Debate on the Address

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 18th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. We could add the plans for the M62, HS2 and electrification of the TransPennine line, which will all make the promises that we have spoken about a reality.

Believing in opportunity means never writing anyone off. For too long the young offender institutions and prisons in our country have not been working. They give the public the security of knowing that offenders are locked in, but they are not doing enough to turn around the lives of people who will one day be let out. So in our prisons we are going to apply the lessons learned in other public service reforms: publishing results; giving the people who run the services proper control over them; encouraging innovation; rewarding success; and not tolerating persistent failure.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

If the Prime Minister is serious about prison reform, why have prison budgets been slashed by a third since 2010, at exactly the same time as the prison population has been growing? Given that 47,000 prisoners are currently incarcerated for offences linked to drug use, is not it time to review a policy that treats drug addicts only as criminals, rather than as people who need our support as well?

[The Prime Minister]

I would make a number of points to the hon. Lady. First, I really think that we need to get away from the idea that we only measure progress in public services by the amount of money that is spent. The whole aim here is to try to do more with less. That is what we have done with so many parts of the public sector. The point about drugs is important. the first thing we have to do is ensure that our prisons are drug-free; not just free of drugs, but free of so-called legal highs, about which the Leader of the House made such a powerful case on the radio this morning.

Panama Papers

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Monday 11th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right about that. I would reinforce the point that many millions of our fellow citizens own shares, and many people choose to make their investments through unit trusts, which are a relatively safe form of investment because they share the risk. Many unit trusts are listed in other countries—many of them now in Dublin—and they are set up in that way not to avoid tax but to make sure that the revenues are returned to the unit trust holder who then pays tax, which is the key point.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

Does the Prime Minister accept that the revelations last week that he intervened personally in 2013 to water down the effects of EU transparency rules on trusts damages his efforts to portray himself as some kind of champion of fair tax? Will he now commit to fully supporting EU transparency rules, including country-by-country reporting by corporations showing exactly how much profit they make and where?

[The Prime Minister]

Let me be absolutely clear with the hon. Lady. There were no EU proposals—the whole thing was based on a British proposal or initiative to encourage all countries to have registers of beneficial ownership. The EU then joined in and suggested extending it to trusts, and we pointed out that if that happened no one would take it up because trusts, as she knows, are set up for all sorts of reasons: the care of a disabled child, support for a local school—any number of things that are perfectly reasonable under English common law. The advice I had was that if we went for beneficial ownership of companies and trusts, the move that we have made, which is genuinely helping to change the world in that regard, would have completely failed.

UK-EU Renegotiation

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd February 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

This is rather a different situation; we are being told in advance that because of the pressures we face, this is a brake we can use, and that we can do so relatively rapidly after a referendum, and I think it would make a difference. The facts are these: 40% of EU migrants coming to Britain access the in-work benefits system, and the average payment per family is £6,000. Don’t tell me that £6,000 is not quite a major financial inducement. I think that more than 10,000 people are getting over £10,000 a year, and because people get instant access to our benefits system, it is an unnatural pull and draw to our country. One thing that we should do to fix immigration into our country is change that system, and that is what we are going to agree.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

Will the Prime Minister acknowledge that the referendum will be won or lost on bigger issues than this renegotiation, not least on a judgment that the greatest challenges facing us are better solved when countries work together? In that vein, may I invite him again to join me in welcoming the establishment of Environmentalists for Europe, which recognises that cross-border problems require cross-border solutions, and highlights the crucial role that the EU plays in protecting wildlife and nature in this country?

[The Prime Minister]

Where there are genuine cross-border problems we must work across borders to try to ensure a strong solution. I think that the key issues are prosperity and security, but within security comes environmental security, and at the Paris accord Britain was able to play a strong role. Through our example of getting carbon emissions down, and by having a strong plan for the future, we encouraged other countries in Europe to do the same. That leveraged in—sorry, terrible jargon: that brought about a better deal from the rest of the world.

Oral Answers to Questions

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 6th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

First, let me pay tribute to my hon. Friend’s constituents, who worked around the clock to help each other in appalling floods and an incredibly high level of rainfall. Let me join her in thanking the emergency services again for all the work they did.

