Queen’s Speech

Lord Smith of Clifton Excerpts

Thursday 9th May 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

My Lords, I wish to speak to the constitutional aspect of this debate and about the volume and complexity of legislation. I am encouraged to do so because it has preoccupied me since before I came into this House 15 years ago. I suppose that is partly, if not mainly, because I have been a general practitioner solicitor for a great part of my life and was for 24 years what was called the “legal eagle” on “The Jimmy Young Show”, fielding citizens’ concerns about the law from all round the kingdom. The other thing that has encouraged me to talk about this matter briefly is the report—I do not know how many of your Lordships have seen it—When Laws Become Too Complex, put out by the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel in March. I am not aware that a similar report on legislation has ever been produced by parliamentary draftsmen themselves. It is an important and readable document, and I urge it upon your Lordships.

The other encouragement for my few brief words is the state of politics in our country. That was manifested clearly by the local elections last week. Surprisingly, one may think, it is impossible to obtain from anywhere the level of turnout at those elections. It is quite bizarre, is it not? It is apparently left to two academics at Portsmouth University—

[Lord Smith of Clifton]

Plymouth.

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

Plymouth. I thank my noble friend Lord Smith very much for that vital piece of accuracy. I rather get the impression that the turnout throughout the country was hovering at around 30%, on average. If you consider that among voters aged under 30, of whom fewer than one in four turned out at the previous general election, possibly only one in 10 cast their votes last week. I do not think that anyone sitting here believes that we are in our prime as a democracy or a Parliament.

We should never forget that the expenses scandal is not a thing of the past. I did a bit of canvassing this time; and the expenses scandal has marked the mind of the British public much more deeply than we would wish, I fear. We all know well about the Leveson inquiry and what it showed in terms of the press, the police and so on. All in all, we are in a dangerous phase, particularly given the continuing crisis in the financial and banking sectors.

A significant element in this disillusion relates to the astonishing amount of complex law that we churn out from this place, year after year. It may also surprise your Lordships that our Library does not stock a complete set of statutes from this side of 2009. You cannot even obtain loose-leafed copies of statutory instruments from 2010, for example. However, those from 2009 are available. In that year, this place produced in excess of 16,000 pages of new statute law; the split was roughly one-quarter Acts of Parliament and three-quarters statutory instruments.

There are a number of lawyers here; all of us, I suppose, are lawyers of a sort because we legislate this stuff. However, we know very well how extraordinarily complex legislation has become because of the extent to which any new law has to fit into existing law. The situation becomes overwhelming, and I have noticed that in the course of our deliberations on Bills there has been a marked reduction in the number of Peers who sit here trying to grapple with amendments that tax the wisdom of Jove.

For example, since 1984, we have passed more than 100 criminal justice Acts of one sort or another and have brought into existence more than 4,000 criminal offences. I suspect that that represents rather more than were created in the whole of our previous history. EU law finds reference in 10% of our legislation, and on top of that we gold-plate EU legislation to an astonishing extent. These are not my statistics; they come from the fine document by the parliamentary draftsmen to which I referred. They provide an example of directive 2002/42, which consisted of 1,167 words in the English text issued from Brussels. By the time we had ploughed it into our own legislation, it had gone from 1,167 to 27,000 words. What is it about this Chamber, using God’s own language, English, that we manage to produce this—I am tempted to use a very rude word—excess of legislation? So far as the people of this country are concerned, it is oppressive, distancing, expensive, disillusioning, disengaging, centralising and dependency-making—you name it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Smith of Clifton]

My Lords, perhaps I may continue with one of the themes of the speech of my noble friend Lord Rennard and pay specific regard to gender equality in corporate life. I make no apology for again raising this issue because the problem is not improving quickly enough and in some respects is getting worse. Three examples illustrate that.

