Ivory Bill

Lord Carrington of Fulham Excerpts

Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 24th October 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Carrington of Fulham (Con)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Cormack’s amendment. I really just want to add to my noble friend Lord Hague that one of the great problems that the drafters of the Bill faced, and never really answered, is the claim that there is an inability in the ivory markets to tell the difference between modern ivory, newly carved from poached elephants, and antique ivory. It is in fact extremely easy to do and is done as a matter of course; indeed, it is enshrined in the Bill by museums having the expertise to determine whether an ivory item presented as of exceptional international and domestic importance—and therefore exempt under the Bill—is old or new. There is the expertise to determine whether ivory is old or new and to tell whether an ivory chess set—the example used by my noble friend Lord Cormack—is an old ivory chess set or one carved for the Hong Kong market. The reality of all this is that we are destroying a great many highly prized historical artefacts in this country for, probably, zero effect on the elephant population. That is the great tragedy of the Bill.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, noble Lords will not be surprised by this, but we are very much opposed to this amendment. The noble Lord, Lord Hague, put the case much more strongly than I will, but I was disappointed by the position of the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, on this. The very fact that his amendment focuses on exports goes to the heart of what the Bill is about. I am sorry that he has sought to start this debate in such a negative way. I hoped that we would have learned from our debates in Committee and that we had made the case in Committee, as the noble Lord, Lord Hague, said, that we are trying to stop the illegal exports of illegal pieces. That is the heart of the problem.

The latest CITES statistics show that there has been a dramatic increase in the amount of both raw and worked ivory being exported from the EU: in 2014-15, the last two years for which data are available, the EU exported 1,258 tusks. That is what has happened according to the CITES information. Over and above that, as the noble Lord, Lord Hague, said, there is the undercurrent of all the illegal trade of which nobody has any record. That is at the heart of this, and I am very sorry that we have started this debate looking at exports, which is the real problem that we have. I know we will go on to talk about other issues, but I regret this and I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, in other contributions that he might make, will do more to persuade us that he really understands the basis of the Bill. He said that he welcomed the Bill, but I think he has more of a responsibility to demonstrate how. I therefore urge noble Lords to oppose the amendment.

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[Viscount Hailsham (Con)]

My Lords, I rise to speak to my noble friend Lord Cormack’s Amendment 2, but what I have to say is in support of all the amendments in this group, including that tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Quin, on Northumbrian pipes. Sharp-eyed noble Lords will have noticed that I put my name to a number of these amendments and then withdrew it. That was not because of lack of support but because I thought I was not going to be here performing professional duties, and I thought it discourteous to your Lordships’ House to sign amendments and not be here. That depends on noble Lords’ point of view.

I think everyone who has spoken in this debate and all the other debates about the Ivory Bill endorses the principle of trying to prevent elephant poaching—it is a dreadful thing—and thinks that we need to do all we can to stop it. As a matter of fact, robust action against poaching is probably the most effective way, but an effective, proportionate and reasonable way of disrupting the trade is also appropriate. That is the purpose of this Bill, but we have to apply the test of proportionality to identify whether the actions contemplated by the Bill are proportionate in their consequences both ways. There are two very serious disadvantages associated with what this Bill is about—I shall come to the amendment specifically.

The first, which my noble friend Lord Cormack dealt with quite correctly and at some length, is the interference with private property. This Bill is flagrant interference with private property, and my noble friend Lord Inglewood takes the same view. At the same time, there will inevitably be a consequential loss and destruction of the artefacts. The description of trying to sell a low-cost bit of brown furniture—although of quite interesting historical value—and it proving impossible will inevitably lead to the skip.

There is therefore a cost in all of this: a cost to principle and a cost to artefacts. That takes me on to the question: what will this Bill achieve in stopping the elephant poaching or trade? I share the view of my noble friend Lord De Mauley: I suspect very little. What this is actually about is sending a message, but messages go unheeded and unheard, and I am sure that this one will. It is about making gestures, but often these gestures should not be made. I remember the Dangerous Dogs Bill. I remember unit fines in the magistrates’ court. These were gestures that should never have been made and messages that should never have been sent.

Against that background, I turn to the way of addressing what has been identified. This Bill is going to pass, and I agree with my noble friend the Duke of Wellington that it should pass. However, there are defects within it, and the defects are being addressed by looking at the exemptions. This House should be trying to enlarge the exemptions and seeking to put in further provisos. It is in that spirit that I propose to support probably all the amendments in respect of which your Lordships’ opinion is sought, and I hope there will be quite a few Divisions. I think, too, however—and this will be to the great relief of your Lordships’ House—that the views I have expressed, which are general to the amendments in this group, actually apply to all the other amendments and will not require any repetition from me.

