VSO: Volunteering for Development Programme

Lord Bishop of Winchester Excerpts

Tuesday 16th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con) [V]]

The noble Lord is right: no development intervention is more transformational than 12 years of quality education for girls. That is why it is a major priority for the Government. Between 2015 and 2020, the UK supported 15.6 million children to gain a decent education, of which 8.1 million were girls. We will use our G7 presidency this year to rally the international community to step up and support girls’ education and co-host, with Kenya, the replenishment of the Global Partnership for Education in July 2021.

[The Lord Bishop of Winchester [V]]

My Lords, is the Minister aware that, if the cuts to the overseas aid budget lead to cuts to the Voluntary Service Overseas programme, they will negatively impact the international distribution of Covid-19 vaccines, given the involvement of VSO in Covid-19 response programmes in different parts of the world, such as Covid safety training for healthcare workers and rural populations in Tanzania, Sierra Leone, Ethiopia, et cetera?

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con) [V]]

My Lords, the FCDO and VSO were able to work together to pivot over 80% of programming to pandemic response in just 10 days, including supporting educating girls and children living with disabilities, strengthening healthcare systems, protecting basic livelihoods, and so on. We have shifted much of the focus of our ODA over recent months towards enabling countries to cope with Covid. It is fair to say that the UK is a world leader in doing so, and we will remain so.

Covid-19: Foreign Aid

Lord Bishop of Winchester Excerpts

Wednesday 11th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sugg (Con) [V]]

My Lords, we plan to set out a strategy in the near future as part of the integrated review. The aim of the new department is to bring the weight of our diplomatic network to support our development expertise and our development programming dealing with the rise in poverty and the climate change that the noble Lord points to. We are committed to working with our partners as we move through the merger, and I assure him that we are indeed committed to independent scrutiny and confirm that we will be keeping to ICAI.

[The Lord Bishop of Winchester [V]]

My Lords, protecting freedom of religion or belief remains a pertinent issue in the developing world when more than 80% of the world’s population identify with a religion or belief system. My diocese has historic links with the Church of the Province of Myanmar, and during the pandemic many of its clergy have been providing volunteer support in understaffed hospitals. Can the Minister assure the House that, despite the almost £3 billion cut in the UK’s foreign aid budget, Her Majesty’s Government will continue to prioritise international freedom of religion and belief and recognise the contribution of religious groups in the development and support of their communities, particularly in times of crisis?

[Baroness Sugg (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I assure the right reverend Prelate that we are indeed committed to continuing to support the freedom of religion and belief around the world. We will also continue to work with and alongside faith groups. I agree with him that they have been incredible in their response to Covid-19. They are among the first to respond and can play an effective role in bringing about the behaviour change essential to slowing the spread of Covid and reducing infection and illness.

UK Foreign Policy in a Shifting World Order (International Relations Committee Report)

Lord Bishop of Winchester Excerpts

Tuesday 21st May 2019 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Winchester]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Howell, for bringing this debate and chairing the Select Committee that produced this excellent report. I declare an interest, having spent 12 years as general secretary of the Oxford-based CMS—historically the Anglican mission society—working across 50 countries, and prior to that six years working with an indigenous Africa-wide Anglican mission society based in Nairobi. My diocese has companion links with the Anglican provinces of Burundi, DR Congo, Rwanda, Uganda and Myanmar, and growing links with Chile. I was born in Tanzania, grew up partly in Kenya and still have a home near Thika.

Early on, the report endorses the rules-based framework for international relations and emphasises three contributory dimensions in which the rules operate: the political aspect of liberal democratic nation states; the economic aspect of the increasing globalisation of economic relations; and the diplomatic expectation of peaceful change. While endorsing the significance of this framework and noting the strength of commitment to the rules-based international system, or RBIS, in the responses of HM Government to the report’s 66 recommendations, I add the need to re-emphasise the place of education in soft power, the place of religion in transnational civil society and the contribution of the voluntary sector to fostering mutual development in a shared world. These strengthen the realistic assessment of physical and cyber security, trade relations, human rights and maritime communications, which all contribute to a peaceful world order.

