House of Lords
Gambling Advertising
(6 years, 7 months ago)
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The Lord Bishop of St Albans
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of levels of gambling advertising.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Ashton of Hyde) (Con)
My Lords, a major survey of evidence in 2014 found that the impact of advertising on problem gambling was likely to be rather small, although further research was required. The Government sought further evidence on gambling advertising as part of our review of gaming machines and social responsibility measures. There are strict controls on the content of gambling advertising. It must not be targeted at children. The consultation outlined a package of measures to help strengthen existing protections and fill gaps in evidence. We will publish our response in due course.
The Lord Bishop of St Albans
My Lords, according to the Gambling Commission more than 300,000 children are gambling each week. That is more than the number who drink alcohol, smoke or take illicit drugs. Yet, despite this, we have unlimited adverts during sporting events and many more online and on social media. The number of gambling adverts aimed at children tripled between 2005 and 2012. Does the Minister agree that it is an unacceptable risk to expose our children to this barrage of advertising when we have no firm grasp of its impact? Will he step in and regulate?
Lord Ashton of Hyde
The right reverend Prelate’s phrase that we have no grasp on it is pertinent—as I said, the evidence is limited. We are looking for more evidence, as is GambleAware at the moment. The protections are strong. No advertising that targets children is allowed, and that applies online and offline. When we publish the response to the consultation, it will be one of the things that we outline, and noble Lords will be able to see what our response was. We are very aware of our lack of evidence. We want to concentrate on protections for the vulnerable, particularly children.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)
My Lords, when I was in the Home Office some 25 years ago and responsible for gambling legislation, the rule was that it was not allowed to do anything that would stimulate demand. That included a 48-hour rule for casinos, and there was no advertising. We had a perfectly healthy gambling industry. Since then, we have seen a huge increase in problem gambling and all the difficulties that the right reverend Prelate outlined. Why can we not go back to having a rule that we do not allow stimulation of demand?
Lord Ashton of Hyde
It is interesting that my noble friend says that there has been a huge increase. In fact, problem gambling has remained stable over time. We have limited the amount that can be put in advertising. We had a review in 2014 and protections were strengthened. We consulted on extra measures in our gambling review, the results of which will be published shortly. We understand the issues. We want to have gambling effectively regulated on a voluntary basis—which, incidentally, is much more flexible to deal with changes such as online gambling than a statutory basis.
Lord Foster of Bath (LD)
My Lords, notwithstanding the limited evidence, does not common sense tell us that increased gambling advertising is intended to increase the number of people gambling and therefore the likelihood of more people having gambling problems? Does the Minister accept that the time has now come for a compulsory levy to support research, education and treatment in relation to gambling problems rather than the current voluntary levy? Does he not find it odd that nearly 10 times more money is raised to support racehorses through the compulsory betting levy than is raised to support people through the voluntary levy?
Lord Ashton of Hyde
The important thing is what is effective. I know that many people have strong opinions on gambling, as they do on smoking and alcohol. The fact is that the evidence does not support some of the claims made. The Binde report said that the impact of advertising on problem gambling rates is likely to be,
“neither negligible nor considerable, but rather relatively small”.
On the noble Lord’s point regarding a compulsory levy, we have said many times that if the gambling industry does not provide the requisite amount to support measures to deal with problem gambling, we will consider a mandatory levy.
Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)
It appears to many of us incredible that there should be reported to be relatively undisquieting developments in the field of gambling—certainly, the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, has hinted at that. Are the Government aware of and disturbed by moves towards what is called the normalisation of gambling or, as the Committee of Advertising Practice put it, the “trivialisation” of gambling? Is not the movement of gambling towards being like the air we breathe a worrying thing that might lie beyond the ability of statisticians to quantify? Will the Government look urgently and proactively for such evidence rather than waiting for the results of a consultation?
Lord Ashton of Hyde
Yes, absolutely. We are looking proactively. We issued a call for evidence; the consultation hinted at areas where there was a lack of evidence. I believe that GambleAware will produce more evidence later this year. We of course accept that there are issues to do with protecting vulnerable people and children. That is why these matters have been addressed in the consultation, and our response will follow in due course.
Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)
My Lords, I am not sure that the research methodology has kept up with the development of social media. Can my noble friend the Minister reassure the House that attention is being given also to computer games aimed at children, which are designed specifically to instil the same addictive thrill that may lead to gambling habits?
Lord Ashton of Hyde
Yes, my Lords; I know concerns have been raised about gambling-style games or gambling games that use cartoon imagery, for example, because they may appeal to children. Last October, the Gambling Commission together with the ASA, the Committee of Advertising Practice and the Remote Gambling Association took steps to make sure that online gambling companies remove advertising from websites and third-party media likely to appeal to people aged under 18. I emphasise again that that is one area where the current code, a voluntary but effective form of regulation, allows things to move quickly without relying on legislative time.
Airports: Passenger Assistance
(6 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Blunkett
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have, in consultation with the Civil Aviation Authority, to improve the experience of passengers requiring assistance when travelling through airports in the United Kingdom.
Lord Blunkett (Lab)
My Lords, I beg to move the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper and draw attention to my declaration in the register of interests.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Transport (Baroness Sugg) (Con)
My Lords, we want to see an improvement in service for all passengers requiring assistance when travelling through our airports. We have seen progress in recent years through the introduction of the CAA annual reporting, but there is certainly more we can do in this area. Through the ongoing work on our aviation strategy, the department and the CAA will work with campaign groups, airports, airlines and ground handlers to produce and implement new and innovative policy proposals.
Lord Blunkett
My Lords, many in this House will be familiar with the experience that the renowned security correspondent of the BBC, Frank Gardner, had at Heathrow recently. I know that the Minister is both committed and energetic on this issue, so can she reassure us that in the event of Britain leaving the EU—in the event—we will be totally committed to maintaining and improving on EU Regulation 1107 and to ensuring that we get everyone to co-operate? It is only through partnership between airports, airlines and service providers that we can put people on equal terms and overcome the indignity and lack of independence that Frank Gardner experienced.
Baroness Sugg
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for raising this issue and I pay tribute to the work he has done over many years in this area. On his point about regulations following our exit from the European Union, we will absolutely not fall below current standards set by EU regulations—in this case Regulations 1107 and 261, which will be retained in UK law. I absolutely affirm my commitment to addressing the issues in this area. In our Next Steps document for our aviation policy, published last month, we have committed to make significant improvements, such as helping to raise awareness of the assistance already provided at airports, reviewing the assistance performance standards for airports and airlines and introducing an accredited nationwide accessibility training scheme in an effort to improve the assistance already offered.
Baroness Gardner of Parkes (Con)
My Lords, I am no relation to the Frank Gardner just referred to, but when I travel, particularly internationally, I have to have a wheelchair or some way of being treated and cared for. Sure enough, everywhere overseas they arrive with a wheelchair and someone to push it. At Heathrow it is very deceptive and very wrong that people arriving and needing help are held up a long time. They arrive with an electric vehicle that takes eight people, the eight people get in and are very impressed by how quickly they have been received. They are then taken to what I call a “dumping area” and you all sit there indefinitely until they can find enough people with wheelchairs to take you on. By the time you get down to the arrivals hall all your luggage has long been cleared and they have to find out where it has been moved to. It is quite hopeless, and although I have taken this issue up in the past with Heathrow Airport, nothing happens. It needs proper action to bring us up to international standards in this respect.
Baroness Sugg
My Lords, I am sorry to hear of the experiences of my noble friend. I am afraid that it is another example of some of the terrible experiences I have heard about. Heathrow, in particular, faces some unique challenges, with the high volume of passengers and the very size of the airport: each terminal exceeds in scale other airports in their entirety. Of course, more work must be done to ensure that our biggest airport is accessible to all and that everybody receives a good level of customer service. Heathrow does have an improvement action plan in place to provide a continuous assistance service at the airport and is looking to reduce waiting times. It is also investing in comprehensive disability training schemes. Terminal 5 and British Airways have embarked on a programme aimed at ensuring that a high-quality service is provided for everybody with a disability or who needs assistance. Last year Heathrow set up the Heathrow Access Advisory Group, which has made good progress, the latest initiative being the adoption of a new process around personal wheelchairs last month. This will see all mobility equipment returned to the gate by default—an opt-out rather than an opt-in process—which we hope will address the issue that Mr Gardner faced.
Baroness Brinton (LD)
My Lords, I am glad that the Minister raised the issue of wheelchairs being returned to planes because, although it is in the guidance on the CAA website, it is not specified by Heathrow or by most other UK airports—it seems that there is a gap between the CAA guidance and what is actually happening. Part of the problem is that under their KPIs airports are held to account solely for the journey either to or from the plane, and passengers are passed from pillar to post and from staff member to staff member, often untrained. I myself was stuck in a baggage hall at 6 am for an hour because there was no one there to meet me with my chair. What can the Minister do, first, to ensure that all airport authorities come together and work to the CAA’s guidance and, secondly, to encourage new proposals like the Neatebox that is being trialled at Edinburgh, which helps disabled passengers to find assistance very quickly?
Baroness Sugg
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for her questions. She is quite right to point out that the CAA’s guidance specifies 20 minutes for wheelchairs to be returned. However, that is often not the case, as in Mr Gardner’s experience. That is something we are working with airports on. The CAA is also looking to extend its guidance, which is focused solely on airports at the moment. Of course, we need to work collaboratively with operators across every part of the journey—because we need this to be as seamless as possible—including airlines, airport service providers and handling agents. With the extension of the CAA’s guidance to deal with airlines as well we will definitely see improvements in that area.
The Neatebox is an excellent and innovative idea for providing more information to passengers with a disability. I understand that it is being trialled at Edinburgh Airport and I look forward to seeing the results.
Baroness Tonge (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I have experienced this issue with a disabled friend, so I thoroughly endorse what has been said. Does the Minister not agree that Heathrow not being able to cope with what it has now is yet another good reason for not expanding it with a third runway?
Baroness Sugg
I am afraid I must disagree with the noble Baroness. I have already explained some of the measures that Heathrow is putting into place in order to improve its service, and I look forward to the debates in the coming months on its expansion.
Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)
My Lords, surely this is just a lot of good words. To fix this problem you do not need innovative solutions or great essays full of good words: you need resources. This is Heathrow penny pinching. What are the Government going to do to force Heathrow to put the right resources in?
Baroness Sugg
My Lords, we highlighted accessibility as a key issue to address in our aviation strategy. I do think that there has been progress, but I absolutely agree that there is more to be done. Since becoming Aviation Minister I have held many meetings with campaign and disability groups, as well as airlines and airports, to discuss what steps we can take, and I will continue to do so. This is something I feel very strongly about. It is an area in which we can and will make real improvements, and I am confident that all passengers will see the positive outcomes of our work.
British and Irish Sign Language
(6 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Bruce of Bennachie
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what practical support they plan to provide to enable the establishment of a nationwide video relay service for users of British and Irish sign language.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Baroness Buscombe) (Con)
My Lords, video relay services are currently available from organisations that buy into the service. It should be possible for these privately operated services to be extended to allow deaf people to communicate with friends and family, but the end user would have to pay. BSL users already have a well-established VRS network, allowing accessible communication with a range of private, public and voluntary organisations. These bodies purchase the service from several established providers to enable their deaf customers to access their services.
Lord Bruce of Bennachie (LD)
My Lords, the Minister’s answer falls far short of what deaf sign language users feel is their right—both what they are entitled to and what they actually need. This is their preferred technology and can give them access to interpreters any time, anywhere. At the moment, its availability is time-restricted and, as the Minister said, it is a chargeable service. VRS is available for free in Scotland for access to public services nine to five, Monday to Friday. But sign language users want access 24/7 for all purposes—private services and public services at work, and contacting their family and friends. The US provides this, as does Australia, Canada, France, Switzerland and even Thailand: why can Britain not do the same?
Baroness Buscombe
My Lords, first, I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Bennachie, for the enormous amount of work he has done in this area over many years. It is important to recognise that access to assisted hearing is available in a number of ways. We have assessed that of approximately 2 million people with hearing impairment, about 25,000 use sign language. Where VRS is not provided, we are ensuring bespoke support—for example, through the disabled students’ allowances and our Access to Work support, whereby the cap on grants for every individual who qualifies for Access to Work has just been increased to £57,000 per person per year to ensure that more people can receive the support they need in a bespoke way to help them stay and progress in work. There is always more to be done. However, we do not believe that enshrining this in statute and focusing all our resources in one area would be right, given the speed of technological advances.