First, women have suffered much greater job losses than men in the current recession, as the noble Lord, Lord Low of Dalston, emphasised earlier. Secondly, women are still paid substantially less, job for job, than their male counterparts. Only last week it was reported that women earn 20% less than men in financial services. Moreover, the European Commission ranked the UK 21st out of 28 countries on equal pay. PricewaterhouseCoopers has found that Britain’s progress on other measures such as female unemployment and part-time working has been slower than in other countries so that its relative position has deteriorated. Thirdly, and more widely researched, is discrimination against and consequent gross underrepresentation of women in business at board level. This had been the subject of the government-appointed Davies commission, which reported in 2011. That report showed how dire the situation was and called for a 25% ratio of women directors among FTSE 100 companies by 2015. This was to be achieved by evangelistic encouragement or “nudging”, as it is called. The noble Lord, Lord Davies, and his colleagues explicitly refrained from recommending the imposition of quotas despite the outstanding success of the quota scheme in Norway, which has been extensively emulated in many other countries.

“Nudging” has palpably failed. Recent research has revealed that FTSE 100 firms will fall far short of the Davies target, while the situation among FTSE 250 firms is quite abysmal. In a debate on 13 November last, both the noble Lord, Lord Giddens, and I predicted that the position would deteriorate—as it has—and said that only a quota scheme would bring success. The latest Cranfield University survey shows that the number of female executive directors has fallen in the past year among FTSE 100 companies, as has the number of female CEOs—which is always miniscule in any event. It also showed that the number of women on sub-board executive committees had fallen since 2009 from 18% to 15%, which is a bad omen as it indicates a real drop in the number of women in the pipeline for promotion to full directorships. On his recent trip to India, the Prime Minister reiterated his commitment to gender equality and we await some further action, although in his most recent reshuffle he reduced the number of women Cabinet Ministers.

Quotas are opposed often by the very women who, commendably and against the odds, have successfully scaled the heights of corporate life, saying that promotion should only be by merit. That clearly does not apply to men. What appropriate skill sets did the directors of HBOS, RBS, Northern Rock and other failed institutions bring to their boards which led to the crisis of 2008, not just in the UK but across the western world? I recall in a newspaper a montage of photographs of leading bankers together with one of Sir Terry Wogan. The caption asked: “Which one has a professional banking qualification?”. Of course, it turned out to be Sir Terry. Would women have done a worse job than those responsible for causing the 2008 bank failures?

Overemphasis on skill sets is used by the “male, stale and pale” occupants of high places to slow down or avoid increases in the number of women directors. It is a restrictive practice the like of which we have not seen since the demise of the print unions. We know that the banking failures were caused by men whose skill sets were overridden by their addiction to greed, recklessness and megalomania. As Dame Barbara Socking put it in an interview in last Sunday’s Independent on Sunday:

“Equality means having as many mediocre women as there are mediocre men in top jobs”.

She also strongly endorsed the use of quotas.

Strict adherence to the principle of proportionality would make the target for women directors 51%, not 25%. As Dame Barbara implies, women should have the same opportunities to fail in business as men. Why is the hurdle placed so much higher for women than for men?

Even so, there is some evidence that they are less likely to fail. Better gender-balanced boards are more likely to succeed. On 28 April, the Financial Times reported that three women were among the 10 most consistent fund managers over 10 years. Similarly, Credit Suisse has shown that the share price of companies with one or more women board members was higher than those with none, which is a pretty minimal criterion.

Two other recent studies, the first by Alison Wolf, the XX Factor, and The Athena Doctrine by Dr John Gerzema and Michael D’Antonio, both based on extensive empirical data, provide further evidence of the still untapped economic potential of women in senior positions. Closing this gender gap must be a priority.

I have drawn the attention of your Lordships’ House not just to the Norwegian example but to a very successful example of quotas working in the UK. On four occasions, I have cited the success of the quota scheme suggested by the Patten report. That called for such a scheme in the recruitment of new staff to the Police Service of Northern Ireland. As in Norway, the target was reached well before the allotted date. In four previous debates, no Minister, in winding, responded to my specific question to confirm that the scheme had led to great success. After some badgering, a Minister—a woman—belatedly conceded that,

“the quotas applied by the PSNI over a ten-year period had led to a marked increase in the recruitment of women in both communities (Catholic and protestant) ... with figures rising from 12.45% in 2001 to 26.58% in 2011”.

I was much obliged to the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, for her letter of 22 January.

The main purpose of Patten was to improve the recruitment of Roman Catholics to the PSNI, and that was both highly desirable and, indeed, essential. My point, however, in the context of gender equality, was that an unintended consequence of the blind tests involved in quotas was a dramatic increase in female recruitment.

