Ethiopia Famine: 40th Anniversary

Baroness Featherstone Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2024 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Featherstone]

That this House takes note of the 40th anniversary of the 1984 Ethiopia famine in the light of the current conflict and food insecurity in the country.

[Baroness Featherstone (LD)]

My Lords, 40 years ago almost to the day, on 23 October 1984, the nation was shocked by Michael Buerk’s famous BBC broadcast. It was a watershed moment in TV and world history that alerted the world to the terrible famine in Ethiopia. Close to 8 million people became famine victims during the drought of 1984, and more than 1 million died.

It was a broadcast that woke millions of people across the world to both the suffering of the people and the scale of the inequities across the world. It was transmitted by 425 television stations worldwide and gave birth to world fundraising in a way that we had never seen before, in the shape of the unforgettable Live Aid concert in July 1985, driven by Bob Geldof. It spawned Band Aid and subsequent initiatives such as the Jubilee 2000 campaign and Make Poverty History. It galvanised a whole generation into action. But what happened next, when the focus moved on, years passed and Governments changed?

In the decades that followed, huge progress was made to tackle hunger and malnutrition around the world and improve global health, with new resources committed by the developing world and effective pro-poor policies enacted by partner Governments in many countries. As an International Development Minister for two years during the coalition, I went to Ethiopia six times and saw both the progress and the need.

Today that progress is in reverse. As we look back and try to understand what the world can do to help deliver lasting change, with all the challenges that beset countries such as Ethiopia, what is the single most important thing that we—indeed, the world—can do to change the future more positively? Bill Gates has said:

“Every now and then, somebody will ask me what I would do if I had a magic wand. For years, I’ve given the same answer: I would solve malnutrition”.


He is right, because it is fundamental to everything.

This is important, not just because of the millions of lives lost to malnutrition and the millions more blighted by it but because every step forward to tackle the world’s challenges is made harder by malnutrition. Tackling malnutrition is fundamental in every aspect of improvement and change. It is absolutely foundational to global development and to a safe, secure and prosperous world. Without it, people cannot reach their full potential either physically or cognitively, economies are less productive and economic development is undermined.

Tackling malnutrition is also cost effective. It is the proven way to make progress on global development. For every $1 invested in nutrition, $16 is returned to the local economy, making it one of the most effective investments in the world. Conversely, malnutrition costs African economies between 3% and 16% of their GDP annually.

We know what to do; the world knows how to make progress on hunger and malnutrition and has done so to a remarkable degree in the past. Between 1990 and 2015 the proportion of undernourished people in low and middle-income countries was halved by global collective action. Sadly, we are no longer doing it. Today the world is cutting official development assistance, even as climate change and conflict contribute to growing levels of malnutrition and hunger.

When the UK Government reneged on their 0.7% commitment to overseas development aid in 2021, the global nutrition budget was disproportionately cut. A Development Initiatives report, commissioned by the UK Government, calculated that nutrition received a 60% cut. At the same time, debt servicing is once again placing unsustainable pressures on countries. We all remember Gordon Brown’s remarkable intervention in that regard.

So progress is going into reverse. In 2023 the World Health Organization estimated that 148 million children experienced stunting and 45 million children experienced wasting. Those are the two most severe forms of chronic and acute malnutrition, and they rob children of their life chances and, sometimes, their lives. Malnutrition is an absolute marker of inequalities in human development and will severely constrain the economies of low and middle-income countries in the future. That, in turn, will limit their ability to provide education and undermine their ability to provide public services and meet the aspirations of their people.

I remember a visit I made to a village in Ethiopia. I gave a talk to a group of women about contraception. Afterwards, I remarked to my civil servants that I was surprised to see so many children there—but, of course, they were not children but stunted adult women. I had never seen a stunted adult before. It was a truly shocking experience, one that we are fortunate never to see in this country.

What do we, and for that matter the developed world, need to do? I am hopeful that, with the new Government, we will see change from the retrograde actions in recent years. First and foremost, we must restore UK aid funding to the 0.7% of GNI for which we legislated under the coalition Government, becoming the first G7 country to meet this long-standing commitment. We must also reverse the 2021 cuts to the global nutrition budget, with an emphasis on long-term, predictable and multiyear funding so that we can build resilience. We need to invest in cost-effective and nutrition-specific interventions such as prenatal multiple micronutrient supplementation, MMS, which costs just $2.60 for an entire pregnancy. If all low and middle-income countries switched from iron and folic acid to MMS, half a million lives would be saved by 2040 and 25 million babies would have better birth outcomes.

We must also specify the proportion of the 2021 Nutrition for Growth summit pledge that will be spent on nutrition-specific interventions, as the Government did previously with a floor of 20%, representing the figure specified in the previous Nutrition for Growth pledge. The Government pledged to spend £1.5 billion on nutrition in the period to 2030—can the Minister update the House on where we are with that pledge?

We need to invest in research to improve climate resistance and the nutrient value of crops, and to support the fortification of staple foods to provide those vital micronutrients. Talking of crops and climate change, I note that one of DfID’s initiatives, together with local partners, was about creating routes to market and improving yield through knowledge. One such market that I visited was organised for local people to learn how to purchase good seeds, when to plant, where to plant and how to irrigate. Perhaps the most impressive thing I saw, and something I have never been able to forget, was a supplement in cow feed that meant a cow would fatten in 2.5 years, rather than the seven it usually took. That would triple the income of a family with one cow—although I dreaded to think what was in the supplement.

