Brexit: UK International Relations

Lord Purvis of Tweed Excerpts

Thursday 26th January 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Earl. It is very helpful that this debate immediately follows the excellent debate that focused on the need for greater development support for women and girls in the world. It highlighted the context of where we are in the developing world. The need for an increased focus on that area is part of the changing global environment in which the new Secretary-General will be taking up his role.

With regard to the previous debate, I reflected that it was UK leadership within the European Union, at the financing for development conference in Addis Ababa, that led to an increase in EU support for aid. I was considering what the European Union’s position on the 0.7% target will be, given that it was UK leadership that increased EU aid year on year. Not taking part in future such conferences will be one of the consequences of the United Kingdom leaving the European Union. However, it highlights that the global pressures are materially different from when the UN family and its agencies were established two generations ago, so I was very pleased that the committee chose as its first subject what the priorities of the new Secretary-General should be.

As a member of the committee, I wish to add to the best wishes expressed by colleagues to our chairman, the noble Lord, Lord Howell, and I thank the noble Lord, Lord Jopling, for stepping into the breach. It is a real privilege for me to serve on the committee with far more experienced colleagues in this House and to learn a great deal from it.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, indicated, the material difference in the world community is the great pressures on the youngest generation. Unprecedentedly, the Middle East and north Africa have their youngest generation experiencing the highest employment pressures—especially those with an education. Globalisation is not only here and is having an imbalanced impact but it is irreversible. The fact that we have also an unprecedented number of internally displaced people within countries around the world puts huge pressures on individual UN member states, and we have unseen levels of movement of people, whether caused by those seeking refuge, those seeking employment or those affected by climate change.

A strong part of the committee’s report is where we highlight that one of the absolute priorities for the new Secretary-General will be to take forward the 2015 and 2016 global conferences, which offered solutions in these areas. I was very pleased to see the Government’s response to say that they agreed with paragraphs 161 and 162 of the report—there is overall consensus. I wish Amina Mohammed, the new deputy Secretary-General, well in the role that will be played in that position.

It is fair to say that there were questions in the committee about whether Brexit would provide the UK with a greater ability to play an increased role in meeting those challenges. The Government somewhat asserted that it would—it is fair to say that the Minister said it with a higher degree of enthusiasm than the officials did. Nevertheless, we need more evidence as to how that assertion will be backed up. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Amos, when in her evidence to the committee she said that another element of Brexit would be that the UK would lose its role to,

“interpret to the rest of the world what is happening in the EU, and the rest of the world expects us to have a huge, positive influence on that”.

That is of concern. It is also the case that we will not necessarily be able to turn to the Commonwealth, nor does the Commonwealth necessarily wish us to, and be a leader in that community, which is so well established and has its own networks.

Finally, I turn to the UK’s relationship with the United States, which is pertinent. I cannot see, yet, how the position of the UK Government, with their “global Britain” approach, will sit comfortably alongside the “America first” approach. The fact is that on all the issues—international development, women’s rights and climate change—President Trump has a different view not only from the United Kingdom but from the consensus around the world. As he has said overnight, his preferred approach is based on how he feels about issues rather than the evidence presented to him. That is a very deep concern. I look to our Prime Minister to send clear signals that the UK is prepared to separate itself from US foreign policy, rather than simply adhere to it.

[Baroness Goldie]

My Lords, I am sorry to be tiresome, but time is tight and there is still slippage. I invite noble Lords’ co-operation in trying to trim their contributions as much as possible in deference to the winding-up speeches. I thank noble Lords for their co-operation.

EU Referendum: Voting Age

Lord Purvis of Tweed Excerpts

Monday 1st June 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

I agree with my noble friend.

