Legacy Issues: Northern Ireland

Debate between Lord Bellingham and Gerald Howarth

Tuesday 13th December 2016 Westminster Hall

[Sir Henry Bellingham]

I agree entirely. I will quote what my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said back in October. She said that

“we will never again in any future conflict let those activist, left-wing human rights lawyers harangue and harass the bravest of the brave, the men and women of our Armed Forces.”

Furthermore, in a letter from my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces, dated 15 November, to my hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray), he said that we

“‘will always salute the remarkable dedication and courage of the RUC and our Armed Forces in defending the rule of law and in ensuring that Northern Ireland’s future would only ever be determined by democracy and consent. We will never forget the debt we owe them…we will also never accept ‘equivalence’ between the security forces and those who carried out acts of terrorism’.”

I submit in conclusion that we have to find a way forward. We have to draw a line under this. We have to see the scrapping of the legacy investigation branch. I suggest to my hon. Friend the Minister that he look at what happened in South Africa. If he does not want to scrap the legacy investigation branch and put a line under this, could he look at something along the lines of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and amnesty committee that South Africa set up so successfully? The alternative does not bear thinking about. It would represent a betrayal of our armed forces and a tearing up of the military covenant, and could imperil the entire peace process.

[Sir Gerald Howarth (Aldershot) (Con)]

I represent the home of the British Army and have constituents in their 70s and 80s who still await a potential knock at the door. My hon. Friend has made a powerful speech. Does he agree that what is being done will seriously damage the morale of British troops? If they feel that their Government are not prepared to stand by them, they will think, “What is the point in putting my life on the line for my fellow citizens?”

[Sir Henry Bellingham]

I fear that if we do not draw a line under this, we will be not just undermining the morale of our armed forces, but betraying veterans. We could also imperil the entire peace process.

Operation Midland: Henriques Report

Debate between Lord Bellingham and Gerald Howarth

Tuesday 13th December 2016 Westminster Hall

[Sir Gerald Howarth]

My right hon. Friend makes an important intervention, and in looking at all of this I have tried to work out precisely what motivated the police. As I will say in a moment, they seem completely bereft of any common sense. However, if he will forgive me, I will try to address that point later on.

In respect of the searches of Lady Brittan’s home, one sergeant told her, “Thank goodness we are only lowly cogs in this investigation”.

Let me turn to my long-standing friend, Harvey Proctor. It took him 28 years to rebuild his life following conviction in 1987 for a sexual offence, which is no longer an offence and which of course cost him his place in this House. He shunned the public spotlight and became a very private citizen until, out of the blue, his home was raided by police, who spent 15 hours searching, removed papers and possessions, and told him that he was accused of being involved in historical child sex abuse. It took the police a further two months to accuse him of being a child serial murderer, a child rapist and an abuser of children. Those were the wild allegations of one fantasist known only to the public as Nick.

[Sir Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk) (Con)]

I think my hon. Friend is coming to a very important area. Does he agree that we must be very careful about talking about victims, because surely what we are talking about are complainants? There are no victims until allegations have been proven.

[Sir Gerald Howarth]

My hon. Friend makes a very important point and it is one that I intend to address in some detail in a moment.

Not content with making these serious charges against Harvey, Nick suggested that there was a paedophile ring operating in Westminster, accusations that the hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Mr Watson), who is the deputy leader of the Labour party, was keen to exploit as a Tory scandal and for which he should now offer a full and unreserved apology.

Harvey had staying with him in his house a couple and their newborn child. He was told two weeks before the search of his house by the Metropolitan police that that child should be removed for their own safety, and secret sessions between the Leicestershire police, Leicestershire social services and the duke’s representatives were convened when pressure was placed on the duke and duchess to sack Harvey from his employment after the search of his house. Leicestershire constabulary and the Met passed responsibility for this issue to each other, backwards and forwards, but it happened.

What are the charges against the Metropolitan police and the other forces involved? First, it is that they adopted a policy that the accusations were, in the words of Superintendent Kenny McDonald, “credible and true”. Gone was any pretence of old-fashioned policing—looking dispassionately at the evidence and seeing where it leads.

This is where we are assisted by the excellent report produced by Sir Richard Henriques, a former High Court judge; admittedly, that report was at the specific request of Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, the Commissioner of the Metropolitan police. What Sir Richard found was that the chief constable of Norfolk, Simon Bailey, who I understand leads for the Association of Chief Police Officers on child protection and abuse investigation, produced guidance in November 2015 that insisted that complainants should be described as victims. He wrote:

“If we don’t acknowledge a victim as such, it reinforces a system based on distrust and disbelief.”