The environment in which nutrition suffers is plagued by conflict. There are so many warring parties, and we need to pressure them, to the best of our ability, to adhere to international humanitarian law and allow access to food supplies. We need to work with international and local partners to promote food security and peace- building.

Investing in nutrition is a cost-effective and proven way to make progress on global development. As I said before—it bears repeating—for every $1 invested in nutrition, $16 is returned to the local economy. It is one of the most effective instruments and investments. Equally, malnutrition costs low-income economies between 3% and 16% of their GDP, and the economies of reducing malnutrition in sub-Saharan Africa are beyond proven.

The proportion of undernourished people in low and middle-income countries fell by nearly half between 1990 and 2015, as stated in the World Food Programme’s state of food insecurity report of 2015. In that period, Ethiopia saw a 57.2% reduction in the proportion of undernourished people in the population—noted in that report—and made remarkable progress in reducing child stunting, from 57.4% to 36.8%. Child wasting was reduced from 12.4% to 7%, and child underweight levels were reduced from 41.8% to 21.3% over the past two decades.

However, the recent conflict in northern Ethiopia, governance challenges and natural disasters have reversed some of that progress. Progress on infant and young child feeding practices is mixed, and children’s dietary diversity remains among the lowest in Africa. Malnutrition is the leading cause of deaths in children under five years old, responsible for 45% of deaths and claiming 2 million lives each year. According to the World Food Programme, over a quarter of a billion people across 58 countries and territories face acute food insecurity or worse.

Of course, it is not just Ethiopia; we see other terrible situations across the region—in Sudan, in Tigray and, sadly, many more countries. I could not believe the previous Government collapsing DfID into the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. The soft power and the good that DfID did were unquestionable. I do not know whether our new Government plan to re-establish it at some point, but the focus it brought to the critical pathway needed was extraordinary. The separation between what the Foreign Office did—foreign affairs—and what DfID did gave two angles, and soft power was extraordinary where DfID was at work.

I declare an interest. As I said, I spent two years as a Minister in DfID with special responsibility for sub-Saharan Africa, and I came to love those countries. That is why, when the noble Lord, Lord Oates, asked me whether I would become one of the three cross-party patrons of United Against Malnutrition and Hunger, together with the noble Lord, Lord Boateng, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, I said yes. I almost never say yes to any requests, as we get many, but I said yes to this, because our international development was something I was incredibly proud of and something that we as a nation were truly proud of too. We did good in the world, in partnership with local and world actors, and moved the dial forward.

But this is where we stand today. And as I stand here, I call on our new Labour UK Government to focus on malnutrition and to press our international partners to do the same. Surely we can promote this message—shout from this Chamber to reach across the world—of the urgent and ever-pressing need to focus primary development efforts on tackling malnutrition. It is the basis of everything, for without food you cannot study, you cannot grow, you cannot think, you cannot live, and you certainly cannot thrive.

Let us help enable the world to feed itself. I beg to move.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Featherstone (LD)]

My Lords, I shall not detain noble Lords for long. It has been an excellent debate, and I want to thank every single contributor for their wisdom, knowledge, passion and intellect in addressing what are insoluble problems. When I was in Africa, they had an expression: “Eat while you are at the table”, which basically meant that if your tribe, ethnic group, people of your religion or whoever were in power, then all your relatives and your tribe were okay—at the expense of everybody else. Until that basic way of fighting for scarce resources is changed, I do not know how much you can change for the long term, because it is a massive undertaking. But in the short term, people are dying because they have no food.

I am grateful to the Minister, and I wish him well, and speed, with his work in Africa; it needs him. I again thank all noble Lords for their contributions, particularly my noble friend Lord Oates. If we had not had a 14 or 15 year-old boy running away to Ethiopia, we might not have had this debate today.

Motion agreed.

Infected Blood Inquiry: Compensation Scheme

Baroness Featherstone Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd May 2024 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe (Con)]

My Lords, I am sure that the noble Lord’s words will resonate with anyone in this Chamber who has had the privilege of ministerial responsibility. Having said that, I do not think we should necessarily point the finger solely at the Treasury when it comes to the responsibility that lies at every level of government in this terrible disaster.

[Baroness Featherstone (LD)]

My Lords, I declare my interest. As this House may know, my nephew, Nick, was a haemophiliac infected with hepatitis C and exposed to CJD and died aged 35, leaving a 10 month-old baby daughter, Niamh. Compensation should be first on the list to alleviate immediate suffering, but can the Minister tell your Lordships’ House whether the Government will seek prosecutions for those who Sir Brian’s report indicates are culpable in this most terrible of tragedies?

[Earl Howe (Con)]

My Lords, I do not think it is for me as a Minister to opine on potential criminal liability. All I can say at this early stage is that the Government will make all relevant information available to those conducting any future criminal investigation.

Infected Blood

Baroness Featherstone Excerpts

Tuesday 21st May 2024 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe (Con)]

I am grateful to my noble friend and well remember the Statement that he refers to, which I repeated in this House in January 2011. He is exactly right. Both he and I were advised at the time that there was no comparability between the situations in the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom—that they were entirely different. That was not true, but it was the advice that we received. We did as much as we could, I am sure my noble friend will agree, to honour the spirit of the late Lord Archer’s report, which was at the time a very thorough piece of work, although he did not have access to all the evidence, as we now are aware. So it does raise the question of how successive Secretaries of State for Health in the Labour Government, the coalition Government and no doubt beyond were advised in the way that they were by officials. This is a question that merits the closest scrutiny and I undertake that that will be done.