Lord Borwick (Con)
My Lords, I declare my interest in the register as a trustee for about 20 years of the Ewing Foundation for deaf children, a registered charity. Does my noble friend the Minister agree that communication of every form is vital to deaf people of every age but that the majority of people who have hearing loss are elderly and do not use sign language? Does she agree that the great work of the NHS in fitting cochlear implants to deaf babies and children, together with the expensive training that is required to make full use of them, and the development of new high-tech digital hearing aids enable a large number of people to use their residual hearing effectively? Does she agree that the new technology of cameras fitted to smartphones and Skype calls enables the creation of what is in effect a worldwide video relay service, not only for the users of British Sign Language but for all deaf people and at far lower cost?
Baroness Buscombe
My Lords, I thank my noble friend. I entirely agree with him that in supporting access to communication for everyone, the exciting work of the NHS in fitting cochlear implants to babies and children is one example of why, as the Minister of State for Disabled People has said, it is clear that there is now a wealth of technological solutions with the power to make a real difference to someone’s ability to progress in education and also to find and keep a job. This means that we can use more of our devices. It offers more opportunities and a wider range of ways in which people can break down the barriers of hearing impairment. Of course, the majority of people with a hearing impairment are elderly and for the most part they do not use sign language.
Baroness Sherlock (Lab)
My Lords, I am sure the Minister would not in any way mean to suggest that people who use BSL should be thinking about other ways of communicating. I want to bring her back to the fact that in 2016, the Department for Work and Pensions introduced VRS for some of its services as a result of a recommendation from the DWP Select Committee that the department ought to be more accessible to BSL users. The Government said at the time:
“In the future, it is hoped that VRS can be rolled out across DWP’s complete range of services”.
I have had a look at the website and some services, such as applying for ESA or PIP, do seem to be available via this mechanism. But I looked on the universal credit website and could find no reference to it at all. Are the Government now saying that they no longer wish to do this at all and will therefore not be rolling it out, or that they will be rolling it out but have not got round to it yet?
Baroness Buscombe
I assure the noble Baroness that there is no question of our not supporting the use of BSL services. In fact, good, accessible services are the best way to remove or overcome barriers that BSL users and people with hearing loss face. We have worked closely with deaf people and their organisations on delivering improvements across a wide range of services, including those provided by the Department for Work and Pensions and across much of the public sector; this is also the case in private companies such as Barclays, Lloyds, Sky and Virgin Media. The reality is that a growing number of organisations in the private, public and voluntary sectors are providing access to their services for deaf BSL users via the video relay services. With respect to the Department for Work and Pensions, I reassure her that there is no question of our not considering this service for UC rollout, but I will certainly take that point back to the department to ensure that that is the case.
Lord Elystan-Morgan (CB)
Can the Minister assure the House that the Welsh language will be given full parity with the other languages of the United Kingdom in this matter?
Baroness Buscombe
My Lords, BSL is a devolved matter so, with regard to Wales and the Welsh language, there were no particular recommendations on the provision of BSL. However, a parliamentary Statement in 2003 recognised BSL as a language and the Lords Select Committee was clear that this should be extended to the devolved regions. It is also important to make it clear that there are a number of different sign languages, not just one particular sign language.
Identity Cards
Lord Empey
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what consideration they are giving to the introduction of identity cards for United Kingdom citizens.
Baroness Manzoor (Con)
My Lords, in 2010 the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition decided to scrap the identity card scheme and the associated national identity register because it was expensive and represented a substantial erosion of civil liberties. This Government have no plans to revisit that decision. That is because we have seen no evidence that countries with physical identity cards, including most of Europe, offer greater protection against terrorism, greater control at the border or greater protection from fraud.
Lord Empey (UUP)
I welcome the noble Baroness to the Front Bench and wish her well. When the Labour Party produced this idea originally, I, like many others in the House, was very sceptical. However, events have conspired to make it absolutely clear that the system we are operating is—in the phrase coined by the noble Lord, Lord Reid—“not fit for purpose”. Anybody who has watched events over the last few weeks would have to say that the truth is that we do not know who is or who is not in this country, and we do not seem to know who we should be removing from this country. With a Bill coming forward in the next few months, does she not agree that the time has come to look at all options and that, instead of taking things off the table, we should be putting things on to it because what we have now is not functioning?
Baroness Manzoor
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Empey, for his best wishes—I think I am going to need them. He makes a very important point and he will be aware that we already issue migrants with biometric residence permits—BRPs—which are credit card-sized documents that include a facial photograph and two fingerprints of the holder. Noble Lords will know that yesterday, in a debate in the other place, the Home Secretary announced a full review of lessons learned in Windrush, with independent oversight and external challenge. We should allow this to happen first and then consider what policies and initiatives we need to take forward.
Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab)
My Lords, the Liaison Committee blocked my application for an ID card inquiry. The Commons Select Committee inquiries are brief and often last only two or three months. How about a royal commission, a procedure normally used to consider broad policy issues? The 1997 Royal Commission on Long-term Care of the Elderly reported in 15 months; the 1999 Royal Commission on Reform of the House of Lords, chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Wakeham, who is in his place, took 11 months. With the mood change in Westminster sweeping across Parliament, particularly after Windrush and what happened last week, why do the Government not now consider a new inquiry? I appeal to the Ulster Unionists, who are in a pivotal position in the Commons and can demand one.
Baroness Manzoor
I know that the noble Lord is committed to this issue. This is my first Question at the Dispatch Box and I fear that he is already trying to lead me astray. I am not in a position to comment on a royal commission or in relation to a new inquiry. However, he will be aware that the existence of identity cards in Spain did not prevent the 2004 Madrid bombing, nor did the French ID card prevent the Charlie Hebdo attacks in 2015. I recognise what the noble Lord is saying but it is a matter for the Commons, should it wish to have an inquiry in that place.
Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate (Con)
My Lords, speaking as another former Home Office Minister who had responsibilities in the 1990s for an ID card proposal of the then Government, I have to say that those exciting responsibilities were set aside because of the public attitude and the attitude of politicians in relation to the freedom of the individual and privacy. On numerous occasions since, Governments have attempted to introduce ID cards with similar results. In the event of us proceeding further with the idea once more, does the Minister agree that apart from having discriminatory or negative information on such a card we would want to use it positively to include blood group, allergies and other important information of the person holding such a card? Does she also agree that any information shown on such a card should be open and transparent to the person whose name is on the card?
Baroness Manzoor
I thank my noble friend for his question. Certainly I agree in principle that in a healthcare setting there may be some use for such a card. I think Headway has a card with health-related issues on it. I do not know whether my noble friend has seen the Times today in which Simon Nixon writes about having a digital ID card. I have some empathy with moving forward on that. Indeed, the Government are moving forward on that as we have the verify system in place. Our aim is to provide people with a common and safe way of verifying themselves to Government and accessing common public services.
University of London Bill [HL]
Thursday 3rd May 2018
(6 years, 7 months ago)
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Brexit: Sanctions Policy (European Union Committee Report)
(6 years, 7 months ago)
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Baroness Verma
That this House takes note of the Report from the European Union Committee, Brexit: sanctions policy (8th Report, HL Paper 50).
Baroness Verma (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful for the opportunity to debate the report Brexit: Sanctions Policy this afternoon—actually, it is still morning. In the run-up to the referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU, foreign policy issues were rarely discussed, but working in partnership with our European neighbours on foreign and security policy is of vital importance to the UK’s national interest. Sanctions—the subject of today’s debate—are a central tool of national security. The development of a new framework for engagement and co-ordination with the EU, and other international allies, on sanctions is an important and timely topic for consideration by this House. As the chair of the EU External Affairs Sub-Committee, I first extend my thanks to the members of the committee for their important contribution to this report. I also thank the secretariat to the committee, Eva George, Julia Ewert and Lauren Harvey, for their assistance with the inquiry and preparation of this report.
When we leave the EU, we will also leave its framework for designing and imposing sanctions, such as arms embargoes, asset freezes, visa and travel bans and other sectoral restrictions. EU sanctions regimes currently account for the majority—around three-quarters—of all the sanctions regimes that the UK implements. These measures are agreed unanimously by all 28 EU member states and applied across the bloc. Unilateral sanctions have only a limited effect. The impact of sanctions is increased considerably when implemented together with other like-minded nations. Multilateral sanctions both strengthen the signal delivered to a target state or entity and deliver the maximum possible economic impact. The events of recent weeks, from the provocations of Russia to the worsening situation in Syria, underline the vital importance of working in partnership with our international allies.
Our inquiry considered sanctions policy—the process of designing measures to achieve the UK’s foreign policy and national security goals. We did not consider in detail the new UK legal regime, as proposed in the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill, being considered in the other place. We found that being part of the collective EU sanctions regime has helped the UK to achieve its foreign policy and national security goals. There have been some important examples in recent years. For example, EU sanctions on Iran played an important role in bringing that country to the negotiating table over its nuclear programme, and EU sanctions on Russia continue to demonstrate that the EU remains united in its condemnation of the annexation of Crimea and destabilisation of Ukraine. The UK has been hugely influential in the design of EU sanctions policy. It has benefited from being embedded within a formal structure for sanctions policy co-operation with the 27 other EU member states. The UK has enjoyed frequent informal interactions in the margins of those meetings.
We concluded that, although we will be leaving the EU, the common interests and threats facing the UK and the 27 other member states will not change fundamentally. We will therefore need to find ways to co-ordinate our sanctions policy with the EU as well as with other like-minded partners. One option would be to align with EU sanctions, an approach often taken by Norway or Switzerland. While that would preserve a united approach to sanctions between the EU and the UK, we would not have influence over the design of those sanctions or have any voting rights. We would simply be implementing EU restrictive measures.
A second option would be to seek to influence and engage with the EU sanctions regime from the outside—the approach taken by the US. We found that informal engagement with the EU on sanctions policy could of course be very valuable, but believe it would be no substitute for the formal influence and decision-shaping role that the UK currently enjoys as an EU member state. We proposed that, if the UK does not seek or is not able to secure participation in the common foreign and security policy after Brexit, the Government should propose a UK-EU political forum for regular discussion and the co-ordination of sanctions policy.
I am pleased that during the course of the inquiry, and in their response to the report, the Government acknowledged the value of international co-operation to the effective use of sanctions. However, their response did not specifically engage with the option of the UK aligning with sanctions regimes agreed by the 27 EU member states after Brexit. I invite the Minister to comment specifically on whether the UK is considering this option after we leave the EU and to give the Government’s assessment of it. If not, what do they see as a preferred option?
In evidence to the committee, the Government told us that they were confident that the UK would remain influential within EU 27 sanctions discussions. They stated their ambition of an unprecedented level of co-operation on sanctions policy with the EU after Brexit,
“beyond any arrangement the EU has now with other third countries”.
What would that arrangement look like, and what resources would be allocated to support it?
My noble friend will be aware of the concern expressed in our report that the Government could provide no detail on what such a “tailored arrangement” proposed for co-operation would involve. We are concerned that the goal of an unprecedented level of co-operation was an untested approach. Have talks on these issues begun and, if so, when will the Government provide evidence of such progress? In the Government’s formal response to the committee, there was no further indication of how this new partnership might be structured. We were left no clearer on the detail of the Government’s desired framework, nor on the proposals that they will be making to the EU as part of the negotiations.
I invite the Minister to explain in detail the Government’s aspirations for sanctions policy co-operation after Brexit, specifically including how a model of UK-EU sanctions co-operation based on two-way exchanges of analysis and information, as mentioned in their response to the committee, would operate in practice. I also invite him to comment specifically on the committee’s proposal that a UK-EU political forum for regular discussion and co-ordination of sanctions policy be established.
Finally, and more broadly, considering Article 122 of the draft agreement on the withdrawal of the UK from the EU, I invite the Minister to inform the House when he expects negotiations on the future of the UK-EU relationship in the area of common foreign and security policy to commence. Furthermore, I ask him to specify whether the Government will conclude an agreement on co-operation in this area that will apply during the transition period.