However, in trying to downplay the significance of quotas with regard to women, the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, commented in her letter:

“What I cannot confirm, is the extent of the impact of quotas on this rise in the number of women police officers. Apart from the implementation of Lord Patten’s recommendations there were other initiatives that were undertaken which also had a positive effect on female representation such as the Gender Action Plan 2004 and the Gender Action Plan 2008”.

Exactly. Those action plans may well have assisted in achieving Patten, but the quotas were the main driver, and that cannot be gainsaid. In an interesting article, in the Sunday Telegraph, of all unlikely places, Octavius Black argued:

“To change behaviour, the carrot will only get you so far. You may also need the stick … As a first step, the Government should make companies publish a breakdown by gender for different salary bands and make gender balance a condition of all public-sector contracts. In effect, quotas through the back door”.

He rightly added:

“Gender equality at work isn’t a feminist issue. It is an economic one. We all need to lean in”.

Following the publication of the latest Cranfield survey, my right honourable friend the Business Secretary, Dr Vince Cable, warned that the Government will introduce quotas for boards of directors to remedy the gross gender imbalance. Will the Minister in winding confirm that what Dr Cable said is now official coalition government policy and, furthermore, when the 25% commitment will apply to Cabinet membership? Simple questions requiring simple answers.

International Women’s Day

Lord Smith of Clifton Excerpts

Thursday 1st March 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Smith of Clifton]

My Lords, this debate is becoming an annual fixture in the business of the House, and quite right too. So far, unfortunately, it has not led to any significant, substantive progress in improving the opportunities for women to contribute fully to the economic prosperity of the country.

By contrast with the UK, in the developing world there is widespread and growing acceptance of the vital role that women have played in improving wealth creation, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, remarked. The Economic Affairs Committee is completing its study on overseas development aid, and the evidence it has received shows irrefutably how important women are as economic drivers. Here, I must again draw your Lordships’ attention to the outstanding contribution of the UK-based charity, Camfed. For more than three generational cohorts, it has helped to improve the status and educational attainment levels of women in many parts of Africa. This, in turn, has generated tangible economic benefits. The progress in Africa has not been emulated in the UK.

Soon after assuming office, very commendably the coalition Government set up the Davies inquiry into gender representation on the boards of the FTSE 100 companies. It reported a year ago, and we all look forward to hearing what the noble Lord, Lord Davies, will say later in this debate. It called for a modest 25 per cent of women directors by 2015. Although much lip service has been paid to that principle, even that low voluntary target is unlikely to be reached by that date. What increases in women’s board representation there have been have been mainly in non-executive rather than executive director posts. Shamefully, 11 per cent of FTSE 100 companies still have all-male boards.

Despite the very poor record in gender balance in the composition of the current Cabinet, it is interesting that the Prime Minister has expressed concern at the lack of progress in improving the participation of women in the higher ranks of business. On 12 February, he was quoted in the Observer as saying:

“It’s about quality … Not just equality … if we fail to unlock the potential of women in the labour market, we’re not only failing those individuals, we’re failing our whole economy”.

He hinted at the possible introduction of gender quotas for company boards after his trip to Scandinavia in February. Norway’s quota system has been a dramatic success story, with a 40 per cent target being achieved in less than 10 years.

The UK has fought shy of compulsory quotas, as in the Davies report. Some business leaders have decried the use of quotas. I must say that I am rather disappointed that the noble Baroness, Lady Bottomley, has joined them. It must be emphasised that those opposing quotas are simply airing their prejudice, against all the evidence. They have no factual evidence whatever to validate their views. Supporting evidence to the contrary is available. The proof of the efficacy of compulsory quotas is not confined to Norway and elsewhere in Europe. There is evidence from within the UK itself that quotas work. The Patten reform introduced to the recruitment procedures of the RUC and the PSNI to ensure a much higher proportion of Catholic police men and women has been very successful. It also had the significant beneficial side-effect of substantially increasing the proportion of women recruits, which was reported to have more than doubled from 12.6 per cent to almost 26 per cent in the 10 years to October 2010.