[Lord Carrington of Fulham]

My Lords, I rise to speak to my Amendment 25, which is a very specific amendment and rather esoteric, but I will come on to that in a moment because I really just wanted to register my agreement with the previous speakers that this Bill is far too restrictive. We are banning ivory items and ivory inlays and items containing ivory that have no possibility of being recarved in the Far East for sale on to that market and no prospect of having any value in themselves. An ivory carver sitting in Vietnam, for instance, would have no interest in carving a sliver of ivory to go into a false 18th century box. It would just make no sense at all and it would be nonsense. We ought to have a sense of proportion about what we are trying to do in this Bill.

What we are trying to do is to stop large lumps of ivory being exported to countries where they will be recarved and converted into the items that their populations think are attractive and for which they will pay good money. This is not an emotional business; it is purely a financial business. If we ban the export of large items of ivory, or their sale in this country—because they will be smuggled out of this country eventually, just as rhino horns are smuggled out of here, which is a similar problem—we will achieve what we can achieve in respect of saving the African elephant using the antique ivory trade.

As has been said, the protection of the African elephant is not down to what is sold at Christie’s in King Street in London. It is down to whether we can finance the actions against the poachers, whether we can train the police and protection officers in those countries, whether we can arm them properly, and whether we can ensure that the supply routes where the ivory is taken out of the country are shut down. That is what it is really all about. It is not about this gesture politics Bill. That is what it is about, and that is what we should be concentrating on.

I add something that has not been mentioned because it is not politically correct to do so. A lot of ivory is not obtained by rogue poachers; it is done with the connivance of people who are very powerful in the countries where the elephants are, and they make a lot of money out of it.

My noble friend the Minister assures me that several of the countries which have large numbers of elephants are in favour of us banning the sale of ivory. I am perhaps too cynical. Perhaps I have lived too long a life dealing with rogues and rascals both in politics and in business, but if I were trying to make money out of selling ivory, I would try to shut down part of the market which I thought conceivably—however misguidedly—could be competition. In other words, I would of course say, “Ban the ivory market. Ban, ban, ban”, so that I can kill the elephants in the savannah and make money by selling those tusks to Hong Kong.

I should apologise, because perhaps I should have made that speech during Committee but, as some noble Lords will know, I was under the depredations of various surgeons then, so I apologise for not making it then.

My Amendment 25 is rather esoteric. It is even more esoteric than the Northumbrian pipes of the noble Baroness, Lady Quin. Under the Bill, an item which is detachable and can stand alone is an individual item and is therefore treated as such. This is not usually important, but it is very important if you are dealing with scientific instruments. The way that 18th-century or early 19th-century mercury barometers are regulated is by a little knob that pulls out. It is detachable and independent of the barometer itself. You would use it to adjust the vernier on the scale to measure the height of the mercury and to put pressure on the mercury reservoir at the bottom of the barometer, when you regulated the barometer to show the correct barometric pressure, to make sure that the mercury was at the right level. So it has two functions.

My amendment is specifically designed to say that this knob should be treated as part of the barometer, not as a separate item, because these knobs were almost always an ivory disc—not dissimilar, I have to say, to the discs used in so many other things, such as portrait miniatures, tickets for theatres, and so on, which have no commercial value for recarving. They have commercial value because there are artistic elements to them, but the knob has no commercial value. If I tell your Lordships that they are 2.54 centimetres in diameter, those of you with a scientific bent will know that that is an inch. They are of a maximum of an inch in diameter, very thin and on a metal shank. All I am trying to do by the amendment is to ensure that antique dealers do not have to throw away the integral knob when they sell the barometer.

[The Earl of Clancarty]

My Lords, I apologise for not having spoken at Second Reading, so I shall speak very briefly. I fully support Amendment 2, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, as well as the other amendments in the group. I believe very strongly in the protection of endangered species, but I also believe strongly in the protection of cultural heritage. The principles I hold on culture are no different from those I held on a previous Bill that passed through this House concerning the protection of cultural property in time of war. As it stands, this is a lop-sided Bill. We need to prevent the destruction of our cultural heritage, which, for some objects, is a far more likely outcome than the Minister thinks, unless the exemptions are allowed.

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[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, I wish to refer briefly to Amendment 6, which is grouped with my noble friend Lord De Mauley’s leading amendments, as is my Amendment 5. I will not speak to that amendment; my noble friend Lord De Mauley has effectively covered it, because I also want to take out the word “outstandingly”.