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, I am sure that many in this Chamber will be greatly relieved that they are now old enough to vote when it comes to the referendum on the European Union. However, perhaps at the other end of the age spectrum—with the greatest respect—in the Scottish referendum 16 and 17 year-olds showed with great maturity their capacity to make a choice as to whether they wished to carry on as part of a political union or not. At an event in Scotland on Friday in which I took part, the Scottish Conservatives said very strongly how much they were in favour of 16 and 17 year-olds having the vote in the European referendum. Has Ruth Davidson, the leader of the Scottish Conservatives, made representations to the Minister in support of 16 and 17 year-olds having the vote in the referendum?

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

Those representations have not been made personally to me yet, but I can almost hear them winging down the wire at the moment as the noble Lord sits down. The issue of who votes and how they vote, and at what age they gain the legal right to vote, is of course very serious. I have heard a lot of discussion by people who may end up in the for and against camps when it comes to a referendum as to why each of those groups would like to see 16 and 17 year-olds have the vote. The most important thing is to have the referendum and give the British people throughout the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland the opportunity to make that choice.

International Trade

Lord Purvis of Tweed Excerpts

Thursday 23rd January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

It is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord’s theoretical and practical contribution to this debate, and I welcome the opportunity given to us by the noble Lord, Lord Harrison, to speak on this issue. I wish to pick up on a couple of points that the noble Lord, Lord Davies, mentioned and to discuss two export sectors that are of considerable significance to the Scottish and UK economies. I want to focus, in particular, on rural Scotland. For skilled workers in difficulties in the recession that has taken hold in the manufacturing sector in rural Scotland over the past few years, there are two shining lights, but both need support from the Government.

I should like to address some areas where removing barriers to international trade will allow whisky exports to continue to grow and will also allow opportunities for the Scottish textiles sector. Unlike other noble Lords, I have no interests to declare in this debate, other than to point out that my title of “Tweed” relates to the river rather than the cloth, although, incidentally, the latter was named after the former nearly 200 years ago. These are iconic products. “Iconic” is an overused word but I think it is appropriate to describe these two Scottish products—whisky and textiles. They are of the highest quality in both product and brand, and they have a heritage that is surpassed hardly anywhere in the world. They continue to represent key areas of employment and domestic economic activity, and are areas known for their innovation and creativity—the noble Baroness, Lady Wheatcroft, mentioned innovation and technology. I am not resting on their laurels; they are of significance for the economy.

Some 35,000 jobs are supported by the Scotch whisky industry, including 10,000 directly related to production. In textiles—medical textiles and pioneering research for technical textiles—Scotland in many respects leads the world. Often, as I indicated, the jobs are in rural and remote Scottish areas, where there is little alternative employment. Jobs supported by the whisky industry include those in packaging, tourism, logistics, maltsters and cereal suppliers, and this industry shares many of the attributes mentioned by my noble friend Lady Miller. We are often told not to mix grain and grape, but I think that in this context we share many priorities.

Scotland’s textile sector remains a key employer in many parts of Scotland, including the one close to my heart in the Scottish Borders. The sector currently employs in the region of 9,000 people across 600 businesses manufacturing textiles, apparel and leather products. For nearly 1,000 years, woollen and woven goods have been exported from the Scottish Borders. Most noble Lords will have worn Scottish textiles and most will have partaken of the occasional dram. Thankfully, few will have drunk counterfeit whisky, but perhaps more will have worn textiles that were either cheaper and poorer-quality products purporting to be Scottish or were otherwise based on traditional Scottish designs but were manufactured in areas where the quality is poorer and the labour conditions even worse. We do not need to go far back in history to find the awful example of the incident in Bangladesh. Such poor labour standards in manufacturing textiles can make us proud of our standards in the United Kingdom.

That leads me to my first area of concern. It is in our economic interests to protect these exports. The current round of negotiations for the EU-US Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, or TTIP, referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Harrison, gives the UK and its EU partners the opportunity to address some of the areas where support is needed for these sectors.