He said:

“The police service”—

please note the reference to the police service, not the police force—

“is the conduit that links the victim to the rest of the criminal justice system; there is a need to develop a relationship and rapport with a victim…in order to achieve the best evidence possible.”

That is the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham).

Defence Expenditure (NATO Target) Bill

Debate between Lord Bellingham and Gerald Howarth

Friday 23rd October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Sir Gerald Howarth]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I want to address that issue. The Bill involves a number of technicalities, and that is one of them.

I have always accepted that overseas aid has a role to play, but I have consistently opposed the extraordinary increase that the Department for International Development has enjoyed from Government ring-fencing since 2010—up from £8.5 billion in 2010 to £13 billion in 2014—to meet the figure of 0.7% of gross national income.

It may benefit you, Mr Speaker, and the House if I explain the difference between GDP and GNI. I am advised that GDP is the market value of all services and goods within the borders of a nation, the measure of a country’s overall economic output, and GNI is the total value produced within a country, comprising GDP plus the income obtained from overseas through businesses and so on that have foreign operations. GNI is therefore a more generous fiscal measurement, which naturally inflates the amount of overseas aid required to meet the 0.7% figure.

[Mr Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk) (Con)]

It is important to bear in mind the Government’s policy on overseas aid. They have made it very clear that as countries move to middle-income status, so aid will be withdrawn and we will move to more of a trade relationship. In theory, the 0.7% would therefore become redundant. Does my hon. Friend agree that the country’s duty to defend itself will never become redundant?

[Sir Gerald Howarth]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right.

The problem is that today’s policy is driven by a belief that a key way to respond to the challenges we face is to increase our intervention upstream so that, by providing aid to poor and dysfunctional countries, we reduce the causes of tension and thus our need for hard power. My response is twofold.

First, there is little evidence, despite committing the massive figure of £13 billion of public money, that such soft power delivers the effect sought. We have provided more than £1 billion to assist refugee camps to cope with the Syrian crisis, yet there has been palpably no reduction in the tidal wave of migrants, whether economic migrants or those genuinely fleeing persecution. I support what the Government are doing in Syria, which is noble and right. We should seek to maintain refugees near their country of origin, not to uproot them and import them into the continent of Europe. I strongly support that policy.

Secondly, there seems to be a quaint idea that the exercise of soft power offers an alternative to hard power. Make no mistake, Mr Speaker: without serious hard power, your soft power is completely non-existent. As Theodore Roosevelt said, it is better to “carry a big stick”, and then you can speak softly.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Eddisbury (Antoinette Sandbach), who made a very good speech.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Aldershot (Sir Gerald Howarth) on his Bill and on the way he introduced it. He is one of the most knowledgeable people in this House, and probably in the country, and his expertise and judgment on the issue deserve to be recognised and respected. He gave us a superb tour d’horizon of the world today. We live in an ever more troubled and dangerous world and I agree with what he said about Russia and China. We also should not forget those rogue states in the world—those potential rogue nuclear states—that could put our security at risk. I agree with him when he says that all the previous norms and assumptions have been torn up, and the Chairman of the Select Committee on Defence, my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), made that very same point.

Never before in the 30 years since the end of the cold war has our nation’s security been more important. Many of us had a rosy vision of what the world might have looked like in this part of the 21st century, but how wrong we were. I welcome the Government’s response to this new troubled world security environment. I am grateful for their commitment to spend more on defence and to spend at least 2%.

I have always been a glass half full person, and there are some good programmes coming on stream in the near future—the carriers, the Dauntless class destroyers, which are incredibly formidable vessels, the joint strike fighter, which has relevance to west Norfolk and RAF Marham, and the numerous upgrades that are taking place. As my hon. Friend the Member for Aldershot pointed out, there are still some significant gaps in our defence capabilities, not least our maritime reconnaissance capability; the carriers are obviously not yet operational and there is a carrier gap with the Harriers having been mothballed and sold.

I mentioned RAF Marham, which is the proud home of the Tornado force. That aircraft has been the workhorse of the RAF over many years and, as we speak, is playing a vital part in the campaign against ISIS and deploying its state-of-the-art reconnaissance system, RAPTOR. It is also the only platform that can deploy the Brimstone precision bomb system. It is very valuable in that theatre.

