Trade Bill

Debate between Baroness Smith of Newnham and Lord Judd

Committee stage
Tuesday 13th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judd (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Alton, for introducing this amendment. I agree absolutely with those who argued that it is inconceivable that the Government will not accept it.

The situation in China is of course appalling, but if we are going to introduce this legislation and further the cause of justice, we must be consistent. That means that we have to try to do everything possible to avoid arbitrariness, in which cases to be brought become, in a sense, historically arbitrary, because there are too many cases of what appears to be genocide in the world.

It is not just a matter of genocide; the definitions of genocide are clear and you can make an absolute stand. The problem is the issues which are marginal; there is also the problem of the immense human suffering, inhumanity and abuse of human rights and so on, which do not formally become genocide but which are appalling.

The one point I want to make in this context is that if the House, as I am sure it will, overwhelmingly approves this amendment—my congratulations to all those who have brought it forward—this must be the point at which we take extremely seriously, in all our trade deals, abuses of human rights, suffering and injustice. I do not hesitate to make the point.

An example of this is Yemen. Why do we prevaricate on Yemen when it is absolutely clear that we are very much implicated, indirectly, in what is happening there? That has great significance for our trade policy towards Saudi Arabia and others. We must be consistent. This is a wonderful opportunity to mark a point of no return, where as a nation we become known for consistency and firmness in our approach to the application and fulfilment of human rights and the protection of people in the name of humanity across the world.

[Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I hope noble Lords can hear me; my computer is claiming that my bandwidth is low, but I hope I am none the less audible. I was going to speak to Amendment 68, but my friend, the noble Lord, Lord Alton, has explained the significance of Amendment 76A, which I therefore support.

Some noble Lords have already gone beyond the term “genocide”, but the narrow scope of this amendment is very important. It is a term for which, as the noble Lord, Lord Alton, has pointed out, there is a very high and exacting threshold, which is important. In a speech on Raphael Lemkin, Michael Ignatieff suggested:

“Those who should use the word genocide never let it slip their mouths. Those who unfortunately do use it, banalise it into a validation of every kind of victimhood.”


It is clear that we should not fall into the trap of calling any sort of human rights abuse genocide, but there are cases where it is important that we acknowledge that something is genocide.

Like the noble Lord, Lord Alton, I have had more than one exchange with the noble Lord, Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Goldie and Lady Anelay of St Johns, when the latter was a Minister, in which Ministers of State have repeatedly suggested that while genocide is obviously a heinous crime, they cannot bring it forward and say that it is genocide—that is only for the courts to decide. As the noble Lord, Lord Alton, has pointed out, that gets us into the most awful vicious circle. How do we ever get to the point where something is declared a genocide and used as a reason not to engage in trade, for example?

Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Baroness Smith of Newnham and Lord Judd

Report stage & Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords & Report: 1st sitting & Report: 1st sitting: House of Lords
Wednesday 30th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judd (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Oates, was absolutely right. Do we want to be a society based on compassion and concern, or to become a nation without a beating heart on humanitarian issues of this kind? As far as the European Union is concerned, there is of course a special challenge because citizenship means citizenship, going right back to classical times, but we took away what people in good faith had come to understand as their citizenship and the rights that followed from it when they went to make lives, futures and careers overseas. They never dreamed that they were breaking links with their home base. Many of them wanted to return at some point and of course, as we have heard from one speaker after another, many have families rooted here for which they feel responsible; they want to be able freely at a time of crisis to return and succour the needs of such people.

It is altogether good news that the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, has moved this amendment; it represents the kind of Britain in which I want to live, given the values behind it. Do we believe that families are fundamentally important psychologically, for mental health more generally, for physical health and to the well-being of citizens, or not? Do families provide a unit of stability in the midst of an increasingly complex, demanding and unpredictable world, or do they not?

What are we doing with this Bill? It is almost impossible to understand how the Government have got themselves into this position. I hope we stand very firmly behind the noble Baroness this evening, or whenever it is we are allowed to vote on this matter.

[Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD)]

I support the amendment in the name of my noble friend Lady Hamwee. That probably comes as no surprise to noble Lords.

I am going to do something that I normally try not to, and that is to rehearse one of the arguments that has been going on for years. For five of the six years that I have been a Member of your Lordships’ House we have been talking about having a referendum on leaving the European Union, having that referendum, and then trying to deal with the fallout from it. The debates that we were having in October 2015 have been rehearsed again and again. I have tried not to rehearse them; I recognise that the UK voted to leave, that we have left and that at the end of the transition period things will be different.

However, one of the points made during the debates on the European Union Referendum Act 2015 was the importance of enfranchising EU nationals resident in the UK but also UK nationals resident elsewhere in the EU. That was suggested precisely because those groups of people were disfranchised yet were potentially going to—I will not use “suffer”, as I realise that that could be seen by some as inflammatory—be more clearly affected than many of the rest of us who are not actively using our rights as EU citizens. British citizens who have opted to use their rights under EU law to marry, reside and exercise the right to family life as EU and UK citizens should not have those rights torn away from them.

We have heard many individual cases this evening, but I will take a slightly more general approach. When an EU national is working abroad in another EU country, family members also have the right to reside and work in that country, regardless of their nationality. That has applied to UK citizens. The Minister puts forward the idea that somehow people have 15 months to make a make-or-break decision: “You can come back now or stay away. You can’t come back with your spouse, your children, your in-laws, your close family members.” Is that really what people thought that they were voting for? Taking back control surely is about us making the right decisions. They do not have to be xenophobic or exclusionary, or choices that say no to people. Why should we make it harder for those British citizens who have chosen to live in other countries—because they were exercising their rights and living with people they loved—to be back in the United Kingdom after March 2022 than it will be for EU citizens with settled status? We should at least be as generous to our fellow British citizens who have used their EU rights as we are to EU citizens who will benefit from settled status. Can the Minister please talk to her colleagues in the Home Office and make the Government think again?

Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Baroness Smith of Newnham and Lord Judd

Committee stage & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 9th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, said that the Minister would find this somewhat like an echo chamber—and I confess that when I looked at these two amendments and thought about whether I would speak on them, I wondered whether I might be repeating myself. I remember speaking on many occasions since 23 June 2016, at various stages, about the rights of EU nationals and of individuals. In particular, I have contributed to debates on amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister. I pay tribute to her for the persistence with which she tables amendments to piece after piece of legislation, trying to hold this Government to account and remind them of the importance of doing the right thing.

These amendments are about the rights of citizens. We are not talking about people who are saying, “Maybe I would like to change my nationality; maybe I would like to become a British citizen.” We are talking about people being able to register their right as citizens. The Minister might not think that is terribly important. She might think, particularly about an EU national with settled status, “They don’t need to worry. Their rights will be so guaranteed in the United Kingdom—a country whose values of liberal democracy, human rights and the rule of law are second to none.” However, if a member of Her Majesty’s Government can say from the Dispatch Box in the other place that the Government are willing to go against international law in a “specific and limited” way associated with the withdrawal agreement, how can people possibly have certainty about the rights of EU nationals with settled status? People need guarantees; they need certainty. Perhaps the Minister will understand why we feel it is so important to raise these issues and probe them again—because the Government do not necessarily always act in the best interests of the people they are meant to serve, or of the most vulnerable.

Children in care certainly should not have to pay a fee, which will undoubtedly be unaffordable. Nor should anybody be expected to pay a fee of more than £1,000—three times the cost of processing the right to register their citizenship. If this country really wants to go global and demonstrate its values, surely one way to do that is to ensure that the rights of the most vulnerable are secured—and one way of doing that is to make sure that we are not effectively profiteering from the costs of registering citizenship.

