UK Relations with Gibraltar and Spain

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Tuesday 19th November 2013 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mark Simmonds)]

I am pleased to serve with your guidance this morning, Mr Gray. I know that you have a particular personal interest in the UK’s relationship with Gibraltar. I congratulate the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Jim Dobbin) on securing this important debate at such a significant time and on the articulate and passionate way in which he outlined his case. He was particularly generous in the number of times that he gave way to parliamentary colleagues to allow as many people as possible to make important points.

I want to highlight the hon. Gentleman’s excellent work as chair of the all-party Gibraltar group and the significant way in which that group supports Gibraltarians and those in the UK who are interested in the future of Gibraltar. I am aware that the hon. Gentleman was among 20 UK parliamentarians who attended national day in Gibraltar on 10 September; I have done the same in years gone by. I hope therefore that he heard the message given by the Prime Minister to mark that occasion, in which he strongly reiterated the British Government’s commitment to protecting the right of the people of Gibraltar to determine their own political future. I will meet Chief Minister Picardo next week in London at the joint ministerial council, where we will discuss further the importance of the relationship and what we can do to make progress in some of the areas that the hon. Gentleman has highlighted.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

There is clear sadness and anger about what is happening to Gibraltar, and the British Government must do more to express the feelings of Parliament. It is an all-party matter, and we are fed up with what is happening to the people in Gibraltar. The Government have to be stronger; I do not know how, but for goodness’ sake, can we get a stronger response to what is happening to our people in Gibraltar?

[Mark Simmonds]

My hon. Friend makes a good point about the cross-party agreement in Parliament on the importance of supporting Gibraltarians in their desire to remain linked to the United Kingdom. I will come on to address his point specifically. I want to make it absolutely clear, however, at the beginning of my response to the debate that the United Kingdom will never enter into arrangements under which the people of Gibraltar would pass under the sovereignty of another state against their wishes. Furthermore, the United Kingdom will not enter into any process of sovereignty negotiations with which Gibraltar is not content. We will continue to respect the wishes of the people of Gibraltar. I do not think we could be any clearer about that.

The debate is about the United Kingdom’s relations with Gibraltar and with Spain, however, and we wish to maintain a strong bilateral relationship with Spain that stretches across a whole range of areas and delivers support for the interests of the UK and Gibraltar. We have a strong economic relationship with Spain that is worth £36 billion to the UK. Spain put £57 billion in inward investment into the UK in 2010, and the UK is the largest single investor in Spain. Spain is a member of the G20 and NATO, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill) has highlighted, and it is an important EU state. We have close ties through consular relationships. Spain is home to 1 million UK citizens, and 14 million of them visit annually. There is significant co-operation on crime, immigration and counter-terrorism. Last year, the National Crime Agency—formerly the Serious Organised Crime Agency —agreed the first UK-Spain joint investigation team in many years. We work with Spain across a range of areas, including our strong operational defence relationship.

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[Mark Simmonds]

The hon. Gentleman will not be surprised to hear that I will not comment on intelligence in this forum. There is a keen urgency about the necessity for ad hoc talks between Spain, the UK and Gibraltar. Officials are working to ensure that those discussions take place again.

My hon. Friend the Member for Gosport raised Spanish incursions into Gibraltarian territorial waters. The Government take seriously their responsibility to ensure Gibraltar’s security. We do not rule out any measures that are necessary to defend Gibraltar and ensure its security against a genuine threat. We believe that the unlawful incursions by Guardia Civil vessels and other vessels of the Spanish state are merely a futile attempt to assert Spain’s legal position in respect of the waters. They are not acts of war and they do not weaken or undermine the legal basis for British sovereignty over Gibraltar and British Gibraltar territorial waters. The British Government are committed to upholding British sovereignty. The Royal Navy challenges all unlawful incursions by Spanish state vessels though radio warnings and close monitoring of Spanish state vessels until they leave Gibraltarian waters. We also make formal protests to the Spanish Government about all such incursions on diplomatic channels, ensuring that the Spanish understand that those incursions are unacceptable violations of British sovereignty.

[Bob Stewart]

If the British Government are determined to defend Gibraltar, why do they not make more use of the defence facilities in Gibraltar? For example, we could send down more often a roulement infantry company, to be based in Gibraltar for perhaps six weeks at a time and exercise there, rather than somewhere like Kenya.

[Mark Simmonds]

Regiments play a significant role in Kenya. My response to my hon. Friend is the point I made earlier: we must strike a balance between being forceful, strong and determined—to ensure that the Spanish Government understand the UK Government’s position and that the Commission undertakes its role responsibly and consistently to ensure that the issues on the border and in Gibraltarian territorial water cease—and finding mechanisms to de-escalate, rather than escalate the situation. That is why we must get back to discussing solutions as soon as possible, without negotiating the Gibraltarian sovereignty position at all.

Iran and Syria

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Monday 11th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

Absolutely. That happened just this afternoon, after my statement went to press, to be printed for the House. The International Atomic Energy Agency and Iran have agreed this afternoon

“to strengthen their cooperation and dialogue aimed at ensuring the exclusively peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear programme”.

We welcome that agreement. It is another positive sign, provided that the verification activities that have been agreed allow us to resolve all the past and present issues that have been raised by the IAEA. It is important that Iran addresses the substance of the agency’s concerns over what it calls the

“possible military dimensions to Iran’s nuclear programme”.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

Twenty-one years ago, I was ordered to take a British force under United Nations command into the Balkans. There was no ceasefire; we acted under a United Nations mandate. Is there no possibility that the Security Council might pass a mandate suggesting a humanitarian mission into Syria, even though the present Government do not agree to that? That would definitely encourage the present Assad Government to approve it.

