Queen’s Speech

Baroness Falkner of Margravine Excerpts

Tuesday 17th May 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB)]

My Lords, I too am delighted to speak in a Motion on the humble Address. I need to declare several interests. First, I am chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission. I want to caveat that by saying that I am speaking in a personal capacity. The only reason I need to say that is because the remit of the EHRC is so wide that one falls into the trap of saying something that impinges on its remit, so I had better get that in. Since I will be speaking on higher education, I also need to declare that my husband is a working academic and I myself have an affiliation with the Policy Institute at King’s College London.

I am extremely pleased that we are finally starting to see some of the recommendations of the Augar review come into play; that is very welcome. I particularly note the Government’s proposals for a lifelong loan entitlement, which will be taken forward in the higher education Bill. I also welcome the emphasis in that on social mobility, as well as the opening up of funding for a greater variety of skills-based training. As someone who completed her last degree when knocking 40—note I do not say my final degree, I just say the last one—I think the principle must be upheld that, as our economy changes, so too must the skills of the workforce.

Far too many people do not have an opportunity for on-job training and recent figures show that this is most marked among people who are not graduates, are ethnic minorities or are older and disabled. We also know from the popularity of online courses that people do indeed want to improve their credentials throughout their lives as a means of personal advancement. But currently, only those able to pay are able to do so. Of course, it is grossly unfair that taxpayers in the workforce are penalised when they wish to take up further learning later in life as a means of changing skills, perhaps towards a different career.

I also support the Government’s aim to retain the UK’s leading role in global league tables, but in this area I associate myself very much with the remarks of the noble Viscount, Lord Hanworth, on the careers of junior academics in particular.

While our higher education institutions are undoubtedly benefited by their autonomy, it is fair to say that students in those institutions have been rather let down by the paltry offering they have received during the pandemic. To burden students with the same level of fees for such suboptimal learning—which still continues in some institutions—is to be deeply regretted. I hope that the Office for Students has taken note of this breach of the contract between the provider and the consumer. Autonomy should not mean a freedom to rip off students when so much public subsidy from taxpayers is involved.

I want to say a word or two about the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill as well. I too share the Government’s overall concern that free speech is being increasingly impinged upon in our academic institutions. I was not alone in being troubled by the treatment of Professor Kathleen Stock by the University of Sussex in its handling of her case. She was attacked simply for exercising her academic freedom, although Sussex did belatedly try to repair the damage she suffered. I am also aware that she is not alone and that other academics in different disciplines self-censor or avoid challenges in areas where their work might not conform with the existing consensus. I broadly support the principles of the Bill but note that we have heard concerns in the other place that the Bill might go too far in its permissiveness of what I think has been described as “hate speech”.

I want to briefly clarify that point. Hate speech does not have legal meaning, although it is generally understood to be forms of expression that incite violence, hatred or discrimination against other groups or people. Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights delineates the law on freedom of expression. Whether or not hate speech falls outside the protections of Article 10 and is unlawful will depend on the context of what is said and when. I would not be overly concerned about measures to protect academic freedom and free speech on the basis that it will be a licence for other types of unwanted behaviour, such as harassment, as those protections will continue to be extant under the Equality Act 2010. As ever, I hope that detailed scrutiny will lead us to a balance, and I accept that competing rights will be engaged in this Bill, and so we shall have to look at it very carefully. On that note, I have to say that I broadly welcome these two pieces of legislation.

Hong Kong: Arrests

Baroness Falkner of Margravine Excerpts

Thursday 12th May 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)]

My Lords, I strongly echo the right reverend Prelate’s comments. I know that any government Minister would willingly do so as well, were they standing at the Dispatch Box. What has happened to Cardinal Zen is truly appalling on every conceivable level. It fundamentally undermines every aspect of the agreement we reached with China at the handover and any sense of plurality or freedom of religion in Hong Kong. We are committed to defending freedom of religion for all and promoting respect between different religious and non-religious communities. Freedom of expression, religion or belief is explicitly included in the joint declaration, which China agreed to uphold. China is in clear breach of that declaration. We have seen its use of the national security law to curtail freedoms and suppress any dissent.

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB)]

My Lords, I am sure the House will welcome the integrity shown by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Reed, and Lord Hodge in no longer legitimising Hong Kong’s broken judicial system by continuing to sit on those courts. Other Members of this House continue to give cover to it by continuing their connection, and we wait for them to reconsider their roles.

