Queen’s Speech

Lord Purvis of Tweed Excerpts

Thursday 22nd June 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, I join other noble Lords in expressing condolences to those who tragically lost their lives and, as the son of an emergency worker—my dad was an ambulance driver all his life—I pay tribute to our emergency services, which have played such an exemplary role over recent weeks.

As Her Majesty said before the Queen’s Speech, the country is in many respects going through a very sombre period. However, there are some areas of common ground which I think this debate will highlight. My noble friends Lady Sheehan and Lord Chidgey, Lord Sharkey and Lord Bruce will highlight many areas where Liberals and Liberal Democrats have for many years taken a stance on international and development issues.

When much of the visualisation of the British constitution is based upon the ceremony of formal occasions, yesterday’s imagery spoke volumes. The last year there was a reduced Queen’s Speech was also the year I was born, the year a Prime Minister called an election on the question of who governed Britain. The 2017 version was a Prime Minister calling an election on the statement, “I govern Britain and want a large enough majority to ignore all opposition”. However, the people said no. Not only is this House a House of minorities, so is the other place. The 1970s also saw the last time a minority Administration introduced a Queen’s Speech—an Administration who would be largely dependent on votes from Northern Ireland Members. Perhaps when some of the press said that one of the party manifestos proposed to take us back to the 1970s, they had it round the wrong way.

It was welcome to hear from the Leader of the House yesterday that the Government will seek to govern with humility and to forge cross-party agreement where they can. Many issues raised in the Queen’s Speech and the Government’s agenda give us the best opportunity to have that wider consensus. When the Government make progressive moves on the international stage, they will receive support from these Benches. Humanitarian assistance, maintaining the legal requirement for the UK to meet its commitment to provide 0.7% of national income for international development, the delivery of the Paris Agreement and—more so—unswerving support for meeting the global goals for development are all issues on which we share common ground with the Government. We pledge to work with the Government on advancing them all.

Furthermore, the preparations for a successful Commonwealth summit next year, focusing on young people and with a greater visibility for human rights and LGBTI issues, will also be one of common cause. I pay tribute to the outgoing Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, for her work in seeking the global abolition of the death penalty and tackling sexual violence in conflict-affected areas, issues which we unreservedly supported and will continue to support. In that respect I welcome the noble Lord, Lord Ahmad, to his post as he takes on many of these important issues. We look forward to working with him. While he does not represent a Government who command a majority in this House, he commands respect across all parts of the House and will make a significant impact on the department.

On the global stage there is much common ground among us. For as long as this minority Government are in office, we will use our votes to support, strengthen and enforce a progressive international humanitarian, developmental and human rights-based agenda. However, in this context it is correct to highlight our concern that the UK has been less visible in 2017 than it should have been on major global challenges. I serve on the International Relations Committee in your Lordships’ House, so ably chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford. Our report in May on the Middle East called for fresh thinking from the Government. It highlighted a lack of consistency in the UK’s approach, especially on Syria.

Over the last 12 months—I refer to my entry in the register of interests—I visited the region 15 times, with most visits to Iraq during the military offensive in Nineveh. The imminent military destruction of Daesh in Mosul now needs to be met with a whole-government response to support an environment where a successor to Daesh is not formed. This means the people there need to see local government in the area work for them and have services restored as soon as possible. I press upon the Minister the need for humanitarian assistance to be delivered as soon as security allows—I stress the urgency of this—to the people in the right side of Mosul who have been prisoners of Daesh. They have literally been prisoners, in the basements of their houses, and are starving to death as we debate this week. I know the work of the UK in that area intimately and I admire many of our staff on the ground. UK humanitarian assistance literally saves lives and I hope the Minister may respond positively. Upwards of 70,000 civilians are trapped in that part of Mosul this week.

I also welcome the announcement of a commission to look into extreme ideology. I have the privilege to serve with the British Council All-Party Parliamentary Group, alongside my noble friend Lady Suttie and the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, in its work on tackling extreme ideology and developing the resilience of young people in the MENA region. I hope that when this work is published in the autumn it will form the basis of cross-party consensus on the need for further thinking on extreme ideology.