The drawing-up of proper job specifications by the PSNI, as Patten required, not only led to a better community balance within police ranks but significantly enhanced women’s opportunities. The coalition Government should take this evidence into serious consideration. They cannot question the evidence, because the review was introduced by Owen Paterson, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. The Prime Minister should now take account of this UK experience and take positive action on women’s directors on the boards of major companies. As Prime Minister, he should set an example by announcing in the Queen’s Speech how he hopes to achieve, let us say, a proportion of 40 per cent women Cabinet Ministers by a particular date.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Verma]

My Lords, it has been a privilege to sit and listen to a debate that has encapsulated a huge range of topics and themes. Each contribution has provided the House with the richness, expertise, passion, compassion and humility for which your Lordships’ House is so proudly known. The debate marked the 101st International Women’s Day and I join my noble friend Lady Seccombe in celebrating safer motherhood.

Before I respond to the many questions and points raised by noble Lords, I will speak about how the Government are supporting women in developing countries with economic progress, through our DfID programmes and our support of the new UN Women agency. On taking office as Secretary of State for International Development, my right honourable friend Andrew Mitchell made it a priority to put girls and women at the heart of DfID programmes. Through both bilateral and multilateral reviews, he identified programmes that delivered and also those that failed to produce positive outcomes.

DfID’s strategic vision for women and girls is guided by four pillars for effective action. Delaying pregnancies among females in developing countries—as many have spoken of today—and encouraging greater participation in education and employment enables women and girls to have better health outcomes for themselves and for their children. Evidence has shown that improving access to economic assets for women could see increases in output of between 2.5 per cent and 4 per cent. Increasing women’s control over household income has a more positive impact on children as mothers tend to invest back more into their households and in the welfare of their children. Providing women with the means, through microfinance or tangible assistance such as seeds or livestock, has seen economic growth in developing countries, adding to women’s ability to harness change and transform their communities.

We know that women make up 51 per cent of the world’s population and that they produce 60 per cent to 80 per cent of the world’s agricultural goods. However, they own less than 5 per cent of the world’s titled land. The Government, through DfID, have set ambitious targets to help 18 million women to access financial services and 4.5 million women to strengthen their property rights by 2014. Economic empowerment increases people’s access to and control over economic resources, financial services, property and other assets.

DfID’s rationale for focusing on economic development of women and girls was reinforced by the 2012 World Development Report on Gender Equality and Development, which highlighted the importance of closing earnings and productivity gaps and improving access to productive resources such as water, electricity and childcare. DfID currently has over 20 programmes in 15 countries, delivering direct assets to women and girls across Asia and Africa, but we recognise that just transferring economic assets is not enough. We need to help change discriminatory social norms and laws.

Whether it is in developing countries or here in the UK, changing attitudes, mindsets and culture takes a long time, as many of us are so aware, as we continue in our sophisticated democracy to struggle with many of the issues that we see widely rampant across the globe. Noble Lords have mentioned violence against women, forced marriages, “honour”-based crime, female genital mutilation and human trafficking, alongside parity in pay and representation in both civic and political life. That is why these debates are so important.

The Government strongly supported the establishment of UN Women, which was formally launched in February last year; I had the privilege of attending that launch. It has a strong programme to support action to increase women’s leadership and participation in the decisions that affect their lives; to increase economic empowerment; to prevent violence against women and girls and expand victim/survivor services; to increase women’s leadership in peace, security and humanitarian response to conflict and crisis situations; and to ensure that a comprehensive set of global norms, policies and standards on gender equality and women’s empowerment are in place.

Noble Lords are aware of our international champion to eliminate violence against women and girls, Lynne Featherstone. She is currently in New York attending the 56th session of the Commission on the Status of Women and will raise the issue of body confidence among young girls and women, a topic that the noble Lord, Lord Giddens, alluded to. She has received strong support at the UN summit from many countries. She is working closely with all parts of the media and with business and has received active support from them.

I turn now to points raised by noble Lords. I have kept my own remarks brief because I think many of them will be covered in my responses. However, because there are so many responses, I will say from the outset that if I do not deliver all the responses in the time allocated, I will undertake to write and have a copy placed in the Library.