After floods like this, there are always questions about which pumps were used, which floodgates were opened and what decisions were made by the experts on the ground. It is very important, having seen many communities flooded in my own constituency, to hold meetings with community after community; to go through those decisions, to work out what lessons can be learned and to work out whether the right decisions were made. I absolutely pledge that that should be done. We have announced £40 million for the work across Lancashire and Cumbria to help people out, and we will ensure that the flood alleviation money for households and businesses, the schemes we set up after 2013, is paid out as quickly as it can be.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

Q4. In the light of last month’s Paris climate agreement, at which all countries agreed to progressively increase their ambition and to keep global warming well below 2°, does the Prime Minister agree that we must now urgently begin the process of strengthening the EU’s 2030 greenhouse gas reduction target to 50% below 1990 levels at the very least, a position he argued for, I am glad to say, at the European Council?

[The Prime Minister]

First, let me join the hon. Lady in once again recognising that Paris was a very big step forward. Previous agreements, such as at Kyoto, did not include action by China or America. Now we have all the big countries and big emitters as part of the deal. We argued that the EU should go further. We achieved, I think, a very aggressive package for the EU, but that was the best we could do in the circumstances. I think the EU agreement helped to bring about the general agreement. No one should be in any doubt that Britain is playing a very major role in bringing that about. Let me give the House one statistic. I know there is a great deal of interest in the House about solar panels. The other day I asked what percentage of solar panels had been installed in Britain since this Government took office in 2010. I expected the answer to be 50% or 60%; the answer is 98%.

ISIL in Syria

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

The number of ground troops is, as my right hon. Friend says, unknown, and their composition is also unknown, but what we do know is that they are, by definition, opposition fighters: they are anti-Assad. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Prime Minister still has a question to answer about how we can work with them to retake ground from Daesh without becoming drawn into a wider conflict with Russia, given that they are on the other side?

[Jeremy Corbyn]

That is an important point. The hon. Lady has been very active in trying to promote peace and humanitarian resolutions to the many conflicts that exist around the world.

Fourthly, the Prime Minister has avoided spelling out to the British people the warnings that he has surely been given about the likely impact of UK air strikes in Syria on the threat of terrorist attacks in the UK. That is something that everyone who backs the Government’s motion should weigh and think about very carefully before we vote on whether or not to send RAF pilots into action over Syria.

It is critically important that we, as a House, are honest with the British people about the potential consequences of the action that the Prime Minister is proposing today. I am aware that there are those with military experience—Conservative as well as Labour Members—who have argued that extending UK bombing will

“increase the short-term risks of terrorist attacks in Britain.”

We should also remember the impact on communities here in Britain. Sadly, since the Paris attacks there has been a sharp increase in Islamophobic incidents and physical attacks. I have discussed them with people in my local mosque, in my constituency, and they are horrific. Surely this message must go out from all of us in the House today: none of us—we can say this together—will tolerate any form of anti-Semitism, Islamophobia or racism in any form in this country.

In my view, the Prime Minister has offered no serious assessment of the impact of an intensified air campaign on civilian casualties in ISIL-held Syrian territory, or on the wider Syrian refugee crisis. At least 250,000 have already been killed in Syria’s terrible civil war, 11 million have been made homeless, and 4 million have been forced to leave the country. Many more have been killed by the Assad regime than by ISIL itself. Yet more bombing in Syria will kill innocent civilians—there is no doubt about that—and will turn many more Syrians into refugees.

--- Later in debate ---

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Johnny Mercer). Although I do not agree with the position he put forward, I think he put it very clearly and passionately, for which I thank him. I thank the armed forces for the work they do.

I share the horror and revulsion at recent atrocities in Paris, Beirut, Syria itself and elsewhere. yet I have still to hear convincing evidence to suggest that UK bombing of ISIS targets in Syria is likely to increase our security in Britain or help to bring about a lasting peace in the region. On the contrary, the evidence appears to suggest that it would make matters worse. I want to highlight that in the few minutes available.

If we are interested in evidence, a good place to start might be to examine the effect of the US-led bombing campaign so far, explore whether it has been successful and see whether our contribution would make a real difference. From what I have seen, the sustained bombings to date have not done much to push Daesh into retreat. According to the latest figures from the US Department of Defence, US-led forces have flown some 57,000 sorties, while completing 8,300 airstrikes over a 17-month period, but they have relatively little to show for it. While the air war has so far killed an estimated 20,000 ISIS supporters, the number of fighters ISIS can still deploy—between 20,000 and 30,000—remains unchanged.

Moreover, there are very real dangers that airstrikes on Syria have become increasingly western-driven. All four of the middle eastern states previously involved—Jordan, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates—have now withdrawn. That risks feeding the Daesh propaganda, in which it presents itself as the true guardian of Islam under attack from the crusader west. Although utterly pernicious and wrong, precisely that message is being reinforced by western bombings, with every indication that the attacks are an incredibly effective recruiting sergeant. According to US intelligence sources, last September, 15,000 recruits were reported to have joined Daesh from 80 countries; a year later, the figure has risen to 30,000 recruits from 100 countries. I have had no reassurance that western military action would not simply drive more recruitment.

I have not heard any evidence to contradict the conclusion of the Foreign Affairs Committee’s report about the military challenges. The report very clearly stated that its witnesses did not consider that extending air strikes into Syria

“would have anything other than a marginal effect.”

Indeed, as other Members have pointed out, far from the issue being a lack of allied aircraft above Syria, the real problem is actually a shortage of viable targets on the ground. The dangers are compounded by ISIS’s deeply cruel use of human shields, which makes targeting more difficult and will add to the civilian death toll.

There is much talk of focusing on Raqqa, but according to recent exiles, many in the ISIS leadership have gone to ground in places such as Mosul. They suggest that to get rid of ISIS in a city like Mosul, which has 1.5 million people and perhaps 150,000 ISIS terrorists, we would literally have to flatten the entire city.

Those of us who are sceptical about the use of airstrikes are often accused of saying that we do not want anything to happen and that we want inaction. Nothing could be further from the truth. The Government can and should be playing a role in brokering peace and stability in the region. The Prime Minister could be redoubling his commendable efforts to find a diplomatic solution. The civil war is inextricably linked to the rise of ISIS in Syria, as the Foreign Affairs Committee report emphasised repeatedly. ISIS flourishes where chaos reigns, so renewed efforts are needed to end the Syrian civil war.

[Lady Hermon (North Down) (Ind)]

Is the hon. Lady inviting the House to ignore completely UN Security Council resolution 2249?

[Caroline Lucas]

That resolution calls on us to use “all means”. I want to make sure that we are using all of the means short of military action. [Interruption.] I do not believe that we are doing that and I do not believe that we should use military action unless there is evidence that it would make things better. There is laughter on the Government Benches at the idea that we might not want to take military action if there is no evidence that it will work.

One reason I do not want to use military action is that there are no ground forces. We have heard again and again that air strikes will not work without ground forces, yet when we ask where the ground forces will come from, it turns out that they are mythical—they are “bogus battalions”, as the Chair of the Defence Committee said.

Let us not suggest that those of us who do not think that there is an instant military answer are not just as committed to seeing an end to ISIS as those on the other side of the House who seem to think that there is a military answer. All of us are committed to getting rid of ISIS. Some of us are more committed than others to looking at the full range of measures in front of us and to looking at the evidence that suggests that bombing, to date, has not been successful.

I was talking about the other measures that I would like to see taken forward. I talked about the diplomatic efforts, building on the Vienna peace talks. The diplomatic effort must extend to Iraq, where the Abadi Government must be encouraged to reach out to the neglected Sunni minority, especially in those parts of the country where ISIS is recruiting.

Why are we not applying sanctions to Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states that have turned a blind eye and allowed the flow of finance to ISIS and, potentially, other terrorist groups? Why are we still selling weapons to Saudi Arabia, when they are then used in a vicious and destabilising war in Yemen that has killed thousands and made millions homeless, and that is creating yet more chaos in which al-Qaeda can thrive? Why are we not putting pressure on Turkey over the oil sales and the transit of fighters across its border?

Why are we not doing more on refugees? We should have more refugees here in the UK—of course we should—but we should also put more pressure on our allies to put more resources into the refugee camps in the region. I appreciate that the Prime Minister has done a lot on that. This country has been good on that issue. Let us make sure that our allies do the same, because those refugee camps are becoming absolutely desperate. It is cold, there is more poverty and desperation, and we can be sure that ISIS will be recruiting in those refugee camps too.

Syria

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Thursday 26th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am very grateful for my hon. Friend’s support. The point he makes about Iraq is particularly potent because there was a danger of ISIL overrunning Iraq, and that was stopped through the combination of action from the sky, including by us, and legitimate ground forces. He is also right to talk about the importance of discussing these issues with President Putin, as I have done and will continue to do. There is a gap between us, but I believe it is reducing.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

I agree with the Prime Minister that the diplomatic and political process must play a key part in our approach to the hugely complex situation in Syria, and credit should be given to the part it has played so far. But with some limited progress now being seen to come out of Vienna, will he directly address the vital concerns that come through very strongly in the evidence to the Select Committee report that our ability to continue that key political and diplomatic role will be compromised fundamentally if we join the bombing?