My Amendment 6 would take out the words “an important” and put in “a significant”. That might sound of no significance, but it is. My noble friend Lord De Mauley talked about the sorts of objects we will be dealing with here. One of the things that attracts me to social history is the things that people used and gave. I once knew a man—I have mentioned him in your Lordships’ House in earlier debates—who had an amazing collection of theatre and race tickets. Many of them were in ivory. They could not be called outstanding and I do not think that any of them could be called important, but significant they most certainly were. This was a collection that reflected the social history of the mid-18th century: the people who patronised the playhouses or went to the racecourses and gained admission by presenting an ivory ticket or token. A large collection such as the one my friend had is of some value. Many of the examples were indeed individually unique; no other tickets to that particular theatre or performance were known to exist.

I referred to this earlier when I talked about the first amendment: he collected these things because of their intrinsic interest and his own fascination with social history, but also because of the knowledge that collectively, even though he probably had not given more than £10 or £20 for any individual item, the collection was worth something. He knew that if he fell on difficult times or wanted to help a son or daughter, there was a little nest egg that would probably produce a few thousand pounds. If we enact the Bill, we will deprive a collection and a collector like that. We are effectively confiscating private property. We are not physically destroying it, although, as my noble friend Lord De Mauley said a few minutes ago, that might well be the ultimate result, but we are saying to somebody that that property, legitimately and lovingly acquired, is no longer theirs to dispose of for any money at all. That is unjust and wrong. I return to the old, worn record: how does preventing the sale of such a collection, the items in which are all of some significance, help in any way to preserve an African or an Asian elephant in 2019 or 2020?

We are all concerned about the elephants—we keep coming back to that—but there is nothing incompatible between being desperately keen to save elephants and being desperately keen to save elements of our social history.

[Lord Carrington of Fulham]

My Lords, I do not want to intervene for long, but there is a slight problem with the definition of “outstandingly”. What is outstanding to one expert may well not be to another. I raised this at Second Reading. It comes down to what sort of museum collections you are trying to create. Museums such as the V&A or the British Museum are interested only in outstanding items, and they can define what they mean by an outstanding item by reference to what they already have in their collections: to be outstanding the item should add to that collection.

Many museums, however, are not trying to do what the British Museum or the V&A do. The example that I have used before is the Geffrye Museum, a series of old almshouses on the continuation of Bishopsgate, just outside the City of London. The Geffrye Museum recreates middle-class rooms down the ages. Those middle-class rooms will have ivory items—ivory cutlery and tea caddies for example—none of which is outstanding in itself. However, items are outstanding in the sense that the Geffrye Museum considers them exemplars of what was used at that time by middle-class people—and increasingly, in some museums, by working-class people in this country. The definition of outstanding is, therefore, somewhat open to interpretation and it would be much better to remove “outstandingly” and replace it with a word such as “significant”, which would allow much more leeway in deciding whether an item is worthy of a national collection or is something that no one is interested in preserving.

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe]

My Lords, my concern is with the effects of this Bill, which may come to be criticised in the fullness of time, as elephant stocks recover and beautiful objects are lost as a result of it, and collectors of Art Deco work containing ivory are stopped in their tracks. I accept that, as we have heard from the Minister, Defra Ministers consulted during the Commons stage of this Bill, but the debate here has shown that some further changes are needed in the interests of common sense. So I support the amendments in this group from my noble friend Lord De Mauley.

I hope that the Minister will be a bit more receptive than he was towards the previous group, and ask whether he can think of any ways to reduce the concerns of people such as us about the perverse effects of these arrangements, for example in the guidance he described earlier.

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[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, I will not detain the House very long on this amendment, which is similar to an amendment I moved in Committee. I was disappointed in the response that I received. This amendment does not touch at all on any of the exemptions or provisions of the Bill; it merely makes the point that if somebody has a certificate, it should remain valid if the ownership of the item passes by inheritance to a member of the family of the registered owner. That seems to me to be sensible, fair and equitable and I cannot understand why anybody would be opposed to it. I beg to move.

[Lord Carrington of Fulham]

My Lords, Amendment 39 is a probing new clause, because I think the issue is already covered in the Explanatory Memorandum. The concern is that if an ivory item or collection of ivory items is not registered, it cannot be sold. If it cannot be sold, it has no value. If somebody dies and a valuable collection of ivories is in their estate and they have left their estate to, say, their children, then the ivories will pass to the children, as I understand it, under the provisions of this Bill—indeed, that is made clear in the Explanatory Memorandum.