Turkey

Debate between Cheryl Gillan and Joan Ryan

Thursday 7th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Joan Ryan (Enfield North) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered early elections, human rights and the political situation in Turkey.

I am pleased to have secured this debate, and I thank the hon. Members for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and for Edinburgh East (Tommy Sheppard) for accompanying me to the Backbench Business Committee to make our request.

This is an important opportunity for the House to show our strongest possible support for democracy, human rights and the rule of law in Turkey. Turkey is a key NATO ally, one of our strategic partners in the fight against Daesh and a major trading partner of the UK. In short, our bilateral relationship is vital.

As the representative of vibrant Turkish, Kurdish and Alevi communities in the London Borough of Enfield, I have been contacted by many residents about the current situation in Turkey. They are deeply worried for the safety of their family and friends.

It has been six years since we last had a general debate in this Chamber on issues relating to Turkey. This debate could not have come at a more urgent time. In 17 days, on 24 June, Turkish citizens will head to the polls to vote in presidential and parliamentary elections, more than a year earlier than scheduled. There are major concerns that the elections will be neither free nor fair. The elections will happen under the state of emergency that has been in place since the attempted coup in July 2016. Under these conditions, the freedoms of expression, assembly and association have been severely curtailed, creating a clear and present danger that democracy is being undermined in Turkey.

This debate is a crucial opportunity to raise these concerns and to call on the UK Government to ensure that Turkey upholds its international human rights obligations.

[Dame Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)]

I congratulate the right hon. Lady on securing this timely debate.

I sit on the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, and I will be going on an observer mission to scrutinise the elections in Turkey, which I agree need to be free, fair, transparent and in line with international standards so that people in Turkey can have confidence in the results.

What should the people going to observe the elections in Turkey particularly look out for? What has the right hon. Lady heard about in advance that may make the elections not free or fair?

[Joan Ryan]

A key point is where polling stations are located. There is evidence that polling stations are being moved from areas of towns and from villages that clearly have a population that will not be voting AK party to areas where there is a larger number of AK party supporters, which I consider to be voter suppression.

We could compare that with what happens in this country, because many people in London and other areas are able to vote in these elections. The polling station for London, for instance, is in Kensington, but a very large majority of the Turkish population are in north London and it is extremely difficult for elderly people and people with children to get across London. The community has had to make buses available, but the location of the polling station hugely reduces the turnout when people actually want to vote. That is one point of which we should be very careful. Of course, intimidation is also a serious issue in some areas of Turkey. I am glad the right hon. Lady will be an election monitor, and I have much confidence in her ability.

This debate is a crucial opportunity to raise our concerns and to call on the UK Government to ask Turkey to uphold its obligations. In pursuit of greater economic co-operation, our Government cannot turn a blind eye to the rapidly deteriorating political and human rights situation. Trade between the UK and Turkey is worth more than £15 billion, but our partnership with Turkey must be honest and critical. We must hold President Erdoğan to account and ensure that he adheres to international human rights law.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has said that Turkey’s state of emergency and restrictions on fundamental freedoms do not in any way

“provide for the safe and free environment essential for the holding of a referendum or any other election.”

How did we get to this position? Why did President Erdoğan call these early elections? He is widely expected to win the elections, which follow the highly contentious 2017 Turkish constitutional referendum. The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, which monitored that referendum, found that it

“took place on an unlevel playing field”

where

“fundamental freedoms essential to a genuinely democratic process were curtailed.”

President Erdoğan labelled some of those who opposed the constitutional changes “terrorist sympathisers”, and in numerous cases the OSCE found that the no supporters faced bans on their campaign activities, and police interventions and violence at their events. That is further behaviour that the right hon. Lady, and Dame, no less, could look out for when she is an election monitor.

The constitutional changes backed by President Erdoğan’s AK party were approved by just 51% of the vote, despite all the pressure that was applied. Such opposition to these changes shows that many Turkish citizens are increasingly worried by what they see as his growing authoritarianism. It shows how divided Turkey is over the direction its Government are taking. These constitutional changes will transform Turkey’s parliamentary system of government into a presidential one, with vast executive powers. The elected President will become Head of State, Head of Government, head of the ruling power and head of the army, and the office of Prime Minister will cease to exist. After the elections on 24 June, the President will be able to call a state of emergency without the approval of the Cabinet, to issue decrees that bypass Parliament and to appoint more judges than ever before. Although the new constitution limits a President to two terms in office, it is possible for a President to seek a third term in certain circumstances. That means President Erdoğan could remain in office until 2029. The Centre for American Progress has said:

“When the president’s party holds a parliamentary majority, checks on presidential power would be virtually nonexistent.”

These sweeping powers have serious implications for the independence of the judiciary and the rule of law, and they raise questions about whether the Turkish Government will sustain a genuine democracy. This is a worrying preview of the sort of harassment and intimidation we can expect in the weeks before and after elections on 24 June.

