European Council

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Monday 22nd February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I certainly think that the Government have a responsibility to be clear about what they are advancing and to communicate that directly to the people. But I also think that the media play an important part in our democratic process. Noble Lords have been arguing about other people making their case, and it is important as well that, through the media, people get to hear the arguments for and against. I would never stand at this Dispatch Box and criticise the work of the UK media.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness the Leader of the House will be well aware that there is no doubt whatever that the people of our nation are safer in terms of terrorism and serious organised crime because we are part of the EU. We lead Europol and have the European arrest warrant and all sorts of things. At the grand strategic level of defence, there is no doubt that NATO is most important to us. However, does the noble Baroness agree that Europe is very important to our nation? We have twice saved its bacon in the last 100 years and there is no doubt that, at the moment, there are huge threats. If we left the EU, I think there would be a certain flakiness within it. Does the noble Baroness agree? This is a very bad moment for that to happen. Europe needs us and, if it becomes flaky, the risks from people like Putin and the southern flank would be huge. We need to bear these things in mind.

Rugby World Cup 2015

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Wednesday 11th November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords—

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Lord Berkeley of Knighton (CB)]

My Lords—

UK Territorial Space: Spanish Incursions

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Monday 9th November 2015 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Courtown]

My Lords, our assessment is that the assets, structure and procedures of the Royal Navy’s Gibraltar Squadron are enough for the job but I take very careful note of what the noble Baroness said. We want to make sure that these challenging maritime incursions can be dealt with by our assets there.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon (LD)]

My Lords—

[The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Stowell of Beeston) (Con)]

My Lords, it is the turn of the Labour Benches.

[Lord West of Spithead]

My Lords, the Minister will be well aware that the ships we have in Gibraltar are in fact very tender, do not have very long range and are not nearly fast enough. Of course, the people manning them are very proud of them and do their best but it is their job to say that they are doing their best and they are good. The reality is that they are not good enough for the job and because of that there will be an incident where someone may be killed or badly injured. The Government of Gibraltar have said that they are willing to pay for faster, bigger craft. That has been done before with other countries we have been responsible for. Could we look at this very closely, so that we can get these new craft and then be able to do things that will not risk injury or death for our people there?

[The Earl of Courtown]

I listened very carefully to what the noble Lord said concerning our naval assets in Gibraltar. I will ensure that that is drawn to the attention of the department.

European Council

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Monday 19th October 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, the sea state and the weather in the Mediterranean are deteriorating rapidly. We are unwittingly going to cause the deaths of increasing numbers of men, women and children. Does the noble Baroness agree that the only way to stop the flow of people from Libya is to blockade the coast? She is well aware that international law at sea allows us to do boardings without an EU requirement to do so, and that only by blockading the coast and really getting at people smugglers can we stop them being able to advertise our ships and EU ships as part of their ticket to Europe.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

The noble Lord knows that, as I have mentioned, we have progressed from search and rescue to being able to target the smugglers who are operating these ships; we can actually go on board and tackle those on board. We are not yet at a point where we can move closer to the Libyan borders, but what will see us being able to make that kind of progress will be the unity Government in Libya that we so much want to see in place as soon as possible. Once there is stable governance in Libya, we can see the further action that the noble Lord and others would like see taken.

Food Supply: Sustainability

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Monday 14th September 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

My Lords, of course the department is looking at a range of ways of ensuring that we have a stable supply of food and we want to ensure that the environmental impact of our food supply is also addressed. That is why we have a 25-year plan for food and farming and, alongside that, and complementary to it, a 25-year environment plan.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, this century, our nation was almost starved to death. Today, the largest proportion of our food comes by sea. Seventy-three years ago today, half a convoy full of foodstuffs was decimated, and at that stage we had 800 escorts. When I joined the Navy we had over 100 escorts; today we have 19. Does the Minister not agree that all parties should agree that this nation needs more escorts for the Navy?

[Lord Gardiner of Kimble]

The noble Lord should be congratulated on weaving in his very strong support for the Navy and all that goes with it. It is important to know that 76% of indigenous-type foods come from the UK, as do 62% of all foods. Interestingly, that is by no means low in the context of the last 150 years, and in fact between the wars, the proportions were much lower. However, I am of course very keen on British production.

Tunisia and European Council

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Monday 29th June 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, the Prime Minister made it clear that he believes that ISIL and Daesh are actually a threat to the existence of our nation at the moment. I have to say I do not see it in that way, but he has said that. Clearly that means—rather like the last time we had such a threat, which was the Second World War and the Cold War—one has to look at spending priorities in a totally different way, and things such as foreign aid, education, the National Health Service and welfare have to take a hit because we need to spend money on defence and security. However, my question is more specific. When we started our air campaign in Iraq, we said that we would not do attacks into Syria unless something specific—an atrocity or something—happened. Those of us in the military pointed out it made no military sense not to do attacks into Syria. Is this now being looked at again so that we have some more cohesive aspect to what should be a much bigger overall strategic plan, which a number of us have talked about?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I think what the Prime Minister said was that ISIL presents an existential threat to the United Kingdom. In response to the point that the noble Lord makes about military action and intervention and expanding on what we are already doing in the area, as he knows, the House of Commons was given an opportunity to consider whether we should get involved militarily in Syria and decided against that action. We believe that what we are doing right now is an appropriate and a very valid and important contribution to the fight against ISIL. Ultimately, we believe—and the international community feels—that to properly combat the threat of terrorism that emanates from ISIL there needs to be better governance in these countries. That is going to take a long time, and we need to support the people in the relevant countries to form the kind of representation of all the people that will lead to stability in those areas.

Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament Report: Fusilier Lee Rigby

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Tuesday 25th November 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I am certainly grateful to my noble friend for echoing the support for the security services and the work that they do to keep all of us safe in this country. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank my noble friend for his work as a member of that committee. I know that the noble Lord, Lord Butler, from this House is also a member of the committee, and there are other Members of this House who have been previous members of that committee.

On my noble friend’s point about prioritisation still being necessary even in light of increased funding, that is right and will always be the case. There is a need for balancing prioritisation with not delaying the necessary steps. I quoted from the statement of the MI5 Director General in the Statement by the Prime Minister that I repeated. The security services do not have an army of people waiting to deploy; they have to use their resources all the time as best they see fit, and they are doing a very good job.

On the capability gap regarding communications service providers, which my noble friend mentioned, he is right that we have to use our influence at all levels and I can confirm to him and the House that that is happening right up to the highest level, including the Prime Minister with the President of the United States.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

The Minister will be aware that since the revelations of the traitor Snowden, terrorist groups—in particular ISIL—have changed their methods of communications, and have shifted to other ways of talking to each other. Consequently there are people dying who would otherwise be alive. Does the Minister agree that it is now critical that we move forward the Communications Data Bill, which was paused so unreasonably, because there is a very real danger that unless we do—and I am not exaggerating in saying this—people in this country will die who would have been safe if it was in place?

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

The noble Lord is right to say that the leaking by Snowden and the reporting of his leaks have had a serious effect on intelligence gathering. That is unquestionable. There is evidence that some of the terrorists and terrorist groups, in the light of that knowledge, are now moving their exchanges to different places, where the intelligence services are not operating, because they now know where they do and where they do not.

As far as introducing the Communications Data Bill is concerned, in the summer we introduced the emergency legislation which addressed some gaps there. The counterterrorism Bill that will be introduced tomorrow will close another gap. This is an area where I believe we will continue to have to keep making progress. We are not ready to move as far as the noble Lord suggests at this moment. To be successful in introducing a Communications Data Bill, we will need a consensus, and we do not have that yet.