Sanctions policy is an important subset of our broader foreign policy. The UK’s influence on its international partners’ sanctions policy will depend on how far it is able to retain its authority and leadership on key foreign policy dossiers after Brexit. It is critical that the Government engage proactively and constructively with our EU partners in the forthcoming negotiations on foreign policy co-operation, recognising that the interests and threats we in the UK face are common to Europe as a whole and are best tackled together. All the evidence that provided the body of our report demonstrated the real and strong influence we carry as a collective body. Therefore, it is in our interest as a nation not to lose that voice. I beg to move.
Lord Horam (Con)
My Lords, the Minister will now be aware from the long list of questions that my noble friend Lady Verma listed that she did a sterling job as chair of the committee, of which I was a member. As she did, I first thank the clerks and advisers to the committee. We are sadly losing Eva George, who was the clerk to the committee. She is going to the International Affairs Committee. She was a model of clerkly conduct—I hope that is noted at the clerk level.
One of the knacks of the committee, for which I am grateful to my colleagues, is its habit of coming out with extremely timely reports. This knack was also evident when the chairman was my noble friend Lord Tugendhat, who I am glad to see in his place. We did a report on Operation Sophia, which addressed the problem of refugees coming across the Mediterranean when it was at its very height, which received quite a lot of publicity. Very early in the discussions about Brexit, we issued two reports on the options for trade which were very well received, and we are at the moment on a third leg of that, looking at customs arrangements—discussed yesterday in the Cabinet, as Members will be aware. In particular, we took evidence from the Freight Transport Association on the issue of a customs partnership, which is one option that the Cabinet discussed yesterday. The House will be interested to know the evidence that we had from James Hookham, the deputy chief executive of the Freight Transport Association. I quote from the press interview he gave, for the sake of clarity, where he said that the customs partnership was “sound”, showed “positive forward thinking” and was a good outcome for everyone concerned. That is rather different from the view taken by one of my colleagues along the Corridor who said that it was “cretinous”. That was the view of exactly the same thing as people operating these things on the ground think of as “sound”. The adjective cretinous can be rather applied to those who wish to apply customs barriers where there are none today. However, that is another debate for another time. Let me come on to the subject of this report, which is, of course, sanctions.
As my noble friend Lady Verma said, we made three significant suggestions. The first was that sanctions should clearly be a subset of foreign policy. There should be an overall strategic view that sanctions fit into successfully. They must also be co-ordinated properly. As one of the Russians in London said the other day, “If they push us out of London, we’ll just go to Paris”. If it is not co-ordinated, that is the sort of thing that could well happen.
It was made clear to us by the noble Baroness, Lady Ashton, who has had a distinguished career in the European Union, that post Brexit we will not be at the table. We therefore proposed that we should form some kind of political forum in which we could have influence. That positive suggestion was raised again in her remarks by my noble friend. I hope the Minister will respond to that very clearly.
The fact is that we will continue to have influence in the European Union, whatever the arrangements, because we are a significant financial centre and sanctions are at their most effective when they are applied to the individual and make it difficult for them to conduct their normal business, whatever it may be. We should also remember in that context that the British economy is, above all, a services economy. Some 78% of our GDP is in services of one kind or another and that will have influence in this area.
Finally, I will comment on the three areas where sanctions at the moment are having an influence. First, on Russia, the move by the United States on sanctions last month was quite a game-changer because the sanctions relate not merely to human rights but to corruption and how money was originally obtained. Anyone who has read the book by Bill Browder, the American entrepreneur who worked extensively in Russia, will be aware of the problems that led to the Magnitsky Act in the United States, which has had considerable bearing on the behaviour of Russian oligarchs of that kind. In this country, anyone who saw the television series “McMafia” and read the book by Misha Glenny will know the effect in London. The Government have to decide how far we will follow up the game-changing sanctions put on by the United States. It is certainly the case that while Ukraine and Crimea are issues between us and Russia, we cannot in any way afford to relax sanctions, they must remain in place. I do not think there can be any going back on that. It is a matter of international concern.
In addition, we should try to understand Russia perhaps more comprehensively and fundamentally than we have in the past. Russia is coming out of a period when it has felt itself to be a great world power. It had an empire—the Soviet Union—around it. We, as a country which has also come out of a period of empire, should have some sympathy for the psychological effect of that diminution of influence in the world. I always remember reading Jan Morris’s great trilogy of the British Empire, which finished with Farewell the Trumpets. There is a sense in which a country feels diminished and therefore has to exert its power and sense of power in the world, and we should understand the psychology of that, as I said.
Therefore, we should be careful what we do in relation to sanctions, as well as about the implications for the City of London of the amount of Russian money there. But I think that we are now pursuing the right attitude, and I am very pleased with what happened at the other end of Parliament this week on a question of transparency in relation to overseas territories. I think that we all welcomed that, because the fundamental issue here is transparency—and we need more transparency, not only for the overseas territories but in the London financial and property markets. It is outrageous that we simply do not know who owns properties in the middle of London, when they are pushing up prices and having a really damaging effect on the lives of ordinary Londoners and ordinary citizens of this country. We should know who owns those properties; we do not know at the moment. It is one area in which the Government can do things unilaterally without too much co-ordination but with a beneficial effect. That is a step that the Government should take.
Secondly, on Iran, sanctions have clearly had an effect and been very successful in winding down its nuclear ambitions. It seems to me that, far from wanting to do as President Trump wants to do and scrapping the arrangements that we have, what is happening reinforces the importance of those arrangements. If Iran feels that the international community and the Americans in particular have turned against it, it will become a more dangerous operator in the Middle East, not less dangerous. In that respect, the Europeans should keep their act together and not go along the path that President Trump appears to be walking down.
On North Korea, we do not really know what is agitating the North Korean leader or what has brought him to the negotiating table. It may well be more Chinese actions and sanctions than anything that President Trump has done—we will have to wait and see. But it is clearly ongoing and is of significance to all of us.
Finally, on Brexit as a whole and the UK influence in the sanctions area after Brexit, the Minister, Alan Duncan, in the Government’s response to our report, put it well when he said:
“The UK is a Permanent Member of the UN Security Council and an active member of other international fora. We have a substantial global reach, with a diplomatic network of 270 posts, world-class security services and extensive military capabilities. The UK is the only major country to meet both the 2% defence spending target and the UN 0.7% target for Official Development Assistance”.
I would add to that that we are also a significant financial centre and will continue to be. All of that is soft power, and hard power, of a significant kind, and I believe that we can wield it well post Brexit, just as much as we have pre-Brexit, provided that we have a strategic view, co-operate in the way that the committee concluded and can put the right amount of resources into our foreign policy and military and defence capability.
Lord Anderson of Swansea (Lab)
My Lords, I join in congratulating the noble Baroness and her committee and welcome what is a highly timely report—timely not only in the sense that the EU Committee is carrying out a whole series of reports via its sub-committees on the implications of leaving the European Union, but also with respect to our policy on Russia. We go back to the death by a Russian agent of Litvinenko and that agent now being in the Duma in Russia. We think of the invasion of Georgia in 2008, and the fact that Russia and its minions still occupy South Ossetia and Abkhazia. We think of other actions, such as the recent tragedy in Salisbury, and of course Ukraine, including Crimea. The only problem about Crimea is that it is claimed as a maxim of diplomacy that we follow the road sign that says, “Do not enter box unless your exit is clear”. If we make sanctions on Russia wholly contingent on Russia’s leaving the Crimea, that, alas, will never happen, and there is therefore no obvious exit in terms of sanctions if we follow that route. Russia seems to be permanently in the Crimea, and there comes a point, after Salisbury and the chemical bombing by its ally Assad, when Russia must learn the lesson of behaving properly in international affairs and must also learn that there is conduct that will not be accepted and for which it will have to pay a price.
Sanctions, as was said in the committee report, are a most useful soft power tool, short of war. Some dismiss sanctions as gesture politics and, of course, they are not always effective and do not always hit the right targets. Iran and North Korea have been mentioned. I was fairly involved in the 1980s as the opposition spokesman on Africa, with the history of the anti-apartheid struggle. There is no doubt that, at that time, the sports boycott had a significant effect on public opinion on South Africa, and private sanctions by the financial community—illustrated by the effect of the 1986 failure of Chase Manhattan to roll over loans—had a major effect on the South African economy.
I note that, in response to the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, on her Written Question of 13 March, the noble Lord, Lord Ahmad, replied that sanctions are indeed biting in Russia. I remind him of his reply: of the 3.7% decline in Russian GDP in 2015, Citibank estimates that 0.4% was due to the sanctions. Perhaps more importantly, it has made it more difficult for Russia to access western finance. As the noble Lord, Lord Horam, has just said, the role of the City of London is particularly important in this context. However desirable sanctions may be through the United Nations, the experience of the Russian veto in the UN Security Council on sanctions for Syria illustrates the limitations of that route. For us, by far the most useful institution is the European Union, where over 50% of the sanctions we impose are autonomous and where we in the UK have played a leading role. There is no doubt that the clout of a unified European Union response is powerful, both as a sword in bringing pressure on such countries and as a shield to protect EU member states against counter sanctions, if we were to carry out those sanctions on our own.
The possible isolation of the United Kingdom in this field would be neither attractive nor effective, so our aim must surely be to retain as much influence on EU policy as possible, even when we are outside the formal structures. The committee has looked at a whole variety of possibilities, the disadvantage being of course, on the evidence from Norway and Switzerland—in paragraphs 80 and 81 of the report—that, however closely we align ourselves and however inventive we are in respect of EU sanctions, we will be outside the club and thus following decisions over which we have no or very limited influence.
My first observation, therefore, is that any alternative to our current membership cannot be an improvement for us. I have seen a similar position in the EU sub-committee on which I have the privilege to serve—the judicial committee—both in terms of consumer protection, where any alternative is worse, according to those in the field, than the current relationship we have with the European Union, and also on the dispute resolution report that we have just published. What is clear is that this is an exercise in damage limitation for the United Kingdom. It is true, as the committee concludes, that there are several possible options which could be mutually beneficial, and who doubts that it is most important and mutually beneficial for us and the European Union that we work together? We have so much experience and so many resources, not least our intelligence resources, to bring to the table. But all other options are less desirable and make us weaker, and that is true over the field of foreign policy as a whole.
My second observation is that currently, our considerable expertise in the field is highly respected in the European Union and beyond, and its loss would weaken EU sanctions regimes. Not only that: our reduced weight in the debate would have a serious effect on the balance within the European Union. If we look, for example, at the EU sanctions against Russia, a number of countries, either because of geography or history, or more particularly because of their economic interests, are very wobbly on those sanctions. I think of Hungary, Austria—where both left and right are much weaker on Russia—to some extent the Czech Republic, certainly Cyprus, and certainly Italy in its current configuration, as it seeks a coalition. All these are reluctant partners in respect of sanctions against Russia, and the balance within the European Union will be substantially altered if our weight is taken from it. The loss of our influence is one reason why Russia belatedly intervened in the EU referendum, and we saw the allegations yesterday from the Conservative Member for the Isle of Wight about one Brexiteer tycoon who played a role on behalf of Russia in that referendum debate.
My next observation is far more positive: I turn to the question of sanctions against individuals for human rights violations. I commend and welcome the recent moves of the Government in this field. In the previous Parliament, the Government amended the Criminal Finances Act to allow our law enforcement agencies to recover from property in the UK the proceeds of human rights abuses, wherever in the world they are committed. This was the first part of the US Magnitsky Act; on the second part, on visa bans, the Government argued that adequate powers were available to exclude individuals whose presence was not conducive to the public good.
This week, in Tuesday’s debate on Report on the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill, the Government went very much further. The result will be that sanctions can be made to prevent, or in response to, gross human rights abuse or violations. This is defined in a separate government amendment—I commend Sir Alan Duncan on his willingness to listen on this—to include the torture of a person by a public official or by a person in an official capacity, where the tortured person has sought to expose the illegal activity of a public official or to defend human rights or fundamental freedoms. This is a most welcome response to the Magnitsky case. Your Lordships may recall that Magnitsky, a Russian national, was an agent of Hermitage Capital Management who was tortured to death in a Russian prison. Subsequently, through an evidence trail, it became clear that Russian tax officials benefited financially from their misdeeds. The Russians took no action save to pursue Bill Browder, the head of Hermitage Capital Management, relentlessly, including at the moment in Cyprus.