I felt that the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, was slightly disingenuous in her start. This debate has recognised a lot of the good things that were done by the previous Government and on which we are working. However, we inherited a deficit. We are struggling to ensure that we restore the economy. We know that difficult decisions have to be made and the noble Baroness is aware of that. We are protecting the lowest-paid. Our changes to taxation will lift 1.1 million people out of income tax, some 58 per cent of whom will be women. We are also providing families with more support for childcare costs.

My noble friend Lord Smith spoke of quotas. I, like the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Abersoch, and my noble friend Lady Bottomley, do not like quotas. We think that it is wrong to make an artificial imposition when we want to ensure that those who take up positions are well supported, well qualified and able to do them. We want to make sure that the means to get into such positions are in place. That is the work that the noble Lord has done. The work is re-educating about and making people rethink how to get people placed on boards. Dare I say that for far too long—I think that the noble Baroness, Lady Nye, mentioned it—boards have had very much a group-think mentality and have carried on in the same way that they have known for years. It is great that they have been shaken up to have a rethink about how their boards and their businesses look. My noble friend is wrong. Research from Norway has found that there is a connection between the introduction of quotas and an underperformance of companies.

[Lord Smith of Clifton]

I thank the noble Baroness for referring to my point on quotas. Does she recall that studies have shown that at the present rate of progress it will be 100 years before we get 25 per cent female representation on boards?

[Baroness Verma]

That would be if we allow it to stay the way it is. Through active engagement we are making progress. We have made 2 per cent progress in a short period of time. I am perhaps not as pessimistic as my noble friend.

The noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, spoke about women in the developing world and early marriage, and the education of girls. The UK’s development programme has put girls at its heart. We know that investing in girls at an earlier stage better helps to break the cycle of poverty between the generations. DfID is working with adolescent girls and communities to end early marriage. For example, in Ethiopia, we are supporting the scale-up of a pilot programme which will delay marriage for 200,000 girls. During the pilot, none of the girls married and all of them stayed in school.

The noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, also talked about forced marriage, a subject on which I am intensely passionate. I know this topic inside out. Unfortunately, the culture from which I come still has the attitude that there is a very fine line between consent and forced marriage. We are working sensitively but vigorously to ensure that no longer in this country at least should we tolerate any form of forced marriage. When victims—that is what they are—want support, we want to be there to provide them with that support, which is why the police, the CPS and other agencies have been given guidance to ensure that they too respond in a reflective manner.

What can I say about my noble friend Lady Miller of Hendon? She is at the heart of what most of us look for in a mentor, friend and role model for politics. I know she went completely off-key in her speech, but she did not need it. She is what I would call the friendly face and the friendly hand that comes into politics—someone who, when everything is going wrong, will tell you that it is going to be all right. The organisation of which she was a founding member actually transformed the perception of people who actively wanted to engage in politics and decision-making. My noble friend has a great deal of respect for her husband and values his support, as do I. It is when both men and women are totally engaged that the changes will be brought about. When my noble friend talks about her husband, I talk about my Ashok, because without him we would never have made this journey.

The noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley, wanted to know about adult social care. The Government are putting in an extra £7.2 billion over the next four years of the spending review to support adult social care, and that comes in the context of a challenging settlement for local government. Perhaps I may say to the noble Baroness that I have personal experience of the care sector because for over a decade my businesses have been in that sector. I agree with absolutely every word she said about the contribution, both informal and formal, made by carers. I wish that at some point we would have a complete attitude change in this country in how we look at those who actually do some of the most downtrodden jobs for the least thanks. We see the bad headlines, but we do not see that many good care workers do an excellent job on a daily basis.

The noble Baroness also talked about flexible working. We are trying to introduce the extension of such working to all employees to ensure that the benefit is available as widely as possible, including to individuals in the wider caring structure and those who wish to play a more active role in the community or undertake voluntary work. The extension will also change the perception that flexible working can harm career progression. It will encourage more fathers to request flexible working in order to take on a greater share of childcare responsibilities. Someone mentioned something about fathers, and we agree that the workplace has changed. Many more fathers want to be at home spending time with their children. Flexible working is positive for business because it enables it to draw on a much wider pool of skills and talents in the workplace, along with improved recruitment and retention rates. It increases staff morale and productivity. The evidence is also clear that flexible working arrangements benefit women by helping them to balance their caring responsibilities.

