Female Entrepreneurship

Lord Harrison Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd April 2019 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Harrison]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how they intend to implement the recommendations of The Alison Rose Review of Female Entrepreneurship, published on 8 March.

[The Minister of State, Department for International Development (Lord Bates) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government responded to the Rose review by immediately setting out a new, ambitious target to increase female entrepreneurship by half by 2030, and making new commitments to help drive more funding to women starting and growing businesses. Alison Rose is working with private sector partners to take forward the recommendations of the review, and will update all in due course.

[Lord Harrison (Lab)]

My Lords, women run businesses better than men. The Rose report, in which that is mentioned, shows that some £250 billion would be added to the UK Exchequer were it to be followed rigorously. Given that, what is being done to help women with childcare, and with increasing business networks? Finally, given that women have extreme prowess in speaking languages, what is being done in this post-Brexit world to ensure maximum use of women in speaking languages to feed and help British business?

[Lord Bates]

I am certainly happy to go with the noble Lord on that. He points out, rightly, that the report says that there are 1.1 million fewer women setting up their own businesses compared to the proportion of men doing so in the country. The ambition to change that would therefore result in a boost of some £250 billion to the economy. The report makes interesting reading on the barriers to employment: childcare is certainly a major one. That is why the 30 hours of free childcare for parents of three to four year-olds is such an important contribution, but we are aware that much more needs to be done. The report has given the Government a clear working strategy going forward.

Overseas Aid

Lord Harrison Excerpts

Wednesday 12th February 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Harrison (Lab)]

My Lords, will the noble Baroness please ensure that the Government continue rightly to resist the calls to divert overseas aid money to tackle the floods? Will she also take the opportunity to clarify from where the money to help flood victims in the south will come, given the confusion wrought by the recent words of the Prime Minister?

[Baroness Northover]

I thought that the Prime Minister was extremely clear in his support. I can also point out that we have spent £3.1 billion on flood management and protection. However, I think that the noble Lord is right and I welcome the cross-party support. This is a false choice. I received an e-mail this morning from Justin Forsyth of Save the Children. He said:

“To raid this money that literally saves millions of lives would be immoral”.

Surely he is right.

Zoos

Lord Harrison Excerpts

Monday 8th October 2012 Grand Committee

Asked By

[Lord Harrison]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how they propose to promote the better running of zoos in the United Kingdom and the European Union.

[Lord Harrison]

In last year’s excellent Commons debate highlighting the economic contribution of zoos to local, regional and national economies, Andrew Rosindell MP proclaimed:

“Zoos are at the heart of everything”.—[Official Report, Commons, 14/12/2011; col. 274WH.]

After Rosindell’s bold assertion, speakers glowed with proprietary pride about the pride of place that each of their zoos has in the heart of their local communities and about the important but unsung job contribution of our some 300 UK zoos, but economic questions remain. Will Her Majesty’s Government explore, with the redoubtable British and Irish Association of Zoos and Aquariums—BIAZA—the zoos’ role in regenerating local communities and, with BIAZA, produce a policy statement on the untapped potential of zoos to aid training, apprenticeships and job schemes in this time of economic downturn? Will the Government recognise the singular regional role of zoos, well illustrated by my local zoo, Chester, which sits at the heart of and astride the north-west and North Wales region, its benign tentacles spreading across the scientific community, the vibrant tourism industry and the education and research community in schools, FE colleges and local universities?

Chester Zoo also promotes forward thinking on the care of the environment. Zoos will have an as yet untapped and influential role in charting our response to climate change. Indeed, zoos’ pivotal role in preserving, conserving and displaying the wealth of wildlife in our interconnected world was brought home to me in a recent visit to Chester Zoo and its black rhinos. Informed of the danger to the world’s black rhino population from illegal rhino horn trading in Far East and African markets, I raised Questions here in your Lordships’ House and actively took up the matter in Vietnam, the centre of the illegal trade and entrepôt for Chinese dealers who trade in the mistaken belief that black rhino horn confers aphrodisiac or medicinal powers on the recipient.

Given zoos’ roles in innovatory thinking within a languishing economy, the incoming coalition’s overhasty abandonment of RDA grants was unwelcome in the zoo world. In the same vein, will the Minister investigate the difficulties that zoos have in accessing lottery and heritage funds? Given that zoos are for the most part independent, self-financing institutions, will the Government look more favourably on zoos as hothouses for enterprise? Indeed, will the Government directly respond to BIAZA’s well argued An Economic Impact Assessment for the Zoo and Aquarium Sector and sponsored, but still relevant, Manifesto for Zoos?