Finally, there is a variety of relevant laws in force in this area in the US—the Magnitsky Act—Canada, Latvia and Lithuania. Relying on these precedents, and the precedent set by our own Government, I am producing a report to the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, which will encourage all members of wider European bodies to enact similar laws. The spreading of such precedence across the membership of the Council of Europe will be a memorial to Sergei Magnitsky himself and a tribute to Bill Browder, who has waged a most effective lobbying campaign to highlight the wrong done to Magnitsky and to seek an appropriate international response.
Lord Taverne (LD)
My Lords, many of my Liberal Democrat colleagues who are experts in this subject are away today door-knocking. I was not a member of the Lords committee, but I did read its very valuable recommendations and the subsequent debates, and I will do my best as a last-minute substitute. As often in the role of substitute, it will be very brief.
Everyone agrees that sanctions are most effective when they are applied on a multilateral basis. As EU members, and participating in the common foreign and security policy, the UK has played an important part, particularly in driving sanctions against Russia and Iran. If we leave the European Union, will the Government continue their participation in the CFSP? Even outside EU institutions, we would not be without some influence. For example, we did rally the rest of the European Union to support sanctions after the Salisbury incident. It is obviously in both our and the EU’s interest to co-operate closely. Nevertheless, if we leave, our influence is almost bound to decline, and the Lords committee seemed to fear that this may be so, as do many outside experts, in the RUSI and the LSE for instance.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Verma, pointed out, EU regimes account for about three-quarters of the sanctions that the UK currently implements. Boris Johnson, ever ready to exercise and declare his diplomatic skills, has argued that, outside the European Union, we will have more flexibility in our policy on sanctions and will no longer have to wait for the European Union to reach a consensus. In his perpetual search for ways of going it alone in splendid isolation, he seems unaware that the impact of 28 states jointly bringing their economic weight to bear on the targeted entities is likely to be rather more effective than the UK acting alone.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Verma, and the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, said, in his excellent contribution, all of which I agree with, if we leave the EU—that is not the phrase that the noble Baroness used—we might still wish to follow EU sanctions. Joint action would not only be more effective but—an important point—would protect British business suffering from the economic harm of acting alone. However, we would have no say in the design of such sanctions. There are often clear divisions between member states, and we would no longer be able to influence the resolution of disagreements in a way favourable to our interests. Furthermore, it is not only exclusion from the decisions of EU institutions that would deprive us of influence but also the absence of informal contacts at marginal meetings, which can be invaluable for finding out what proposals may be acceptable. That has not always been the case for the proposals put forward by our EU negotiators.
Sanctions are yet a further example of what Brexit would mean: losing control rather than taking it back.
Lord Risby (Con)
My Lords, first, I warmly thank my noble friend Lady Verma for introducing this discussion and so ably chairing our committee. I thank also the committee clerks, who did a magnificent job in bringing this report to fruition.
Whatever our view is of Brexit, all of us wish our country to have a standing in the world for a multiplicity of very good reasons. At the heart of that are our own important values. In the past few decades we have seen those values exported and, in varying degrees all over the world, actually adopted. That is largely due to our working in co-operation with like-minded countries. Overall, the adoption of more democratic values has been gratifyingly successful, but of course there remain countries that do not respect human rights or wish to undermine the advances towards greater democracy that we cherish, or that threaten peace and stability outside their borders.
Sanctions have been a most useful tool in reining in aggression and actually changing behaviour. At the moment, for example, we may see this process under way in the Korean peninsula—we certainly hope so. A more aggressive sanctions regime against Russia is perhaps partly why the recent missile attacks into Syria, and the appalling Skripal incident, have not resulted in some of the threatened retaliation from Russia. Targeted sanctions on individual Russians seem to be proving efficacious as we put into legislation anti-money laundering activities with a new sanctions policy in our country framework outside the EU. But during the course of our inquiry what emerged was the desirability—the absolute necessity—to find formulae for continuing to have the closest common position on sanctions with our European neighbours.
This country implements more than 30 sanctions regimes targeting both countries and violent and often fanatical groups within countries. The response may be asset freezes, travel bans, or financial or trade restrictions. It is clear that, with the experience of hindsight, while these punitive measures may arise from UN Security Council resolutions, many arise from decisions of the European Union as well. That is at the heart of what the committee’s report was all about. Apart from anything else, as we have heard already this morning, Russia has wielded its veto in the UN Security Council with no hesitation when it perceives that its own interests are being undermined. We know that, historically, it is a country that is hugely sensitive about defining and defending its own perceived interests.
What emerged in the comments of experts interviewed by the EU External Affairs Sub-Committee was a loud and clear message that the words “efficacious” and “cross-national co-ordination” were inextricably linked, and that successful multilateral action for the United Kingdom immeasurably enhanced our capacity and desire to achieve results. Indeed, the majority of UK sanctions are linked with EU sanctions as well.
I very much welcome the Government’s commitment to maintain the highest level of co-operation and co-ordination with the EU after we leave, not least because that puts us at an advantage in helping to align sanctions activity with other countries and most notably collectively with the United States, and because London remains pre-eminent—head and shoulders above in importance—over other European financial centres. In practice, it would be unlikely that we would wish to differ from EU decisions in sanctions policy even if we had no formal role, and particularly if the EU had been in direct contact with the United States—a pattern that is well developed—when drawing up a common sanctions position. So my question for my noble friend is, in building the Government’s intention to have a tailored Brexit arrangement, can he share the Government’s thoughts more explicitly on what that means? Will the Government suggest for the future a formal body to be constructed to deal with a sanctions matter? Indeed, when we enter the transitional period after finally leaving the EU, does my noble friend expect such a structure to be in place?
As a country, we have unique attributes much valued by other EU members, most notably our defence and intelligence capabilities. When the Prime Minister indicated that future co-operation in these areas would be unconditional, it was hugely appreciated.
We continue to have a remarkable global reach and much admired soft power, but the clock ticks on inexorably. In this most important area of our national life, our willingness to confront those who undertake unacceptable actions is greatly valued by EU members. Important decisions in our national interest need to be taken now. Integral to this, with our shared common values, is for us to start outlining the structures needed post Brexit to maintain those important links and deal with rogue states, targeting our like-minded European neighbours to work closely with us. We need to deal with these rogue states and individuals—criminal and terrorist—in a collective manner. I hope that my noble friend will be able to put more flesh on the bones of this endeavour, particularly in respect of sanctions in our mutual interest.
Lord Jay of Ewelme (CB)
My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Risby, with whom I entirely agree. I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Verma, and her committee on an excellent report on an extremely important subject.
I will start where the report ends and emphasise, as others have done, that sanctions are an important part of a wider foreign policy endeavour. They are essential in helping to fill that often difficult area on the foreign policy spectrum between doing nothing very much and going to war. However, sanctions are of little use on their own. They need to be combined with other foreign policy instruments: the appointment, or sometimes removal, of embassies and ambassadors; criticism of or expulsion from international organisations; and limited military activity. Proper co-ordination of those instruments is needed.
Equally, sanctions need to be properly targeted, as the recent debate on sanctions against Russia has shown. What is the most effective way to not just punish a country but attempt to change its policy? In Russia’s case, targeted sanctions against individuals—particularly those close to Putin—and their overseas assets would be far more effective than less focused sanctions. It follows that sanctions need to be as far as possible collective. The UK may be the fifth-largest or sixth-largest global economy—we are in a constant tussle with France, which I sometimes think has more to do with the fluctuating exchange rate than the real economy—but we can do little by imposing sanctions on our own. Sanctions are effective as part of an international effort, ideally through the UN, but if that is impossible—as is often the case, alas—through the European Union.
That is never straightforward, as I well remember from many often difficult negotiations over sanctions in the past. The UK’s interests, and in particular the potential effect of sanctions on the City of London, will not always coincide with the interests of other European Union member states, so compromise will always be needed. Even if they are imperfect, sanctions agreed by 28 states are a lot better than no sanctions or divided sanctions.
As others have said, the UK’s influence over the form that sanctions have taken up to now has been considerable and extremely important in ensuring an effective EU sanctions policy. That will present us with problems when we leave. We will not be part of the EU 27 mechanism that formulates EU sanctions—but if as a result we do not take part, those sanctions will be less effective and our foreign policy interests will suffer. Sir Alan Duncan put that point to the committee extremely well. I am not quite sure how his remarks are consistent with the quote from Boris Johnson, mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Taverne, but I will leave that aside for the moment. Paragraph 74 of the report states:
“Sir Alan Duncan said that, after leaving the EU, it was ‘inconceivable that we will not be a strong and important part of collective governments’ action on sanctions, be it through the UN, in which we are a major player, the P5 … or’”—
this is the important point—
“‘replicating what the EU does’”.
I welcome this, but let us reflect on “replicating what the EU does”. Therein lies the dilemma. Without our influence, the design of EU sanctions will be less to our liking, and replicating them will be more difficult and domestically contentious. The risk is that there will be divisions not only among government departments but between government departments and the private sector. I therefore hope that we will succeed in developing some form of formal or informal consultation mechanism on sanctions, as indeed on other foreign policy issues, at both official and ministerial level, with the EU after we leave. Like others who have spoken, and like the noble Baroness, Lady Verma, I would be very grateful if the Minister would confirm that that is indeed our intention and give us whatever evidence he can of how far he thinks we are likely to succeed in reaching that objective during the negotiations.
Whether we succeed or not—and I hope we will—we shall need to intensify bilateral contacts to compensate for our absence from formal EU consultative and decision-making fora. We should do so particularly with France as a fellow permanent member of the UN Security Council. As I well know, the foreign policy relationship with France is not always straightforward—we should remember Iraq or relations within NATO before France rejoined the integrated military structure. There may be differences ahead as France pushes, after our departure from the EU, for a more integrated EU foreign and security policy with a stronger defence element than we shall like. But I hope we will not let those differences get in the way of the close co-operation we shall need after Brexit on sanctions and wider foreign policy issues with France and, indeed, with the EU 27 as a whole. As the Prime Minister often says, we will remain a European country after Brexit—all one has to do is look at a map—and a close relationship with the EU 27 on all foreign and security policy issues, including sanctions, will be strongly in the interests of all of us.
Lord Tugendhat (Con)
My Lords, it gives me very great pleasure to speak in this debate on a report produced by the sub-committee of which I was chairman before my noble friend Lady Verma. I congratulate her and the members of the committee, and indeed the clerks, on the quality of the report that has been produced.
This debate is also taking place at a topical moment in the light of what is happening in Korea—events to which my noble friends Lord Horam and Lord Risby have already referred. What exactly has brought the North Koreans to the table? One cannot be sure, of course, but certainly United States strategic pressure on the one hand and Chinese economic pressure on the other have played a significant role. According to Reuters, in January China exported virtually no oil products to North Korea and imported no iron ore, coal or lead. This is an encouraging example of how effective sanctions can be. Of course, China is not the only contributor, but it was by far the most important one in bringing pressure to bear.
By virtue of its dependence on China, North Korea is, of course, an unusually simple case. I very much agree with the following in the Government’s reply to the report:
“sanctions regimes are more effective when they are implemented by a broad range of countries”,
in support of a strategic policy than when they are conducted by a single country or small group of countries.
At this point, it becomes clear how much damage is done to the European Union as a result of Brexit. I am reminded of an inter-parliamentary gathering I attended when I was chairman of the sub-committee. A member of some other Parliament—I cannot remember which—asked the representative of Mrs Mogherini whether it would not much easier to reach decisions if Britain were to leave the European Union. The representative replied, “Yes, it probably would be much easier to reach decisions—and they would be worth much less”. She pointed out how weakened the European Union would be without Britain’s global reach and without the other assets referred to in this debate, of which the City of London in this context is an important one.
As the noble Lord, Lord Taverne, and others have pointed out, Britain, too, will be weakened. The Government’s reply suggests that the United Kingdom’s influence on international sanctions policy derives only partly from our current EU membership and points to our membership of the Security Council, but, as my noble friend Lady Verma and other noble Lords have pointed out, that is somewhat disingenuous: we all know how difficult it is to organise effective policies of this kind through the United Nations because of the Russian and Chinese vetoes. It is in the EU that we have played our most effective role, and it is within the EU that we will be most missed.