[Mr Hague]

Realistically, there is unfortunately no prospect of the Security Council agreeing a mandate for any military mission into Syria, as that would undoubtedly be resisted and blocked by Russia and China. I hope that, if this situation continues, they will at least agree to a resolution in the Security Council, requiring the Assad regime to comply with presidential statements issued by the Security Council and therefore greatly increasing legal and diplomatic pressure on the Assad regime. I think that is the next step that will become necessary on current trends.

European Union (Referendum) Bill

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Friday 8th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hain]

Labour has never been afraid of consulting people in referendums. We have called more referendums in our history than any other party. Labour is the only party that ever called a referendum on the EU—the Conservatives took us into membership of the Common Market without one. Labour Members have never been afraid to consult the people, and we have specified the circumstances in which we would hold a referendum.

Despite CBI member companies’ frustrations with many aspects of EU membership, which, as a pro-European, I share, more than half of them—some 52%—say that they have directly benefited from the introduction of common European standards. Only 15% suggested that that had had a negative impact. A consultation would reveal that and enable it to be properly debated, assessed and considered.

Those CBI members believe that UK influence has helped to maximise the openness of the EU. Some 72% of British businesses believe that the UK has a significant influence on EU policies that affect them.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

I would have thought that those points of view would come out in the campaign, so why would we need consultation? Surely, in the yes, no or whatever campaigns, the various interests groups would directly lobby the British people, rather than MPs.

[Mr Hain]

I have taken every intervention that hon. Members have wished to make and I want to make progress, but I will answer the hon. Gentleman’s point first. As an experienced politician, he, like all hon. Members, knows that, in the din and pressure of a three-week campaign, with all the focus that that brings, it is very difficult to get all the arguments across. We need a proper assessment so that the British public have the chance to make their minds up, free from the influence of Eurosceptic newspapers, which dominate the debate. They should make their minds up on the facts by consulting the CBI, the TUC, the Institute of Directors and other such organisations. Those organisations will want their say, and the way to achieve that is through proper consultation, for which the Bill does not provide.

The City is a significant institution that will need to be consulted, which could be achieved under paragraph (j) of new schedule 2. According to the evidence we have, such a consultation would reveal that the City takes the same view as the CBI—it believes that British membership is positive for financial institutions. Why is the City not being consulted? Are the Government scared of consulting it? Is the hon. Member for Stockton South (James Wharton), the Bill’s promoter, scared of consulting it? Some 84% of Britain’s financial sector executives are strongly in favour of staying at the centre of the EU, according to a survey published in October by TheCityUK. Through a consultation, we could drill down into that and see whether it is a proper assessment.

The financial services sector accounts for 13% of gross domestic product and contributes more than £60 billion in taxes. Nearly 80% of all foreign exchange trades in the EU take place in the City, as do 74% of all interest rate derivative trades. The idea that the City would want to be frogmarched out of Europe is complete nonsense, as a consultation would reveal.

Gibraltar and the George Cross

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd October 2013 Westminster Hall

[Oliver Colvile (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Crausby. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for selecting me to have this debate on the possibility of the Crown awarding Gibraltar a George Cross to demonstrate that gallant naval port’s loyalty to Britain. The George Cross was created on 31 January 1941 by Her Majesty’s father, George VI. It has been awarded twice to a group of people, first to Malta in 1942 for its resistance following significant bombing by the Germans during the second world war, and more recently to the Royal Ulster Constabulary in 1999. I pay tribute to the armed forces that served in Northern Ireland during recent times. In both cases, the Crown recognised that those groups of people had shown real loyalty to the United Kingdom.

I am firmly behind the George Cross for Gibraltar campaign, which is organised by one of my constituents, Kevin Kellway. Kevin has had an illustrious campaigning career. When I first met him, he was campaigning for the restoration of the art deco Tinside pool on Plymouth Hoe, which is one of the jewels in our city’s crown. Before I arrived in Plymouth, Kevin was one of the leading lights in the campaign for Gibraltar to become part of the south-west region within the European Parliament. He organised a 30,000-strong petition in the 1990s to keep the Rock British.

Gibraltar’s connection with Devonport, in my constituency, is legendary, because both have a naval dockyard and naval base. Three hundred years ago this year, Gibraltar was ceded in perpetuity by the Spanish to the British Crown at the treaty of Utrecht in 1713 following the Spanish war of succession. It is now a British dependent territory and has withstood more than four sieges over the past three centuries. Throughout that time, it has remained loyal to the Crown.

The Spanish war of succession arose over the succession to the Spanish Crown following the death of the childless Charles II of Spain in November 1700. The two candidates for the throne—who, needless to say, were not up for election—were the French Prince Philip of Anjou, grandson of Louis XIV of France, and the Habsburg Archduke Charles of Austria. Louis XIV, the Spaniards who were loyal to Philip V and the Electorate of Bavaria supported Philip of Anjou. England, the Netherlands, Austria, Portugal, Savoy and some of the German states supported Charles in a grand alliance, because they were concerned that the unification of the Spanish and French Crowns might result in France dominating not only Europe but the Americas. That was before the American war of independence.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

I have written a George Cross citation, and I always thought that one of the criteria was that it had to be awarded for something that had happened post its foundation, so retrospective gallantry awards before the second world war would be difficult. I am in total favour, and a supporter of Gibraltar, but I wonder on what criteria a George Cross could be awarded since 1941-42.

[Oliver Colvile]

Gibraltar has an extremely distinguished historic position and loyalty, and I will come on to that during my speech.

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[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mark Simmonds)]

I am pleased to be serving under your guidance, Mr Crausby. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Oliver Colvile) on securing the debate and on his articulate remarks, including a brief history lesson about Gibraltar’s importance and the significance of its relationship with the United Kingdom. He rightly explained that we have a proud 300-year shared history.