On Syria, the committee’s report highlighted confusion over the Government’s policy, outwith their commitment to humanitarian assistance. In summing up, can the Minister be clear on the Government’s position on Assad and whether he would be free to continue to play a role in the future leadership of Syria? Can the Minister also state how much of the £12 billion committed to the conference on support for Syria and the region, which took place in London, has actually been secured and how much has been delivered to the people who need it most in this ongoing humanitarian catastrophe?

In a much-publicised speech, the Foreign Secretary said that the UK was “back east of Suez”, and the Prime Minister said in Bahrain that the UK’s new Gulf strategy would deepen further our relationship with the Gulf states, but what is the UK’s current position on this tense situation? Does the UK agree with President Trump that Qatar funds terrorism, or does it have a distinct position? What is the UK’s position on the most recent developments in Iran? As we abstained from being involved in the outgoing French President’s initiative for discussing the Palestinian question, what active steps are the Government taking in challenging Israel on its recent moves in the Occupied Territories? The committee’s report said:

“The balance of power in the delivery of peace”—


the two-state solution—

“lies with Israel … The Government should give serious consideration to now recognising Palestine as a state, as the best way to show its determined attachment to the two-state solution”.

I would welcome the Minister responding to that in his summing up.

I mentioned our steadfast support for the UK meeting its international obligation on 0.7% for developmental aid. This was a welcome element in the Queen’s Speech, as it was in the Conservative manifesto, as it was in ours. In fact, it has been in ours since the 1970 general election, so while we may not meet the heights of the numbers of Conservative MPs, at least we have consistency on our side. I greatly admire the noble Lord, Lord Bates, and I think he is an excellent Minister in the department. I hope very much that the Government will not countenance the abolition of the Department for International Development and I hope that the Minister can state that unequivocally in his closing remarks. We have led the world in having a distinct department, setting in many respects the standard for the delivery of development aid and assistance. I hope very much that it will not be subsumed into the Foreign Office.

One area where there will be some equivocation is on what arrangements the UK will have on international trade. The Government sought a mandate for a hard Brexit, where leaving the customs union was a key part of that approach. They did not receive it. If humility was to be on display, it would be the recognition that maintaining membership of the customs union should be in the best interests of British business. Many warned that it was simply unfeasible, as outlined in the Prime Minister’s letter triggering Article 50, to negotiate both the terms on leaving and the new trading arrangements simultaneously. This has been the first quite significant defeat for the Government with regard to their negotiating stance.

It also seems that the “no deal is better than a bad deal” rhetoric has been ditched, gladly. When during the campaign Ministers were asked to outline what a bad deal sounded like, they defined what “no deal” actually was. The rhetoric has now moved away from “no deal is better than a bad deal” but now what has seemed to creep in is “no deal is better than a punishment deal”. It is an odd week indeed, when negotiations have started, when the Brexit Secretary’s first move is a retreat on the Government’s previous position on the process of the negotiations, but the prospect of a punishment agreement being forced upon us is now real. It is just not the right approach to commencing these important negotiations with our European friends.

The speeches this week by the Chancellor and the Governor of the Bank of England have stated in stark terms the economic reality we are now facing and the likelihood of people being poorer and the economy being impacted. Of course the people did not vote for themselves to be poorer; nor did they want the economy to be less developed. But the real admission from the Government of the challenges ahead is a welcome move. The Chancellor has now said that it is in the interests of Britain that we have a significant transitional arrangement for trade. This was not really mentioned in the Minister’s speech. The Chancellor said this morning that he could not rule out that this would be for a number of years. Can the Minister confirm that this is the Government’s position and whether the European Court of Justice jurisdiction will apply over this period? The Chancellor said that once this was agreed, business could breathe a huge sigh of relief and investment could start again: is this an indication that there is significant business concern?

Overall, there is much that we will agree with—on humanitarian, diplomatic and aid support—and we will provide those elements to the Government. But when it comes to issues of Brexit and our separation from the European Union, we will be forensic in our scrutiny and we will hold this Government to account.