Office for Veterans’ Affairs

Lord Eames Excerpts

Wednesday 9th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, the work done by charities such as that my noble friend is associated with is vital. As a supporter of some of those charities, I know what good work they do. In June we announced that 100 UK Armed Forces charities would benefit from nearly £6 million of extra funding to support serving personnel veterans and their families during the Covid pandemic. I hope that is a sign of the importance the Government attach to this work.

[Lord Eames (CB) [V]]

My Lords, while I welcome the Minister’s response to the noble Lord, Lord Caine, can I press him on the particular situation of former veterans and members of the Royal Irish Regiment and the former Ulster Defence Regiment, who have recently given voice to complaints that they have been ignored in many aspects of support, particularly medical support? This is of particular concern to those of us in Northern Ireland at this time.

[Lord True (Con)]

I understand the noble and right reverend Lord’s point. I repeat what I said to my noble friend Lord Caine: we attach importance to this and will continue to pursue it.

EU: Customs Arrangements

Lord Eames Excerpts

Wednesday 8th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True]

My Lords, the Government are convinced that the arrangements are both deliverable and defensible. The Government’s intention is to be pragmatic. The phased arrangements have been widely welcomed by business and industry, but we intend to operate to those dates and phases.

[Lord Eames (CB) [V]]

My Lords, the Minister’s answers on this Question are of particular interest and importance to us here in Northern Ireland. We have been assured there will be no border in the Irish Sea, but more recent government comments on this are, to say the least, confusing. Can the Minister give a statement today that will clarify the situation for business and commercial interests in Northern Ireland, which is, after all, an integral part of the United Kingdom?

[Lord True]

My Lords, Northern Ireland is most certainly an integral part of the United Kingdom and I profoundly hope it will stay that way. The Government have specific engagement with the Northern Ireland Executive and Northern Ireland business. We have made the terms in which we hope to proceed very clear in the Command Paper published earlier this year.

Covid-19: UK-wide Discussions

Lord Eames Excerpts

Tuesday 9th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord True [V]]

My Lords, I fear that I am not a specialist in aviation matters, but I will write to the noble Lord on this important topic.

[Lord Eames (CB) [V]]

My Lords, at present, who in government is responsible for co-ordinating contact with the devolved nations? Lately, on at least one occasion, one of the devolved Administrations learned of a policy decision by central government involving public health issues from the media. Is that acceptable?

[Lord True [V]]

My Lords, good communication should always be striven for. That is the Government’s objective. At the outset of the crisis, the United Kingdom Government established a Cabinet committee structure to deal with the health, economic, public sector and international impacts of Covid-19 on behalf of the whole of the UK. Ministers from the devolved Administrations have regularly been invited to participate in these discussions. We are certainly committed to ensuring that the Administrations are informed and involved at every stage.

Referendums: Parliamentary Democracy

Lord Eames Excerpts

Thursday 19th July 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Eames (CB)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Lord, Lord Higgins, for making this debate possible. A week ago the report of the independent commission on referendums, which has already been referred to, was published. When I was invited to be a member of the panel that produced that report, I went into those sessions with two human emotions. The first was that I came from a part of the United Kingdom where the people had spoken with such force in the Good Friday agreement referendum—and I also came from a part of the United Kingdom which had voted contrary, by a majority, to the rest of the United Kingdom on the Brexit issue. There I had two contrasting human pictures of the power, purpose and result of a referendum.

What did I find? I found that in all our discussions in that panel, which comprised politicians, the media, academics and people who had experience of referendums, and which resulted in 70—I say again: 70—recommendations in the report, what came through time and time again was that there is a human side to the dilemma of the referendum issue. Let me explain briefly what I mean. Having been Anglican Primate in Ireland through all those years, and being absolutely involved in the events that led up to the Good Friday agreement, to feel the people speak with the volume that they did when the possibilities and results of all the discussions were made known was not only an emotional endorsement but a constitutional endorsement of the way forward. You could not be in the position that I was in and not be totally overcome by the power of what was possible by having a referendum and giving the people the choice.

The difference between the two referendums was that the people knew what we were proposing as the way forward. There had been preparation, education, discussion and dialogue, and when the first referendum was held and the Good Friday agreement, or Belfast agreement as it is sometimes referred to, was put before the public, they were in a position to say, “This is what we want. This is the way we are prepared to go”—and there was no disillusionment as to the possible outcome. Moving on to the second referendum, there is a part of the United Kingdom that by a majority decides one way and finds that, when the whole picture becomes plain, it is in a minority. The democracy that we all believe in said, “Fair enough. Northern Ireland has expressed its view but the referendum says, ‘This is the view of the United Kingdom, so we go this way’”.

I cannot overemphasise the degree of confusion that exists in Northern Ireland today, not only about the border, and not only about the fact that so many of the consequences of Brexit will be felt by us first in the United Kingdom, but about the fact that we have learned two lessons about referendums from the examples that I have given. It was therefore no surprise to me that there were three consequential suggestions from the independent commission’s report:

“First, we should seek to ensure that referendums fit as well as possible into the rest of the process of democratic policy-making, so that there is effective preparation for any referendum and the choices available to voters are as clear as possible”.


The last speaker reminded us of the significance of that in the Scottish situation.

Secondly, we suggest that,

“referendum campaigns should be conducted in a way that is fair to both sides and enables voters to access the information that they want before deciding how to vote”.

The noble Lord, Lord Norton of Louth, reminded us of the significance of that point. The third suggestion is that,

“the rules around referendums should be updated for the digital age, so that transparency is maximized and it is harder for the system to be abused”.

In making a plea from my own experience of the two contrasting consequences of the process of referendums, I suggest to the House that not only should this independent report be seriously considered but that the House should understand that there are different facets of how the population of the UK approach a referendum situation.