Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill

Debate between Baroness Brinton and Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn

Wednesday 28th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn]

My Lords, I certainly support the intention behind the amendment. My noble friend the Minister may well say in his reply that some of these issues are already covered by the Dealing in Cultural Objects (Offences) Act 2003. It is certainly the case that it is illegal to sell in this country cultural objects that were illegally exported from their country of origin after 2003. However, there are many new dimensions and my noble friend is right to draw attention to them. The scale on which terrorism is being funded through the sale of such artefacts gives cause for concern. I am not sure that many artefacts of this kind are being sold in this country now, but many will be in transit. As they may well be sold in the future they could still command a good price in the market.

I draw attention to one point. Proposed new subsection (2)(c) would require the examination of,

“the possibility of placing a strict liability on United Kingdom auction houses in respect of the provenance of any cultural artefacts they sell”.

This is not the occasion for a long debate on these matters. Some of them were raised in amendments during the passage of the Coroners and Justice Act 2009, although they were not carried. They placed an onus on auction houses in particular to be more transparent about vendors because auction houses are not obliged to declare for whom they sell such objects and somebody selling privately on the open market is not obliged to declare from where the objects came. There is a real problem. Indeed, there have been cases recently where auction houses have offered for sale objects which, it turned out, did not have a respectable provenance and had emerged on the market by shady means. It is therefore time to place an onus on the auction houses to check the provenance of the artefacts and to be assured that they left their country of origin legally after 2003, which would comply with the Dealing in Cultural Objects (Offences) Act. However, there is at present no onus on auction houses to be clear about the source of their objects. That is a glaring loophole, and that is why I support the amendment.

[Baroness Brinton]

I will speak to Amendment 118B but will not repeat the points made by my noble friends Lady Berridge and Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn. I want to remind the House of the scale of this problem and that it is a key funding area for Islamic State. A flash stick recovered after a courier was killed last year revealed that $36 million of goods had been taken from one town alone in Iraq. If you scale that up, and understand that each item can be sold for between $20,000 and $50,000, one begins to understand where IS’s money to resupply itself with weapons comes from. In addition to the provenance arguments and making sure that auction houses deal with appropriate items, there is a real issue of funding terrorism that needs to be addressed as well.