We strongly welcome the wish of the people of Gibraltar to remain British. Our relationship can be pithily summed up by saying that Gibraltar’s history is our history. We must never forget that. My hon. Friend was right to highlight the significance of the fact that 99% of Gibraltarians voted for Gibraltar to remain an overseas territory of the United Kingdom. I want to state firmly that we shall continue to respect the wishes of Gibraltarians and to protect their right to determine their political future. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister reiterated that in his message to Gibraltar marking its national day on 10 September. I urge any hon. Members who have never attended Gibraltar national day to do so. It is a stark reminder of the importance of the relationship, and of how passionately Gibraltarians still feel about the UK and Gibraltar working closely together.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for setting out why he believes Gibraltar should be awarded the George Cross. The British Government value highly the loyalty and service that the people of Gibraltar have given to the Crown and the UK during 300 years of British sovereignty. Gibraltar has been and remains a strategically important location for British defence—a key point that was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Filton and Bradley Stoke (Jack Lopresti). Through a succession of conflicts, from the war of the Spanish succession to the present day, Gibraltar has provided a vital base for our armed forces and for the Royal Navy. It has made a strategically important contribution.

[Bob Stewart]

Two hundred and eight years ago, Gibraltar was crucial to our winning the battle of Trafalgar, which gave the Royal Navy superiority over the seas of the world for 100 years. It was incredibly important.

[Mark Simmonds]

My hon. Friend makes a good historical point. Of course, he will be aware of Gibraltar’s pivotal strategic role not only in the Napoleonic wars but in the second world war—despite serious attempts by the axis powers to take it.

The Chairman of the Equality Rights group in Gibraltar, Mr Alvarez, whom I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport knows, is leading the “Thumbs Up for Gibraltar” campaign, which was launched in Gibraltar in mid-August. The commendable and worthwhile overall aim of the campaign is to generate awareness and support for Gibraltar among the British public.

Arms to Syria

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Thursday 11th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

As the House may recall, in 1992-93, I was the first British United Nations commander sent into Bosnia. I was sent for humanitarian reasons and with the mandate of the Security Council. The Bosnian Muslims were fighting for their lives, with precious few arms or equipment, primarily against the Bosnian Serbs, who had largely appropriated the weapons and equipment of the Yugoslav national army. In comparison with the Bosnian Muslims, the Bosnian Serbs—and indeed the other warring faction, the Bosnian Croats—were well equipped. I never saw a Bosnian Muslim tank. The only armoured vehicles they possessed seemed to be a few 4x4s with makeshift metal plates strung along their sides.

I remember despairing that so many civilians were dying but no one was able to defend them. In my reports up the chain of command, I repeatedly argued that we should get involved, as well as arm, equip and train the Bosnian Muslims so that they could better protect themselves, even though that would have meant challenging the then European arms embargo. Of course I felt that way on the ground—who would not have done, given what my soldiers and I witnessed? If I was in Syria today, I would feel exactly the same way. My heart bleeds for anyone trapped in that country.

With the passage of time, I have often wondered whether there would have been a change in events if we had armed selected belligerent parties in Bosnia. My conclusion now is that it would not have made much difference. However, Syria is not like Bosnia, and I shall cite two obvious differences.

First, the Bosnian Muslims were united, unlike the diverse groups that constitute the Syrian rebel opposition. Worse still, it seems that the most militarily successful group among the rebels is the al-Nusra Front, which is directly affiliated with al-Qaeda. The rebels in Syria are hardly a credible, unified entity. Even if we were to arm the apparently moderate Free Syrian Army, there is no way we can forecast its chances of securing power after the eventual fall of Assad.

Secondly, we operated in Bosnia under Security Council resolution 775, which was agreed by all five permanent members of the highest international authority in the world. However, there is no international mandate for action in Syria—Russia and China will not sign one.

I would be willing to consider supporting humanitarian active operations into Syria itself. Under certain circumstances, I might even support some form of international military protection for aid convoys. However, I have two caveats. As things stand, there is neither the agreement of the warring factions to such operations, nor a Security Council mandate for action. In truth, addressing those circumstances seems highly unlikely in the foreseeable future. Unless circumstances or the current situation change radically, I would not support British arms being sent to the Syrian opposition, if such a question ever came before the House.

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[Mr Newmark]

Yes, my hon. Friend is absolutely right. In fact, there are 70 to 80 citizens of the United Kingdom who are today with Jabhat al-Nusra and the more radical groups. However, those groups represent only 5,000 or 6,000 people on the ground, versus the silent majority of 15 million Sunnis.

The second part of the strategy, beyond radical diplomatic engagement, should be containment. We must protect the likes of Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq and Turkey from becoming infected by this explosion. Thirdly, we must provide more aid, not just to Jordan and Lebanon, but internally.

[Bob Stewart]

I am in favour of considering military intervention to escort aid into Syria. Does my hon. Friend agree?

[Mr Newmark]

Yes, I do, although that is not without its dangers. When we ask the UN to do something, we have to think about what protection it will get.

My fourth point is that the Syrian National Council must become less dysfunctional. It cannot be a puppet of the Qatari regime, which it has been to date, representing just the Sunnis. It must reach out to the Alawites, the Kurds, the Druze and the Christians.

My fifth recommendation is this. I am not asking for British soldiers on the ground or for our pilots’ lives to be put at risk; I am asking for what the Syrian people have set out to me time and time again. We need to rebalance the situation on the ground. We need to arm the Free Syrian Army and support General Idris. If we do not, unfortunately more and more of the Free Syrian Army—the moderates—will drift towards the extremists. I am afraid that inaction will breed extremism and the fragmentation of Syria. Supporting the Free Syrian Army is also more likely to bring Assad and Russia to the negotiating table.