The report and the reply therefore dwell, as other noble Lords have done, on the need as far as possible to continue close co-operation with our EU friends, which is in their interest—indeed, more so—as well as ours. However, it will not be easy. Clausewitz is reputed to have said that war is simply a continuation of political influence with the addition of other means. If that is true of war, it is certainly true of sanctions. Sanctions emerge from discussions on common foreign and security policy, from which a common purpose or a coalition of the willing begins to take shape. If our influence and the value of our contribution are to be maintained, we have to be part of the initial discussions and not simply come in when the broad lines of a policy have been set. I make this point because, to be effective, not only do sanctions need to be implemented by a broad range of countries but their burden needs to be shared as fairly as possible among the participants. If the burden of the sanctions is not fairly shared, it is unlikely that they will be fully implemented. If we are not a part of the initial deliberations, EU policies will inevitably begin to take shape without taking our views sufficiently into account. That does not mean that a joint policy cannot be formulated, but it does mean that time will be wasted in achieving that joint policy.
Regardless of our particular issues in the European Union, though certainly including them, financial measures are likely to play an increasingly important part in sanctions regimes in the future. That is, of course, because they can be targeted not only on states but on individuals, and because, in the nature of the modern economy, so much international trade is financed through operations in New York and, to a lesser extent, London. Therefore, the role of the financial sector in implementing sanctions will be increasingly important, which is why Brexit is so damaging to the European Union in this respect. If sanctions are going to rely increasingly on the financial sector, this will raise very considerable problems for the United Kingdom. It is going to be very difficult for us to ensure that, in imposing sanctions, we are not imposing restrictions on the way our markets work or putting ourselves at a disadvantage in coming to agreement on joint policies with other people. I do not have an answer to that; I just raise the point that I think financial measures will be more important, and this adds to the difficulties in formulating effective regimes in the circumstances that will apply after Brexit has taken effect.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)
My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Tugendhat, particularly his last point. I also very much agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Jay, said. It will come as a huge surprise to the House, I should think, that he and I agree—he is coming on quite nicely. My worry is that we ourselves, as far as I know, have not yet put forward any proposal to our European Union partners in this area. The noble Lord, Lord Jay, ended by asking the Minister to flesh out the tailored arrangement that Sir Alan Duncan had in mind. All we get in the report is that the Government’s ambition is for an “unprecedented” level of co-operation, which is an “untested” approach. That seems to me a slightly tautologous statement: if it is unprecedented, probably it is a little bit untested.
The report goes on to say:
“If participation in the Common Foreign and Security Policy after Brexit is not possible—or not sought by the UK”—
well, participation in the common foreign and security policy will not be possible after Brexit: the CFSP is for members of the European Union—
“then the Government should propose that a political forum be established between the UK and the EU, for regular discussion and co-ordination of sanctions policy”.
I entirely agree. It sounds very mechanistic, but you need to have a structure, with regular meetings. We will not be in the room, having a voice in the decision taken on sanctions in the European Union, but we need to have the room next door. We need to be there regularly, the day before they decide or the morning of the day they are going to decide, able to influence the decision they take. Putting forward a proposal for that kind of consultative architecture would be well worth doing in itself, for the reasons I have just given. It would also be extremely helpful to the atmosphere of the ongoing negotiation with the European Union.
Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Taverne, reminded us that it is election day, and I must admit that it is one of those rare occasions when I was rather hoping there would be more Lib Dem Peers in here than there are.
Moving on from that, I too thank the noble Baroness for her introduction, and all her colleagues for what is an excellent and timely report. It is timely because we have seen, down the other end, consideration of the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill. Many of the contributions made today were made at Second Reading of that Bill, because it is critical: sanctions are not made in isolation of our foreign policy; they have to be an integral part of it. Of course, without the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill we would not be able to fulfil even our most basic international obligations as a member of the United Nations. We know, as we have heard in this debate, that most of the sanctions we have been considering come through EU regulations.
The other point is that the Bill will return to this House in a week or so. One thing I have been pleased to see—and noble Lords have alluded to this—is that when MPs are actually given the opportunity to consider Bills freely, they often make the most progressive and right choices. We have seen that with the sanctions Bill, so I hope that we will not have to consider too much when the Bill comes back.
Everyone accepts the need for co-operation to ensure sanctions are effective. In isolation, sanctions simply do not work: they are gesture politics; they might ease the consciences of some people, but we adopt sanctions for a specific purpose, as the noble Lord, Lord Horam, alluded to. For non-UN sanctions, what we are discussing is how the Government ensure not just that UK-EU co-operation continues after Brexit but that we maintain the ability to shape decisions on EU sanctions in terms of when and how they are imposed—the noble Lord, Lord Tugendhat, is absolutely right on that. But this is not just about when and how sanctions are imposed, it is also about how the burden is shared and how we create greater co-operation.
The EU Committee has rightly pointed out that participation in the EU sanctions regime has helped the UK to achieve its foreign policy and national security goals. As my noble friend Lord Anderson said, EU sanctions have sent powerful signals to such states as Russia and leveraged the bloc’s considerable economic weight to change countries’ behaviour—noble Lords have referred to Iran in this context.
As to the future, we have the Government’s declared intention to continue to work closely with the EU and other international partners on sanctions post Brexit. As we have heard, the report examined a number of options as to how this might be achieved, including the UK aligning itself with the EU sanctions regime. Noble Lords have alluded to the fact that Norway and Switzerland have done this but that, in doing so, we would lose the ability to shape the sanctions. As the noble Baroness said, informal engagement with the EU on sanctions is no substitute for the influence that can be exercised through formal inclusion in EU meetings. The noble Baroness also said that the extent to which the UK and the EU co-operate on sanctions will depend on their future relationship in the wider foreign policy area. I agree with the report that this is an area that needs urgent consideration.
In her speech at the Munich security conference, Theresa May argued for a partnership,
“which offers the UK and the EU the means and choice to combine our efforts to the greatest effect”.
On sanctions, she suggests that we should be open to doing this through EU mechanisms, but in doing so, she said that,
“the UK must be able to play an appropriate role in shaping our collective actions in these areas”.
Every noble Lord has said that today: what we are concerned about is the Government’s response, which says this can be done through regular dialogue, specific co-operation, close consultation on policy issues, et cetera.
As the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, said, what we have not heard about from the Government are the precise mechanisms allowing these discussions and the co-ordination of sanctions policies to take place. When will we hear the detailed plans for effective co-operation? As the Minister said many times during the passage of the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill, I suspect these items are subject to negotiations—what we want to know is what the Government’s objectives are: what do they hope to get out of these negotiations? It is simply not good enough to be so vague. If the parties in the negotiations do not know what you are asking for, how will they reach a sensible conclusion?
That is the simple point made by the report, and what I hope we will hear from the Minister today. I ask him to tell us what the Government hope to achieve and what the mechanisms are that will ensure that we have proper co-ordination in the future on sanctions and foreign policy.
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon) (Con)
My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have participated in this important debate, particularly my noble friend Lady Verma for tabling it. I pay tribute to her long-standing commitment to these issues. That is not just in her capacity as chair of the EU External Affairs Sub-Committee as, on a personal note, I assure your Lordships that, over the different roles of my ministerial career, if my noble friend has had something to tell me I know about it very quickly. I appreciate her candid and honest advice at all times.
I thank all noble Lords for their expert insight into the debate. When I stand up to respond to a debate on any respect of the European Union I am reminded of the words of my noble friend Lord Howard on my introduction to this House back in 2011. He said, “Tariq, I have not been in this House that long myself, but one piece of advice I can offer you is, before you say anything about a subject, bear in mind that someone around you has probably written a book about it”. That applies to the debates we have on the European Union. I am delighted to thank all members of the sub-committee for the report and their contributions today and to respond on behalf of the Government. The phrase “flesh on the bones” has been used a number of times and I hope I can provide some build-up beyond the structure we have talked about thus far.
In response to this wide-ranging debate, I will set out where the sanctions fit within our vision of a post-Brexit foreign policy and explain how we see our future sanctions policy operating. I was delighted to learn that the noble Lord, Lord Collins, has been paying such attention to my right honourable friend the Prime Minister’s speeches. I will pass that comment on to her at the earliest opportunity. It is very welcome; I know him well. He also mentioned the sanctions Bill and said that on a number of occasions I had said that of course it was subject to negotiations. He will also remember that through the passage of the Bill in this House I consistently said that the Government were listening. I hope that reflects the sentiments of the other place as well. Indeed, my colleague Sir Alan Duncan has been quoted on a number of occasions.
I assure noble Lords that as we leave the European Union we intend to pursue an independent and ambitious global foreign policy—one focused on security, prosperity and influence for the whole United Kingdom, by actively promoting and defending our interests and values. My noble friends Lady Verma and Lord Risby both talked about the values. I assure all noble Lords that we take our international responsibilities seriously and will remain an authoritative and influential player on global issues. The noble Lord, Lord Horam, among others, listed some of the areas in which the United Kingdom continues to be an important influence. Indeed, yesterday we were pleased to host at the Foreign Office and the IMO the hierarchy of the United Nations, which reflects the positive nature of the engagement we have with that organisation. Indeed, Secretary-General Guterres was complimentary and positive about the UK’s continued contributions on the world stage. When you include NATO, the G7, the G20, the OSCE and the Commonwealth—I cannot miss an opportunity to mention the Commonwealth—you see the global influence of the UK.
A point that is often raised about British foreign policy is our assets—our places on the ground, our diplomatic posts. I am sure your Lordships followed the announcements that my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary made during CHOGM. One alluded to the opening of nine new diplomatic posts across the Commonwealth family. The noble Lord, Lord Jay, talked about how we may be the fifth or sixth-largest economy. Sometimes in our friendly rivalry with our French friends we ask who has the most posts; I believe that on the last count we are now one ahead but I am sure that our French friends are watching that closely. But as noble Lords have acknowledged, we are a major country economically, diplomatically and on issues of defence.
Several noble Lords referred to the City of London as a part of our soft power. I believe that my noble friend Lord Horam referred to the importance of the City of London as a financial centre. As someone who spent 20 years in it before joining the Government, I assure your Lordships that it is important that we keep the global nature of the City of London open.
On the issues concerning the Foreign Office itself, the 2015 spending review protected the FCO’s budget for this year and, as I said, we continue to open new posts. Let me also assure noble Lords that we are working to develop and strengthen our bilateral relationships with our key partners, both in Europe and globally, to maintain and expand our international influence. The noble Lord, Lord Jay, talked about the importance of France and I am sure that he observed with real positivity the exchanges that we had during the Anglo-French summit. Of course, that summit covered a range of issues: not just security and defence but important issues such as technology, the challenges across cybersecurity and development. That shows the importance of our European Union partners, but not just in the context of the European Union. Poland is another country with which we have recently had a very positive, high-level exchange. This demonstrates the importance of the bilateral relationships between the United Kingdom and those respective countries.
As the Prime Minister set out in her Munich speech in February, the United Kingdom continues to seek a deep and special partnership with the EU, so that we can continue to co-operate on security and foreign policy and go further to meet new threats. We saw that solidarity in the strength of the response after the nerve agent attack in Salisbury, and saw how important this co-operation continues to be. Yes, this co-operation must extend within the context of the European Union but also go beyond it, as it does now, because we know that the wider the range of countries implementing a sanctions regime, the more effective that regime will be. This was a point made by many noble Lords during the debate. I assure your Lordships that we will work hard to get the broadest possible agreement for any measures we propose, starting with our position as a permanent member of the UN Security Council.
After we leave the European Union, I can assure the House that our approach will be one of co-operation. Sanctions will continue to be, by their nature, a multilateral tool and we will continue to seek to impose them in co-ordination with others. If I may turn to working directly with the European Union and a point raised by my noble friend Lady Verma in her introductory remarks, until we leave the EU we remain committed to our rights and responsibilities as an EU member state. This includes continuing our proactive approach on sanctions, in pursuit of our security and foreign policy objectives.
