Jailing of Hong Kong Pro-democracy Activists

Lord Purvis of Tweed Excerpts

Wednesday 20th November 2024 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Baroness Chapman of Darlington) (Lab)]

I was not expecting Chagos this afternoon, I have to say. We have discussed the issue around Chagos and the treaty we have with Mauritius at length. As the noble Lord knows, Mauritius is a close ally of India and the UK, and the treaty will be subject to scrutiny in this House, so I hope that the concerns he raises about Mauritius somehow being susceptible to something around China can be responded to during that process.

The noble Lord is right, though, to draw attention to the fact that the UK Prime Minister met President Xi at the G20 in Brazil in the last few days and rightly raised the case of Jimmy Lai. Noble Lords can see the footage of that exchange for themselves, and they can reach their own conclusions about how it went.

On the 45 who were sentenced under the NSL, we are opposed to the NSL. We see this as in breach of the agreement that we reached with China in respect of Hong Kong; we are deeply concerned about what has happened. The 45 people were exercising their right to political expression and have now been imprisoned for it, and we oppose this.

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, after meeting President Xi, our Prime Minister said that he wanted to see more trade with China, notwithstanding the fact that the UK has a trade deficit in goods with China of over £25 billion. The previous Government refused to even countenance the suspension of some trade preferences from China in the UK economy if there were significant human rights abuses. In opposition, the noble Lord, Lord Collins, and I were at one in calling for a statutory human rights and trade policy. Can the Minister state that it is still the intention of the Government to ensure that human rights can trigger suspension of certain trade preferences from China if there are significant human rights abuses?

[Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)]

As the noble Lord knows, we keep these things under constant review. We are deeply concerned about what has happened, not just in recent days in Hong Kong with the sentencing but about wider issues that I know he and my noble friend Lord Collins will have worked on together in the past. We have made quite strong statements at ministerial level in the last few days on these issues, and we will continue to do so as appropriate.