United Nations General Assembly 2018: IRC Report

Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone Excerpts

Thursday 6th September 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone (Con)]

My Lords, great appreciation is due to my noble friend Lord Howell for his dedication and expertise. In another place, he served as an enlightened chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee. He continues to add tremendous insight, eloquence and authority as chair of the International Relations Select Committee in this House. We are all in his debt.

I fear I may have tested your Lordships’ patience today, but I need to declare my personal interest in that my grandfather, Maxwell Garnett, was Secretary of the League of Nations Union from 1920 until 1938. It was his life’s work and we were all brought up on the work of the League of Nations Union. He worked extremely closely with the father of the noble Lord, Lord Judd. We used to hear a great deal about “Judd”; we had no idea who he was, but he was a subject of conversation throughout our childhood.

In these troubling and difficult times, I wanted to make a contribution. We see a world assailed almost daily by terrorist attacks—thousands killed, and hundreds of thousands displaced by sustained conflicts in Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq and Yemen. We see insidious nationalism and xenophobia rising up across Europe and elsewhere. Fear and anger manifest themselves in a pervasive backlash against human rights. Our technological triumphs come twinned with malicious and disturbingly opaque aggression, from cybercrime to election-hacking. Liberal democracy is being undermined by persistent backsliding. The Freedom House research institute considers the world to be in its 12th consecutive year of democratic decline. The dangers of climate change carry unprecedented urgency.

The words of Dag Hammarskjöld echo in our ears: “The UN was not created to send mankind to heaven, but to save humanity from hell”. Let us consider the UN Human Rights Council, for example, which rightly attracts controversy over the anti-Israel bias of permanent agenda item 7. The inclusion of countries such as Russia, China, Cuba and Saudi Arabia can be questioned. Their records on political inclusion and civil liberties leave a great deal to be desired but, nevertheless, many regret seeing the United States turn its back on the UNHRC. As recognised by the United Nations Association UK, during its participation in the UNHRC, the United States positively influenced effective steps towards reducing bias against Israel. Its departure may compromise this progress.

The array of threats and challenges makes international co-operation and multilateral action all the more essential. With an “America First” United States shunning the long-held mantle of global leadership, with Britain potentially weakening ties with our European neighbours, and with the world feeling the growing pains of a shift towards a multipolar system, the UN represents a crucial platform for dialogue and co-ordination. Its agencies can create indispensable opportunities to manage change and to tackle the challenges of the world. I was pleased to hear my noble friend describe the work of many of the agencies as absolutely excellent.

Clearly, the UN can benefit from review and criticism. For the UN to continue to flourish, it is essential that criticisms are sought, considered and acted upon. I am delighted that the Assistant Secretary-General for Strategic Coordination is already introducing a number of steps, promising management restructuring, the elimination of duplication, increased structural efficiency, greater transparency and, splendidly, an increase in the number of women in the UN Secretariat and its agencies. Over 50% of the senior management group and the 50 most senior individuals in the UN are now women for the first time in its history—a significant accomplishment.

I particularly applaud our first female ambassador to the UN, Dame Karen Pierce. She is a formidable diplomat, evidently thriving in her role. She uses the UK’s position as a permanent member of the Security Council and as a substantial financial contributor to push for collaboration in tackling the security, stability, development and prosperity challenges of today. I also applaud the Secretary-General’s proactive and explicit commitment to gender equality.

The horrific revelations of peacekeeper misconduct have already been mentioned. It is critical to abolish an intolerable culture of apparent impunity demonstrated by some UN operatives.

I am proud that the UK continues to be placed among the top financial contributors. It contributes more to multilateral institutions than any country other than the US, and our contributions are more than double those of the US in per capita terms. This is an unequivocal demonstration of our commitment to supporting the rules-based international order through which we work in concert with other countries to promote security and liberal values across the world. I have great confidence in our new Foreign Secretary, the right honourable Jeremy Hunt—my successor in my former constituency. I know that he sincerely and deeply holds to the values and importance of the UN and the rules-based international order.

We should take pride also that we were the first major economy to meet the UN’s 0.7% target on foreign aid and expenditure. Just this week, there was a welcome announcement from Alistair Burt, the Minister for the Middle East, in support of the UN Relief and Works Agency to help ensure that vulnerable Palestinians can access vital healthcare and education services. The additional aid will help keep schools open for 500,000 children and provide medical care for 3.5 million refugees.

The legitimacy of the UN is inextricably connected to its effectiveness in preserving peace and resolving conflicts. I fully support the Select Committee in urging the Government to discourage strongly the use of vetoes, especially when such behaviour hinders responsiveness to humanitarian crises. Of course, we have not used the veto at the Security Council since the 1980s, but that is not the case for other members, and we have seen the veto used more commonly over the past 12 months than at any time since the Cold War.

I conclude by echoing the noble Baroness’s comments about former Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who died last month after an extraordinary life of dedication to building a fairer and more peaceful world. Around the turn of the century, Secretary-General Annan said that,

“if the United Nations does not attempt to chart a course for the world’s people in … the new millennium, who will?”