Returning to the point of this debate, I would not wish to bind the hands of the Executive on a foreign policy matter where our soldiers’ and our pilots’ lives are not at risk. Therefore, I would oppose the motion.

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[Bob Stewart]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Alistair Burt]

No, not yet.

We are also providing technical assistance for the protection of civilians. That includes advice and training on how to maintain security in areas no longer controlled by the regime, on how to protect civilians and minimise the risks to them—including in respect of helping the opposition counter regime forces as they attack towns under opposition control—and on co-ordination between civilian and military councils, and on how to maintain security during a transition.

Amending the arms embargo on Syria in May also supported these aims. As the Prime Minister has said, lifting the arms embargo on the Syrian National Coalition sent a powerful signal that there is no moral equivalence between Assad on the one hand and the legitimate representatives of the Syrian people, recognised by over 130 countries, states and other entities, on the other. It also increases pressure on the regime to negotiate seriously. We now have the flexibility to respond in future if the situation continues to deteriorate and if the Assad regime refuses to negotiate.

Let me come to the nub of the motion, just to be clear once again to the House. As my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary said yesterday in his statement to the House:

“On the question of any future lethal support—arming the opposition or intervening militarily ourselves—the Government’s position has not changed. No decision has been made, and any decision would be put to the House on a substantive motion.”—[Official Report, 10 July 2013; Vol. 566, c. 379.]

And as he said in the House on 18 June:

“We certainly would not want to pursue any aspect of our policy on this issue against the will of the House of Commons. That is neither feasible nor desirable, so of course we have made clear that there would be a vote. I have also made it clear that we would expect it to be before any such decision was put into action.”—[Official Report, 18 June 2013; Vol. 564, c. 746.]

Middle East and North Africa

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Wednesday 10th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

It is the advance of settlements on occupied land that makes the return to negotiations in the middle east peace process so urgent. Those settlements are illegal, as well as creating many anomalies, including the kind that the right hon. Gentleman describes. On my recent visit to the west bank, I visited families whose homes had been demolished. I went to see the E1 area, which is of enormous importance in determining whether a viable, contiguous Palestinian state can be created. I think our views in this House on this issue are well expressed, and that is how we have also expressed them at the United Nations Security Council, which underlines the urgency of getting both parties into negotiations.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

What hopes does my right hon. Friend have that the Syrian opposition, especially the al-Nusra Front, can achieve its aim of providing a “free, democratic and pluralistic” Syria that defends the rights of all Syrians after the demise of the Assad regime?

[Mr Hague]

We cannot look to the al-Nusra Front to provide a free, democratic or pluralistic Syria. There are extremist forces, but they are not the majority of people who are fighting for the opposition and certainly not of the people who simply want to see peace, dignity and prosperity for their country and a change of Government in Damascus. I think my hon. Friend should be able to trust the sincerity of the National Coalition, now with its expanded membership and new leadership, which includes many secular figures and minorities from across Syria. I have found in all my meetings with them that their commitment to a democratic, non-sectarian Syria is credible and sincere.

European Union (Referendum) Bill

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Friday 5th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davidson]

No, no; if you offer it to one, then you have to—Anyway, I will be having consultations in Room 220 in Portcullis house for those who wish to see me privately.

As we all know, it is really UKIP that has to be congratulated on this Bill. This would not be coming forward in this way if the Conservatives were not under pressure from UKIP. My side should not be unduly enjoying what is happening with the Conservatives and UKIP, because UKIP is also entirely capable of eating into our vote, as voting for UKIP is a vote against leadership and government by an elite that is seen to be out of touch. It is a revolt, in a sense, by those who see themselves as little people ignored by the existing system. While Europe has been the particular issue around which it has coagulated, that is not necessarily the only issue on which it sees itself as divorced from politics. However, the Conservatives have reacted to UKIP almost solely on this issue.

The Government’s position is much weaker than it appears. I was appalled to hear the Prime Minister say before the negotiations had started that he was going to be voting for Britain to stay in. That grossly undermines the Government’s negotiating position. Who goes into negotiations and says, “We will vote to accept the terms we are offered” before the negotiations have started? That seems to me to be an incredibly weak position.

After today’s votes and discussions, we ought to enter into a period of serious discussion of the terms on which we wish to seek renegotiation. What is it that we want to see? I want to spell out a number of points I think we ought to discuss, because, knockabout apart—and snivellers apart—these are serious issues that we have got to debate.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

Clearly that discussion is going to start now and go on for four years until 2017. If there was a vote now, I would vote to come out, but now we are going to have this alternative plan. It is good that we have four years to try and get it right, so the British people can then say, “Actually we like the end result that the Prime Minister has negotiated”—or they say that they do not and we leave. In my view, this makes a pretty good fist of dealing with this problem.

[Mr Davidson]

I have considerable sympathy with that point of view, but it is grossly undermined by the fact that the Prime Minister has already indicated he intends to vote for the terms that are offered after renegotiation, irrespective of what those terms are. That is an absurd negotiating position, and the silence now among Members on the Government Benches speaks eloquently to their support for my position.

What points for renegotiation should we be focusing on? The first is the question of ever-closer union. It is clear to me that we have to make it clear—absolutely clear, crystal clear—that we reject totally the concept of ever-closer union and the idea that the EU is a ratchet which only ever turns in one direction. I support devolution for Scotland on the principle that I believe powers should be moved downwards. I support the concept of subsidiarity, too, as I believe that in principle we ought to say that all powers held at any given level should be moved to the level below, unless a very strong case can be made for retaining them where they are. The onus ought to be on those who wish to hold them centrally to justify that position, rather than the converse. That has not been the position of successive British Governments up until now, and it should be, and I think we ought to make it absolutely clear that that is our position going forward, so that the inexorable expansion of the EU’s powers—like the Blob in the science fiction films that used to replicate itself every 24 hours and expand into new areas—is halted and constrained.