[Baroness Featherstone (LD)]

I was not going to speak, because I find it very emotional. For anyone in this Chamber who does not know, my nephew died aged 35. He was a haemophiliac. He was infected with hepatitis C and exposed to CJD. He left a 10 month-old daughter. But I wanted to put on the record my admiration and heartfelt thanks to Sir Brian Langstaff. It was an absolute miracle that he chaired this inquiry, because he did not hold his punches yesterday, did he?

I also want to put on record my thanks to Theresa May, whom I worked with in the Home Office and whose ear I bent regularly. She was the first politician to do things right by commissioning this inquiry. Although it has taken five years and has been agonising for all those people—including my sister, who lost her son and now has Alzheimer’s—yesterday felt at last like a day of reckoning when justice was finally done. She campaigned for 40 years for that day, against all the odds. She was treated by civil servants and Ministers as if she was dirt on their shoes, quite frankly. I cannot even begin to express it.

There is so much that I would like to say, but, as this is meant to be questions, I will just say that I had evidence. I met Sir Chris Wormald. He lied to my face then apologised in writing afterwards. This was all given in evidence to the inquiry. Yes, all the things that the Minister has said will be done must be done, but there are so many of these situations. Denial and cover-up seem to be systematic, whether it is Grenfell, Bloody Sunday, Hillsborough or any of those things. This duty of candour has to really mean “never again”. I am sick and tired of hearing “never again” after all these inquiries. If it is not “never again”, there will be some recompense to those who were affected but it will not change anything. In this country, when it feels like everything is going to hell, this is an opportunity to perhaps turn it around and make sure that we become the good, honest Government and citizens that we always should have been.

[Earl Howe (Con)]

My Lords, I very much identify with the remarks of the noble Baroness and extend my personal sympathy to her with regard to the death of her nephew.

She referred to the duty of candour. It is perhaps not surprising that Sir Brian Langstaff has made such a recommendation. We need to think about it very carefully. As the noble Baroness will know, this House passed an amendment, proposed by the party opposite, to consider a duty of candour as part of the Victims and Prisoners Bill. I am still not sure that Bill is the right place for it; I think we need to take a longer run at this issue in the light of the full dimensions of Sir Brian’s recommendations.

However, it is not an issue that is going away. Nothing can ever compensate those who have lost loved ones or had their lives ruined by this terrible disaster. However, we can create a scheme that delivers monetary compensation speedily, efficiently and accessibly, in a way that is consistent with the proper management of public funds. Above all, the scheme must treat people with the kind of respect, dignity and compassion that the noble Baroness says was singularly absent along the way for those who required help and support.

These are basic rights which too often people impacted by the scandal have been denied. They need to feel that there is a system there to support them that is collaborative, sympathetic, user-friendly and as free of stress as possible. I know that that is the aim that Sir Robert Francis has at the top of his mind as well.

Victims and Prisoners Bill

Baroness Featherstone Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 30th April 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Waldegrave of North Hill (Con)]

I join other noble Lords and Baronesses in paying tribute to my noble friend, who has been extremely generous with his time in meetings. I am quite certain that he personally has been pushing in the direction that has led to really major progress. I declare an interest as a former Secretary of State and therefore a witness to the Langstaff inquiry.

The three months is excellent; the shadow organisation set up before the final report is good; the shadow CEO is excellent. I am interested in Amendment 119HA, from the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. Like her, I would like the reassurance sought in her proposed new subsection (2):

“In assessing compensation under the scheme, no account should be taken of any past support payments”.


The structures of the tariff-based compensation and so forth seem right and sensible. If we can have reassurance on that also, it would be very helpful.

The major item in the noble Baroness’s amendment is one that sets off tremendous alarm bells in the former Chief Secretary lobe—or half—of my brain. The idea of letting the chair set the tariffs, even with these structures around them, would have been very alarming to me, as a former Chief Secretary, and would be alarming to any future person who has to be accountable for public expenditure.

None the less, I still hesitate on it, because every noble Lord has spoken about the requirement to rebuild trust, and my noble friend himself began his speech with that. If it were possible to provide criteria for the payments such that the chair was enabled to be independent within those criteria, that would rebuild trust in a formidable way. I would be very interested to hear what my noble friend has to say on that.

Rebuilding trust is the primary task, as it has been among the terrible casualties of this disaster—trust in the state, trust in the NHS and doctors, trust in everybody. Trust in Ministers, of course, has been severely damaged and we may have to take exceptional steps in this really unparalleled scale of disaster to rebuild that trust. Precedent is always a terrible weapon to deploy against anything, but one hopes that there would be a few precedents for disasters on this scale in the future. I would like to probe my noble friend a little further on that, but I end by thanking him again. I was privileged to work with him as a colleague in the past, and it is no surprise to those of us who have worked with him that he has been not only efficient but empathetic and careful, in the best sense of the word, in his dealings certainly with me and, I suspect, with other Members of this House as well.

[Baroness Featherstone (LD)]

My Lords, as some of your Lordships will know, I declare an interest as my nephew died aged 35. He was a haemophiliac, a twin and my sister’s son. He left a 10 month-old baby daughter. I too thank the noble Earl for being so sincere about this. He is one of the first people I have heard on the government side who actually gets it and understands the agony that the community has been through over the last 40 years—so I thank him for that.

