to the hon. Lady about her factory is that we believe that the phase 2 factories have the opportunity to become viable and we shall be looking at ways to make that happen. I hope that, perhaps working with her, we can identify somebody who is able to take on that challenge at local level.
Paul Goggins (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)
Today’s announcement is a crushing blow to the staff at Wythenshawe Remploy, who have battled against closure for four and a half years. They have made the factory more efficient and have boosted sales, yet their reward is that they are classed as a stage 1 factory, which means that it will close. Can I have an assurance from the Minister that if in the 90-day consultation period a credible proposal is made to keep that factory open—perhaps as a social enterprise—it will be given sympathetic consideration and adequate support?
Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)
The heartless, callous decision announced today casts hundreds of hard-working disabled people on to the scrap heap, probably for a lifetime. The Minister continues to state that they will get jobs elsewhere, but in my constituency, 55.5 people are after every jobcentre vacancy. Can the Minister tell me where they will get employment?
Maria Miller
The hon. Gentleman really should have been listening to what I was talking about. Under the Labour Administration, 28 factories were closed in very difficult circumstances. What we are doing differently is making sure that the proper support is put in place, which it probably was not in the case of factories closed under Labour. We want to make sure that disabled people who are affected by the plans today have that support, and I hope I can call on the hon. Gentleman’s support to make sure that his constituents are aware of it.
Ian Murray (Edinburgh South) (Lab)
In 2007, the Conservatives said they would do all they could to support Remploy when they were in government. Does the Minister agree that the shambolic and shameful way the statement has been made today epitomises the Government’s cavalier and out-of-touch attitude to vulnerable people, and represents a broken promise to the dozens of disabled people in Edinburgh who are losing their jobs tonight?
Maria Miller
I am sorry; the hon. Gentleman needs to listen to what I am saying here. What we have done as a Government is to follow the Labour modernisation plan. We have followed it for the last two years and continued to make sure that in these tough economic times £555 million continued to be available. What we are not doing is wasting money; we are making sure that the money we have is going further.
Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)
I notice that the excellent Coventry plant is down for reconsideration. I also notice that the Minister certainly has not consulted me, or any of the other Coventry MPs. Can we have an undertaking that she will consult the Coventry MPs? More important, to help her with her reconsideration we are prepared to give her a tour of that very successful factory, which does work for Jaguar Land Rover and other automobile industries. Is the Minister planning to privatise that plant?
Maria Miller
I am always happy to meet the hon. Gentleman. I think I have visited the factory in Coventry. We had a consultation on the process, with many contributions from hon. Members, but obviously I shall be happy to meet Coventry Members at any point in time.
Jim McGovern (Dundee West) (Lab)
I have visited the Remploy plant in my constituency so often that I am practically on first-name terms with most of the work force. They are fantastic—a mix of able-bodied and disabled people—and I cannot help but fear that they would be offended by the continuous references to a segregated workplace. Thankfully, Dundee is not earmarked for closure, but what assurances can the Minister give the work force in Dundee that they have a future there?
Maria Miller
The assurance I can give the hon. Gentleman and the work force in Dundee is that whether their factory is phase 1 or phase 2, they will get the support they need, either to work in mainstream employment through our £8 million support fund, or to look for alternative viable ways of taking the factory forward outside Government control. The hon. Gentleman will share with me the desire to make sure that more of his disabled constituents can get work, which is why I hope he can support our plans today.
Dr Phillip Lee (Bracknell) (Con)
I must say I am amazed that I am standing here in the 21st century discussing state-subsidised segregated jobs. Can the Minister confirm that the Government spend more than £60 million a year and that the operating loss on the factories was £68.3 million last year? Disabled people in my Bracknell constituency would welcome funding from the Government to support them to get into profitable jobs in the future, because they do not have the opportunity to be employed in a state-subsidised factory.
Maria Miller
My hon. Friend is right. The cumulative figure for the factory losses is well in excess of £200 million. That is important money, which could have been used more effectively to support more disabled people throughout the country into work.