[Lord Judd (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I am glad to pay a tribute to my noble friend Lady Lister for the way in which, as has just been pointed out, she has consistently fought on these issues through Bill after Bill, and debate after debate. She has a firmness of resolve that is to be envied. I am also particularly glad that we heard the right reverend Prelate speak in this debate. He spoke with his usual incisive analysis, and, much more importantly, with his usual decency and humanity, which seem to underline his whole approach to public affairs.

In this debate, we are not just talking about citizens who should be enabled to establish their rights. We are talking about vulnerable, individual people. We are talking about children. We hear a great deal from this Government about our desire to be an independent nation, standing on our own and demonstrating to the world what life should be about. What kind of Britain are we trying to portray? As an older man, I find it almost inconceivable that difficulties such as the price of registration should be used as a means of deterring a number of applicants. I also find it deeply sad that the nation that we should be in—where we are compassionate, where we are almost consumed with concern for the vulnerable, where we want them to establish their rights—is replaced by an impersonal policy of this kind. I find it incredible that we even have to look at a situation like this. It is not a Britain of which we can be proud. It is a Britain that must be raising doubts, all over the world, among all those who have fought and struggled for human rights, decency and civilised values. These are not decent civilised values that we are hearing here, and we need to ensure that this is put right.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Baroness Smith of Newnham and Lord Judd

Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 23rd April 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD)]

My Lords, Amendment 29 is also in my name. I would like to say that I agree entirely with my noble friend Lord Wallace—and in many ways I do; I agree with the sentiment of everything he said—but I am a little puzzled. He is suggesting that there must be some document somewhere in Whitehall, that the Prime Minister has a plan, and that all we need is for her to give the Minister permission to tell us what is in that plan. I do not think that that plan exists. It might be nice to believe that there is a blueprint of a future EU-UK foreign and defence co-operation policy but I do not believe it yet exists.

When I was doing my homework for today, I was not rereading the collected speeches of the Prime Minister; I happened on the report of the European Parliament from last week. In one-minute summaries, each of the leaders of the groups in the European Parliament responded to the European Council meeting. Obviously, President Macron had also been present. One of the speakers was therefore the chairman of the European Conservatives and Reformists Group, the Conservative MEP Syed Kamall. He was talking so positively about the future and the existence of EU-UK security and defence co-operation that I thought he could almost be a Liberal Democrat.

I thought that I should perhaps make a note of what Dr Kamall had said, but I could not find a transcript, so I went a little bit further into the internet and discovered something that he had been writing on ConservativeHome. He was so positive about what the Prime Minister had achieved at the European summit meeting. He pointed out that she had pulled off a diplomatic coup by securing unprecedented support from EU leaders for her tough stance against Vladimir Putin. He noted that the Prime Minister had persuaded the Council to toughen up its summit conclusions. This extraordinary solidarity, he continued,

“sent a strong signal to Moscow and once again highlighted Britain’s influential role on the international stage. It has also brought into focus the importance of our post-Brexit security and defence relationship with the EU”.

Indeed it has, but the point is surely that the reason that the Prime Minister was able to pull off a diplomatic coup was that she was in the room.

As a member of the European Union, the United Kingdom has a seat at the table. The Prime Minister is present at every European Council meeting; the Foreign Secretary is present at every Foreign Affairs Council and we have people in the room every time there is a discussion about European foreign policy. However tight a relationship we seek to have when we have left the European Union, one fundamental change is inevitably going to have taken place: we will not have a seat at the table.

Therefore, while I completely agree with my noble friend Lord Wallace that we need to have clarity on what the Prime Minister is anticipating in relation to foreign and security co-operation once we leave the European Union, there is a more fundamental question: what arrangements are the Government making to strengthen our relationships with our bilateral partners—to strengthen relations with each of the member states—so that we will at least have a direct contact in each of the member states? If we do not have a seat at the table, we will have to put far more effort into our bilateral and multilateral diplomacy. So far, although the Foreign Secretary, when he gave evidence to the International Relations Committee, suggested that the Government had improved their representation in bilateral embassies, there is no clarity on what the Government are doing in hard, practical terms.