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Lady asks a very important question, which is whether taking action against ISIL in Syria makes a political agreement more likely or less likely. In my view, it makes it more likely, first of all because we need to have a Syria with territorial integrity, and unless we deal with ISIL and the caliphate we will not have a Syria to have a transition in. Secondly, while she and I may disagree about many things, surely moderate Sunni forces in Syria need to play a part in the future of that country, so we should be helping them, including through what we do with ISIL, rather than seeing them being wasted away.

G20 and Paris Attacks

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Tuesday 17th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We can learn the lesson from Morocco. There is also work that the German Government have been doing with Turkish imams and work that we have been doing with training imams coming into this country. One of the remarkable things about the G20 was the conversation about fighting radicalisation and extremism. The proposals made by, for instance, the Indonesian President and the Malaysian Prime Minister—both countries pride themselves on being part of the moderate Muslim world—were particularly powerful to listen to.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

While we differ on the details of how to ensure that citizens are kept safe, I certainly agree that it is the overwhelming priority of the Government to make sure that they are. In that vein, will the Prime Minister assure us that as well as giving extra money to the security services, he will make a significant investment in our diplomatic services, which are world class and are needed more than ever right now? They should not be hollowed out by cuts.

[The Prime Minister]

Our diplomatic posts play an absolutely vital role in Britain’s soft power. We were ranked the other day as No. 1 in the world for soft power. We have been opening embassies around the world rather than closing them. This is a good opportunity to thank all our hard-working staff from this Dispatch Box.

Oral Answers to Questions

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 9th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I have got nothing to add to comments I have made about this issue before, but I am very happy to write to my right hon. Friend and set out the position.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

Q5. The ongoing harrowing refugee crisis is fuelled by conflict, which in turn is powered in part by the global arms trade. The UK has supplied the weapons being used in many areas from which people are now fleeing, including Yemen and Libya. In the week that London will once again host the largest arms fair in the world, is it not time for the Government to recognise the link between arms sales and the terrible tragedy that we see unfolding around us?

[The Prime Minister]

First, we have some of the strictest rules anywhere in the world for selling arms to other countries. If the hon. Lady thinks that the reason why so many people are fleeing Syria is something to do with the arms trade, the fact is that it is because Assad is butchering his own people and because we have an Islamist extremist, terrorist organisation running a large part of two countries—Iraq and Syria. Those are the problems that we have to confront, rather than pretending it is about something else.

Syria: Refugees and Counter-terrorism

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Monday 7th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. Friend is entirely right that what is required, whether in Iraq or, more crucially now, in Syria, is functioning Governments that can represent all their people, with armed forces that have the confidence of all their people. That is the long-term answer in both Iraq and Syria, but we are a long way from that in Syria. He asked what conversations are going on. Conversations are going on to try to secure a transition in Syria from the totally unacceptable regime we have today, which is the recruiting sergeant for ISIL, to a regime that can represent all the Syrian people, but he is right.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

The offer of 20,000 refugees over five years amounts to just 12 refugees a day, which falls pitifully short of what is needed and of what people in this country deserve and expect. Local authorities such as Brighton and Hove’s would be very willing to accept more, provided the Government fully resource this. Will the Prime Minister therefore guarantee the funds—not from the aid budget—and, crucially, that they will last for more than one year, so that people who want to act to help this crisis can be enabled to do so?

[The Prime Minister]

I notice that Brighton is very keen to be generous with other people’s money. The point is that, yes, we will fund this in the first year through the Department for International Development budget and then we will need to look at how we provide the resources that local authorities need. That process will be led by the Home Secretary and the Communities Secretary over the coming weeks.

G7

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 10th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

We have not picked the fight with Russia; Russia has brought this on herself by destabilising and encouraging separatists to take Ukrainian territory. As for whether Ukraine is a country, we should recognise that the Ukrainian people themselves have decided that it is a country; it is recognised by the United Nations. The whole point we have to learn is that redrawing the lines and maps of Europe by force can end in disaster for everyone in Europe, including the people here in this country.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

The G7 pledge on climate action is very welcome, but a new report from Oxfam warns:

“Coal plants in G7 countries are on track to cost the world $450 billion a year by the end of the century”.

Given that the Committee on Climate Change recommended that we should end unabated coal generation by the early 2020s, will the Prime Minister put in place a policy framework to try to achieve that?

[The Prime Minister]

We all want to see an end to unabated coal, but the key is in the term unabated. We need to make sure that we invest in carbon capture and storage so that we can accelerate the decarbonisation of electricity, but in a way that does not damage our economic interests.