Mr William Bain (Glasgow North East) (Lab)
Will the Minister apologise to the deaf employees at the Springburn Remploy factory in my constituency, who were denied the dignity of a signer to tell them this afternoon that their jobs were gone? Does the Minister accept that with just 45% of disabled people employed—some 30% less than the non-disabled population—with a flatlining economy, with 20 people in my constituency chasing every job that is available, the question is: where will the jobs come from?
Maria Miller
I will look into the point that the hon. Gentleman raises about the Springburn factory. I would absolutely apologise to factory workers if there was not a signer available. I will look into that in detail. I ask the hon. Gentleman to consider the number of disabled people in his constituency who have been supported into mainstream employment through our employment services programmes and many others. We know that disabled people want to be able to live independent lives, and through the changes that we are talking about today we can support many, many more to do that.
Chris Evans (Islwyn) (Lab/Co-op)
Croespenmaen in my constituency has worked hard to make its business a success. It has shown faith in Remploy. It is a pity that the Government could not show the same faith in it. Today’s announcement is nothing short of a kick in the teeth. Does the Minister believe that 90 days is long enough for these people to plan their future or try to save their factory?
Maria Miller
I know the hon. Gentleman feels very strongly about this. We are absolutely showing faith in disabled people in what we are doing today. The plans and proposals that we have put forward have the full endorsement and backing of many disabled people throughout the country, and the work that has been done by Liz Sayce is an important contribution to the way we can help improve the lives of disabled people in Britain today.
Sir Alan Meale (Mansfield) (Lab)
Bearing in mind the Minister’s statement in respect of residential training colleges, she is aware of Portland training college, whose patron is Her Majesty the Queen in this, the diamond jubilee year. Will the Minister accept an invitation to visit that college to meet directors, staff and, of course, students to talk about their future?
Maria Miller
As the hon. Gentleman will have heard in my comments earlier, I understand the value of residential training colleges and I will be delighted to accept his invitation.
Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)
Can the Minister tell the House when she envisages that the factories will start closing? I know that there will be a great deal of distress about this in north-east Wales. We do not see it as a state-subsidised industry. We see it as to do with disabled people in a very challenging economic situation.
Maria Miller
I understand the hon. Lady’s commitment to supporting disabled people in her constituency. There is a 90-day consultation period, so that will be completed and then we will talk to disabled employees about their futures. I hope we can continue to keep her up to date on that progress.
Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)
The Minister gave a shambolic reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin), in much the same way as she addressed Remploy workers and the House. What are the redundancy costs calculated to be, and what is the impact on businesses which are customers or suppliers?
Maria Miller
It is very difficult to give facts and figures when we are in consultation. That will depend on the outcome of the consultation. I am sure the hon. Gentleman will be able to be furnished with those figures when the consultation is complete.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
Leaving aside the utterly shabby way in which the Minister tried to sneak out the announcement today—[Interruption.] Utterly shabby. Does she not realise that one of the reasons that there are Remploy factories in places such as the Rhondda and in Cynon Valley is that we already have some of the highest levels of unemployment and the highest levels of disability? Will she guarantee that not a single person in the Aberdare factory or in Porth will be forced into redundancy?
Maria Miller
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question and hope that he received my letter, which clarified that I enjoyed my discussions with the Porth factory and very much understand his support for them. I gently remind him that the factory supports 74 disabled people. He needs to ensure that he is also thinking about the 12,400 disabled people in his constituency—[Interruption.] The Porth factory lost around £200,000 last year. We believe that we need to challenge ourselves on how we can use that money more effectively. Last year in Wales employment service—[Interruption.]
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. Mr Bryant, you asked a question. Please listen to the answer and stop shouting across the Chamber at the Minister.