NATO

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Thursday 4th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)]

I, too, thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting time for a debate on NATO in the main Chamber.

My first real awareness of NATO came when I was interviewed to join the Royal Air Force in the 1980s. I was asked how many countries were in NATO and who was the Secretary-General. Of course, all Members will know that there were 16 member countries at that time and that the noble Lord Carrington was Secretary-General. NATO has now grown to 28 member nations, with former Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen as Secretary-General. Like previous speakers, I now serve on the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, which brings together parliamentarians from the Atlantic alliance and contains 257 delegates from the 28 nations. I serve on one of the five committees, the defence and security committee. I am proud that a UK member, the hon. Member for York Central (Hugh Bayley), is the current president of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly and is well into the first year of his two-year term. Congratulations, el Presidente.

NATO’s essential core tasks and principles are summed up in the strategic concept, and I will run through them. The cornerstone of the alliance, of course, is collective defence. NATO members will always assist each other against attack in accordance with article 5 of the Washington treaty. That commitment remains firm and binding.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

May I ask my hon. Friend’s opinion of whether French Guiana, in south America, might be defended under that collective security umbrella if it were attacked by Brazil?

[Jason McCartney]

My hon. and gallant Friend makes a good point. There are a number of anomalies, such as the situation of the dependency of the Falklands Islands and the tensions between Greece and Turkey, which of course are both member nations, in Cyprus. There are certain cases, of which he gave a prime example, in which article 5 perhaps has a little leeway.

Crisis management is another core task of NATO, and it has a unique and robust set of political and military capabilities to address the full spectrum of crises before, during and after conflicts. Of course, my hon. and gallant Friend was involved in one such conflict in Bosnia.

Another task is co-operative security. The alliance engages actively to enhance international security, through partnerships and by contributing actively to arms control, non-proliferation and disarmament. Other recently added facets of NATO’s work are cyber-security, which has been much in the news in the past fortnight, energy security and the threat posed by climate change.

NATO has been at the heart, and at the head, of command and control for current and recent western military interventions and operations. In many ways, it now delivers the military aspects of the United Nations’ work. I will highlight three examples. First, as we have heard, there is the international security assistance force, the NATO-led security mission in Afghanistan that the UN Security Council established in December 2001 under resolution 1386. Secondly, there was Operation Unified Protector, the NATO operation enforcing UN Security Council resolutions 1970 and 1973, concerning the Libyan civil war. Those resolutions imposed sanctions on key members of the Gaddafi Government and authorised NATO to implement an arms embargo and a no-fly zone and to use all necessary means, short of foreign occupation, to protect Libyan civilians and civilian-populated areas.

Thirdly, there is Operation Ocean Shield, which was referred to earlier. It is NATO’s contribution to the anti-piracy campaign off the coast of the horn of Africa, following the earlier Operation Allied Protector. Naval operations began early in 2009, having been approved by the North Atlantic Council, and primarily involve warships from the UK and the United States, although vessels from many other nations are also included.

That brings me to some of the challenges facing NATO, a big one of which is duplication. The operation against Somali piracy is a good example. I have been with the NATO Parliamentary Assembly to Djibouti, which is strategically placed on the horn of Africa, and there are clear signs of overlap and mission repeat. We have not only the NATO-led mission but an EU-led operation called Operation Atalanta, also known as European Union Naval Force Somalia. There is also an independent French air base, a US army camp and a Japanese air base. Time and time again, I ask the commanding officers how much liaison there is between the different operations, and I have never got a satisfactory answer.

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[Stephen Gilbert (St Austell and Newquay) (LD)]

Of course the hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) has outlined a minority perspective, but that shows the value of this Chamber in allowing those perspectives to be aired.

I disagreed fundamentally with the hon. Gentleman on a number of points. First, he said that NATO was looking for a role in the early 1990s and was therefore keen to latch on to Bosnia and Kosovo, whereas at the time NATO commanders were very reluctant to get involved in those conflicts. It was the international community, through institutions that I am sure the hon. Gentleman supports, that was looking for a mechanism to deliver its collective will on the ground. The only mechanism available to the international community at the time was NATO.

[Bob Stewart]

May I just confirm what my hon. Friend is saying? At the time, I was the chief of policy at Supreme Allied Commander Europe’s headquarters. It was my job to try to avoid getting involved in Bosnia and places like it, but I was given political instructions that we had to start thinking about it. What my hon. Friend says is absolutely accurate; the hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) is wrong.

[Stephen Gilbert]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend and I am pleased that he has been more successful in some of his more recent endeavours than he was in getting NATO to stay out of the Balkans. It was the international community looking for a vehicle to deliver its will on the ground that led to the NATO involvement in south-east Europe, which shows the benefits of an alliance that brings together collective action in support of common values.

I do not entirely share the view of the hon. Member for Islington North on Afghanistan. Hundreds of thousands of people are now going to school there in a way that they did not before. There is now a freedom for women that has not been felt recently. There is also the beginning of self-determination. NATO has helped to bring an end to a religious dictatorship there and my hope is that, as the negotiations go forward, it will continue to protect the newly won rights for people there.

I would like to pay tribute to the hon. Member for York Central (Hugh Bayley) and to my hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley (Jason McCartney) for securing this very important debate. My hon. Friend talked about the danger of unnecessary duplication—we may see that in some of the remarks today—but that in itself pays tribute to the work of the Parliamentary Assembly and to its British delegation, which works on a cross-party basis, putting the British national security interest first. The delegation is able to come back to this House and to the country and share a fairly coherent and joined-up criticism of NATO where there are criticisms to be made. We also play a key role in advocating the benefits of the alliance for everybody.

We all recognise that the world has changed. NATO was born into a Europe that was divided, and it formed the bedrock of our security for 60 years. The world was split between two diametrically opposed systems of government that were forged out of the second world war, the largest conflict in history. For much of its existence, NATO has been preoccupied, rightly, with conflicts between states, but as hon. Members on both sides have said, that has now shifted. It is no longer simply about interstate warfare. In Bosnia and in Kosovo, NATO has involved itself with civilians as well as states and this new role has been cemented in Afghanistan and, more recently, under the right to protect mandate delivered by the UN in Libya. That latter conflict displayed a strong example of how NATO, in accordance with international will and international agreement, was able to deliver effective military capabilities to prevent, I believe, the escalation of that conflict and to hasten the end of hostilities.

Humanitarian-led intervention is only one part of the changing landscape. There has been a paradigm shift towards focusing on international terrorism and piracy, as we have heard, and UK forces are highly active alongside NATO and EU allies in these regards. Cyber-security is also a new frontier for NATO. The unrelenting computerisation of our society and our reliance on the internet bring many opportunities for NATO Governments and citizens, but it brings significant dangers too. The scale of such infrastructure is something that no state could have anticipated in 1949. It requires a completely different approach that, through common endeavour, is better delivered within the alliance.

The power structures of the world have shifted far more rapidly than many predicted. We now live in a world where China is the world’s second largest economy, and it looks set to overtake the United States this century. This, coupled with the relative demise of the Russian economy and the break-up of the Soviet Union, has seen the attention of the United States shift firmly to the Pacific. That poses fundamental questions for NATO, an organisation that remains embedded in the regional geopolitics of Europe and the Atlantic.

The US remains by far the largest contributor of money and matériel for NATO. In 2011, the US spent 4.8% of its GDP on defence. Germany, Italy and France failed to contribute even 2% of their respective GDP. Like many hon. Members, I think it is deeply unfair that our European NATO allies expect the US and the UK to bankroll European defence. It is right to expect our allies in NATO to contribute fairly to the upkeep of NATO forces, and I call on Ministers not to be shy in their discourse with our European counterparts. Calling for member states to contribute fairly is one part of ensuring that the organisation remains effective. For NATO to be effective, we do not just need a willingness to deploy military force when necessary, but for our European allies to be willing to fund that resource, so we have the ability to deploy when the time is right.

On procurement, we can and should do things differently. There are many ways to work more closely with our European allies. We must ensure that the sum total of a country’s specific specialised contribution exceeds its individual parts. By procuring equipment and weapon systems together, we can create the flexibility essential to meeting the array of challenges in the 21st century. For example, it is wasteful to buy planes that cannot land on another country’s aircraft carriers, to have to supply different types of bullets for different countries, or to have radio systems that cannot be integrated or talk to each other. We must ensure that our armed forces can operate as effectively as possible with troops from other countries. That underscores the point made by the hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) about how unlikely it is for this country to go to war by itself. The more likely scenario is that we will always be acting as part of a coalition, so it is important to make that coalition effective—very basic stuff that NATO continues to get wrong.

Let us be clear: Britain should always be able to retain control over the deployment of its forces. We must do so wisely and with appreciation of the consequences of engaging our men and women in armed conflict. However, the EU can play a role in developing institutions and structures that allow humanitarian access and peacekeeping missions in partnership with NATO where possible. As I and other hon. Members have said, the gaze of the United States is now firmly on the Pacific. Having EU structures, where appropriate and necessary, to help plug the gaps left by the Americans, who are now more concerned with Beijing than Berlin, will be in the UK’s national interest. Deeper EU defence co-operation makes economic sense for the same reasons that it does within NATO. We are stronger together, and if we are smart, it will not be an additional burden to the taxpayer.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

I am going to return to the theme that the vice-president of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly started us on: why NATO? By the end of next year, we will be out of combat in Afghanistan. Clearly, there will be a period of readjustment for western armed forces. The British Army is being reduced by 20%. The other armed forces—the Air Force and the Navy—are being reduced by a similar amount. The Americans are already declaring that sequestration will take $50 billion a year out of their $550 billion budget, which is a lot. Therefore, fundamentally, there will be big changes.

When NATO started in 1949, General Lord Ismay said that its purpose was

“to keep the Russians out, the Americans in, and the Germans down.”

Obviously, the situation has changed a lot. The Warsaw pact was formed in 1955 as a reaction to NATO. We could not have had NATO without German rearmament.

I and other members in the House spent most of our military careers preparing for what we loosely called the third world war, hoping it would not happen. Thank goodness it did not happen on the north German plain. When the Berlin wall fell, everything changed and NATO had to change. As I have explained to the House on previous occasions, after I came back from Bosnia, in my last two years in the Army, I was a member of the planning team at Supreme Allied Commander Europe. We most definitely were not seeking a new role outside Europe; it was largely thrust upon us. Therefore, doubts remain about NATO and its solidarity. I agree that we must keep banging on about NATO’s target of spending 2% of GDP on defence. We must keep it. The problem is that some people, particularly in France, suggest that the alliance is

“an alliance of the unable and unwilling”.

A French academic said that. I put it to the House that NATO has a good future.