Finally, there is a second aspect to this. It is not just a question of what the Government want: it is a question of what the EU 27 are willing to concede. The House of Lords Library briefing on the proposed UK-EU security treaty points out that the European Council has stated that,

“the EU stands ready to establish partnerships in areas unrelated to trade, in particular the fight against terrorism and international crime, as well as security, defence and foreign policy”.

However, the briefing goes on to say that the European Commission has stated that,

“while the EU aims for a partnership with the UK on security and justice, the EU’s interests must be protected, a non-member state cannot have the same rights as a member state, there must be a balance of rights and obligations and the EU must continue to have autonomy in making decisions”.

That applies particularly to internal security, which we will be moving on to, but if you talk to the Norwegians, they will tell you that, however much they want to be associated with EU foreign policy, they do not have a seat at the table. They might be able to tag along when the EU has decided what it wants to do in relation to foreign policy, but the idea that they have an equal partnership is for the birds.

To get beyond fantasies, can the Minister tell us whether the Prime Minister has a plan? Is it hiding somewhere in Whitehall and is he going to be able to reveal it before Third Reading? It is not only on environmental policy that we need to have a sense of what the Government plan and what they are seeking. It is on that most fundamental aspect of the state: the defence of the realm. At the moment, although I believe that the Prime Minster wants to have a close relationship with the European Union in this area, we need to have some clarity on how she intends to get there.

[Lord Judd]

My Lords, I thank our noble friends on the Liberal Benches for having put this amendment forward. It seems self-evident in its logic. Indeed, not to respond to what it calls for would be to forgo the responsibility of government to put the defence and well-being of our people in Britain first and foremost. I have had posts in defence and in the Foreign Office and it seems inconceivable that in any significant conflict in which we would be involved we would not want to work with our allies and friends. It is much better to prepare for that and to have the arrangements in place to make sure that we make the best of it. This is not just a matter of fixing something when a crisis arises; it is a matter of having a culture of co-operation in which people feel they have a shared responsibility, that they want to develop that responsibility together, they understand each other and their training and organisation are geared to co-operation with others. From that standpoint, this is a wise amendment and I hope the Minister will respond positively.

Defence: Continuous At-Sea Deterrent

Debate between Baroness Smith of Newnham and Lord Judd

Wednesday 13th July 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD)]

My Lords, I am going to wind up for the Liberal Democrats and will probably give the only—dare I say it—authentic and official Liberal Democrat position on continuous at-sea deterrence. I will say in advance that I am speaking as briefed according to our party policy. I speak as vice-chair of our Federal Policy Committee and as the person who has the dubious distinction of chairing our last defence working group. We produced an excellent defence policy paper, most of which I would be very happy to advocate to your Lordships. The bit that achieved most publicity and notoriety at the time was our policy on the nuclear deterrent. I am tasked this evening with advocating that again, so I think I will be the only Member of your Lordships’ House this evening not saying that I support the Government.

I will say in advance that, while I am speaking officially in terms of the party line, my own view is very much as a multilateralist. Certainly, anything that I am saying should not be taken as suggesting in any way that I am advocating a unilateralist position, nor indeed that my party is advocating a unilateralist position. I will explain shortly because I can see quizzical faces.

There have been suggestions from various Members of your Lordships’ House that this is a snap decision, and it has been asked why we are making it now. We are not making a snap decision this evening. We have been talking about this for at least 10 years. The Liberal Democrats are now on, I think, our fourth review of what we think our policy should be. Back in 2006-07, the policy review was led by the late Lord Roper and the person responsible for drafting the then policy was the late Lord Garden, both of whom reviewed and took this issue extremely seriously. I was on that working group. At the time, a decade ago, we were reviewing whether it made sense to have an independent nuclear deterrent. The words of Sir Michael Quinlan, which have been mentioned by various noble Lords this evening, were important. Was it still the appropriate measure to have after the end of the Cold War, in a world where the threats seemed to be changing and the threat of Russia was perhaps less significant than it had been?

