Syria: Refugees

Debate between Lord Selkirk of Douglas and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 6th November 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Selkirk of Douglas]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they will pursue a dialogue with the governments of Jordan, Turkey, Lebanon and Iraq in order to ascertain the top priorities for those countries with regard to the present and future needs of refugees remaining in those countries who have fled the war in Syria.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the situation in Syria is worsening. There are more than 2 million refugees in neighbouring countries, which is creating a growing regional crisis. The UK’s total funding for Syria and the region is now £500 million, the largest total sum the UK has ever committed to a single humanitarian crisis. This reflects the scale, despair and brutality of the situation. The Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary regularly raise the issue with their counterparts from Jordan, Turkey, Lebanon and Iraq, the four countries where refugees are now mainly to be found, and they will continue to do so.

[Lord Selkirk of Douglas (Con)]

The Minister’s statement is extremely welcome. Does he accept that using aid in a country such as Jordan—for example, to improve water supplies and sanitation and to supplement the very hard-pressed health provision, education and other basic services—undoubtedly helps to reduce both tension and the increasing scope for friction between the refugees and the often vulnerable local communities who have so generously welcomed them?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, we do understand that. The sheer scale of the number of refugees now in Lebanon and Jordan in particular is such that it has the full potential to destabilise their societies and, therefore, their political systems. Of the £500 million that we have so far committed, £167 million is going to the neighbouring countries of Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, and Iraq and, in addition to humanitarian aid, Britain is providing more than £15 million to support stability in Lebanon and Jordan, including support for their police and armed forces. The UK also recently announced an additional £12 million of support for Jordan, aimed at keeping essential public services running.

Scotland: Civil Service

Debate between Lord Selkirk of Douglas and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Thursday 6th October 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, I entirely agree with that. This Question, however, was about the division between what is political and what is administrative; what it is appropriate for the Civil Service to do and what it is appropriate for politicians to do. I am a strong supporter of the union myself, although I am not a unionist fundamentalist, as the Scottish newspapers are apparently alleging some are. We are finding a new balance between the devolved Administrations and the London Administration. It is very important that we all engage in the active debate on what that balance should be, but that is a political activity.

[Lord Selkirk of Douglas]

Would the Minister accept the principle that it is extremely desirable that civil servants should remain impartial, especially in the context of a referendum on whether the United Kingdom should or should not remain in existence? Is it not extremely important that individual civil servants should be like Caesar’s wife—above suspicion?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I am never sure about Caesar’s wife. One of the things I have learned in government is that special advisers—political advisers—are a very useful way of maintaining the distinction between what is political and what is impartial Civil Service advice. That is a distinction that I think everyone here—and, I hope, everyone in Edinburgh—wishes to maintain.

EUC Report: EU Afghan Police Mission

Debate between Lord Selkirk of Douglas and Lord Wallace of Saltaire

Wednesday 22nd June 2011 Grand Committee

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

Like me, the noble Lord goes on holiday there. My wife and I spent a week in the heel of southern Italy some time ago, and it was quite interesting to read about some of the local ways in which policing is provided and order is maintained. We all understand that there is a continuum between our idea of perfect civilian policing and perfect law and order, which we have not quite achieved in this country but have gone a long way towards. The Afghan situation is starting very much at the other end; indeed, noble Lords remarked that the situation there has gone backwards over the past 30 or 40 years. With our different contributions—our bilateral mission in Helmand and our contribution to EUPOL—we are helping to rebuild the beginnings of a civilian police and judicial structure, recognising that what we are putting in is only beginning to build and cannot reach what we would regard as modern standards in a short period.

[Lord Selkirk of Douglas]

Is the Minister aware that NATO has lengthened its training period for the police from six weeks to eight? Will that happen with EUPOL, has it happened or is it currently under consideration? It would be a great help if he could give some indication.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I do not have the information on that; I will write to the noble Lord.

I turn to the problem of decisions in Brussels. The report was rightly critical of the Brussels bureaucracy. I happen to have former students working in this area in what was the Council Secretariat and is now becoming the EU External Action Service, and I am struck by how much they have all had to learn in creating a new structure and in developing this new concept of civilian operations jointly. I think we all recognise that doing anything like this in the context of an international organisation is not entirely easy; the levels of trust are not too high so the levels of accountability, as with the initial problems over procurement, are low. I have the impression—this is certainly what I have been briefed—that lessons have been learnt, and questions of how future and continuing missions and relations between the Brussels institutions and mission leaders in the field will be managed in future are now improving.

I do not have the figures to show where secondees are coming from, how easily different groups work together or whether one should point a particular finger at some member states for not pulling their weight as much as others. That is an area that the committee or others might like to look at in future. I was impressed by the written memorandum from the researcher from Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik who is clearly doing some very valuable work on this. We all know that we have a great deal to learn, but we also know that the Americans are envious of the EU’s ability to apply this mix of civilian and military resources and feel that that is not something that the US is yet able to do—it tends to put the military first and not provide the full mix that we would like to have.

Many other points were raised in this debate, and I shall deal with one or two. The noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, remarked on regional co-operation. We all understand that we cannot resolve the problem of Afghanistan on its own. I remind him, though, that although India is very active there and in many ways is a natural partner, the reaction in Pakistan to India playing a larger and more visible role, particularly with Afghanistan’s security forces of all sorts, would be such as to make that an extremely delicate area. It is almost like saying, “We recognise that Iran has legitimate interests in Afghanistan”—which of course it does. These are very difficult areas. Pulling in Afghanistan’s neighbours to help them is not entirely easy, given the delicacy and difficulty of the region as a whole.

The EU mission is on an upswing at present. It has a first-class Finnish leader and it has more people on the ground than previously. The figure is not yet up to 400, but it is well into the 300s. The sense in Brussels and London is that the situation has improved and is continuing to improve. That is not to say that things are going very well. As those who have read Sherard Cowper-Coles’ book are extremely well aware, Afghanistan presents a very difficult situation. Giving ordinary people in the provinces outside Kabul confidence in the state and in its governance is extraordinarily difficult. EUPOL has therefore begun with city policing and is working in particular in Kabul and a number of other areas to try to build civilian city policing as a constructive way forward.

We recognise that what we are doing in training leaders of the police force is a long-term investment, but we hope that it is improving and providing the leadership for the much larger number of police recruits who are being trained through the NATO mission. We also feel that EU/NATO co-operation has improved and is continuing to improve on an informal basis without us stubbing our toes on the underlying problems of formal EU/NATO relations. However, that is something of which the Government are acutely aware.

To come back to where I started, it is an active concern of the British Government, as it was of our predecessors, to continue to improve our capabilities in this very large area, in which weak and failed states need to make the transition to stronger governance, a more effective rule of law and, as far as possible, the building of civil society and democratic institutions. That is what the conflict pool has been about. It is the area on which we continue to work, and it is something that the Government are talking about with civilian police providers and others, as well as with our partners in Brussels.

I thank the committee very much for this report. I look forward to continuing reports on this area, and I hope that other Governments, as well as many people in Brussels, have read it as well.