Twenty years ago, who would have thought that Russia would be resurgent? Russian military spending is now increasing by three quarters of a billion dollars; it will have increased by 53% by 2015. Russia still possesses more than 1 million troops and it has 20 million in the reserve. However, the Russians have big problems. Russian military prosecutors recently said that about a fifth of the budget had been embezzled, so they are trying to sort that out. However, look at the Russian navy. We have talked about the high north. That navy has been transformed in the last eight years: 45% of the ships in the Russian navy will be replaced by 2015. By 2007, Russia was building as many ships every year as the Soviets did at the height of their power.

My hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin) made an excellent speech on the nuclear deterrent. The Russians certainly think in terms of flexible response. They envisage using tactical nuclear weapons in their exercises; a recent exercise that they undertook in the Baltic states suggested exactly that. Part of their war-fighting ability is to use nuclear weapons. That is one of the reasons that we must retain our nuclear deterrent.

[Mr Jenkin]

Not only do the Russians exercise that capability, but they talk about it, have not renounced first use and have said that they would use their nuclear weapons in a conventional conflict against their neighbours.

[Bob Stewart]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. He puts it better than I could write it.

In China, Xi Jinping has consolidated his power. He talks of fighting to win wars. There has been a 10.7% increase in the Chinese military budget. The strategic forces of China now have 3,000 miles of tunnels. They have 850 nuclear warheads ready to launch. They are almost at strategic parity with the United States. They are also building globally deployable forces, which are now edging into the Mediterranean, as we have heard, and coming through the high Arctic. They are challenging western strategic military superiority.

Something else is new, and we have touched on it in the debate: cyber-warfare. The Defence Committee has just completed a report on that. It is a new form of war. It is invidious and evolving at unimaginable speed, with serious consequences. Cyber-space is an aspect of asymmetric warfare. It is very difficult to identify sometimes where these attacks are coming from. State actors such as China, North Korea, Iran and Syria are devoting resources to it. Hacking can be more deadly than the gun. The targets are government, industry and the military. There is great concern in the west about how disruptive cyber-attacks can be. For example, on 23 April, in seconds, the United States stock market dropped 1%, losing $136.5 billion, because of a false tweet put into the system, possibly from Syria.

The United States is changing some of the focus of its direction. Its strategy now, as the Defence Committee heard when we were in the US, is to concentrate on trying to avoid war much more. The Americans do not want any war that is not short term. They are looking at Asia. Sequestration will cost an enormous amount in military terms. The Americans consider that Russia is not a great threat at the moment—although its military spending is increasing, as I have mentioned—but that China is and it is growing in power. However, as one American academic put it to the Committee, “Going to war with China would be like going to war with your bank if you are an American.” Thankfully, since 2001, there have been huge improvements in US intervention power: there has been a two thirds increase in its intervention power capability.

The lesson of European, and world, history is that surprise is normal. The unexpected should always be expected, so we should expect to be surprised. Therefore, whatever we do within NATO, we must try to work in such a way that our armed forces can deal with as many envisaged eventualities as possible while also expecting that we will still be surprised. NATO gives us more combat power, by collaboration with others.

I am about to conclude Mr Deputy Speaker—I think you might be looking at your watch. The problem is that our potential enemies remain our potential enemies. Symmetric warfare between states is not dead. We may think it is. We have not had a war for 70 years, when Europe historically had six or seven each century, and thus the public ask, “Why do we have to spend money on defence?” The problem is that that has not gone away and we may well be surprised.

Defence is an insurance policy, therefore. We want to deter the possibility of war. We do not want to use nuclear weapons. The point of possessing nuclear weapons is to avoid using them by avoiding threats. The aim is to help our country be left alone and not be attacked, and, in NATO terms, the aim is to avoid all NATO countries being attacked.

I believe very strongly that we must remain part of NATO as I believe it has a big future. I disagree with those who say its purpose, in Lord Ismay’s definition, is gone. No, NATO is required because it helps us, as a medium-sized nation, to combine with other nations—the French, the Germans, the Spanish and other nations that are not members of NATO—and form a coalition of the willing to deal with problems in the world.

We must have the resilience to adapt, to deter and to deal with the unexpected, and we should try to do that as cheaply as possible of course. The days of huge military budgets are over; they are long gone. The best way is for us to collaborate and work with like-minded states, and NATO is most certainly the best means to that end.

Oral Answers to Questions

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Tuesday 18th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Swire]

The Government have assured us that there will be no more impunity for servicemen, and I discussed this with both the vice defence Minister, Jorge Bedoya, during his visit here in March and subsequently with the constitutional court judge, Vargas Silva, who was here on 30 April. I will continue to discuss these matters. We are against impunity for the military, and we make our position on that very clear.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

The Government of Colombia are making extensive efforts to counter the dreadful trade in narcotics. Will the Minister assure us that we will give that Government as much support for counter-narcotics as is possible?

[Mr Speaker]

With reference to human rights, which is what the question is about.

Sudan and South Sudan

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Tuesday 18th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mark Durkan]

I welcome the right hon. Gentleman’s support in securing this debate and I absolutely accept his point. Signals given by the international community, and promises made in various peace agreements by those in Sudan and South Sudan, were not always followed through. It is important that we take time to address this issue in the Chamber.

The previous debate on Sudan and South Sudan took place in spring 2011, in the countdown to South Sudan’s independence. At that time, there was some hope about the new country’s prospects. There was hope that more of the comprehensive peace agreement would come to fruition if it had a framework or context in which to work. The hopes and goodwill of NGOs and others in the international community were tragically dashed. The effect on the lives of so many people in both countries was cruel.