My brief question to the Minister is this: will the Government consider the report by Hong Kong Watch that proposes to conduct an audit of UK assets owned by Hong Kong officials and lawmakers? According to Hong Kong Watch, five officials and six lawmakers who are complicit in these ongoing human rights crackdowns hide their wealth in this country. If we are to prepare for future Magnitsky sanctions, we need to start conducting that audit now.

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)]

I thank the noble Baroness for raising an important point. On 14 March this year, the current Foreign Secretary issued a statement on the unjustifiable action taken against the UK-based NGO Hong Kong Watch. The action is clearly an attempt to silence those who stand up for human rights in Hong Kong. Attempting to silence voices globally that speak up for freedom and democracy is unacceptable and will never succeed. I will of course convey the noble Baroness’s request back to colleagues in the FCDO.

Russia

Baroness Falkner of Margravine Excerpts

Monday 10th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB)]

My Lords, the Foreign Secretary mentioned Nord Stream 2 and the efforts of the UK Government to discourage European countries’ overreliance on Russia for their energy supplies. Have the Government had any talks directly with the German Government about that in recent months?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

The noble Baroness will know that the German Government have just gone through a change and that there is a new Chancellor and Foreign Minister. The statements that have been made by the new Administration reflect the concerns that we have constantly reiterated on Nord Stream 2 and the instability it is giving rise to about energy supplies across Europe.

Genocide: Bringing Perpetrators to Justice

Baroness Falkner of Margravine Excerpts

Thursday 27th May 2021 Grand Committee

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB)]

My Lords, I too thank the noble Lord, Lord Alton of Liverpool, for securing this debate. I am sure the Minister will have heard the frustration from every speaker who has yet spoken with the current impasse, where we are going nowhere on doing anything to properly prevent genocide.

I want to pick up the theme of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Blackburn on the tricky issue of what the international community can and should do, particularly where genocide is a slow burn. It does not happen all of a sudden. It starts with removing human rights protections from certain groups, mainly ethnic groups; then by imposing new laws that impinge on their ability to live and work freely in society; then by using new laws to deny these peoples and groups the right to inhabit a society in security and freedom. Usually, the culmination is violence to drive them out and/or bring about their extinction. That is the course we have seen throughout the 70 years of the convention and before it, under the Nazis and the genocide of the Jewish people. So also in Darfur, in Rwanda, with the Yazidis and now with the Uighurs in China, it follows the same course. China is of course more egregious in many ways, as those people have nowhere to flee.

My question to the Government, borne out of the frustration of the ineffectiveness of the UN in this regard, is that, since the Security Council is incapable of consensus on these matters, will they work with like-minded countries such as those in the Accountability, Coherence and Transparency Group, to establish a risk register to monitor the slow burn of genocide so that human rights violations in a given country that point in the direction of genocide can be monitored? The international community can then use responsibility to protect and other measures in coalitions of the willing to take the necessary actions that they may need to before the act occurs.

Myanmar

Baroness Falkner of Margravine Excerpts

Thursday 11th February 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, I take on board what my noble friend said about the military and the need to look at the situation regarding the arms embargo. As she will be aware, the UK is a long-standing supporter of an arms embargo on Myanmar and, together with our EU colleagues, we played a key role in the embargo imposed following the 2017 Rohingya crisis. Since we left the EU, we have transitioned that into domestic law. My noble friend also made a broader point about the importance of stability in Myanmar. We are working in the region, particularly with ASEAN, which has an important role to play in this respect.

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I noticed the Minister’s warm words about co-operating with China and drawing the importance of this matter to its attention. However, does he accept that the military coup would have been impossible had the military, given its very strong relations with China, not been given the nod by the Chinese Government? This is another geostrategic win for China while the West stands by helpless. What long-term plans does the United Kingdom have to reform the United Nations Human Rights Council so that countries such as China, Russia and Saudi Arabia are prevented from making a mockery of global human rights?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness said that I have warm words for China; I was merely reiterating our practical engagement with that country. We should not forget that China is a P5 member of the UN Security Council. As I have said a number of times on various issues, where we have direct challenges with countries that are P5 members, we must continue to engage with them, albeit in very candid terms, through the international fora of which the UN Security Council is an important part. I strongly believe in doing this because I have seen for myself the benefits.