I will speak briefly to a couple of amendments. With Amendment 119PA, we are concerned that infected and affected people who may want to appeal against a decision on compensation will not be able to go to a separate body to appeal, as Sir Brian Langstaff recommended in his report. If Sir Brian’s recommendations are ignored, people will have to seek to reverse a decision through the First-tier Tribunal, as is the case at the moment. They are concerned about that because the First-tier Tribunal is not specialised in infected blood and has a whole host of other things to deal with, such as PIP and housing appeals. The process will be very difficult.

Victims and Prisoners Bill

Baroness Featherstone Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 26th February 2024 Lords Chamber

This Government say they are doing everything at pace for the Post Office Horizon scheme, with most settlements paid in full by August or as soon as possible thereafter. The victims of the infected blood scandal deserve no less.

[Baroness Featherstone (LD)]

My Lords, I apologise for not having been in the Chamber at Second Reading.

Thousands of people have died because of Governments’ and officials’ lies and obfuscation about the contaminated blood scandal. This Government, and every Government for the past 40 years, should be ashamed. Perhaps this Government should be more ashamed than all because, when we finally got the long campaigned for and long literally begged for public inquiry—I praise Theresa May for initiating that inquiry—the chair, Sir Brian, said in terms what the compensation should be and that it should be paid swiftly. Unbelievably, the Government are still prevaricating. I hope they are not hoping to limp on to the next election. We need to do better to stop obfuscation and delay, and make the amends that can be made, although nothing will ever make up for what has happened. My noble friend Lady Brinton’s speech was extraordinary and laid this out far better than I can. We can never bring back the 3,000 who have died and those who are dying every single day while this is delayed, nor undo the suffering experienced by this 40-year agonising wait for justice.

I declare an interest. My nephew Nicholas Hirsch, one of my sister’s twin boys, was a haemophiliac and contracted hepatitis C. He died aged 35, leaving a 10 month-old baby daughter. Every family that has lost a loved one is in the same position. Those who are still living need to live to see justice, and the families of those who have died need to see justice. The time being taken is obscene, inordinate and cruel. The rubbish being pumped out by the Government about waiting for the final bit of the inquiry is intolerable. Sir Brian, the brilliant chair of the inquiry, has made it crystal clear that there is no need and no time to wait. Quite frankly, we should not need a TV series and public outrage to be the motivation for the Government to do the right thing.

I have been trying over the years to get redress on the issue. I remember going with Lynne Kelly, head of Haemophilia Wales, to meet Chris Wormald, Permanent Secretary at the Department of Health, to show him the proof of obfuscation and lies. He lied to us there and then, and then he lied in writing—a lie for which he later apologised in writing, and which I submitted in evidence to the inquiry. It was shameful how many lies were told by officials to victims, as well as to the parents and families of those who were contaminated. The very least the Government can do is to act, right now, before any more victims die.

Before I sit down, I want to pay tribute to all the campaigners, fighters and families who have sought justice. In particular, I thank the Labour MP Dame Diana Johnson, who has been chair of the APPG and fought so hard on this, as well as Jason Evans from the campaign organisation Factor 8.

It is important to be clear beyond doubt and lay responsibility where it lies: at the Government’s door. These amendments make it clear that the Government are responsible for fully funding payments, that they should set up the body that will administrate this on their behalf, and that they must put on the record how and when this will happen, and stop prevaricating that they need to wait for the final report. For decency, for honour and for compassion, I ask the Government to please do the right thing and do it now.

[Baroness Campbell of Surbiton (CB)]

My Lords, before I begin, I too pay tribute to the late Lord Cormack. He was a consummate parliamentarian, but he was also my friend, and he taught me so much when I arrived in the House. Equally, he gave terrific support on disability issues; on every occasion, he was very supportive.

I support Amendment 134, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. I declare an interest, as my first husband, Graham, had haemophilia and received infected blood products. As a result, he contracted both hepatitis C and HIV. We learned of this only after we had become engaged. Graham died 30 years ago, on 19 December 1993, aged 32. We had been married for only six years.

I apologise that my health prevented me speaking at Second Reading. As I was directly affected by the infected blood scandal and gave evidence to the inquiry, I hope your Lordships will forgive this late intervention.

The noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, addresses a matter of profound importance to the thousands of us infected or affected by the shameful events that devastated the lives of so many. Your Lordships will remember that, in July 2017, Prime Minister Theresa May ordered a fully funded independent inquiry into how contaminated blood transfusions infected thousands of people with hepatitis C and HIV. She also allocated £75 million to be available for interim payments to victims still living and bereaved families. Yet only two months ago, some seven years on, the distinguished chair of the inquiry, Sir Brian Langstaff, expressed his frustration with delays in setting up a compensation scheme. He said:

“The Inquiry’s final recommendations on compensation were published in April 2023. My principal recommendation remains that a compensation scheme should be set up with urgency”.


The Government accept the “moral case for compensation”, but these words are meaningless if actioning the inquiry’s recommendations is further delayed.