Given the variety of zoos’ functions and footfall, will the Minister assure me that he has had full briefings not just from Defra but from other departments, even from the FCO? After all, panda diplomacy at Edinburgh Zoo panders admirably with the FCO’s wider and wiser engagement with China. In the preparation for replying to this debate, which departments other than Defra spoke of their distinctive interest in the success of Britain’s zoos? Did the Treasury, which might just recognise investment opportunities in active zoos; DCMS, wrongly vested with responsibility for tourism, which is more properly the domain of the Treasury or BIS; or the Department for Education, for instance? Zoos cater for an important group of unengaged children who, cabined, cribbed and confined by classroom teaching, are liberated among zoo animals and their enthusiastic keepers in the classroom of the open air. Zoos demand a multidisciplinary approach from the Government. Will the Minister confess that we have not yet achieved that?

DCLG is important too, given that local authorities are charged with the task, devolved from Defra, of licensing zoos, but local authorities are already wilting under the burden of delivering local services to national standards in a climate of dwindling resources. It is to this issue, the running of zoos generally, that I now turn. A Licence to Suffer is a controversial and contentious analysis of the regulatory protection of animals in zoos. Its methodology is challenged, as are many of its dispiriting conclusions about the state of animal welfare in our zoos. It declares that,

“there are simply too many zoos, too many animals, too little training, too little understanding of the legislation, too little enforcement”.

That should give us pause for thought. In their proper concern for the welfare of the 190,000 animals in our zoos in England, are the Government convinced that we have a suitable supervisory system? If the author of the report, the Captive Animals’ Protection Society, is even one-quarter right, we have much still to do to comply with our own domestic legislation, the Zoo Licensing Act 1981, and the EU zoo directive 1999.

In that regard, it is disappointing to learn that Defra has recently discontinued its instructional workshops for local authority licensing officers who may simply not have the time, expertise and resources to ensure compliance with the local authority’s statutory duties in respect of zoos. The Born Free Foundation makes similar criticisms. Will the Government introduce a more formal mechanism to evaluate and measure the outcomes of the education and conservation programmes that zoos are legally required to undertake? Is sufficient time and expertise given to quality zoo inspections currently undertaken by local authorities? Are sufficient experienced veterinarians available to help the local authorities in that task? Will the Minister ensure a regular national analysis of all zoo inspection reports to monitor compliance with the Zoo Licensing Act, thereby highlighting the efficacy or otherwise of the current inspection regime? Furthermore, is the Minister alarmed that some one in four zoos may fail to respond to licence conditions imposed in the aftermath of adverse zoo inspections? Indeed, does the Minister accept that improved and modern methods of animal welfare assessment should be urgently and universally introduced, and that there is a compelling case for improved science-based, species-specific guidelines when keeping animals in zoos? Finally, will the Minister agree that zoos that repeatedly and wilfully transgress in the welfare of kept animals should be closed? Indeed, what will the Government do to help the zoo world fulfil its own proper ambitions for the highest standards of animal welfare?

I am most definitely not a zoo abolitionist. Indeed, I believe passionately in well run zoos performing their myriad roles of conservation, preservation, education and scientific discovery, and providing sheer enjoyment and wonder to millions of our citizens, including children, by displaying the world’s unparalleled fauna. I am reminded that the imperishable Charles Darwin learnt not only from studying animals in their natural habitats, such as the turtles on the Galapagos Islands, but from his regular visits to the then newly established London zoo. Jenny the orang-utan and the fast-breeding finches each helped him to formulate his far-reaching thoughts on the origins of species and, ultimately, of humans themselves. Zoos, too, are at the heart of science and human understanding.

All the interested parties that I have consulted share common cause in promoting animal welfare, and none more so than the estimable BIAZA. Its regular questionnaires to its membership provide us with a veritable wealth of data on who runs zoos, their viability and economic impact, including the numbers of visitors and scales of entrance charges, zoos’ education role and their marketing strategies and, perhaps most importantly, their conservation and research roles, including field conservation and animal management. The Government should acknowledge and immerse themselves in BIAZA’s treasure trove of zoo facts and figures. In the 2010 survey, BIAZA’s cri de coeur is the crying need for its members to reply diligently to the questionnaires. Only then can BIAZA document the transparency and accountability of zoos as well as celebrating their achievements and calibrating their shortcomings. BIAZA is alive, unlike some of its members, to the imperative to explain to the world—

[Baroness Northover]

I am in the fortunate position that I can see a clock. The noble Lord might like to know that he has exceeded his allotted 10 minutes and perhaps he might bring his remarks to a close. Given the lack of a clock in front of us, I will keep an eye for other noble Lords.

[Lord Harrison]

I was completing my remarks about the Government helping and aiding BIAZA in its task of bringing in the very best standards of zoo management. I have not been able to touch on the European angle, which I had hoped to do, but I look forward to hearing from colleagues examples of the good that zoos do for our communities, as well as what the Government can contribute to this important task, which I think all of us around this Table share.