The noble Baroness, Lady Gale, highlighted the great benefit of strong Welsh women, and I agree with her. We have a lesson to learn from the Welsh Assembly and I am sure that the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, and I were thinking, “How do we manage this for our next elections?”. What I would like to say to the noble Baroness, Lady Gale, is this: we are a stronger nation for having Wales as part of it, and as a good neighbour we will take lessons and look carefully at how Wales is doing.

The noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, talked about the important role played by her mother. I heard “Hear, hear” across the Chamber when she said that. Mothers are so important in shaping our ambitions. My mother, like the noble Baroness’s mother, was, is, and I suspect will always remain my greatest inspiration. Again, if I reflect only on my own culture where girls are seen as a bit of a burden—and if you are a girl with a darker skin than the other girls growing up around you, you are a bigger burden—I can tell noble Lords that it is usually the mum who tells you that it is going to be okay.

The noble and learned Baroness, Lady Scotland, talked about legal aid reform and expressed her concerns about women losing out on vital legal aid. The Bill is currently in the House and there will be, I am sure, energetic discussion on it. However, I can reassure the noble Baroness that we are retaining legal aid in key areas impacting on women—in particular injunctions to protect victims from domestic abuse and in private family law cases where domestic violence is a feature.

The noble Baroness also referred to human trafficking. The Government published a human trafficking strategy last July which focused on: improving identification, care of victims, enhancing our ability to act early before the victims reach here, smarter action at the borders and much more co-ordination of law enforcement in the UK. We are also tackling trafficking through our international work. DfID supports projects which are specifically designed to prevent trafficking—for example, the Malawi anti-child trafficking project run by the Salvation Army to improve knowledge of, and access to, rights for children in Malawi who are vulnerable to being trafficked; and in Bangladesh DfID has supported the establishment in the police of a specialised unit for human trafficking.

The noble Baroness, Lady Massey of Darwen, asked whether I agreed with not only the outstanding sacrifices but the work of the suffragettes. Absolutely. Had they not done what they did then, we would be fighting this battle at a much later stage than we are now. The suffragettes put into motion what we have to continue. The work is far from done but I agree with the noble Baroness that it took some outstanding women to stand up at a time when it was very difficult to do so..

The noble Lord, Lord Shipley, asked about DfID’s work with girls and women. I have spoken about that but I shall read out my note because it is important to repeat a good message. I am delighted that he welcomed our strategic vision for girls and women and that he cited the compelling evidence upon which that strategic vision is based. Investing in the poorest girls and women is good for them, their families, societies and economies. I am pleased that DfID is scaling up and prioritising resources to support girls and women in all 28 of its bilateral programmes and international organisations such as UN Women, to which the UK is the second largest donor.

I have been told that I have a couple of minutes left and so I shall quickly ramble through.

My noble friend Lady Seccombe spoke about apprenticeships in non-traditional roles. Working with the National Apprenticeship Service to run a series of diversity pilots we are looking at increasing diversity in apprenticeships. My noble friend pointed out how it can actually transform the culture of both men and women’s thinking by taking on usually non-traditional female apprenticeships. Overall, there are more female apprentices than male, particularly in advanced and higher apprenticeships. However, of course, there is always room for improvement.

The noble Lord, Lord Davies, referred to childcare and how there needs to be a major review. The Government are committed to investment in childcare. We are extending free childcare to the most disadvantaged two year-olds and, through the universal credit, we are providing an extra £300 million of support for women working less than 16 hours.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, mentioned grannies, an issue on which we need to focus more. They form a huge part of our population and are a huge resource of not only experience and knowledge but patience. I know, for instance, that my daughter much prefers my mother’s company to mine. She thinks my mother is far trendier than I am—probably because my mother does not say no to her as much as I do. However, the noble Baroness is right. We are doing many more things. For instance, we are working on pensions to make sure that women’s basic state pension outcomes rapidly catch up with those of men and continue to improve. Around 80 per cent of women reaching state pension age since April of last year will be entitled to a full basic state pension and projections are that that will rise to 90 per cent in 2018.