It was in 1987 that Graham, then my fiancé, and his younger brother Anthony were first told that they had HIV from factor 8 clotting agents. Anthony was first to die, leaving a widow and a one year-old daughter. Graham endured five years of misery, a barrage of associated illnesses, including pneumocystis pneumonia, epilepsy and intermittent blindness. He died 18 months after his brother. It must have been unbearable for him to watch what he knew was in store for him, but his courage took my breath away.

I count myself lucky. I eventually found a way to move on, enough to lead a good, purposeful life after Graham died, but the memory and the flashbacks do not fade. Thousands of other affected families have not been as fortunate, with the personal cost of the past ever present and haunting. Many wives of infected men lost their childbearing years. Parents and countless partners gave up jobs to care for loved ones at a time when HIV/AIDS was stigmatising and isolating. There have been over 3,000 deaths to date, with an average of one more every four days.

The Government have rightly accepted more responsibility for their part in the tragedy, but they have procrastinated in establishing a compensation scheme. Not content with the guidance given by Sir Robert Francis, who was specifically appointed to make recommendations for compensation, the Cabinet Office has now appointed Sir Jonathan Montgomery to chair a group of experts to decide who gets what. Not surprisingly, the infected blood community is concerned, given Sir Jonathan’s past links with two bodies implicated in the scandal, and unhappy about yet a further delay.

According to the chair of the Haemophilia Society,

“it has caused huge anger and upset in the community. We certainly haven’t been consulted and neither have any other members of the community as far as I am aware. This is now the third knight to be asked for his opinion on it. First, Sir Robert Francis. Then Sir Brian made his recommendations in his interim report. They are now asking for a third time. It feels like they want to keep asking the same questions until they get an answer they like”.

I hope the Minister will tell us how this latest “body of experts” on compensation will involve members of the infected blood community, whose lived experience makes them experts too. The need for such involvement is a consistent theme of Sir Robert’s report if trust is to be restored. So, in the spirit of transparency, will the Minister let your Lordships have sight of the membership and terms of reference of this new expert group? Can he also give an approximate timeline of when compensation will be paid? As the Government insist on waiting for the final inquiry report to be published on 20 May, will the Minister at least assure this House then that a compensation scheme will be ready to go live afterwards?

Every year, on the anniversary of my late husband’s death, I visit St Botolph’s church in the City of London. It has a remembrance book with the names of hundreds of haemophiliacs who have died from infected blood products. Each year, I see pages of new entries. Surely this example alone should galvanise the Government into compensating those still living as soon as humanly possible. Each delay means countless more deaths without the comfort of knowing that justice has been served for the infected victims, and their affected partners and children.

Parliamentary Democracy and Standards in Public Life

Baroness Featherstone Excerpts

Thursday 11th January 2024 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Featherstone]

That this House takes note of the current standing of parliamentary democracy and standards in public life.

[Baroness Featherstone (LD)]

My Lords, I have no doubt that this noble House knows right from wrong, believes in decency, wisdom, truth and honesty, and values our freedoms and way of life and the vital part that parliamentary democracy and standards in public life play. Inevitably, much criticism in this debate will be levelled at the current Government, but this is about principles that are for all time and all Governments and opposition parties—all of us in politics. We all need to do better.

In recent years, there has been an erosion of many of the cornerstones of British political life. Recent Prime Ministers and Cabinets have shown a disregard towards parliamentary process; a preference for journalists and broadcasters who support the Government’s position; an apathy for the rule of law; an overwhelming transfer of law from primary to secondary legislation; a disdain for domestic and international courts; a reduction within freedom of protest; and an undue influence on the operational independence of the police services, and indeed the electoral process itself. At the same time, we have witnessed a deterioration in standards of public life, particularly highlighted in the Covid inquiry, where we are seeing how poor standards at the heart of Government led to unnecessary amounts of human suffering at a time when the public needed those standards more than ever. Instead, the Government created a shoddy PPE procurement process, which allowed profiteers to benefit at a time of crisis.

I raised the issue of political preference in media coverage in my response to the gracious Speech. The guidelines for government communication services say that dealing with journalists

“should be objective and explanatory, not biased or polemical”,

and

“should not be—and not liable to being misrepresented as—party political”.

In 2019, a Freedom House report entitled Media Freedom: A Downward Spiral stated:

“The fundamental right to seek and disseminate information through an independent press is under attack, and part of the assault has come from an unexpected source. Elected leaders in many democracies, who should be press freedom’s staunchest defenders, have made explicit attempts to silence critical media voices and strengthen outlets that serve up favorable coverage”.


This is sadly now true of us.

When the former Home Secretary Suella Braverman flew to Rwanda, the Guardian, the Mirror, the i and the Independent were all excluded, and initially also the BBC. That happened less than a year after journalists from the Guardian, the Financial Times and the Mirror were blocked from joining the then Home Secretary Priti Patel’s trip to Rwanda to sign the original asylum deal. In 2020, political journalists, including the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg and ITV’s Robert Peston, staged a walkout after Downing Street communication staff attempted to brief some journalists but not others. Those excluded by former Mirror and Sun journalist Lee Cain—and that revolving door itself is incestuous—included journalists from PA, the Mirror, the i, HuffPost UK, Politicshome and the Independent.

That got me thinking about the state of us, and not in a good way. It is clearly not just me. This debate is not the first on the subject, both here and in the other place. Many voices are now speaking out about the need for change, and many of us who went into politics are sad at what has happened to it. This is a cri de coeur from me and my colleagues, and, I would hope and expect, from many across this Chamber.