The noble Baroness also raised an important point about the Human Rights Council. I agree that there are members of the council which do not reflect in any way the value system we subscribe to. I can assure her that, through our engagement at the council, we look carefully at the human rights records of those countries that put themselves forward for election to the 47-strong membership. While the council is still not without its challenges, it provides a very useful forum in which to bring these issues to the fore at the top level of international diplomacy.

The UK’s Relationship with the Pacific Alliance (International Relations Committee Report)

Baroness Falkner of Margravine Excerpts

Monday 1st February 2021 Grand Committee

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford, and the committee for the report. Let me say how pleased I am to see that the committee has turned its attention to these countries in Latin America. I broadly agree with its recommendations, notably that the UK

“should deepen its engagement with the Pacific Alliance”.

Turning to the Commonwealth, which I know is dear to the heart of the noble Lord, Lord Howell, the reports notes that Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Singapore have applied for associate status to the alliance. What conversations have Her Majesty’s Government had with these like-minded states and fellow Commonwealth members as to their aims in seeking this status? Will the UK consider joining them in the longer term?

I will also refer to the UK export strategy. My concern is less to do with languages, which the report emphasises, as the US and Canada are more geographically proximate to that continent. I suspect that their institutions, as well as language centres, will be the more natural home for learning English than the United Kingdom. However, taking paragraph 65, I agree that our share of trade is extremely modest. I notice that the committee took evidence from the City of London Corporation, but that body, important though it is, does not speak to the regulatory and supervisory aspects of the UK’s skills and know-how in these areas. I emphasise this as a really important aspect of our influence in emerging markets.

The report emphasises innovation and research, and in this context I am informed by two pieces of work. I, along with a few other noble Lords, have been serving on the Economic Diplomacy Commission of the London School of Economics, the report of which is due out shortly. That report, and the evidence we took, say that services should be front and centre of the UK’s export strategy. Professional services are a hugely significant part of that, given that it is a global industry where regulations work upstream at global level and that most advanced and emerging market economies apply rules negotiated through the Financial Stability Board, the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision and so on. We in the United Kingdom are not only significant players at those levels—after all, the City of London is ranked number two globally among financial centres—but leaders in fintech and other innovative products. We thus have capacity and knowledge in the regulation of new innovations, where we might usefully share our expertise. I hope that the Department for International Trade will be able to promote that aspect of our professional services.

Another omission in the committee’s report, for me, stems from another piece of work that I have done recently and which the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay of St Johns, and other Members have mentioned. I served on Policy Exchange’s commission on a strategy for the Indo-Pacific region, chaired by the right honourable Stephen Harper, the former Prime Minister of Canada. As an aside, I am delighted to join other noble Lords in congratulating the director of Policy Exchange on his introduction to the House today as the noble Lord, Lord Godson. It has been a pleasure to work with him over the years. The emphasis of that report, A Very British Tilt, is the role of the UK in reinforcing a sustainable rules-based order in the Indo-Pacific region. For us, this should take a twin-track engagement approach.

First, we advocate a prosperity agenda focused on trade economics and technology issues, the latter including intellectual property, digital standards, science co-operation, sustainable development and environmental protection. Secondly, our report advocates a security agenda, seeking to reinforce regional security and the resilience of domestic socioeconomic political institutions in the Indo-Pacific countries, which may be open to our expertise. The report we are discussing today notes that Pacific Alliance countries, along with the UK, seek to pursue membership of the CPTPP. Apart from the obvious geographical difference—whereas the committee looked at the countries of the eastern Pacific, we looked at the western Pacific—there is much commonality, which I hope the FCDO can usefully incorporate from both. I look forward to the Minister’s reply.

Xinjiang: Forced Labour

Baroness Falkner of Margravine Excerpts

Tuesday 19th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

My Lords, there were a series of questions there. Some I believe have already answered, and I am sure my noble friend would acknowledge that. Of course, I share with him—as do the Government—the view that it is important to act and act now. As I have already illustrated, over the last few years we have seen real action being taken through multilateral fora, as well as directly, as the Statement from the Foreign Secretary has demonstrated. Of course, this does not stop here. If China fails to co-operate, we will continue to look to see what further provisions and actions can be taken. We take note of what our international partners are doing as well. As I have said consistently before, the application of sanctions works most effectively when we do so in partnership. On the point of stopping access to the UK for officials, one thing I will share with my noble friend, particularly through my engagement on multilateral fora, even with your worst foe you should never stop talking because by talking you are able to deliver your point of argument. China remains an important partner, so I do believe we will continue to work constructively where we agree with China and raise issues of human rights concerns where we do not.