I pay tribute to the airmen and Air Force women, their families, the other personnel and the civil servants stationed at RAF Marham. They serve this country with huge competence and we should be very proud of them. The base also has a great impact on west Norfolk and is a vital and integral part of our local community. Only those colleagues with an airbase or a barracks in or near their constituency will understand how the armed forces always want to be involved, and play a part, in the community, the wider family and civic life.

[Sir Gerald Howarth]

I hugely appreciate my hon. Friend’s support for the Bill. May I draw his attention to the fact that one of the squadrons based at RAF Marham is 31 Squadron—the “Goldstars”—with which my father served during the second world war?

[Mr Bellingham]

That is an incredibly important connection, too, and I am grateful to my hon. Friend for mentioning it. I am also grateful that he mentioned the reprieve given to the third squadron at RAF Marham, because that is crucial to the squadrons rotation through RAF Akrotiri. Had we gone down to two squadrons, the rotation would have been at least six months and perhaps nine months, which, with unaccompanied tours, would have put immense pressure on the families. Keeping the third squadron enables a three-month rotation.

I am very pleased that the joint strike fighter, the Lightning II, will be coming to RAF Marham in 2018. We are looking forward to this superb aircraft coming to west Norfolk.

I mentioned RAF Akrotiri—I shall not digress too much—and yesterday’s news of refugees arriving on its shores is extremely worrying. I understand that 17 refugees arrived there 15 years ago and their status is still uncertain. If this is opened up as a new route into Europe, it will be incredibly dangerous and I very much hope the Government will take firm action. We have the two sovereign base areas and it is essential that extra personnel and capability are put in place properly to guard the coastline and stop these very unfortunate people landing there. Does that not reinforce the Prime Minister’s decision to take refugees direct from the camps in the region, rather than encouraging people to make such a perilous journey across the Mediterranean?

The Economy and Living Standards

Debate between Lord Bellingham and Gerald Howarth

Thursday 12th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Sir Gerald Howarth]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker.

Let me be the first Government Member to congratulate my right hon. Friend the Chancellor on sticking to his guns, and on the long-term economic programme, which has unquestionably benefited the United Kingdom—not least my constituents in Aldershot, where unemployment has now fallen to 1.8%. We have done fantastically well, and, in my view, that was undoubtedly a factor in the Newark by-election success, on which I congratulate my right hon. and hon. Friends. There is no doubt that the sheer weight of Conservative effort helped, as, indeed, did the contribution made by Patrick Mercer, who was very popular in the constituency, and had done good work over 13 years.

However, as the shadow Chancellor pointed out, we should not be lulled into a false sense of security. One of the key reasons for UKIP’s success is that it has homed in on the public’s rising concern about immigration. That concern is not new; it has existed since the 1960s. What is new is that while there was an understandable reluctance to vote for the British National party, no such inihibitions apply to UKIP.

For 50 years, those of us who have expressed concern about the impact of mass immigration on our country have been reviled and denounced as racist. All argument was effectively closed down, as perfectly decent people expressing perfectly reasonable fears were intimidated into remaining publicly silent.

Things have now changed, however. People feel that at last they can break free from the shackles of political correctness in which they have been chained. It is no longer racist to want to preserve our British way of life, our religion and our culture; it is not racist to express pride in our nation’s history and, indeed, in our imperial past.

It is not just the Conservative party that has been affected by the public’s concerns, as the shadow Chancellor’s comments again made clear. Labour has seen white working-class support desert to UKIP. Furthermore, many of those who have arrived from abroad and have integrated in our society are also concerned about the continuing flows of migration.

The main parties have to recognise the effect that this unprecedented tidal wave of migration has had on the UK, including our economy. Of course migration has not been without its benefits, some of which are only too evident on the Benches around us here, and companies such as Tata have made, and continue to make, a very valuable contribution. However, this week’s Ofsted report on Birmingham schools has revealed the extent to which people newly arrived here not only reject our values and customs, but want to impose their own on the rest of us. I have a very clear message for them: this is a Christian country, a tolerant country, we speak English, we shake hands with ladies, and open facial recognition is a key part of our culture. If they find that offensive, they should please feel free to leave and move to a country that is more to their liking—for there are plenty of repressive regimes around the world that clearly are more to the liking of people like that. As the T-shirt worn by a young man whom I saw on the underground earlier this week said: “Speak in English; Think in English; Dream in English”. I thought that was rather good advice to a lot of people in our country.