On the rule of law and independence of the judiciary, the extraordinarily wise and now sadly late Lord Judge believed that we were ceding too much power to the Executive, power that should and must be retained by Parliament. In a lecture he gave, he said that

“what Parliamentary sovereignty never has been is executive sovereignty, or ministerial or government sovereignty. Indeed Parliamentary sovereignty is the antithesis of executive sovereignty. The two concepts are mutually contradictory. The democratic process is not meant to give, and our constitutional arrangements were not intended to provide us with executive sovereignty. No Prime Minister is a monarch, or president, not even the head of state … At the heart of the development of our constitutional arrangements, Parliament is there to protect us from authoritarianism, from despotism, from an over mighty monarch, but also from an over mighty executive … in the last session of Parliament just over one hundred Henry VIII clauses had been enacted … proliferation of clauses like these will have the inevitable consequence of yet further damaging the sovereignty of Parliament, and increasing yet further the authority of the executive over the legislature … Henry VIII clauses should be confined to the dustbin of history”.

I could not agree more.

Only recently we have seen machinations to subvert the Supreme Court holding unanimously that the Government’s Rwanda scheme was unlawful, by bringing forward legislation declaring Rwanda a safe country. This move is scarily reminiscent of George Orwell’s 1984, when party member O’Brien tests Winston Smith’s allegiance to party truth, insisting that Winston sees five fingers when he holds up only four—that is, the truth is what I say it is. We have seen contempt for international courts, such as the ECHR, which is the embodiment of high ideals of internationalist values and constants that remain today hugely important in guaranteeing peoples’ fundamental human rights in law. It came as a surprise to some in government that it was nothing to do with the European Union.

The Government have acted to strengthen their power over the judiciary in the Judicial Review and Courts Act by reducing the scope of judicial review. The Government have severely restricted legal aid, making access to justice uneven and unfair. Members of the legal profession are exhausted and court backlogs deny justice. The breaking of treaties such as the Northern Ireland protocol was once unthinkable. Mrs May spoke for many when she asked

“how can the Government reassure future international partners that the UK can be trusted to abide by the legal obligations in the agreements it signs?”—[Official Report, Commons, 8/9/20; col. 499.]

This is not to mention the illegal proroguing of Parliament.

The phrase “free and fair election” is dashed off so easily, but it is the heart and soul of our democracy. The Government compromised that in the Elections Act 2022, by giving themselves the right to intervene and to direct or guide the Electoral Commission’s strategy and priorities. Those changes went through—of course—via a statutory instrument, the excess use of which is the preferred tool of a Government who will not be thwarted. The ability to thwart a Government acting in an overweening and injudicial way is the absolute strength of our democracy.

As to the operational independence of the police, it is a fundamental principle of British policing that sits alongside the important principle of policing by consent. The ex-Home Secretary did not approve of the Metropolitan Police’s handling of pro-Palestinian protests and went into print to criticise the police force for applying “double standards” and being “more sympathetic to the left”. To attack the police publicly is just not acceptable, let alone to accuse them of political bias. She is entitled to that view but, regardless of whether she was right or wrong, she was not entitled to say so publicly.

On the public right to protest, it has always been recognised that the right of people to criticise Governments, laws and social conditions is fundamental to democracy. Via regulation yet again we have a new definition of what “serious disruption” means: a new and astonishing threshold at which police can restrict protest for any obstruction which causes more than minor hindrance to day-to-day activities, meaning that police restrictions can effectively ban a protest. If those restrictions are breached, we are now in criminal offence territory. Exactly what does the right to protest mean when the enactment of that right is criminalised?

Britain is now a country where only 9% of people say they generally trust political leaders—that is the lowest since records began. How we do our politics really matters, both inside Parliament and in the country. Standards in public life, the Nolan principles, are not going well. Selflessness, integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness, honesty and leadership are a crucial part of our responsibility and are literally the antithesis of Boris Johnson, our former Prime Minister. Before I get to the deleterious effect of his behaviour, I point out that the Financial Times published an article on 16 December about the loss of trust in Parliament. More than one in 20 MPs has been suspended from the House of Commons, left Parliament altogether or been stripped of their party whip in the wake of misconduct allegations—just since the last general election. I am sure your Lordships remember the expenses scandal. We have still not recovered from that low base. That rocked public faith in all of us. Whether innocent or guilty, we were all guilty. On the doorstep, we were all scum.

Our constitutional protections have been put under huge strain because of major breaches of the standards in public office, with concerns about corruption and conflict of interest at the most senior levels. Boris Johnson’s changes to the Ministerial Code were detrimental to standards in public life. His lying, obfuscation and belief that the rules did not apply to him were shameful. He blocked his independent ethics adviser from being able to initiate his own investigations, and he rewrote the foreword to the Ministerial Code, removing all references to honesty, integrity, transparency and accountability.

In recent days, thanks to the Covid inquiry, we have seen the scale of the PPE scandal. Yes, it was an emergency, and yes, abnormal procedures were needed to facilitate that urgency, but what is a VIP lane? I would have hoped that a VIP lane was a lane that gave priority to those who came forward to help because they had the know-how, not the know-who.

As for the charade in the No. 10 garden, and the absurdity of the Barnard Castle fairy tale, what contempt for the truth and the people of this country. We all saw Allegra Stratton, then the Prime Minister’s press secretary, laughing and joking during a mock televised press briefing about a Downing Street Christmas party. Anyone who saw that clip knew in an instant what was really going on in No. 10.

This is decline and fall. We have not even recovered as a country from the way Brexit was conducted. It harmed us as a nation. Truth was a victim, and people felt empowered not only to lie but to hate the other side. Political protagonists peddled dislike, disdain, denigration of other, and fear. We created an unhappy and angry nation. We are bombarded with hate. Hate sells; hate works; hate garners votes; hate strikes emotion in us. There is hatred of other—foreigners, immigrants, scroungers, Muslims, Jews, the rich, the lazy, the lucky: we hate them all. Years of the drip-drip poison of “enemies of the people” and negative political campaigning has taken its toll on all of us.

Politicians have become reductionist in order to find simplistic messages that focus groups tell us will win votes. To win, lies do not matter any more. Truth is fake news. Facts—who cares? Experts with real knowledge are disparaged. To win, the common good comes way down the list, after party good, and public discourse is driven now by heat, not light, with the media feeding a frenzy of the negative and the nasty, amplified by the Twittersphere but led by us politicians.

Fifteen minutes was inadequate—although I understand I am running ahead of my schedule—because I have not even touched on reform of our own House, the use of hate speech by politicians in the media, nor the part that the “winner takes all” nature of our Commons elections plays in our behaviour. Yet I am absolutely sure that noble Lords across this House will fill in any gaps I may have left.

There has not even been time to lay out a prospectus for us moving to happier territory, but we have an opportunity—with an election year ahead—to demonstrate change for the better. I beg to move.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Featherstone (LD)]

My Lords, I would like to thank all noble Lords for their contributions; they were thoughtful and intelligent. The sense I get from the debate is that we are all struggling in a world where the old ways no longer hold sway, trying to think our way through to making it work for everyone. I also sense that this House really cares about the state of parliamentary democracy and standards in public life—so thank you all.

Motion agreed.

Ukraine

Baroness Featherstone Excerpts

Thursday 24th February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

As I said on Tuesday, I think, British nationals were being encouraged to leave Ukraine. What we have also said now is that any who are still in Ukraine should register their presence, which will allow us to provide the latest information. Obviously, now there will be a lot of difficulties around this, but we have encouraged all British nationals to leave Ukraine. We are also providing an enhanced response in the FCDO, with teams working around the clock to support British nationals and respond to political developments. Obviously, we will continue to update travel advice as and when we can.

[Baroness Featherstone (LD)]

My Lords, will the measures that the Leader of the House has announced target Putin’s personal wealth? I do not think he cares about institutions but I do think he cares about his wealth.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Baroness Featherstone Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 31st January 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Featherstone (LD)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the powerful contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, every word of which I agree with. I fear that my contribution will be more like “Just a Minute”—there is no hesitation but definitely quite a lot of repetition and a certain amount of deviation.

I would like to believe the Government when they say that everything will be all right, everything will be transferred into UK law, the Government will maintain our environmental standards, I need not worry about the precautionary principle and it is not a problem if retained law is not quite the same. Of course, with the best of intentions all the EU directives that have kept us on the straight and narrow will still be underpinned. Of course, Ministers will not under any circumstances misuse statutory instruments. I would love to believe the Government. I almost believe that they have good intentions, but you know what they say: “The path to hell is paved with good intentions”. Good intentions are not adequate. The Government could give no assurances of good intentions that would satisfy me. The law, the face of the Bill, is the only place where doubts, concerns and worries can be laid to rest.

There is a governance gap in environmental standards. While the Government can say that standards will be maintained, where is the equivalent legal last resort to replace the force of the ECJ? Judicial review is not an answer. Fear of infraction concentrated ministerial minds on meeting legal obligations, but there is no enforcement in the Bill or even reporting obligations. We cannot and must not have a diminution of environmental rights. Without the protection of primary legislation, we cannot accept words alone. It is no wonder that so many Members of the other House expressed so much concern over the Bill giving Ministers the power to change primary legislation with a test that is as flimsy as whether Ministers think it appropriate. There has to be a legal test as to whether it is necessary, at the very least.

One of the key principles under EU law has been the precautionary principle, which forces those whose actions might harm the environment to prove in law to the contrary. The Bill rules this out. It also rules out the polluter pays principle. These are protections that have stood us in good stead. The precautionary principle and the polluter pays principle have kept us on the straight and narrow. They have forced us in the right direction, but they are explicitly ruled out in Schedule 1, so where are those protections to come from in future? The Government continually reiterate that there will be legal continuity, but that is not in fact the case. The Government must enshrine EU environmental principles in domestic law.

Alongside the principles, there is also a need to carry across provisions from EU directives that are not transposed into UK law. Some parts of EU law did not need transposition while we were a member state, but they need it now. We have to have the ability—nay, we have the obligation—to put right any deficiency in terms of failure to transpose EU law: it must be a duty and not simply a power. If Brexit comes to pass—and I still hang on to my “if”—we must be sure that laws that are currently EU regulations and laws that implement EU directives are transposed into UK law with the same force and intent as when we were a member state. On Report in the other place, there was cross-party support for new Clause 13 on the certainty of retained EU law.

The Government are trying to assuage the many concerns that we have in this regard by proposing that each measure will be dealt with on a case-by-case basis. That gives no comfort to those of us who suspect that the Government wish to find a way of moving away from these strictures. As energy and climate change spokesperson, I have huge concerns about a whole range of threats in that regard related to our departure from the EU.