Ukraine (Shooting Down of MH17) and Gaza

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Monday 21st July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

As the Statement says, even the separatists did not want to target a commercial airliner: that is the point we are trying to get at. It is not a question of evidence being gathered to show that there was that intent; it is about the aircraft that they were focusing on. As regards my noble friend’s point about the fly zone above this area, it is important to note that the controls that were in place extended to a specific height, and that this commercial airliner was above the height determined to be safe. However, those controls have now been extended and there is a complete lockdown of the whole area at any height. My noble friend rightly said that the fighting needs to stop and talking needs to start. We are very clear that Russia needs to take steps to de-escalate the action in Ukraine. We need to ensure movement to bring security to Ukraine very soon.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

The shooting down of MH17 was clearly an unexpected atrocity. However, we must not be surprised at that because atrocities happen every day in civil wars, as we see in Syria and Iraq and saw in Bosnia. I am afraid that these irregulars will behave in a very inhumane way: that is what happens in civil wars. There is no doubt whatever that Putin has been caught on the back foot. He has been caught out in this situation for the second time. The first time was the revolution in Kiev, where he was very badly caught out. We must think very carefully about how the Russians perceive this. They conflate NATO, the EU and America and see them all as a threat. We never gave any credit whatever to the fact that Crimea has a special status. There is no love lost between me and Putin, but does the Minister really believe that forcing him even further into a corner will help the settlement within Ukraine? Would it not be far better to aim to stop all fighting and have a conference whereby we can leave Russia primarily to broker some sort of agreement because, in the end, the Minister must agree, it is only with the Russians that we can get peace in this region?

European Council and Afghanistan

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

That sounds an extremely sensible point to me. I am not an expert in the area or in those complex discussions and negotiations that need to go on, but I will certainly make sure that my friends at the Foreign Office are aware of the extremely sensible point that my noble friend has made.

[Lord West of Spithead]

My Lords, can the Minister clarify the numbers post-2014, because they are not at all clear? The MoD must have done this work already. How many personnel are we talking about for the defence academy? What is this protection force that we are talking about? It sounds a very open-ended thing to me. What sort of numbers are we talking about and where would they be? On what date will we give up Camp Bastion? Will we be abandoning it or handing it over to the Afghan authorities or to the Americans? Will we provide any air assets post the end of 2014? It is really rather important for us to get our minds round these numbers and issues.

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

I take that point. The noble Lord has illustrated one of the recurring problems in this House: that it is full of people who know what they are talking about. It makes my job extremely difficult. I will see what specific numbers I can find and I will be happy to circulate them. I know that the numbers envisaged are small. The numbers on the continuing support that would be made available to the national training academy are extremely low, but I take the noble Lord’s point about wanting specificity. If I am able to get better particulars, I will do so and will write to the noble Lord.

House of Lords Reform

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Monday 23rd April 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

May I ask my noble friend a question, although it may be a naive question? Given that we had a manifesto commitment to seek a consensus on House of Lords reform and given that the Joint Committee is split completely down the middle, is that not the end of the matter?

[Lord West of Spithead]

My Lords, on St George’s day, and falling back on the line that I am very much a simple sailor, I am confused by the fact that half the committee effectively has an alternative view. I agree with some of the statements by other noble Lords that it seems to make a nonsense of this process. I am also very concerned, as I look in a simple way at next week, that there seems to be very little time in which to have a sensible debate about this issue.

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I am not at all surprised by any of the interventions that have been raised today. I am sorry that the noble Baroness is disappointed that there should not be a Statement. We have had the report for only a few hours and, after all, we are House that likes to have debates when we are informed. I thought that it would be better to give all noble Lords the opportunity to read the report before debating it next week.

I am at pains to suggest that next week will not be the only opportunity to discuss this report, or indeed the whole issue of reform. I am not one of those who wish to leak the contents of the Queen’s Speech, so I will not pre-empt it, but if a Bill on this subject were to be announced there would be plenty of time during the course of the Motion for an humble Address to debate it further. That will be in two weeks’ time. Between now and the Summer Recess, I am sure that there will be other opportunities if that is required. All that is to say that Members of the House do not need to rush to put their names down next Monday. The House will not prorogue next Monday. It will sit at the normal time for the normal business to be taken in the normal way.

As for the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, I think that there were 26 members of the Joint Committee.