What we all need to understand is that it is numbers that are the issue. As that excellent organisation MigrationWatch has pointed out, between 1951 and 1991 the population born overseas grew by less than 2 million, yet after the election of the Labour Government in 1997 the scale of immigration increased to a level without historical precedent. Between 1991 and 2011, the foreign-born population more than doubled, increasing by 4 million. Much of this was deliberately encouraged by the Blair Government, partly, as we were helpfully told by a Labour speechwriter, Mr Andrew Neather, to rub the noses of the right in diversity.

All this has had an impact on our country. The Prime Minister has been at the forefront of the campaign to denounce the growth of Islamic fundamentalism in the UK, but there are practical challenges, too. My right hon. Friend the Chancellor mentioned the housing issue. We need to build a new home every seven minutes just to accommodate new migrants to this country. England is already the most crowded country in Europe, yet unless tougher action is taken the population will grow by 7 million in the next 15 years, 5 million of which will be attributable to immigration, which is the equivalent of the towns and cities of Birmingham, Leeds, Glasgow and Manchester.

[Mr Bellingham]

Does my hon. Friend agree that this Government have made very significant progress in reducing migration to the UK from outside the EU? Indeed, there have been a number of big successes in that regard. However, does he also agree that the time has now come for the Governments of all countries in the EU to look again at the absolute free movement of people for jobs across the EU? The only way we can solve this problem and bring migration into some form of balance is by looking at migration from the EU as well.

[Sir Gerald Howarth]

My hon. Friend, with whom I have the privilege of sharing adjoining offices in Portcullis house, is entirely right. This Government have set about trying to tackle migration, not least by dealing with the legacy left by the previous Government, and we have tackled non-EU migration. My hon. Friend is right to alert the House to the extent to which our membership of the EU is inhibiting our ability to do something about that other aspect of migration, however, and I have a proposal, which I will make in winding up my contribution.

Labour’s failure to apologise for inflicting this policy on the nation, together with its failure to apologise for the destruction of the public finances, which I mentioned earlier, means it is wholly unfit to return to office. That brings me to the topic of the next Queen’s Speech. I hope with all my heart that that will be prepared by my right hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr Cameron) as leader of the Conservative party, elected with a clear working majority in this place. This country absolutely needs that. We cannot afford to go back to the policies of tax and spend, and running up yet more debt, as my right hon. Friend the Chancellor has reminded us again today. We have to keep reminding the British people that that is what Labour did in office and it has not yet recanted. We therefore must do our duty to the British people, which is to be returned with a clear working majority.

To get to that happy position, however, we need to convince the public that we will build on the existing measures we have put in place to contain inward migration, particularly from less affluent EU countries. We must act now. The Government should accept the unanimous recommendation of the European Scrutiny Committee to disapply the European Communities Act 1972 in relation to specific EU legislation, not least so that this Parliament can once again become sovereign and take swift action to recover control of our borders and reduce the level of burdensome regulation being imposed on us externally. If the European Court of Justice does not like that, then tough; the British people certainly will.

Points of Order

Debate between Lord Bellingham and Gerald Howarth

Tuesday 18th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk) (Con)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I need your urgent advice on an important constituency case. As the local MP, I have been representing a family in a contested adoption case, including the birth mother, Miss P. In order to represent the family properly, I needed to see the final statements and assessments by relevant social workers. Norfolk county council then e-mailed my constituent, stating:

“I would be grateful if you could confirm whether or not your client has disclosed a copy of the assessments to Henry Bellingham. This would clearly be in breach of the family procedure rules and a contempt of Court.”

I then wrote to the Minister of State, Ministry of Justice, the right hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes), and the president of the family division, Sir James Munby. Both the Minister and Sir James replied that since the case of Re N in 2009, the family procedure rules had been updated specifically to include MPs as interested parties who can receive all relevant statements and assessments. In other words, the county council was completely wrong.

Norfolk county council was either ignorant of that change in the law, which I find pretty staggering given that every family practitioner in the land will surely have known about the consequences of Re N, or it deliberately misled a vulnerable young mother about the law and conspired to stop MPs going about their duty. I take the matter very seriously, because I have been prevented from getting full and considered advice to Miss P. What protection can you give MPs, Mr Speaker? Is there a possible contempt of Parliament, and could Norfolk county council be referred to the Committee of Privileges?

[Sir Gerald Howarth (Aldershot) (Con)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker.