Hong Kong Protests

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Goldie]

We would advise anyone intending to visit any country to take the Foreign Office’s advice and pay attention to what that advice is. Last month and yesterday, there were significant protests of enormous scale, but nothing should detract from the fact that Hong Kong is a successful, prosperous society. It operates under the structure of “one country, two systems”; it has its own distinctive legal system and protection of human rights; it has its own rule of law and an independent judiciary. It will be for people to make their own judgment as to whether they travel there. As I say, for anyone travelling anywhere abroad we always advise double-checking with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, the reality is that there is very little we can do, and we must not make meaningless threats. I commanded the battle group and the amphibious force off Hong Kong during the withdrawal. We had some very difficult incidents with the Chinese which we dealt with talking through back channels and getting agreements with them. Does the noble Baroness not agree that the way we must handle this is very quietly in the background? It seems to me that the Hong Kong police encouraged the violence by not being there, and they want to do that because of the effect they will then get from mainland China.

[Baroness Goldie]

I thank the noble Lord. We try to ensure in our discussions with China that we are blunt, we are direct, we say exactly what we think and China is left in no doubt as to our feelings. He is correct. I think these matters are always better dealt with by dialogue and sometimes behind closed doors.