Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill

Debate between Lord Purvis of Tweed and Lord Sentamu

Committee stage
Tuesday 7th May 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

I think it is. Other noble Lords may think not. I am looking forward to the Minister’s response to make sure that this is clear.

I wish to move the Committee on to a specific question about British International Investment. That is a body which receives its funding from government—from the taxpayer—but it is charged with making investment decisions in emerging economies. It operates under its ethical investment policy. It has a toolkit and operates under its own set of compliance rules when it comes to how it defines human rights. It takes international obligations under its co-ordination. That policy is not set by Ministers and is not determined by the Government. It makes its own, independent decisions on which countries it invests in.

British International Investment could choose, under its toolkit, not to invest in any of the human rights priority countries. My reading of this Bill is that this will be prohibited. Unless the Government specifically state that BII should not make investment decisions, BII would be in the scope of this Bill. That would be another very retrograde step for the UK with a development institution such as BII leading the charge on international human rights determinations for investments. I would be grateful if the Minister could state that BII is specifically exempt from this Bill.

[Lord Sentamu (CB)]

My Lords, I was not at Second Reading because, as some of you know, I have been away for six months for reasons I will not explain.

The argument goes on from side to side, but the simple answer for me lies not just in the Bill but in the Explanatory Notes on economic activities of public bodies overseas. In the background to this legislation, we are told by those who prepared it that, if people argue that there should be no investment in Uganda—let me just give that as an example, as it is the country I come from—because of a number of human rights questions, the public body should not agree to that if the Government’s policy is different.

I find the Explanatory Notes absolutely disturbing for any democratic body. Many noble Lords know that I led a campaign against Robert Mugabe’s regime. In fact, I cut up my dog collar and never wore it for nine years and nine months. Some people would have said, “You are an archbishop of the Church of England, so you are part of a public body. The Government have not stated that you could do such and such a thing; therefore you will be in breach”. I find this sentence disturbing. There may be those who want, for example, to say that we must disinvest from a particular body, country or place because it is breaching part of our understanding and that sanctions should be brought, but paragraph 6 states:

“The Government has set out its view that it is not appropriate for public bodies to accede to such campaigns except where to do so is positively consistent with the UK’s foreign policy as determined by the Government. The Conservative Party manifesto for the 2019 Election included a commitment to ‘ban public bodies from imposing their own direct or indirect boycotts, disinvestment or sanctions campaigns against foreign countries.’ This Bill is intended to fulfil that commitment”.


Friends, in a free democracy, should we rule out public bodies that may feel, for example, that they should not invest such an amount of money and have our people working with a Government who are oppressing their people from doing so unless it is consistent with government policy? Sometimes opposition to certain things tells us who we are. I trust, I think because of our parliamentary democracy, that things will be challenged in both Houses but, for heaven’s sake, why impose such a thing on a public body? Are we simply saying that the Government cannot err, cannot turn a blind eye, cannot behave in a way that their citizens may find quite difficult? Some of us campaigned against the South African apartheid Government. At that time, there was a particular sort of Government who did not agree with sanctions. I remember arriving in Cambridge. We wanted to boycott green apples from South Africa. There was no way of doing this, but some of us decided to go to Sainsbury’s and announce as loudly as we could, “We are not buying these green apples from South Africa”. Do you know what happened? We never saw those green apples any more in Sainsbury’s. That is democracy. You cannot ban a public body from engaging in an activity which those who belong to it may feel very strongly about.

The Bill is trying to do something, but it is the way it is drafted. The explanation given has a chilling effect on a lot of us, because it suggests that the Government, of whatever shape, will always get it right, that, somehow, they have become omnicompetent and omniscient, and that there are no areas where because of political pressure they will not do it. I know where the Bill is trying to go, but it needs far greater revision if we are going to protect the rule of law in this country and not suggest that the Government always get it right. Some of our foreign policies have not been good. Somehow, we have spoken. Noble Lords have heard what the noble Lord, Lord Hain, said about some people from Africa. I find it disturbing that they would think that Ukraine should not be supported because all of them—and I am being honest—are getting a lot of money from Russia and are being supported by China, so any criticism of China and Russia, as far as the African continent is concerned, is very bad, but they will find it very easy to say, “What about Gaza? Why aren’t you doing so much about it?”.