I can also assure noble Lords that, after we leave, we will continue to work with our EU partners to maintain our collective peace and security. As noble Lords have all acknowledged, sanctions will be a powerful tool in that effort. As my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary told the House of Commons at the Second Reading of the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill, he hopes that we will “act in tandem” with the EU on sanctions, where possible, because we,
“will always confront the same threats and defend the same values”.—[Official Report, Commons, 20/2/18; col. 78.]
If I may turn to the specific questions, first, my noble friend Lady Verma and the noble Lord, Lord Jay, raised the option of aligning with sanctions regimes agreed by the EU 27. This would be along the lines of, or in a similar fashion to, the likes of Norway or Switzerland, which implement UN sanctions and have the powers to implement autonomous national sanctions. We understand that Norway and Switzerland rarely, if ever, implement unilateral sanctions and instead choose to align with EU sanctions, with limited input on decisions. As such, we are not seeking this option as part of our future relationship with the EU. We have been clear that when we leave the European Union, we will seek to impose our own autonomous sanctions.
As the Foreign Secretary told the House of Commons at Second Reading of the Bill, we will be able to concert our measures with the EU if there is a shared position, but by leaving the European Union we will be able to act independently or alongside other allies if there is no agreement within the European Union. The sanctions Bill will give us the powers to do so. This differing framework means that in the long term, any co-ordination with the EU on sanctions would be political, rather than the legal alignment we have now.
Given our independent foreign policy and our sanctions expertise, it would be inappropriate in the long run for us to adopt EU sanctions automatically, without any input into decisions or the flexibility to choose our own approach. I assure noble Lords that as part of our future relationship we are seeking an arrangement that appropriately reflects this.
Turning to some of the specific questions, my noble friend asked about aspirations for sanctions co-operation after Brexit and the model of sanctions co-operation based on two-way exchange, and my noble friend Lord Risby and the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, referred to the proposal for a UK-EU political forum. My noble friend Lady Verma asked for a detailed explanation of the Government’s aspirations for sanctions after Brexit. I assure my noble friend that, as we have said before, including in our reply to the committee’s report, we envisage a model of UK-EU sanctions co-operation based on two-way exchanges of analysis and information. This is still our vision. When we look at some of our international security co-operations, the Five Eyes co-operation comes to mind immediately. It demonstrates how like-minded countries acting on common values can come together to act in the common shared security interest.
Given our shared interests and values, the importance of multilateralism in this area, and the UK’s expertise, it is in both the UK’s and the EU’s interests to be able to discuss sanctions in the future. Any mechanism to do so should respect both the EU’s decision-making autonomy and the UK’s sovereignty, and, through the exchange of analysis and information, will allow us to combine our efforts on sanctions to the greatest effect.
The committee recommended that the Government should propose a regular political forum with the EU to discuss and co-ordinate sanctions policy. My noble friends Lady Verma and Lord Horam asked me to comment on this specifically. A forum such as this is one way in which this close co-operation could be put into practice, but there is a range of forms this could take. I assure noble Lords, and my noble friends in particular, that we have now moved into the next phase of negotiations with the EU where we are discussing our future relationship on a wide range of issues, including foreign policy and sanctions. I am sure noble Lords will respect the fact that it would be inappropriate for me to go into too much detail at this point, as these are discussions that will be had with our European partners, but we are starting from a position where both sides have agreed close engagement through both formal and informal mechanisms.
My noble friend also asked about our intent. The European Council’s guidelines for our future relationship give us good reason to believe that the EU is also committed to progress on an arrangement of this kind. The guidelines state that there should be “strong EU-UK co-operation” in our security, defence and foreign policy and they foresee,
“appropriate dialogue, consultation, exchange of information, and cooperation mechanisms”.
This mutual agreement on the benefits of close co-operation is welcome and, during the upcoming negotiations, we will be working towards achieving this in practice.
Several noble Lords, including the noble Lords, Lord Taverne and Lord Anderson, spoke about loss of influence and expressed concern that our influence on sanctions will be diminished as we leave the EU. I disagree with this assessment. I have already alluded to the strength of the UK’s position in different fora and our representation in different international bodies but when it comes to sanctions, it is clearly in the interests of our international partners to continue to co-operate across jurisdictions, for the EU to co-operate with us and for us to co-operate with the EU.
With regard to the EU specifically, we know from its negotiating guidelines that I have just alluded to that it wants to maintain close links with us on foreign and security policy, of which sanctions remain an integral part.
Lord Hunt of Chesterton (Lab)
The Minister has talked a couple of times about maintaining a lead. The fact is that in leaving the EU we are seriously losing our position in some of these important high-technology defence matters; the Times yesterday was referring to the Galileo programme. These are very serious changes that are taking place. Is he really saying that we are going to be stronger as a result of our likely measures?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
The noble Lord is right to raise the issue of technology. A direct response to that is that when you look at some of the issues, specifically on security, cyber security perhaps poses one of the biggest challenges that we are now confronting. The National Cyber Security Centre, which is just up the road in Victoria, again demonstrates UK expertise and insight.
I assure the noble Lord that in leaving the EU we have been able to further strengthen our work not only in the European context but internationally. Indeed, during the Commonwealth summit we announced an additional £15 million in support of cybersecurity assessments for various Commonwealth states. The noble Lord shakes his head but I do not agree with him. The position that we are setting out during the Brexit negotiations is one of co-operation and working together where our needs align with the EU, but at the same time looking at the broader world, the global challenges that we are facing and our position through the different international bodies that I have alluded to. On the question of technology, if the noble Lord has not yet visited the National Cyber Security Centre then perhaps he should, and he will see that it is a world-class outfit that again demonstrates British leadership on what I agree is an important issue.
I assure noble Lords that we have a long-established reputation for playing our part in developing strong, credible and lawful EU sanctions, and we have a range of assets that will continue to make us an attractive partner for the EU on sanctions policy. This includes the strong public and private sector expertise, with significant resources devoted to sanctions across government—again, I refer to the City of London—as well as a world-class legal system and well-respected think tanks. These are all important assets that we have.
As I mentioned earlier, our influence on international sanctions is not limited to our role at the EU. Roughly half the sanctions regimes currently in force contain UN Security Council measures. We are a permanent member of this important body and will continue to play a leading role in developing global sanctions. Given this, we believe we will remain one of the leading sanctions players after we leave the EU.
My noble friends Lady Verma and Lord Risby referred to the important issue of the implementation period. As I have said, we envisage close co-ordination with the EU on sanctions as part of our future relationship with the EU. The Prime Minister has already mentioned this specifically in her Munich speech. The details of the mechanisms to enable co-operation during the implementation period are still very much subject to negotiations but I assure noble Lords that we will seek a co-ordinated approach on sanctions before decisions are made.
My noble friend asked, as did the noble Lord, Lord Taverne, about the issue of the UK/EU relationship on common foreign and security policy. At the March European Council the UK agreed arrangements with the EU for how common foreign and security policy would work during the implementation period. This included an agreement covering our future relationship on the CFSP, and the CSDP would come into effect during the implementation period. The UK hopes to begin discussions on our future relationship very soon.
I shall refer also to the sanctions Bill. When we leave the EU, we will of course need powers to design and implement the UK autonomous sanctions regime. The committee referred in its report to the framework contained in the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill, which many noble Lords are familiar with; the noble Lord, Lord Collins, talked about that quite specifically. The report raised the concern that the Bill, along with the future economic arrangements between the UK and the EU, could limit the extent to which sanctions co-operation could be put into practice. As noble Lords will be aware, the Bill completed Report and Third Reading in the other place on Tuesday and will return to this House in due course for the consideration of amendments here. Changes have been made to it, and those amendments include making clear that sanctions regulations can be imposed for the purpose of preventing or providing accountability for gross human rights abuses, a point made very well by the noble Lord, Lord Anderson. As the Minister for Human Rights, let me assure him that that is an important addition and recognition which will allow the UK to act against those responsible for serious human rights abuses or violations worldwide. They also include important powers to enforce sanctions on board ships outside UK territorial waters, to strengthen our efforts to counter the transportation of dangerous and harmful goods and technology and the ability to create criminal offences for breaches of sanctions regulations, subject to statutory mechanisms controlling the use of that power.
As the Bill stands, we are confident that it will not limit appropriate co-ordination with international partners. It was drafted for flexibility. I again commend the positive way in which the Bill progressed through your Lordships’ House. It was drafted to ensure that we can continue to impose sanctions currently implemented through EU law, and that has been improved through the helpful scrutiny of both this House and the other place. If the key provisions of the Bill remain in their current form, we are confident that we can use this framework to co-ordinate effectively with our partners and remain a leader in responsible and smart sanctions policy.
The noble Lord, Lord Anderson, among others, mentioned the sanctions on Russia and the nature of Russia. As we have seen, they are having an effect on Russian policy. Many noble Lords, including my noble friend Lord Horam, mentioned Iran. Most of the financial and economic sanctions against Iran were indeed lifted following the International Atomic Energy Agency’s verification. There are now far fewer sanctions in place, easing previous restrictions on trade with Iran, and we are clear that the JCPOA is in the UK’s national security interest, that it is working and that we remain committed to it.
My noble friend Lord Tugendhat also raised the issue of the DPRK. Our latest sanctions on the DPRK build on the tough measures that the UN has passed over the past year. They target significant income streams used by the DPRK to fund both nuclear and ballistic missile programmes. I heard the sentiment of noble Lords across the House: with the challenges that we sometimes have on the world stage, there is a glimmer of hope through the recent meeting of the two Koreas. We hope that those talks, and those with America—the US—progress well.
My noble friend Lord Horam also mentioned transparency, and he was right to raise the issue of London property. Returning to the sanctions Bill, as he may recall, my noble friend Lord Faulks introduced an amendment and the Government gave a commitment to bring forward a Bill making provision for a UK register containing details of the overseas companies which own property in the UK. We anticipate doing so early in the next parliamentary Session and, as we committed, establishing that register by 2021.
To sum up, the Government are deeply grateful for the EU External Affairs Sub-Committee’s report and believe it to be a valuable tool and contribution to the important debate on the UK’s future relationship with the European Union and future foreign policy in general. We are confident that the UK will remain a leading international player on sanctions after we leave the European Union. Let me assure noble Lords that we will continue to work closely on this vital area with our partners in Europe and across the world to advance our foreign policy and national security interests.
Finally, the report has provided some very useful tools and points of discussion, which I assure your Lordships that the Government continue to consider very carefully. I am once again very grateful to all noble Lords who have contributed to this important debate and assure noble Lords that, as we work through the policy, particularly in this important area of sanctions, we have listened. It is important to get this right and, in this respect, I always welcome both the wisdom and, at times, the wit of your Lordships’ House in ensuring that the Government can work progressively and in co-operation to ensure that the sanctions policy and regime we have in place after we leave the European Union is one that works for everyone.
Baroness Verma
My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for their very thoughtful and measured contributions. There was a common theme from across the House. I think we were expecting the response from the Minister that we got. While I appreciate that he tried very hard to respond to our questions, I was not really satisfied. I feel that we are still where we were—waiting for a response from the Government to see where we next journey once we exit the European Union and what that structure will look like. I hope that my noble friend will urge colleagues to take this on board. It is important that we do not fall out of the strongly influential position we hold or out of the great friendships with our European partners.
I remind my noble friend, who said that we will continue to build strong relationships with the Commonwealth and the UN, that we are members of those organisations already, as we are of the EU. I strongly hope that we can build better and closer relationships, particularly with the Commonwealth, but we need to make sure in building those relationships that we do not forget we have a relationship already in existence. This relationship works to make sure that countries not behaving in a way that is acceptable to all of us have sanctions put in place against them. That is often done by a very strong collective voice.
Our committee worked really hard to ensure that we were of assistance to the Government in looking at areas such as these, which have not have great debate but which are crucial not just for the City of London but for all of the UK and our partners in Europe. I hope very much that the Government will look very closely at what we are asking from this debate today. From across the House, there was a common theme—I do not think it was party political—which was our fear of not being able to be the great influencer at the table, and we urge the Government to take note.
I will also say to people who listen to debates in the House of Lords and comment on our suitability to be present, that this is why this House is so great. It looks at issues such as this in great detail to ensure that we have debates on crucial matters that impact not just on us here in the UK but on many people across the globe. On that note, I beg to move.