We sought this debate because we are coming up to the second anniversary of South Sudan’s independence and because we recently marked the 10th anniversary of the conflict in Darfur. Hon. Members from all parties wrote to the Foreign Secretary, the US Secretary of State and the Australian Foreign Minister to raise concerns about policy drift on Darfur. Perhaps we have been remiss as parliamentarians in not addressing this issue in this Chamber, but we know why that has happened. Other events have caught our attention: the Arab spring and its complex aftermath and the situations in Mali and Syria have taken our focus. The danger is that the international community is giving a signal that what is happening in Darfur is par for the course and there is not a lot more that we can do about it beyond the commitments we have previously made.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

The sadness is that this situation has been going on for so long. Some 20 years ago, my wife worked in southern Sudan for the International Committee of the Red Cross, and it was a basket case then. It is about time the world got together and sorted out this dreadful situation, so that the people there can live peacefully and bring up their children properly.

[Mark Durkan]

I recognise the passion of the hon. Gentleman’s intervention, and that is exactly why this debate is necessary. There is a danger that because South Sudan has been established, we think it can make its merry way forward, but it is a fragile state—the world’s youngest. It lacks serious governmental and administrative infrastructure, and there is a gross disparity in the position of women and girls in its society. For decades now, these people have suffered from the effects of conflict, and they are still suffering. Even now, seven of the 10 states in South Sudan display features of conflict and the depredations that come with it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen Mosley]

The question of aerial bombardment features large across all the problem areas in Sudan. The hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan) mentioned the situation in Blue Nile state, and there have been regular bombing incidents in South Kordofan and Darfur. The Sudanese Government are also laying landmines, which is another concern. Both those things are contrary to international conventions, and both of them are classified as war crimes: deliberately targeting civilians is classified as a war crime. The right hon. Gentleman will be aware that four members of the Sudanese Government, including President Omar al-Bashir, are wanted by the international courts on war crime charges.

I would put South Sudan’s problems into two categories: they involve the relationship between South Sudan and north Sudan, but they also involve the internal problems facing South Sudan. There are many unresolved issues between Juba and Khartoum at present. We have talked about oil, so I will not dwell on that subject. There are also the problems over South Kordofan and Blue Nile, and the questions about their future. There was meant to be a consultation on the future of those two states, but it has not happened.

We have for years been promised a referendum in Abyei, so people in Abyei can decide whether they want to be part of the south or the north. Because many of the farmers in that area are migratory, there has been wrangling over the electoral roll for years; no decision can be reached, so there can be no agreement on a referendum. We have been promised that there will be a referendum this autumn, but we have been promised a referendum before, so we will have to wait and see whether it takes place.

There are also issues about support for rebel groups. Both the Sudanese Government and the South Sudanese Government are supporting rebel groups in each other’s territory. There are issues to do with the migration paths of pastoralists, too, who travel across the border on a seasonal basis. There are not just cross-border issues, however. South Sudan faces internal problems. There is conflict in seven of the 10 South Sudanese states. There is ethnic and tribal violence. South Sudan is not an elected democracy. Broad powers are given to the Executive, and we see high levels of corruption.

There is also a huge problem of lack of state capacity and infrastructure. South Sudan is one of the hardest places in the world to reach, and once there, it is incredibly difficult to travel about the country and reach some of the more isolated states.

[Bob Stewart]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. My wife was a delegate of the International Committee of the Red Cross in South Sudan. Indeed, she was taken hostage there by rebel groups. She set up a camp from scratch for 100,000 people. She firmly believes that one of the problems now is that we have set up these camps in inhospitable places, where we have to resupply them and keep them going. By doing that, we have caused a problem in an area that cannot sustain such a large population. These camps attract people. Hard as it would have been, perhaps we should not have done so much.

[Stephen Mosley]

I do not know that I agree with that, but my hon. Friend is right that many of the camps are very isolated and difficult to reach. There is some good news, however. A new camp has recently been completed at Ajoung Thok, and it has a very good reputation. The agencies are gradually moving people there from more isolated camps. They can supply them with food and water there, and allow them to start making the long-term decisions that will enable them to set down roots and start to develop livelihoods in those areas, because that is also a problem with humanitarian aid, and we have faced it in Sudan in the past. People are quick to supply food and emergency aid, but we are not so quick in providing more long-term solutions that allow people to survive and live on their own over time.

The hon. Member for Foyle mentioned non-governmental organisations, and while preparing for this debate we met representatives of a number of them. Normally when we speak to NGOs, we find that they are desperate for MPs to stand up in this Chamber to sing their praises and tell Members of this House about the good work they are doing. On Sudan and South Sudan the NGOs deliberately said, “No, we don’t want you to say what we’re doing. We don’t want you to say where we are doing it.” They face so many problems that they are afraid that if they highlight their situation, they may face repercussions. They have told us that they already face restrictions on visas, and the cost of permits is going through the roof. They are finding that it is becoming more restrictive to operate in both Sudan and South Sudan, and they asked us to make sure that when we talk about their situation, we talk in general terms rather than in specifics.

What we do know is that 1 million people remain displaced by the fighting, with more than 300,000 having been displaced since January—that is more than for the whole of last year. The problems in Sudan and South Sudan have not gone away; they are in a real mess. There is continued armed conflict and human rights abuse, and hundreds of thousands of people have fled and are living in camps.

This is a debate on the UK Government’s response to Sudan, so I wish briefly to mention the Sudan Humanitarian Assistance and Resilience Programme—SHARP—which the Department for International Development is running. The idea is to spend £67 million over three years, with half of that being in Darfur and the rest in the Blue Nile and South Kordofan states. The idea is to build household and community resilience, and to allow people to move on from aid dependence. It is a long-term project, and I congratulate the Minister and the Department on the work they are doing to ensure long-term success.

Sudan and South Sudan are not a problem that can be solved on its own by this country or by themselves; it needs all the international community to work together to help resolve the conflicts they face.