My main point is that a greater emphasis on the soft power of higher and further education, on the religious and civil aspects of society and on voluntary agencies for mutual support actually strengthens the RBIS framework but also begins a transition towards new ways of working. In a world where everything is highly connected through modern communications, and where there can be a dramatic influence by the local on the global and vice versa, the rules-based framework is shifting in its emphasis. In whatever way we interpret this shift, alternative perspectives are shaping our thinking, drawing on cosmopolitan ideals, global governance models and international covenants. I am not proposing any of these, but they should influence our thinking when our world is now more polycentric, informal media voices count and values are increasingly central.

I therefore welcome the general impression given by the Government’s response to this report. There is a sense of new openness and reinvestment in our international relations. Alongside the recognition of major changes in the reality of our relationships with Europe, the USA, China, Russia and India, there is also an affirmation of the importance of middle-ranking powers in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The commitment to invest in new positions, the language audit and the establishment of new missions all indicate a positive engagement. Cross-departmental working is also most welcome.

My reflections are therefore limited to the three points I highlighted earlier. First, in continuing to promote soft power, I again advocate for the importance of the UK’s higher and professional education offer to the wider world. By its nature, higher education is one of those aspects of cultural engagement that allows for a real mutuality, and therefore a re-evaluation of the British perspective and its contribution to other nations through its education of those who will lead and build societies elsewhere. My own portfolio of interests from these Benches includes further and higher education. I therefore again advocate for a more informed approach to the PR impact of including student numbers in the immigration figures. We lose the chances of sharing, through higher education, our liberal democratic perspectives if students are put off from coming earlier on. The numbers are going in the wrong direction, and the influence we might have had is diminishing. Our world-class education might therefore not be accessed by some of the best minds in the world. However, I note that the Government intend to increase international scholarships and professional bursaries. These will certainly enable the kind of future relationships the report proposes.

Secondly, I suggest that in a world where up to 80% of people are committed to a religion or belief, it is vital that our policy of international relationships includes an expertise and engagement with what motivates billions of people, framing their personal and social aspirations. There are literally billions of Christians and Muslims and millions of Hindus, Buddhists and members of other religions. This dimension of human life is not confined to the private; it is public, social and transnational, and a core element of civil society. From a Christian perspective, I know well the importance of the Catholic Church and the networks of the Anglican Communion, which stretch across over 160 countries. I therefore warmly welcome the recent draft report from the Bishop of Truro looking at the persecution of Christians worldwide. This not only points up a key dimension of human rights but shows the need for greater religious literacy about what people are prepared to live and die for in the contexts of their countries and nations. People seek change and vote for change mostly on the basis of deeply held convictions. Our understanding of politics and how these shape our global economics cannot be separated from the tap-roots of the religious beliefs that people who construct these imaginations draw on and express. I therefore urge that religious literacy is a language that could be invested in as part of this new openness to international relations.

Lastly, I was a little surprised not to see an emphasis on the importance of the voluntary or charitable sector’s contribution to international relationships, particularly in connection with the UN sustainable development goals. These goals represent an advance on the millennium goals that had a real and practical impact on questions of global poverty and health. There are 17 goals; they start with “no poverty” and conclude with,

“revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development”.

In my own diocese, we are encouraging a new emphasis on global citizenship, particularly in Church of England schools. These 17 goals capture something of what it means for us to work together across the world for a common future, recognising that we are all citizens of this one planet. I would like to have seen in the report and the Government’s response a greater recognition of the SDGs in connection with the references to NGOs. Linking back to my second point, I also suggest that an 18th goal needs to be added—religious freedom for global good—so that we can harness the resources of religious communities locally and transnationally to tackle some of the greatest global challenges, not least that of climate change, which is now a shared crisis and is presenting itself in the clear threat of species extinction and predictions of sea-level rises.