I want to touch on our membership of the internal energy market. If we continue to participate—and of course we must—we will be obliged to comply with the relevant EU legislation. We need to continue to be as influential over EU energy post Brexit if we are to ensure that energy trading works to the benefit of UK consumers. The Government claim that they want to hold consumer energy bills down, so this is vital. Unless we adopt the energy acquis, we will not be able to maintain membership of the relevant bodies. Without proper management, this could lead to higher energy prices and energy supply shortages.

There is still no certainty about our continued membership of the internal energy market. If we leave it, what will happen if we have a gas security incident? Currently, there is an obligation on all members to meet the essential energy needs of any member state before the non-essential needs of their own. That is there to prevent a country from having a total power failure. If we leave the energy market and we have an issue with our gas supply, member states will no longer have an obligation to help us. We will be at the back of the queue and I do not think that Europe will be very kind to us.

Equally, with interconnectors, we could, if things get bad, be unable to export gas to the continent. Northern Ireland and Ireland have a single energy market and have interconnectors between them and the UK mainland. As Ireland will remain a member of the energy market and will obviously want to go on trading energy with mainland Europe, it will have to pass through the UK, a non-member.

There is no economic upside to Brexit in the case of energy—or actually anything—only possible downsides, and the positive pan-European climate efforts about which we have all been so enthusiastic and which are so necessary to our commitments to the Paris Agreement and our own Climate Change Act may be undermined.

European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

Baroness Featherstone Excerpts

Monday 20th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Featherstone (LD)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, and I could not agree more with him on that last point.

I do not take kindly to threats. There may be many reasons for which this House in its current form should be abolished or reformed, but expressing our views honestly is not one of them. Those in the other place who seek to threaten and bully us should be ashamed of themselves. If we send this back to the Commons with amendments, it is simply to say, “Look at this again”—that is what we do with legislation. At least, that is my understanding after a year in your Lordships’ House. This is no different.

We live in uncertain times in an uncertain world, which is even more uncertain today now that the new leader of the free world appears to have no understanding of or respect for his role—or worse. Each day brings another jaw-dropping statement, press briefing, appointment, tweet or executive order, the reality of which is stark and dangerous. I have always been a great fan of America and have always wanted a close relationship with the country that has the most power. I also wanted a close relationship with Europe. I am now concerned about our relationship with the former.

But, to be frank, even if it had been Hillary, in an internationalist world we stand with our friends, be that the EU, NATO, the Commonwealth or the United Nations. None of these groupings is perfect—far from it—and all need to be more effective and dynamic. But the EU was our rock and it is our nearest and dearest. I am broken-hearted that, on a simple majority in a poorly argued and lie-ridden campaign—on both sides—our nation is walking away from peace, security, jobs and economic success. Yes, we will survive—how well is yet to be seen—but do not threaten me or tell me not to fight for what I believe in or not to stay as involved and as close as is humanly possible to Europe post Brexit. On this debate—the power to trigger Article 50—I have but a few comments on key issues.

Without Euratom—I have always pronounced it “Eurahtom”: you say “Euratom” and I say “Eurahtom” —the peaceful use of nuclear energy, nuclear safety, nuclear safeguards, nuclear security and research into nuclear fusion are not certain. As ever, there are two views from the legal profession: one that leaving the EU means we automatically leave Euratom, and the opposing view that leaving the EU does not mean leaving Euratom. It is beyond vital that we remain in Euratom, even if we were outside Europe, for the reasons afore given, one way or the other.

On EU nationals, as has been expressed across your Lordships’ House, we should give assurance to the EU unilaterally that their future is secure. This is no way for a decent country to behave. On the single market, we need our heads examined if we leave. I was a Home Office Minister and worked with Theresa May for three years. She is a very sensible and clever woman. I hope beyond hope that hard Brexit is a negotiating position, and that common sense will prevail in the negotiations and that we will retain access to that market. Anything else is beyond mad.

Lastly, I come to perhaps the most important part of the process that this debate kicks off, which is that we should give the British people the final say on the deal when it is dealt. Listening to MP after MP in the Commons debate say how much they disagreed with leaving the EU but that they did not wish to frustrate the will of the people, it was—if noble Lords will forgive me—as if their cojones had gone missing. That is the point. In the Commons they are in a double bind—or perhaps more of a triple bind. They are torn between their conscience, the will of their constituents and the overarching result in the country. That is why this must go back to the people. It will be almost impossible for Parliament to simply vote without the confirmation of the British people. It started with the people and it must end with the people, when they are in a position to make a judgment based on the facts—the deal itself. Parliament can debate and argue, but it is clear that the Commons believes that it must not frustrate the will of the people—though, if noble Lords will excuse my cynicism, I wonder what will happen when the cold wind of Brexit blows public opinion the other way.

Of course, the referendum was clear: as clear as mud. The retrospective clarity that is now given to it was not there at the time and is no substitute for the ultimate truth that will be the deal. That we should make this momentous change and leave the EU on a simple majority—the result of an advisory referendum based on campaigns that had only a tangential relationship to the truth and that was given as the result of appeasement of the right wing of the Conservative Party—is unforgivable.

The final decision must go back to the people; and the people of this country can be trusted, knowing the deal on the table, to make a decision about whether their first view, now informed by reality, remains their view. Of the people, by the people and for the people.