Conflict-induced Food Insecurity

Debate between Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton and Baroness Northover

Tuesday 21st May 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton (Con)]

My noble friend is completely right about that. We can see from the statistics that acute food insecurity is at a five-year high. The Global Report on Food Crises this year indicated that over 281 million people worldwide faced high levels of food insecurity. I agree that climate change has an impact and population can have an impact, but what is driving this insecurity at the moment across Africa and elsewhere is conflict. Trying to unlock some of the peace processes in those conflicts is where we could have the biggest influence.

[Baroness Northover (LD)]

My Lords, the ICC chief prosecutor has said that there are reasonable grounds to accuse the Prime Minister and Defense Minister of Israel of a potential war crime, as we have heard. That war crime is the:

“Starvation of civilians as a method of warfare”.


I note that the noble Lord said that he will respect the ICC process. Does he agree that 90 trucks via the sea bridge hardly matches up to the 4,500 trucks prevented from entering via Rafah? Does he agree that, as a first step, funding must be restored to UNRWA, on which the aid agencies heavily depend for logistics and delivery capacity?

[Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton (Con)]

I will answer both parts of that question. On the entry of aid into Gaza, it is absolutely right that Israel has not met some of its promises, like the 500 trucks a day, but there are other areas, like having this new pier on the beach in Gaza, from which aid, including British aid, has been distributed. That is a step forward, as is opening Ashdod port, where flour for bakeries has been delivered. Those do not look to me like acts of a nation embarked on genocide and war crimes, but of course we must keep up the pressure elsewhere.

I totally understand and respect the fact that UNRWA is vital for the onward distribution of aid—I discussed this with the head of the World Food Programme just last week—but we have to be cognisant that reports that UNRWA staff were involved in 7 October need to be properly investigated and properly dealt with. Two reports have been commissioned, but we have had only one. I want to see that second report and I want really strong undertakings from UNRWA so that we know our money is going to the right cause.

Developing World: Debt Reduction

Debate between Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton and Baroness Northover

Tuesday 13th February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton (Con)]

I thank the noble Lord for his question. We are happy to accept the IMF definition of debt sustainability and to use it as a baseline. We are happy to look at other ideas but, given the IMF’s role, that makes sense. I completely accept what lies behind the noble Lord’s question: 58% of low-income countries are now either in debt distress or at risk of it, so he raises an important point. However, I think the definition is done by the IMF.

[Baroness Northover (LD)]

My Lords, climate change is already hitting the poorest the worst and the most, often in indebted countries. Although it is welcome that a loss and damage fund was agreed at the last COP, does the Foreign Secretary agree that what has been pledged so far—including, I am afraid, by the UK—is totally inadequate? Does he further agree that it is not only right to scale this up but in our interest, as we seek to reduce the conflict and migration that are likely to be caused by climate change, which will be much more costly?

[Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton (Con)]

We have doubled our commitments to climate finance. One of the successes of COP was that the climate finance funds are now considerable, running into many billions. I identify the problem more as small countries, particularly island and developing states, not being able to access that money because they do not have the expertise, the lawyers, the bankers, the officials and so on. That is a problem that my officials are trying to solve. In the area of debt itself, the climate resilience debt clauses that we are now writing into debt, which give states a holiday from debt repayments if they suffer a climate disaster or some other unforeseen event, can be a big part of the future too.