Clearly, the situation now is very different. Russia now poses a threat, and the only nuclear threat that seems to have abated in the past decade is that of Iran. The geopolitical situation a decade on is such that those of us who had questioned whether a nuclear deterrent that arose during the Cold War was still appropriate in the 21st century have begun to change our minds.

The position that my party took in 2007 was to say very clearly that the decision on a replacement for Trident did not need to be taken then. The main-gate decision did not need to be taken until the 2010-15 Parliament. For reasons that we do not need to rehearse now, that decision was not taken until 2016. The Liberal Democrat position is that we believe we should retain a nuclear capability. We believe the threats are such that the United Kingdom and her European allies need to have a nuclear deterrent, but we do not believe in like-for-like replacement. The noble Lord, Lord West of Spithead, might suggest that we are closet unilateralists.

The party’s position was debated at great length over the years and agreed in 2013: that we believed in retaining a nuclear deterrent but we were not persuaded that it was essential to keep a four-boat solution. While I understand that that is not going to work—were we to have a vote this evening, I would be in a minority, possibly of two, because I note that my Chief Whip has appeared and would support this line as well. But the position that the Liberal Democrats took, after a prolonged debate, eschewed the unilateralist perspective that many in my party, like the leader of the Labour Party—his position was outlined earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe—would have preferred.

My party was willing to accept the retention of nuclear weapons and the replacement of Trident, but not like-for-like replacement, on the understanding that we would seek to take a step down the nuclear ladder, and that giving up nuclear weapons in a unilateralist way—saying simply, “We no longer wish to retain nuclear weapons”—would not give us any leverage in non-proliferation discussions. Keeping a seat at the table was important, and having a non-like-for-like replacement would at least ensure that we were still building submarines, retaining the skills that, as we have heard, are so important for our economy but also for the country’s nuclear capability. Therefore, while moving away from continuous at-sea deterrence might strike some of your Lordships as leaving us vulnerable, it would also mean that we have not lost such capability and that we keep many options open, in a way that a step to unilateralism would not. The official Liberal Democrat position is that we do not support the like-for-like replacement of Trident but we do support the retention of nuclear capabilities and believe that stepping down the nuclear ladder would pave the way for further discussions on non-proliferation.

I will conclude with two questions for the Minister. First, in light of questions about non-proliferation, can he explain how the Government intend to contribute further to non-proliferation discussions once a decision on the four-boat solution is voted on next Monday? We have five-yearly reviews of the non-proliferation treaty. They tend to coincide with general election years, which perhaps has meant that the United Kingdom has not played as significant a role in the discussions as it might have. What scope might there be in 2020 for a key British role—

[Lord Judd]

I thank the noble Baroness for giving way during a short debate. I am very interested in what she is saying. She has been very candid about the Liberal Democrats’ position—in favour of retaining a nuclear capability, but not supporting this particular move. In what form would they retain a nuclear capability?

[Baroness Smith of Newnham]

I am most grateful for the opportunity to clarify the non-continuous at-sea deterrence policy. It was outlined clearly in 2013 during the debate following the Trident alternatives review. We will have fewer than four boats, which is understood to be two or three boats. Since the Trident alternatives review did not explore a two-boat solution, I believe that must mean a three-boat solution, but, technically, our policy is for fewer than four boats. Not having a continuous at-sea deterrent means that the boats can be in or out of operation according to a timetable decided by whoever runs our defence policy at the time.

My final point goes back to the issue of costs. On Monday, after the Minister repeated the then Prime Minister’s Statement following the NATO summit, I asked a question about defence expenditure and some of the issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, and other Members this evening. My understanding, from reading the report of the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy, is that it shares the concern I raised on Monday. It was outlined on Monday—this was repeated by the noble Lord—that there has been a 0.5% increase in real terms in defence expenditure, but that was predicated on a budgetary forecast made before the decision to leave the European Union, which may mean that the defence budget is smaller than initially assumed. In that case, will the Minister reflect on what the implications are for the defence budget of taking this decision and ensuring that our defence capabilities are secure?