Brexit: Financial Services Sector

Debate between Earl Howe and Lord Tugendhat

Tuesday 23rd January 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Tugendhat (Con)]

My Lords—

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Earl Howe) (Con)]

My Lords, we have time for both speakers who have been on their feet. We shall start with the Conservative Benches and then go over to the Labour Benches.

[Lord Tugendhat]

My Lords, does my noble friend the Minister agree that the range and diversity of markets and services in the City of London, and the extent to which overseas institutions participate in them, means that it would be very difficult to produce a paper of the sort that the noble Baroness opposite has demanded without going into a gross oversimplification, and that it would be much better—as my noble friend Lord Lamont said—to allow these negotiations to progress?

NATO Warsaw Summit

Debate between Earl Howe and Lord Tugendhat

Monday 11th July 2016 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

I am afraid I am not aware of discussions specifically relating to the relationship between Greece and Russia. If I am able to find out particulars on that theme, I will gladly write to my noble friend.

[Lord Tugendhat (Con)]

My Lords, the Minister has announced a very important commitment to the Baltic states. Can he assure the House that the Governments of all three of these states are behaving entirely as we would wish in respect of their Russian-speaking citizens and people of Russian nationality living within those states? Can he be sure that they are not giving any justifiable cause or excuse to Mr Putin to act, and that they are behaving in a way that is completely consistent with the principles of the European Union?

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, there is a delicate balance to be struck here. We do not wish to provoke Russia into responding inappropriately to these deployments. On the other hand, we do ourselves need to react to the actions of Russia, as was laid out at the 2014 Wales summit, which delivered an effective and united response to Russia’s illegal annexation of the Crimea and its actions in eastern Ukraine. The measures taken at the summit will, we believe, provide further reassurance and deter Russian aggression. They are proportionate and defensive in nature. In saying those things, I recognise my noble friend’s appropriate concern that we ensure that the Baltic states in particular are being measured and reasonable towards the Russian-speaking element of their populations. This move is not designed to provoke those people any more than it is to provoke Russia itself.

NHS: Cost-effectiveness

Debate between Earl Howe and Lord Tugendhat

Monday 12th September 2011 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

I agree with the noble Baroness. One of the aims of our reforms is to integrate health and social care in a much more seamless way. There is another element to our reforms, which may have escaped noble Lords' notice. It is our wish to bear down on health inequalities in a much more systematic way than we have done hitherto. Both health and social care have a part to play in that.

[Lord Tugendhat]

My Lords, I declare an interest as chairman of the Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust. Does my noble friend not agree that whenever an international organisation such as the OECD or the IMF has good words to say about the conduct of the British economy, the Chancellor of the Exchequer always welcomes them and uses them as an argument to support the Government’s economic policy? Would it not be helpful, when other organisations have good words to say about the NHS, for the Government to welcome them with equal fervour? Of course the NHS can improve and must modernise and move with the times; but when significant institutions such as the Commonwealth Fund in America, and the one that has just been quoted, have good words to say about the NHS, surely the Minister should be less carping.

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, in my opening words I said that we welcomed the report. I stressed that we fully acknowledge the improvements that have been made by the NHS over the past few years, which the report highlights. However, it is limited in its scope. The difficulty with all these reports is comparing like with like, particularly with different health systems. I am not decrying the work that went into the report, but I will say that perhaps some OECD reports take us closer to how well the UK's health system is performing in relation to those of other countries.