Breast Cancer Screening
(6 years, 7 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Lord O'Shaughnessy) (Con)
My Lords, with the permission of the House, I will repeat the Statement made yesterday by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care on breast cancer screening. The Statement is as follows:
“I wish to inform the House of a serious failure that has come to light in the national breast screening programme in England. The NHS breast screening programme is overseen by Public Health England and is one of the most comprehensive in the world. It screens 2 million people every year, with women between the ages of 50 and 70 receiving a screen every three years up to their 71st birthday. However, earlier this year PHE analysis of trial data from the service found that there was a computer algorithm failure dating back to 2009. The latest estimate I have received from PHE is that as a result of this between 2009 and the start of 2018 an estimated 450,000 women aged between 68 and 71 were not invited to their final breast screening.
At this stage it is unclear whether any delay in diagnosis will have resulted in any avoidable harm or death, and that is one of the reasons I am ordering an independent review to establish the clinical impact. Our current best estimate—which comes with caveats as it is based on statistical modelling rather than patient reviews and because there is currently no clinical consensus about the benefits of screening for this age group—is that there may be between 135 and 270 women who have had their lives shortened as a result. I am advised that it is unlikely to be more than this range and may be considerably less. However, tragically, there are likely to be some people in this group who would be alive today if the failure had not happened.
The issue came to light because an upgrade to the breast screening invitation IT system provided improved data to local services on the actual ages of the women receiving screening invitations. This highlighted that some women on the AgeX trial, set up to examine whether women up to the age of 73 could benefit from screening, were not receiving an invitation to their final screen as a 70 year-old. Further analysis of the data quantified the problem and found a number of linked causes, including issues with the system’s IT and how age parameters are programmed into it. The investigation also found variations in how local services send out invitations to women in different parts of the country.
The existence of a potential issue was brought to the attention of the Department of Health and Social Care by Public Health England in January, although at that stage its advice was that the risk to patients was limited. Following that, an urgent clinical evaluation took place to determine the extent of harm and the remedial measures necessary. Public Health England escalated the matter to Ministers in March, with clear clinical advice that the matter should not be made public. This was to ensure that a plan could be put in place that ensured any remedies did not overwhelm the existing screening programme and was able to offer proper support for affected patients.
I am now taking the earliest opportunity to update the House on all the remedial measures that have been put in place, which are as follows. First, urgent remedial work to stop the failure continuing has now been completed according to the chief executive of Public Health England. This was finished by 1 April and PHE is clear that the issue is not now affecting any women going forward. Of the estimated 450,000 women who missed invitations to a scan, 309,000 are estimated to be still alive. Our intention is to contact all those living within the United Kingdom who are registered with a GP before the end of May, with the first 65,000 letters going out this week. Following independent expert clinical advice, the letters will inform all those under 72 years old that they will automatically be sent an invitation to a catch-up screening. Those aged 72 and over will be given access to a helpline through which they can get clinical advice to help them decide whether or not a screening is appropriate for their particular situation. This is because, for older women, there is significant risk that screening will pick up non-threatening cancers that may lead to unnecessary and harmful tests and treatment. However, this is an individual choice and, in all cases, the wishes of the patients affected will be followed. By sending all the letters to UK residents registered with a GP by the end of May, we hope to reassure anyone who does not receive a letter this month that they are not likely to have been affected.
It is a major priority to do our very best to make sure that the additional scans do not cause any delays in the regular breast screening programme for those under 71, so NHS England has taken major steps to expand the capacity of screening services, and has today confirmed that all women affected who wish to be screened will receive an appointment within the next six months. Of course, we intend the vast majority to be much sooner than that.
We have held helpful discussions with the devolved Administrations to alert them to the issue. Scotland uses a different IT system, and while the systems in Wales and Northern Ireland are similar, neither believes that they are affected. However, we are discussing with them the best way to reach women who have moved to another part of the UK during this period. This is, obviously, more complicated, but we are confident that all those affected will be contacted by the end of May.
In addition, and as soon as possible, we will make our best endeavours to contact the appropriate next of kin of those whom we believe missed a scan and have subsequently died of breast cancer. As well as apologising to the families affected, we would wish to offer any further advice that they might find helpful, including the process by which we can establish whether the missed scan is a likely cause of death and compensation is therefore payable. We recognise that this will be incredibly distressing for some families and we will approach the issue as sensitively as possible.
Irrespective of when the incident started, the fact is that for many years oversight of our screening programme has not been good enough. Many families will be deeply disturbed by these revelations, not least because there will be some people who receive a letter having had a recent diagnosis of breast cancer. We must also recognise that there may be some who receive a letter having had a recent terminal diagnosis. For them and others, it is incredibly upsetting to know that you did not receive an invitation for screening at the correct time, and totally devastating to hear you may have lost or be about to lose a loved one because of administrative incompetence. So on behalf of the Government, Public Health England and the NHS, I apologise wholeheartedly and unreservedly for the suffering caused.
But words alone are not enough. We also need to get to the bottom of precisely how many people were affected, why it actually happened and, most importantly, how we can prevent it ever happening again. Many in this House will also have legitimate questions that need answering: why did the algorithm failure occur in the first place and how can we guarantee it does not happen again? Why did quality assurance processes not pick up the problem over a decade or more? Were there any warnings—written or otherwise—that should have been heeded earlier? Was the issue escalated to Ministers at the appropriate time? What are the broader patient safety lessons for screening IT systems?
I am therefore commissioning an independent review of the NHS breast screening programme to look at these and other issues, including its processes, IT systems and further changes and improvements that can be made to the system to minimise the risk of any repetition of this incident. The review will be chaired by Lynda Thomas, chief executive of Macmillan Cancer Support, and Professor Martin Gore, consultant medical oncologist and professor of cancer medicine at the Royal Marsden, and is expected to report in six months.
The NHS has made huge progress under Governments of both sides of this House in improving cancer survival rates, which are now at their highest ever. Some 7,000 people are alive today who would not have been if mortality rates had remained unchanged from 2010. But this progress makes system failures even more heartbreaking when they happen. Today, everyone in this House will be thinking of families up and down the country worried they may have been affected by this failure. We cannot give all the answers today, but we can commit to take all the necessary steps to give people the information they need as quickly as possible. Most of all, we want to be able to promise that this will not happen again. So, today, the whole House will be united in our resolve to be transparent about what went wrong and to take the necessary actions to learn from the mistakes made.
I commend this Statement to the House”.
Baroness Thornton (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for repeating that Statement and say to him that, along with millions of other people in this country, I am looking at my older relatives and wondering if any of them were caught by this. I do not think I am alone in that. As a woman of my age, it is important to say that we absolutely depend on the screening process to take care of us, to be invited for the smears and breast cancer screening and to be warned and told. So this is a massive public health failure—I think that we would all agree about that.
The noble Lord is quite right: there are a great many questions that he has mentioned that need to be answered. I appreciate his candour in questioning why this problem was not picked up, because eight years is a long time for an error of this magnitude to go undetected. Did the department receive any warnings in that time? Is there any record of how many women raised concerns that they had not received the appropriate screening? Were there any opportunities to change this mistake that were missed? We on these Benches indeed welcome the establishment of a national inquiry. Will the inquiry be hosted and staffed by the Department of Health or by another department? In the interests of transparency, I hope that Public Health England’s analysis from this year will be put in the Library, so that we can see what was identified as the problem with the algorithm. The noble Lord says that NHS England will take steps to expand capacity of screening services. Can he say a little more about that? Where are those extra resources going to be found and how will they provide extra screening?
The reason that this is so terrible in many ways is that we all know that the screening rates were falling; we have known that for years. The proportion of women aged between 50 and 70 taking up routine breast screening invitations fell to 71% in 2016-17; in London, I understand it is about 64%, so this is very serious indeed. In a way, I hope that the inquiry will address how we can make sure that those warnings are heeded and will allow questioning to take place of the whole process, which should be escalated to the right level in the Department of Health. There is an enormously wide range of variation in screening rates, which I hope the inquiry will also address. It seems that the fact that there is such a wide variation is also connected with things such as kit and staff—yesterday we were discussing the understaffing at various levels in the National Health Service. So beyond the problems identified by the Minister today, what more are the Government doing to make sure that screening rates rise again so that cancer care for patients is the best it can possibly be?
We are all concerned—this has cast a shadow that will bring fear and anxiety to millions of people. I know that all Members on all sides of the House who want to see cancer prevented will see this as an issue which we will all join in helping to resolve.
Baroness Maddock (LD)
My Lords, I am sure that all of us in this House are considerably concerned about those older women who at the moment are suffering acute anxiety because of what happened, and not only them but their families. It would appear that this was a software error. As I understand it, the same situation has not occurred in Wales, although the health service there appears to be on the same system. Can the Minister tell us a little more about that?
The Minister said that past notes will be looked at. How long does it take to get notes from the archive? Not all notes are held with GPs, and hospitals sometimes archive historic records. Are there enough current NHS staff to look at this, or will we need to take on new staff? That leads me on to another point about speed being of the essence. Depending on the uptake, as has already been alluded to, there may be a need to get women in this cohort X-rayed quickly and at scale. I know that we have had a shortage of radiologists; do we have enough to meet this need?
There is a wider issue, already referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, of the lowering of the take-up rate. One thing that has come to my notice because of where I live and from talking to other people, is that if you happen to be unable to take up the appointment in the travelling van that comes round, you are often referred to a hospital. Sometimes that works and sometimes it does not—it can be a long way to go. However, when one of my colleagues asked whether she could have it done when she was here in London and have the X-ray emailed to her, she was told that that was not possible. Can the Minister look at that? While on technology, perhaps the problem of not detecting this is connected with the fact that we have become so reliant on technology that we think it is looking after things and so people do not personally ask the questions they need to.
I hope that the Minister will give us a bit more information about other steps that the Government are taking to try to help improve the take-up rate of screening. Unfortunately, this episode will cause some people to lose faith in the system, and we need to do something about that. Can he also say what his department will do to raise awareness, particularly among women over 70, so that they can continue to be checked?
I hope that the House will indulge me if I take this opportunity to thank those in the health service who have served me with my breast cancer. I may or may not have been one of these people; I self-referred when I was 70 because I had been through the screening process and had been looking out for signs that I had been warned of, so that is one very good thing. I had excellent service at the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle, which has been rated as outstanding after an inspection, and I was fortunate enough to be able to have chemotherapy down the road in my local hospital in Berwick. The two nurses who run that are absolutely fantastic. So I am very fortunate, and I know that that is what happens in my part of the country. I therefore thank the National Health Service for helping me, and I look forward to hearing from the Minister.
Lord O'Shaughnessy
First, if I may, I express my thanks to the noble Baronesses, Lady Thornton and Lady Maddock, for their constructive questions and the offer of working together to make sure that we get to the bottom of the situation and put it right. I also thank the noble Baroness, Lady Maddock, for sharing her own experiences with us. I am glad that she got good care, as, of course, the vast majority of people do, and we are indebted to the NHS staff who provide it. She made an incredibly important point about self-referral. One thing we must emphasise throughout this is that screening is one part of a much broader programme for spotting cancer early, and women’s awareness of their own body is absolutely at the front line of those efforts.
I want to add my own apology to those of my right honourable friend and the Government to the women affected, and to express my personal sympathies to them and to their families.
The noble Baronesses asked excellent questions and I will attempt to answer all of them. Key questions included early warnings, whether public concerns were expressed but not picked up on, and whether technology could have looked for trends in uptake in this age group—an example of technology coming to our help rather than being a problem. These are all very good questions that must be and will be the focus of the review. The review will, I am sure, also look at issues around variation. There are attempts to address falling screening rates, including national information campaigns, but whether or not those are adequate is a reasonable question given what we know about uptake.
The noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, asked specific questions about the analysis from Public Health England on the flaw in the algorithm. Indeed, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State committed to sharing that yesterday, which we will do. Since finding out about this problem, we have been in close conversation with NHS England to make sure that there will be additional resources, such that all women can be seen within six months for an extra screening if they want one. The vast majority would be seen much sooner than that and in a way that does not interrupt the normal screening programme, which is critical. The department and NHS England will provide additional resource to make that happen, including using temporary independent sector resource as necessary.