--- Later in debate ---

[Joan Ryan]

I am certainly not surprised to hear that. I expect the situation to get worse because, as we know, the suspension of the commitment to the international human rights obligation does not ever permit the use of torture, yet that is precisely what has happened. In the words of Human Rights Watch, President Erdoğan

“unleashed a purge that goes far beyond holding to account those involved in trying to overthrow”

the Turkish Government. The UN special rapporteur on torture found that

“torture was widespread following the failed coup”.

Non-governmental organisations reported that there 263 incidents of torture in detention in south-east Turkey in the first quarter of 2017 alone. The level of complaints and representations being made is therefore no surprise.

Thousands of Turkish citizens, particularly members of the Kurdish and Alevi communities, have been arrested and persecuted by the very Government they sought to protect. In March 2018, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights found that nearly 160,000 people had been arrested during the state of emergency. Civil servants, police officers, teachers, academics, and members of the military and judiciary have been detained or dismissed from their jobs, often without reason. The speed of the arrests was so alarming that in 2016 the EU Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy, Johannes Hahn, stated:

“It looks at least as if something has been prepared”,

in reference to lists of arrests being prepared before the attempted coup even took place.

On the first anniversary of the attempted coup, President Erdoğan announced that he would approve “without hesitation” the death penalty if the Turkish Parliament voted to restore it. If that happened, we would have no choice but to draw a line in the sand, and such authoritarianism would in effect end Turkey’s bid to join the EU. What a backward step that would be.

[Dame Cheryl Gillan]

Does the right hon. Lady also appreciate that if Turkey re-imposed the death penalty, that would put its Council of Europe membership in total jeopardy?

[Joan Ryan]

I thank the right hon. Lady for that contribution. It is at least reassuring that there will be some reaction to these measures, but we need from our own Front Benchers a reaction that is a little stronger than anything we have seen so far, because it has been very disappointing.

Throughout Turkish society, freedom of speech and expression has come under sustained attack. Amnesty International reports that more than 1,300 NGOs—including groups that assist displaced children and that support survivors of sexual assault—have been shut down for unspecified links to terrorist organisations. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights has said that the Turkish Government’s emergency powers are being used to

“stifle any form of criticism or dissent vis-à-vis the Government.”

According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, Turkey is now the biggest jailer of journalists in the world, and more than 300 journalists have been arrested since the attempted coup. The Council of Europe’s Venice Commission has described the closure of more than 180 media outlets as the “mass liquidation” of television and radio stations, newspapers and publishers. In the words of Reporters Without Borders, the stark truth about the current situation is that President Erdoğan

“now has complete control of the media in the run-up to general elections in 2019. Amid an unprecedented crackdown on civil society and the political opposition, only a handful of low-circulation newspapers still offer an alternative to the government’s propaganda.”

It is a stranglehold.

The crackdown on the media has taken place alongside a severe crackdown on Opposition parties. In December 2017, all 60 Members from the main Opposition party, the Republican People’s Party—the CHP—were put under investigation for

“defaming and insulting the presidential post, the Turkish nation, state and its institutions”.

Both CHP leaders—Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu and CHP presidential candidate Muharrem İnce—have issued statements to say that they believe that their phones have been illegally wiretapped by Erdoğan’s supporters.

As of 13 June, at least 136 officials from the pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic party—the HDP—had been detained and 14 arrested. HDP leader Selahattin Demirtaş, who is running for President, has been imprisoned since November 2016. The HDP has also reported, as I have said, that polling stations are being moved from villages where the party has strong support to neighbouring villages where the AK party has strong support.

This crackdown has affected all areas of civil society, but the Kurdish and Alevi communities in particular have suffered targeted and sustained harassment. They are deeply worried that their communities may be intimidated during and after the election period. In my capacity as chair of the all-party group for Alevis, I have received numerous reports that Kurdish and Alevi neighbourhoods have been harassed by the Turkish Government and supporters of President Erdoğan’s AK party. That intensified following Turkey’s assault on the predominantly Kurdish region of Afrin in Syria earlier this year, when hundreds of people were detained for voicing criticism of the military operation on social media. Such flagrant restrictions on freedom of expression served only to weaken Turkish democracy and civil society. There can be no justification for the oppression of communities on the basis of their religious or cultural identity. The Kurdish and Alevi communities that have made the UK their home are looking to us as Members of Parliament to speak out against these abuses.

I was extremely disappointed to see the Prime Minister welcome President Erdoğan to the UK with open arms just three weeks ago. Aside from Bosnia, we are the only European country to have hosted President Erdoğan during the election period. Germany, the Netherlands and Austria all banned him from holding political rallies in their territories. I have no doubt that President Erdoğan’s photographs with the Prime Minister and with Her Majesty the Queen will be used for his own election propaganda. My constituents, many of whom make up the 80% of British Turks who voted against last year’s constitutional referendum, expected the Prime Minister robustly to address Turkey’s growing authoritarianism in her joint press conference with the President. Instead, concerns about human rights and the political situation were alluded to only at the very end of the statement, after details of the UK and Turkey’s growing trade relationship had been announced at some great length.