The noble Lord, Lord Bach, and I have Leicester in common and agree that cities such as Leicester have so much to offer economically. However, we have to make sure that people in those cities are able to access services and jobs at local authority level, where we have very poor representation both for females and for BMEs. The noble Lord also talked about the legal aid Bill. As I said to the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Scotland, we will leave that until we discuss and debate it in the House.

The noble Lord, Lord Loomba, talked about women, peace and security. Women have a crucial role to play in resolving conflict. The FCO is working with DfID, the MoD and the Stabilisation Unit and is committed to ensuring that the promotion of women’s participation in conflict resolution is an integral part of an overseas conflict policy—not only because the principles of equality and justice underpin our values but because the effective participation of women helps to secure more sustainable peace, which is vital to our security interests. He also champions the role of women, on which I heartily congratulate him.

My noble friend Lady Morris of Bolton spoke about women in the Middle East. The recent uprisings in the Middle East have led to concerns about women’s rights in the context of political instability and conflict. They are at their lowest in fragile and conflict-affected areas such as Yemen, Iraq, and the West Bank and Gaza. Heightened instability in the region could see a further deterioration in women’s participation. However, I also congratulate my noble friend on the work she does to make sure we have a wider understanding of what is going on in that region.

The noble Lord, Lord Giddens, spoke about body image. I agree with almost everything the noble Lord said—we need to tackle the way that women are portrayed in the media so that girls have positive role models and are not under pressure to conform to looking, or behaving in, a certain way. We have launched the body confidence campaign to reduce the burdens that popular culture places on an individual’s well-being and self-esteem.

The noble Baroness, Lady Dean, asked whether I would relay a message to the Colombian Government through the FCO. The Government are firmly committed to working with countries such as Colombia to uphold and protect women’s rights but I will write to Jeremy Browne at the FCO, who is the ministerial lead on this area, and raise the issues with him.

The noble Baroness, Lady Healy, asked me about universal childcare—which I think I have mentioned—as well as free education for disadvantaged two year-olds.

The noble Baroness, Lady Kinnock, noted that deaths in childbirth are too high around the world and asked what we are doing to help. As I have said, DfID, through its strategic vision for girls and women, has set out our commitment to improve reproductive and maternal health for women in the poorest countries as a priority. By 2015, the UK will have helped save the lives of at least 50,000 women during pregnancy and childbirth, and those of 250,000 newborn babies. It will also ensure at least 2 million safe deliveries with long-lasting improvements and access to quality maternity services.

I still have many more responses to deliver so I will ask your Lordships’ indulgence and write to them. I will just conclude with these remarks. We have taken our domestic and international issues very seriously. I have spent the past year or so travelling around the world doing round-table discussions and asking women in the UK what is important to them. That direct contact has benefited us greatly; we are feeding into our departments some of the main issues that women have.

Someone asked me some time ago what inspired me to get up and carry on the fight that sometimes seems hopeless. I said that as a kid I heard Dr Martin Luther King’s speech, “I have a dream”. While there is so much to do, ordinary people are doing extraordinary things, and that inspires me. We have made progress, but we have so much to do, and this Government are determined that we will not shy away from taking difficult decisions.

Northern Ireland: Police Evidence

Lord Smith of Clifton Excerpts

Wednesday 20th October 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Neville-Jones]

My Lords, I did not quite say that there are no statistics. I was asked about present performance and I said that my answer was based on a very small set of statistics. I can give some figures: 17 requests have been received in total this year from the Republic of Ireland, of which six concern Northern Ireland. That is against a background of 1,585 letters of request overall. We are dealing with low numbers, which is why averaging statistics is fairly misleading. My other point was that, in relation to outgoing requests from Northern Ireland, the Northern Irish authorities do not collect those statistics, so I am not able to give that figure.

[Lord Smith of Clifton]

My Lords, does the Minister agree that there is something special about requests regarding details from Northern Ireland and the Republic, which is that we have a land border, the only one that we have? Does she also agree that, with the increase in dissident republican paramilitary activity, this issue is becoming urgent and should not just be left for the lawyers to take their time?

[Baroness Neville-Jones]

My Lords, in this particular instance we are talking about evidential letters, but there is the quite separate and important issue that the noble Lord has raised, which is cross-border co-operation between police authorities in relation to terrorism. However, that is not dealt with through this system. Even so, we agree entirely with the importance of what he has said.