Maria Miller
I was simply going to point out that 2,000 disabled people got very good jobs in Wales last year. The hon. Gentleman really needs to focus on the fact that there are employment opportunities there, but we need to ensure that his constituents and those of other hon. Members have the skills and support to be able to take those jobs up.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. I ask Members to leave the Chamber quietly and save their congratulations for outside, Mr Lloyd, so that we can proceed.
Business without Debate
Delegated Legislation
European Union Documents
Business of the House (12 March)
BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE (13 MARCH)
Petitions
Michael Connarty (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (Lab)
The village of Torphichen has one shop, and in that shop there was a sub-post office. Sadly, because of family circumstances, the previous owner closed the shop and returned the licence for the sub-post office to the Post Office. The Post Office has stuck a notice on the window of the shop but consulted absolutely no one. The shop has been bought—thank goodness—but unfortunately it appears that the Post Office is not prepared to put back the sub-post office that was previously part of the network.
The petition, signed by 340 residents, states:
The Petition of residents of Torphichen, West Lothian,
Declares that the Petitioners are concerned about the provision of Post Office services in Torphichen, following the closure of the Post Office when the previous sub-postmaster gave up the lease on the premises; declares that the Post Office had said that the closure would be temporary; that no consultation has been carried out on any proposal to close the Post Office permanently; and declares that the Petitioners believe that a reduced service is not justifiable or acceptable.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to take all possible steps to ensure that the Torphichen Post Office is reopened.
And your Petitioners remain, etc.
[P001011]
Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)
To the House of Commons, this petition of residents of the United Kingdom, collected in Marton, Coulby Newham, Guisborough, Saltburn and Redcar over a period of one week, amounts to more than 700 names.
The petition states:
The Petition of residents of the United Kingdom,
Declares that the Petitioners are opposed to the Health and Social Care Bill.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to withdraw the Health and Social Care Bill.
And the Petitioners remain, etc.
[P001012]
Historical Enquiries Team
(12 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and the Speaker for allowing me to highlight two cases in which the Historical Enquiries Team has been involved: specifically, the deaths of Kenneth Smyth and Hugh Lexie Cummings.
Policing and justice were devolved in April 2010. After that, on 3 November 2010, the Secretary of State felt able to stand up and not only take part in a debate about Bloody Sunday, but take on the burden of apologising, along with the Prime Minister, on behalf of the Government. On Wednesday 30 November 2011, I asked the Secretary of State a question directly relating to the HET:
“The HET investigated the murder of my cousin, Kenneth Smyth, on 10 December 1971—those on the street knew who committed the murder—and Lexie Cummings was murdered on 15 June 1982. HET investigations into both cases concluded that no action should be taken. The concern is that the investigations might not have been thorough, so does the Secretary of State accept that confidence needs to be instilled in the Unionist community and that the HET therefore has considerable work to do?”
The Secretary of State replied:
“I am grateful for that question. I do not entirely agree. The HET is impartial, and the latest polling commissioned on the reaction of the families is extraordinarily high: 90.5% said they were very satisfied or satisfied with the performance of the HET.”—[Official Report, 30 November 2011; Vol. 536, c. 919.]
I am here to represent those families who suggest that some investigations into events during the troubles have not been concluded satisfactorily.
Why is the Bloody Sunday case any different from the one under discussion? I could cynically suggest the difference by asking, has not enough money been spent on the investigations to warrant the attention of the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland? Surely the reason could not be that the families of those men, who faithfully served Queen and country in awful times, are not worth as much. Just because those men wore the uniform of the British Army, does that make them expendable or cannon fodder? I trust that that is not the case, but I shall be very disappointed if I find out that it is.
I thank each and every Member who has stayed behind to hear what the families of those men have asked me to say in this House, respecting and honouring them for the sacrifice that they made for the people of Northern Ireland and for the whole UK. The presence of every hon. Member has been noted and is appreciated.
Kenneth Smyth was my cousin. I remember him well. I looked up to him as an expert shot who introduced me to shooting at a young age, as a six or seven-year-old, and represented the B-Specials of the Ulster Defence Regiment in shooting at Bisley. I have a photograph of him being presented with a prize and a medal by Bill Craig, the Home Affairs Minister from way back in the old Northern Ireland Parliament.
Kenneth used to send me pigeons through the post the whole way from Strabane to Ballywalter—it gave a whole new meaning to pigeon post, so it did. If the birds arrived within a couple of days they were still okay to eat, but if they arrived a wee bit later they were not, I am afraid, quite as edible—but that is by the way.
I have Kenneth’s UDR beret, and my first son is named after him. I admired him when he took part in shooting competitions for the UDR, and perhaps as a young boy I wanted to be like him. I can well remember the day that his life was taken away.
Kenneth’s sister Shelley described him in an interview for a book entitled, “If Stone Could Speak”, and I shall use it in my illustration of him:
“Kenneth Smyth loved hunting or anything to do with the outdoors and, as often as possible, spent his time in the fields and countryside around his native Castlederg in County Tyrone. He was the eldest of four children and described as very talented while at school and with a great ability at hand crafts especially anything to do with wood.”
He was a joiner by trade. The book continues:
“Being a lot younger than Kenneth, his sister Shelley does not remember much about his earlier years, but she does remember him as being very quiet natured and a person who enjoyed fun. In later years Kenneth went to stay at his grandparents house and kept his gundogs there so that he could go hunting more easily in the nearby countryside. Because of the constant terror campaigns being waged in Northern Ireland, security was always of paramount importance and, to supplement the regular police service, the Special Constabulary or B Men were formed. Kenneth was a member of this force and he carried out regular security duties around the frontiers of Northern Ireland and guarded specific installations against attack.
He was still a member when he decided that he would like to go to Canada and join the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and went over there to follow his ambition. It was partially the police and partially the wide open spaces which attracted him, but he only stayed a month as his grandparents pleaded with him to come home as they missed him so much. Around the time he came home, the B Men had been disbanded and was to be replaced by the Ulster Defence Regiment, so he decided to join up.”
Kenneth became a sergeant in the UDR. The book continues:
“As with other members of the security forces, Kenneth was well aware of the risks and took precautions to ensure his safety as much as he possibly could. While he was at home, he placed his car in the garage and closed and locked the garage door. On the nights that he went out either socially or on business he left the garage door open so that he could drive inside in safety and not provide himself as a target by getting out of his car to open it.
One particular night he was out and, for some unknown reason, he closed the garage door and obviously someone who was watching”
not too far away
“must have assumed he was at home. A group of masked and armed men attacked the house and forced their way inside. His grandfather”—
my grandfather—
“was talking on the telephone and this was pulled from the wall by one of the raiders. They made their way straight to Kenneth’s bedroom, but, on seeing it empty, left the house again and ran off into the darkness. After this Kenneth received numerous death threats including one in a note form that was left on the windscreen of his vehicle when it was parked it in the nearby town of Strabane”
in County Tyrone.
“He took the threats seriously enough to take proper precautions and, for months prior to his death, he slept in a different house every night so that he would not have a known routine.”
At that time, there was a petrol bomb attack on his grandparents’ house and they had to grid their windows.
“In September 1971, Kenneth got married and went to live back at his family home in Castlederg, where he and his new wife took over the top flat in a house. Friday 10 December 1971 was a day which seemed no different to any other, as the family carried on their normal routine. Kenneth had his own successful construction business and that morning, he had collected one of his workmen to take him to the job they were working on. They were travelling along Lisdoo Road near Clady, outside Strabane, when they had to stop because of a rope that had been tied across the road. Kenneth stopped the car”—
a Jeep—
“to reverse away from it, but a number of gunmen began shooting at the vehicle. Kenneth’s passenger, Daniel McCormick, a Catholic, who was also an ex member of the UDR, was shot and killed” ,
leaving a wife and four children, one of whom was disabled,
“with Kenneth being seriously wounded. Kenneth managed to get out of the vehicle, but fell on to the ground. While he lay there, he was shot again at close range and died from the injury. Kenneth’s body was taken to his church”—
a Church of Ireland church outside Strabane—
“and was given a fulltime guard until the funeral on the Sunday as there were fears that the body would be stolen. He was then buried with full military honours. He was the 5th UDR soldier to be murdered.”
The HET’s summary of intelligence said that there were no recorded threats, yet there were plenty that we were aware of: the gunmen calling at Kenneth’s home, the arson attack on his grandparents’ bungalow, and numerous letters and phone calls to him. The family therefore strongly disagrees with the HET. The HET has also said that one man who was questioned admitted to being there that day and to having shot at the Land Rover. He was tried in the Republic of Ireland, convicted of offences in relation to terrorism and sentenced to a term of imprisonment from 1974 to 1978, when he was released. He continued to live in the Republic until his death in 1995. The obvious question is this: why was he never prosecuted? Why was he never brought across the border to answer for his crimes? Why was he never extradited? The explanation that the HET provided—that it was possibly a matter of papers being lost or overlooked—is not a satisfactory conclusion or an answer for the family, who are still grieving.
The man named an accomplice who carried out the murder, and despite that man being arrested in London for terrorist offences, he was never charged for the murder of Kenneth Smyth. When asked why not, the HET said that the man denied it and the evidence was not good enough to take the case further. Does that provide closure for the family? No, it does not—far from it, especially when it is clear that most of the people in the area knew who had carried out the attack and were powerless to do anything. Has the HET investigation revealed any further evidence? No, it has not.
At this stage, I will say that I am very aware of the funding limitations of the HET and the fact that there is only so much that it can do. My problem is that the closure that it was designed to bring to families, along with the hope of prosecution, has not come close to being fulfilled in Kenneth’s case. Does the Minister feel that the fact that the HET was given a budget of some £38 million to investigate 3,268 incidents, whereas it cost the Bloody Sunday public inquiry £191 million to investigate the events surrounding the deaths of 13 men, reflects the differences between the two cases?
Stephen Pound (Ealing North) (Lab)
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. I am sure that I speak for the whole House in saying that our profound sympathies are with him in the memory of Kenneth Smyth. There is a great deal of concern across the House about the time frame in which the HET—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. Will the hon. Gentleman turn around so that we can all hear him?
Stephen Pound
I apologise profoundly, Madam Deputy Speaker. There is a great deal of concern throughout the House about the time frame in which the HET conducts its inquiries. The Northern Ireland Assembly has requested that the Secretary of State hold multi-party talks on this subject. Does the hon. Gentleman agree with me that that seems to be a positive way forward, in accordance with the expressed formal wish of the Northern Ireland Assembly?
Jim Shannon
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. The talks are about the past. I am talking about specific incidents and cases involving the HET. I feel that these questions have to be answered. However, I accept his point.
If the HET had had the appropriate funding from central Government at the time of its investigations, when it was under the direct control of the Secretary of State, would the outcomes have been more extensive and brought satisfaction to the family?
Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)
I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way. We appreciate the deep sensitivity of the issues of which he speaks. I speak as the one party leader who lobbied for and supported the creation of the HET. The right hon. Member for Torfaen (Paul Murphy), who was the Secretary of State at the time, can vouch for the fact that only one party lobbied for the HET and supported the Chief Constable of the time in so doing. Perhaps if more of us had recognised what was involved, we would have secured better resources and, more important, a stronger mandate for the HET. The limitations on the HET’s mandate are part of the problem, as this important case demonstrates.
Jim Shannon
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. I agree with him wholeheartedly that if there had been better funding, the investigations might have come to more successful conclusions.
The second case I mentioned at the start of my speech is that of Hugh Cummings, known as Lexie. Twenty-nine years ago on 15 June 1982, one of life’s true gentlemen was killed when Lexie Cummings, aged 39, from Artigarvan outside Strabane in County Tyrone and a part-time member of the Ulster Defence Regiment, was shot by the IRA at close range in the back and the chest as he got into his car in the centre of Strabane, during his lunch break from the menswear shop where he had worked for 25 years:
“Lexie was well known and held in high regard by everyone in his community. The small village of Artigarvan came to a standstill for his funeral, where the Presbyterian minister told mourners:
‘In the face of tremendous provocation you have remained a totally loyal and law-abiding community. You have watched helplessly the very flower of manhood being systematically murdered. Your anger and frustration runs very, very deep. Yet there has been no retaliation and there will be no retaliation because your faith is built on the solid rock of the righteousness of God’”.
The family refused to accept a letter of sympathy from the then Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, James Prior, which was delivered to them on the day of the funeral. They sent the letter back with the message that
“the hands of the security forces should be freed”.
A spokesman for the family said at the time:
“Nothing is being done, feelings are running very high on this issue. Innocent, defenceless people are being mown down and no action is being taken against the godfathers who are walking the streets. They are getting away with murder”.
When the HET investigated the death of Lexie Cummings, it found a different story. It found that a thorough investigation was carried out by the RUC at the time, which found cartridge discharge residue—gunpowder residue—on the suspect. It found fibres from the suspect’s trousers on the seat of the car, which was left abandoned at the scene of the crime. The two guns that were used were found by the Garda Siochana the next month and tests confirmed that that was the case.
It was an open-and-shut case, and yet questions must be answered. Why did William Gerard McMonagle not stand trial for the murder of Lexie Cummings? How was it that William Gerard McMonagle was allowed to travel across the border to safety and freedom, and to begin a new life, which has led to him being the mayor of Letterkenny today? Why was he never extradited, when it was known where he was? Why was there no co-operation between the Garda Siochana and the RUC to bring McMonagle to justice?
The HET did not have access to the answers or criteria that the Director of Public Prosecutions used to issue his decision, which stated that in 1986 there was not a
“suitable case to make a request to the authorities in the Republic of Ireland for the return of Mr McMonagle”.
Why was that? Was the HET prevented from finding out the answers and the truth?
How did the DPP reach his decision of 2003? It was that
“having reviewed the evidence and information now available and obtained the opinion of counsel, I have concluded that there is no longer a reasonable prospect of convicting William Gerard McMonagle of any criminal Offence. I therefore rescind the direction of 13 December 1982 and direct no prosecution of William Gerard McMonagle”.
What was the evidence, and why were the family not made aware of it? Can the Minister tell us what answer we should give the family about the criteria by which the decision was reached? The HET cannot provide the answer—who can? Can he? Why was McMonagle no longer classified as on the run even though the HET confirmed that he was never granted an amnesty?
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
The Minister of State may reply by saying that some of the very important points that my hon. Friend is making are about devolved matters. Does my hon. Friend agree, however, that we have difficulty in explaining to our constituents why, on the one hand, these matters are all devolved and there is a limited sum of money to investigate hundreds of killings, yet on the other hand the Minister and his colleagues stand in this House and announce expensive and long inquiries, albeit not open-ended judicial inquiries, into other cases?
Jim Shannon
My right hon. Friend puts my case coherently, and I thank him for that.
There are too many questions that the HET cannot answer, due to its scope and resources, but to which the family of Lexie Cummings deserve an answer. They turn on the news and see the mayor of Letterkenny, Gerry McMonagle, who ran from justice in Northern Ireland after having been proven to have been at the scene with gunpowder residue on him, embracing his freedom and his position in life. The family visit the grave of a true gentleman, Lexie Cummings, with questions in their minds and grief in their hearts. Who can answer their questions and give them closure? Questions must be answered, because the family cannot forget that Lexie Cummings was a good man and worthy of justice. They know that for a reason unknown to them, someone has seen fit to give an unrepentant republican murderer the opportunity to parade around, with no fear of justice, in his mayoral robes. That is cruelty in the extreme, and I am here today to ask for parity in the help provided to that family and others so that they can have closure, as my right hon. Friend clearly said.
Those who had committed crimes during the troubles were asked to come forward before the Good Friday agreement. Those who did not admit their crimes but remained at large cannot be given the same amnesty, nor do they deserve their freedom. All the men and women who were murdered in the troubles by paramilitaries—in uniform or out of uniform—demand our respect, which I know we give them. I feel that the Northern Ireland Office is not giving their families the right support, and I know that a great deal of Unionists feel that, in the Government’s eyes, their pain is a second-class pain. The lack of Government representation tells me that that view may be justified, as we in the Unionist community feel. The washing of hands did not make Pontius Pilate clean, and it will not make others of that ilk clean in this case.
There is a social media page on Facebook called “Castlederg Forgotten Friends”. Part of the reason for its being set up was that Castlederg, which is one and a half miles from the border, had 26 unsolved murders—26 families with unanswered questions. For two of those families, I have made their case and their point tonight. They need help. The site clearly lists those who were murdered, and under each post it says, “Lest we forget”. Let that be the cry from this House tonight, and I hope from the Minister. We will remember them, and we will support their families and help them grieve their loss in whatever way we can.
The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr Hugo Swire)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) on securing the debate and thank the other Members who have participated in it.
There has been no washing of hands, as the hon. Gentleman suggested. However, as hon. Members know, following the devolution of policing and justice in April 2010, matters relating to the Historical Enquiries Team are the responsibility of the devolved Administration in Northern Ireland, particularly the Minister of Justice, to whom I spoke yesterday. You will therefore understand, Madam Deputy Speaker, that I am unable to comment in detail on HET operational matters, which are for the Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland.
Let us remind ourselves of the history of the HET. It was set up in September 2005 to investigate some 3,259 unsolved deaths relating to the troubles from 1968 to the Belfast agreement in 1998. I would like to put on record the Government’s strong support for the HET and its work with the families of those killed.
The HET provides a valuable role in bringing resolution to and addressing any concerns that may remain for the families of victims of the troubles. That is supported by the findings of a recent survey, which showed that 90% of family members—across all community groups—indicated that they were “satisfied” or “very satisfied” with the HET. That is an extraordinarily high figure, and the HET is to be commended for achieving such high satisfaction rates.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned funding. Let me comment briefly on the current situation. The HET is midway through its seventh year of work, and it is worth noting that its spend to date is around £34 million. Let us compare that with the combined total cost of £300 million for recent inquiries. Bloody Sunday—I gently remind the hon. Gentleman that the Saville inquiry was set up under the previous Government—cost £192 million; the Hamill inquiry cost £32 million; the Nelson inquiry cost £46 million; and the Wright inquiry cost £30 million. The good value for money that the HET provides is clear, as opposed to open-ended and costly inquiries, of which, as the Secretary of State has made clear time and again, there will be no more.
To date, I understand that the HET has already investigated, or is in the process of investigating, 2,423 deaths, which are dealt with in a chronological order. Of those, the HET can currently say that 1,375 were caused by republicans; 724 were caused by loyalists; 265 were caused by security forces; and 59 were caused by “unknown”. I understand that the HET has also referred 26 cases to the PSNI for further investigation.
All those cases are the subject of ongoing live investigations, and it would therefore be inappropriate for me to comment further. However, I note the valuable role that the PSNI and the HET play in helping bereaved families find justice.
We remain strong supporters of the HET. Both my right hon. Friends the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland have on many occasions highlighted their support for the work of the HET.
Not every investigation will result in closure for the family and friends. I am aware of how strongly the hon. Gentleman understandably feels about the brutal murder of his cousin, Kenneth Smyth, in December 1971, and Lexie Cummings in June 1982. Both were members of the UDR, which suffered so badly during the troubles.
However, for many families, the HET’s reports bring comfort and some understanding of the circumstances of the death of a loved one. I commend its work to the House.
Question put and agreed to.