The Kurdish constituents to whom I have spoken were also deeply shocked and insulted to read that the only reference the Prime Minister made to the Kurdish people was in relation to the “extraordinary pressures” Turkey was facing from Kurdish terrorism. That is an inflammatory remark and it could be interpreted that the Prime Minister views all Kurds as terrorists.

Budget Resolutions

Debate between Cheryl Gillan and Joan Ryan

Wednesday 22nd November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Joan Ryan (Enfield North) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond), although I am not sure whether we will find a great deal to agree on. In the run-up to this Budget and during the Chancellor’s speech today, we heard a lot about building a Britain “fit for the future”, but many of my constituents do not share the Chancellor’s confidence that the Government’s proposals will achieve that vision.

I have been in Enfield for more than 20 years, and I have always considered it to be a fantastic place to live and great place to raise a family. However, for too many residents of Enfield North, especially hard-working and hard-pressed families, the past seven years of Tory austerity have led to more insecurity, poorer public services and, in some cases, abject poverty. Child poverty has risen to its highest level since 2010, as I mentioned at Prime Minister’s questions when I pointed out that the IFS and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation predict that an additional 1.2 million children will be pushed into poverty by 2021 on top of the 4 million in 2015-16. That is not a proud record; it is a scandal and a moral issue facing this country and this Government. Enfield is the worst-affected borough in London, with almost one third of children living in poverty. The Chancellor was emphatic that that was being dealt with, but let me tell the House what Alison Garnham, the chief executive of the Child Poverty Action Group, said about today’s Budget that:

“this should have been the Budget that ushered in much needed structural reform of Universal Credit to revive the central promise to strengthen the rewards from work and that didn’t happen. Our new analysis finds while effective tax rates may have improved for some families, big falls in family income caused by cuts and changes to Universal Credit have left many worse off overall, overwhelming any gains from increases in the ‘national living wage’, personal tax allowances and help for childcare. Families on universal credit who want to get better off through earnings gained little from today’s Budget.”

I am more inclined to accept what the chief executive of the Child Poverty Action Group has to say than the Chancellor’s empty words.

[Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)]

The right hon. Lady makes an interesting point. I do not know whether she has had an opportunity to study “Impact on households: distributional analysis to accompany Autumn Budget 2017”, but its analysis shows that

“since 2010, households across all income deciles have seen growth in their disposable incomes, on average”.

That is good news, and I am sure that she would want to welcome it.

[Joan Ryan]

If the right hon. Lady sat in my advice surgery and listened to what was said by families in Enfield, where over a third of children live in poverty, she would find that the amount of disposable income that people have is a major problem, and that most families feel that rising costs, particularly due to rent, have wiped out any possible gains.

Almost six in 10 Londoners in poverty live in a working family, so the picture of poverty has changed. Those people are not “scroungers,” as they are sometimes referred to; they are working people who are trying to get on in life. A third of all jobs in Enfield are classed as low paid and are below the London living wage, as recent research by the Trust for London has shown. The Government’s failure to address these issues has meant that many families are unable to just about manage today, let alone build for tomorrow.

Enfield now ranks as the London borough with the fourth highest food bank usage. Last year, 5,974 three-day emergency food supplies were provided to people in Enfield, with 2,434 given to children. The roll-out of universal credit in Enfield, which started this month, will make a bad situation even worse. The Trussell Trust has said that demand for emergency food parcels is 30% higher in areas where universal credit is being implemented. Week in, week out, I see many hard-working families at my constituency advice surgery who are living on or below the breadline.

I want to say a few words about housing. A great many constituents come to see me about problems that are related in some way to housing, particularly those living in the insecure private rented sector. The threat of falling into rent arrears, and of families being put at risk of eviction and long-term debt due to the roll-out of universal credit, has only added to their concerns. Stagnant wages, fast-rising rents and a crisis in housing supply have created a perfect storm in Enfield, which now has the highest eviction rate in the capital. Homelessness acceptances have risen by a staggering 82% over the past two years. Enfield has the second highest number of temporary accommodation placements in London, which puts even more pressure on an already strained housing market. Again, that is not a record of which the Chancellor can be proud.

Today the Chancellor said, “House prices are increasingly out of reach for many”—yes, they are. He continued: “It takes too long to save for a deposit”—yes, it does, if someone can save at all—“and rents absorb too high a portion of monthly income”. But the OBR report makes it clear that house prices will rise as a result of the measures announced today. When the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) intervened on the right hon. Member for Wokingham (John Redwood) to ask about houses for social rent, the right hon. Gentleman insisted that the Budget statement referred to that. I listened to the Chancellor’s speech and I have read through the printed copy, but I heard and read nothing about that. He did say that the Government would increase supply “including nearly 350,000 affordable homes”, but the question is: affordable for whom? There is nothing about houses at a social rent. I think that is a disgrace, completely ignoring the desperate need.