I congratulate the new Secretary of State for International Development, Rory Stewart, on his appointment and hope he will consider these points in collaboration with his colleagues in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office as they shape our foreign policy in a shifting world order.

Rohingya Refugees

Lord Bishop of Winchester Excerpts

Monday 17th December 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

My Lords, the history of the United Kingdom as a place which grants support to refugees from all over the world predates our membership of the European Union and will remain after Brexit. I pride myself on being in the Government of a country which over the years has stood up in support of refugees, internationally and in the UK. This continues today and will continue tomorrow.

[The Lord Bishop of Winchester]

My Lords, the diocese of Winchester has had a link with Burma/Myanmar since the late 19th century. This gateway state to Asia is therefore of great interest to the praying Christians of the diocese. Will the Minister confirm what action Her Majesty’s Government have taken to ensure the guaranteed security of existing internally displaced persons in Rakhine state and of any refugees who voluntarily return to Myanmar?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

The right reverend Prelate raises an important issue about ensuring the security and safety of those who are in Burma. We continue to raise this directly with the civilian and military authorities. He will be aware that one of the first visits that the Foreign Secretary made on his appointment was to Burma to raise the very concerns that the right reverend Prelate highlighted.

On the safe return of refugees, I made it clear in answer to the previous question that the United Kingdom stands by the Rohingya community and supports their needs in Bangladesh. They should not return until we can guarantee their safety and security—and, above all, their return should be voluntary.

Syria

Lord Bishop of Winchester Excerpts

Tuesday 20th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

I assure the noble Lord that we are following very closely the developments in Afrin and in the wider northern and western Syrian provinces. We call repeatedly for de-escalation and for the protection of civilians. We are using our good offices through NATO and the UN and through bilateral exchanges directly with the Turkish Administration to call for that very de-escalation.

[The Lord Bishop of Winchester]

My Lords, will the Minister give an assurance that in the provision of humanitarian aid to those displaced in this conflict the Department for International Development’s understanding of vulnerability includes religious persecution? Will he also give an assurance that the Government will continue to ensure that the UNHCR’s procedures and criteria for determining refugee status recognise religious persecution as a distinct category?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

The Government are very cognisant of religious persecution in Syria and Iraq. Indeed, I returned from Iraq only a couple of weeks ago. I visited Mosul and met directly with Christian representatives as well as those of the Yazidi community and heard first hand about the heinous crimes that have been committed against young women and children. I assure the right reverend Prelate that all forms of persecution against all people throughout Syria and Iraq are taken into account, and those issues are fully considered by all agencies, including the UNHCR.

Syria and Iraq: Daesh

Lord Bishop of Winchester Excerpts

Thursday 19th March 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

I sympathise entirely with my noble friend. I am aware from when I talk to my Foreign Minister counterparts throughout the region that they find it puzzling that in this country the media and therefore the Government continue to use the term “ISIL”. They prefer “Daesh”, and I understand the significance of that. However, at the moment we find that if we talk about Daesh the media become puzzled. I take my noble friend’s point, and we will indeed consider how we can discuss that further.

[The Lord Bishop of Winchester]

My Lords, even if the current operations to clear Daesh prove successful, the ancient religious and ethnic minority communities in Iraq have an uncertain future. Does the Minister agree with the statement recently submitted by the Holy See to the United Nations Human Rights Council? It said that a future without these communities in Iraq and the Middle East risks,

“new forms of violence, exclusion, and the absence of peace and development”.

Therefore, what steps are being taken to secure the future of those communities, and in particular their human right to religious freedom?

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

I can respond first by saying that the motion before the Human Rights Council was presented by the Vatican jointly with Russia. We are a signatory to that and fully support it. The work that we are doing with regard to humanitarian aid and our work with the International Committee of the Red Cross is fully aimed at supporting all minorities. The Christian church is clearly an important part of that. I pay tribute to those who use the £800 million of aid we provide in Syria to provide support to keep communities safe in the future and to keep them able to stay there. But it is bleak at present.