The noble Baroness, Lady Maddock, asked about case notes taking a long time to be assembled. That can happen, and it is critical for any woman or her family who think that they may have been affected negatively by this, with her cancer not being spotted. We will go through case note reviews for each of the women who may have been affected in that way—and if the NHS is shown to have been at fault, they will be eligible for compensation.
The noble Baroness asked a very good question about the location of screening. Choice is embedded in the system. I believe it was the noble Baroness, Lady Jolly, whom she was talking about and who had that experience. I looked into this: the 2016-17 guidance from NHS England provides flexibility and choice for women to say where they want their screening, which is one of the ways of driving uptake. If that has not happened in this case, and it does not sound like it has, I will be happy to raise that directly with NHS England at the highest levels.
I hope that I have been able to answer the questions from the noble Baronesses. I agree with them that this is a dreadful outcome of administrative incompetence and that we need to make sure, as we are reassured at the moment, that it is not affecting either other screening processes or other countries. One reason for that is that the particular clinical trial—the AgeX trial—applied only in England in its interaction with the screening database. The trial is not taking place in Wales or Northern Ireland, which share the same system—which is why the Welsh case seems to be different.
We will at all times in the process of the review and as we find out more be at great pains to make sure that we are as transparent as possible and to share information with the House.
Lord Stirrup (CB)
My Lords, the Minister referred to IT and QA failings, and has recently been answering questions about data security. An independent review into the breast cancer screening programme is clearly important and welcome, but how confident is he that the sorts of failings he has talked about do not exist in other areas of the NHS? Given the fact that the QA process failed in the current instance for eight years to pick this up, how can he have any confidence at all in automated processes elsewhere?
Lord O'Shaughnessy
We must be absolutely cautious in our dealings with technology. Of course, technology is part of the health and care service now. It is in everything. Making sure that there is good quality assurance is critical to that. Clearly, we have uncovered a problem but we do not think that the problem is in other screening processes. We have had reassurance from Public Health England that that is the case, but we clearly need to investigate further. We also need to be alive to the fact that these systems are often under attack from other actors, and to provide that cyber resilience. So I am afraid that it is an ongoing process to provide that kind of resilience and quality assurance. It is a job that never ends.
Baroness Massey of Darwen (Lab)
My Lords, I declare an interest as vice-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Breast Cancer. The Minister may be aware—I hope that he is—of a report, Good Enough?, about capacity issues within the breast cancer screening service. The report expresses very forcefully that there is regional variation. What is the answer to this and how can it be improved so that wherever you are you can get excellent service and screening?
Lord O'Shaughnessy
The noble Baroness asks an extremely good question. It is important in this instance to distinguish between the very correct questions that she is asking and the particular problem in this case. In this case the problem is not one of resource but of, unfortunately, an IT flaw in the interaction between the national screening programme database and its AgeX trial. I want to make that clear. But in response to her question, we had an opportunity to debate these issues in the House yesterday in an Oral Question from the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton. We are increasing and have increased the number of specialist cancer nurses, for example, by 1,000. Health Education England, in its cancer workforce strategy, has outlined a plan to recruit more radiologists, radiotherapists and so forth. Having more staff and higher-trained staff with the proper competency frameworks is clearly one way in which we can deal with the variations that she rightly highlights.
Baroness Falkner of Margravine (LD)
My Lords, the Minister mentioned that the Government will be looking at public information campaigns to ensure that women who may not have captured the periodic screening letter that is sent out would be aware that they need to take the initiative themselves and find out if they should have been screened. But, if I understood him correctly, when the Minister gave the figures in the Statement, 270 was the upper limit of deaths that would have been caused. If that is the case, I am slightly perturbed in terms of frightening people. He would probably accept that, whatever the figure, it is impossible to be precise about the number of deaths that “would” have been caused. Perhaps he meant to say “may” have been caused—because screening of itself does not cure breast cancer. That is an important distinction to make.
Lord O'Shaughnessy
The noble Baroness makes an incredibly important point. To refer back to the Statement, I think that the word used was “may” and that an upper range was given. I want to distinguish between two things. The first is the national campaigns that take place—I think there were 14 in the past eight years—to encourage women to check for their own symptoms and take up opportunities for screening programmes. Those will continue; that is part of the overall programme. In terms of writing to the women who are still alive who may have been affected, that is a separate and discrete process. It will start with a letter. It is easy for us to track down those who are registered with a GP in England and we are working with colleagues in the devolved Administrations, as noble Lords would expect, to make sure that we can write to those who have moved to those countries, and to provide resources to those countries so that they can provide screening. A helpline is also included that has been publicised.
On the point about the number of deaths that may have occurred, it is a difficult issue. On the one hand, we have received advice that that may be the case and we felt that it was wrong not to be honest and transparent about it. At the same time, there is not a clinical consensus about the benefits of breast cancer screening for women aged 70 and over—that came as something of a surprise to me—because of the non-malignancy or low malignancy of some tumours that can be spotted and the harms that can follow from treatment.
So we need to be cautious. What we have projected as a range is based on statistical modelling and not based on scrutiny of actual case note reviews. Of course, we deeply hope that the number will come down as we carry out that inquiry.
Baroness Masham of Ilton (CB)
My Lords, why is there the magical cut-off point of 72? In the paper the Minister just read, what are the non-threatening cancers in older people and what are the harmful tests and treatment? If they are harmful for older people, what about younger people?
Lord O’Shaughnessy
The noble Baroness asks an excellent question. The clinical advice that we received, which is the reason for the extension of screening from up to the age of 70 to up to the age of 73, is part of a clinical trial. There is no evidence that screening necessarily benefits women in general; of course, it will benefit some women in particular. There are breast cancers—I cannot claim to be able to describe them because that is well beyond my clinical knowledge—that women can have at that age and live with, and, indeed, they can die of something else at a later age. The treatment process, whether it is chemotherapy, radiotherapy or surgery, can be very debilitating, harmful and in some cases unnecessary, although, having found a tumour, a woman may well want to progress with that treatment. We have been driven by that age range, with 72 as the cut-off, and the wider description of this lack of clinical consensus. I assure the noble Baroness that we have been informed by a clinical advisory group throughout the process to make sure that we are as accurate and effective as possible.
Baroness Masham of Ilton
I am glad it is not the case that older people are not worth treating.
Lord Hunt of Chesterton (Lab)
My Lords, a broadcast on the BBC news last night commented that people should not contact their GPs but use some number instead. A lot of people will want to go to their GP to be reassured about this. Visits to GPs were not mentioned in the Minister’s Statement, nor in the Oral Statement, so it is important to explain this.
Lord O’Shaughnessy
The noble Lord makes a good point. We are encouraging people to use the helpline. Indeed, the number will be written in the letter that is sent to women, whether they are offered a screening because they are aged 72 or under or want to refer themselves for a screening. At the same time, many women will be anxious and will want to see their GP, or are seeing them anyway. We recognise that. We have liaised with the Royal College to make sure that GPs are properly briefed on a potential increase in the number of women referring themselves so that they are able to cope with that and provide the necessary signalling.
It is also important to highlight that we are working very closely with the key cancer charities, such as Macmillan, Breast Cancer Care and Breast Cancer Now, and others to make sure that there is a proper, broad approach so that women, whatever their anxieties—mental health issues may have been triggered as well as physical ones—get the support that they need and deserve.
Baroness Morris of Yardley (Lab)
My Lords, I obviously share in the concern about what has happened. I want to emphasise a point that has already been made and make sure that it will be part of the review. It is unimaginable that some women realise that they have not got the recall for their regular breast screening appointment. As a woman, you are sort of aware when it is about to come around; if the letter had not come, some people—though not everybody—would have either contacted the helpline or gone to their GP. I am worried that the response was, “Well, the computer says you’re not ready for a screening yet”, so the person was not listened to. I am seeking some assurance that the inquiry will come back with an answer on what happened when women said, “I think my breast screening appointment is late”.
Secondly, I am not sure about the scope of the inquiry, which I of course welcome. Will it look at all the circumstances surrounding this incident or will it go further, for example by looking at other causes of the drop in the percentage of people taking up such opportunities, as well as the regional disparities, which have already been mentioned?
Lord O’Shaughnessy
As always, the noble Baroness makes a very incisive point. The inquiry must look at whether there were signals and whether they were missed. That may be at the macro level or the micro level, with individual women saying to their GP, “Hang on, this is odd, I haven’t got this”. The problem has arisen because of the interaction between the screening process, which is due to run until a woman’s 71st birthday, and the extension, which was meant to run from a woman’s 71st birthday to the end of her 73rd year but was taking women into this clinical trial prematurely and randomising them. Hence, women in their 70th year did not get anything. It was the interaction of the two. It is technically quite devilish. A 70 year-old woman might or might not have known that she was due to have another one. This is one of things we have to get to the bottom of because, as the noble Baroness said, although this is about technology and computers, ultimately humans are at the centre of this problem.
The inquiry is primarily focused on the incident itself, but I imagine that if, during the course of its work, it finds out or establishes that other issues need to be pursued, such as increasing screening rates variation and so on, it will have the freedom to make those recommendations.
Baroness Donaghy (Lab)
My Lords, this is very close to home for me—I am probably not the only one in the Chamber. It was probably the breast screening programme that saved my life. I had no symptoms and if it had not been for regular mammograms, I would not have known. I am grateful to the health service, just as the noble Baroness, Lady Maddock, is.
The worry I have is that although I had a regular mammogram directly resulting from treatment every year for eight years, I was then told last summer at the age of 73 that the following year I would not be able to have a mammogram unless I went private. This seems to rely too much on people taking individual responsibility for their own health, which I support, but does not provide sufficient back-up for those who are perhaps fearful of having a mammogram. It is extremely painful for some women. The fear of it is still there. That explains why some of the take-up is quite poor. We have a duty of care for those in that position. Those of us who are vocal will do our best to look after ourselves.
My final point is that the cut-off is arbitrary and has a sniff of age discrimination about it. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Masham: there is sometimes an element in hospitals whereby perhaps you are not worth it any more. I feel obliged to say that I am still very active and working, just to make sure people think I am worth saving. That should not be the case and it ought to be reviewed. There is age discrimination. It might be just a clinical thing, but I cannot help thinking that there is some self-limitation when some of these clinical groups get together and decide what is appropriate for a woman, without consulting them as individuals.
Lord O'Shaughnessy
I know that the whole House will join me in saying that the noble Baroness is definitely worth it. Indeed, I am pleased to hear that her care was successful and that she is with us today. It is a very interesting question about age discrimination. We have again to separate it from the clinical advice, which I am reassured, having spent time with those involved in putting it together, is based on a proper weighing of costs and benefits—of course, that is inevitably in aggregate because we are talking about whole populations. Clinicians have autonomy to do things differently. Indeed, the offer we have given to women aged over 72 is that they can refer themselves and they will have an appointment if they want one. I can provide that reassurance to the noble Baroness.
There is perhaps a separate issue. There are sometimes problems of age discrimination in society and in the national health system itself. Could that be an issue regarding why signs were missed? We know that in some instances, the National Health Service has not been very good at listening to women on some of the issues we have debated in this House and that my noble friend Baroness Cumberlege is looking at in her review. This is a very good point that needs to be investigated properly: are there cultural reasons why signs that might otherwise have been picked up during these nine years were not? I can reassure her that the inquiry will look at this.
Lord Judd (Lab)
My Lords, reverting to the point about the role of the GP, does the Minister agree that it raises wider questions about the operation of the health service? Surely, if we are taking a holistic approach to the well-being of patients and people, the GP has a vital role which increases in importance the more technology comes into play. There should be a proactive role for the GP in helping people to meet the challenges that arise from the inevitably rather more impersonal operation of more technological services. There is a significant issue. Frankly, I sometimes wonder what the role of the GP really is. In a lot of surgeries, it is a pretty meaningless term, because one goes not to a general practitioner but to a surgery. This issue needs attention as we consider the future of the health service.
Lord O'Shaughnessy
The noble Lord makes a good point, in the sense that technology is an enabler and supporter of clinical practice done by highly skilled professionals, not a replacement for it. That interaction between reliance on technology and the human face of the service is an issue that the inquiry should investigate.