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I too welcome the Statement, but I am conscious that it talks about co-operation with international partners. The Minister will recognise that sanctions in whatever form work best when there is across the board co-operation among countries. I note that the EU has just completed an investment accord with China. What actions will the Government take if EU firms manage to export items made with forced labour to the UK, while UK firms are disadvantaged? What conversations are being had with France and Germany to ensure that this does not happen?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

I agree with the noble Baroness. I can assure her that we are working closely with our European allies and friends on the important issue of global human rights sanctions. Indeed, they followed our sanctions regime. The practical issue that she raises is a matter for the EU and I am sure it will act swiftly in this respect.

USA Presidential Election

Baroness Falkner of Margravine Excerpts

Monday 9th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sugg (Con) [V]]

My Lords, we have seen lots of social media activity during this election, as we do in every election, and indeed we see more in every election that comes along. We have also seen actions taken by social media companies. I agree with the noble Lord that it is incredibly important to make sure that we track this closely and do everything we can to make sure that a free and fair media report in every election. I add my thanks to those of the noble Lord. Like, I am sure, many noble Lords, I was glued to the election coverage at the weekend, and I thank the broadcasters for that coverage.

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness has mentioned security co-operation several times in this interlude. Does she agree that security co-operation with the United Nations Security Council is pre-eminent in terms of UK-US relations? Can she take this opportunity to deny allegations in the media that the United Kingdom vetoed a ceasefire put forward by the Minsk Group on the Azerbaijan-Armenian conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh last week?

[Baroness Sugg (Con) [V]]

My Lords, we continue to work with the US and all our partners in the Security Council, particularly on the issue of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Nagorno-Karabakh

Baroness Falkner of Margravine Excerpts

Wednesday 7th October 2020 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking in relation to the conflict in the Nagorno-Karabakh region.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Baroness Sugg) (Con)]

My Lords, the UK continues to urge de-escalation and an immediate return to the negotiation table in our engagements with our partners, including the Azerbaijani Minister Bayramov and the Armenian Foreign Minister Mnatsakanyan. We have also been in contact with the Turkish and Russian authorities to discuss the matter and we continue to believe that the best solution to this conflict is a peaceful negotiation under the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group.

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine (CB)]

My Lords, the sad fact is that innocent civilians are being maimed and killed while the Minsk process continues to fail them—as it has for over 25 years. But so, too, has NATO failed, in so far as Turkey’s rampant authoritarianism and turbo-charged nationalism imperils its allies’ interests in Syria, in Libya and, now, in Nagorno-Karabakh. Can the noble Baroness tell the House what discussions Her Majesty’s Government are having within NATO to curb Turkey’s power and reassess its membership as a last resort?

[Baroness Sugg (Con)]

My Lords, I join the noble Baroness in her concern at the reports of civilian settlements being targeted. We are deeply concerned about that and, as I say, we urge an immediate return to the ceasefire. Yesterday, the NATO Secretary-General highlighted NATO’s concern about the escalation of hostilities and called for all sides to immediately cease fighting. He also said that he expects Turkey to use its considerable influence to calm tensions. We welcome these calls. Turkey is a key NATO partner and we continue to work in NATO to encourage it to use its influence to calm tensions.

Aid Impact

Baroness Falkner of Margravine Excerpts

Thursday 3rd September 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Senior Deputy Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

Is the noble Lord, Lord Collins of Highbury, in a position to participate? If not, we will move on to the noble Baroness, Lady Falkner of Margravine.

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I welcome the review. It is extremely timely, given the merger of the two departments. However, can the Minister confirm that the resources of ICAI will be strengthened? Surely three commissioners and a very small secretariat are not sufficient to provide the resources that the budget demands to provide assurance to Parliament and the public.

[Baroness Sugg (Con)]

My Lords, that is certainly one of the issues that the review will look at. The terms of reference will be published on GOV.UK in due course. We are keeping ICAI because we welcome independent scrutiny, and we are committed to ensuring that it continues to give us robust and constructive criticism.