Scottish textiles, and in particular woollen and woven goods, require protection to maintain brand standards. The mislabelling, and therefore mis-selling, of goods that are not made in Scotland is a continuing concern for the sector and it is an area where the Government can assist in providing support. Clear labelling of the country of origin for manufactured textile goods is of significant importance given that some retailers in the UK—even in Scotland—and around the world sell woollen or cashmere products that claim to be Scottish or from Edinburgh or the Highlands, or they purport to be of a Scottish design and therefore give the impression that they are manufactured in Scotland, whereas they are actually manufactured in other countries, typically China, Pakistan, India or Vietnam. By ensuring that the Government use all the powers available to their offices and agencies around the world, and by encouraging domestic prosecuting authorities, whether it is the Lord Advocate in Scotland or the authorities in England and Wales, we can support and protect this important British product by making sure that customers are aware of what they are buying. .

The Scotch Whisky Association, regrettably but necessarily, has to use considerable resource in pursuing legal challenges around the world against those mislabelling and mis-selling Scotch whisky. The reality for many textile companies is that they do not have the reach or the resources to do this. Therefore, I should like Her Majesty’s Government to explore how they can use their trade representatives around the world to look at how more support can be offered to ensure that there is aggressive and proactive policing of those undermining Scottish exports.

In the latest round, EURATEX, the European trade body for textiles, and its American counterpart, the American Apparel and Footwear Association, sent a joint letter in December to Michael Froman, the US Trade Representative, and Karel De Gucht, the Commissioner for Trade, which said that,

“design, creativity and innovation are at the core of our companies’ strategies and we rely on the authorities to clarify and improve coordination mechanisms on Intellectual Property Rights … in order to better safeguard our companies’ creativity. Maintenance of an appropriate framework of intellectual property protection and effective enforcement of intellectual property rights is vital for individual brands and companies in the context of the T-TIP”.

It would be helpful to hear the Minister’s thoughts on the protection of intellectual property rights.

I do not expect the Minister to respond to that today but it would be most helpful if he would meet myself and representatives of the Scottish Textiles and Leather Association to discuss this and associated issues as they are fundamental to creating the conditions in the world and in the emerging markets for this sector to flourish.

These exports are of real significance already and the opportunities are huge. Scotch whisky leads the way for British food and drink in overseas markets, accounting for about 25% of all UK food and drink exports. The Scotch Whisky Association informs me that 40 bottles of Scotch whisky were shipped overseas each second in 2012. For many Scots that is both a tragedy and something to be proud of. Exports have increased by 87% in the past 10 years and the value of Scotch whisky exports increased by 11% to almost £2 billion in the first six months of 2013.

The Scottish textile sector remains an important contributor to the economy, with an annual turnover of £950 million, and exports of Scottish textile products are valued at £295 million. In fashion and interior textile design, Scotland operates in more than 100 markets worldwide, with major emphasis on the USA, Japan, Russia and Europe. Therefore the trade negotiations and promotion that the Minister will carry out is of fundamental importance to this sector.

Finally, touching on the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Davies, about crippling tariff regimes, there are continuing barriers for Scottish woven exports. Noble Lords may be interested to know that in exporting a lambswool sweater from the Scottish Borders to the USA, a 16% import tariff is applied. That means that a sweater manufactured for $50 in the Scottish Borders, with a fourfold retail mark up plus a 16% tariff, will cost the US customer $232. That is a crippling tariff regime. While it is less for cashmere at 4%, both are above the average tariff rates that are currently being negotiated. I know that my right honourable friend Michael Moore has been pursuing this issue since he was first elected but we have an opportunity with T-TIP to have it addressed.

There are opportunities for both whisky and textiles in the emerging markets of Africa, South America and central America. Opinion formers and fashion and creative leaders in those markets should wish to be associated with these high-quality products. With the continuation of the Britain is Great campaign, with our brand reputation around the world increasing in value and with the support of the UK Government, we can make sure that barriers are lifted, opportunities are increased for whisky and textiles and the vulnerable rural areas, where many of these jobs are so important, can look forward to a positive future.