Europe, Human Rights and Keeping People Safe at Home and Abroad

Crispin Blunt Excerpts

Tuesday 24th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Hilary Benn]

I look forward to the contribution of voters in Scotland to ensuring that we remain in the European Union. I think it would be nice to see a more vigorous campaign from the SNP in support of a remain vote, but that is in the hands of those who sit on the SNP Benches.

The first of the facts is the fact of our membership of the European Union, and what it has brought. It has brought jobs, growth and investment. It has brought rights for workers and consumers that are guaranteed from John O’Groats to the tip of the Peloponnese, and from Lisbon to Riga. It has brought paid holidays, improved maternity and paternity leave, limits on working times, and a fairer deal for agency and temporary workers: all those are protected by the EU. It has brought environmental protection and progress, from cleaner air to cleaner beaches, and from better safeguarding of our most precious habitats to tackling dangerous climate change. Europe has acted together to make a difference. As the Foreign Secretary said, we have access to the largest single market in the world, to which we sell 44% of our exports, and indeed, through our membership, we have trade deals with 53 other countries’ markets. That shows how Europe’s collective negotiating strength achieves stronger trade with the rest of the world than we could hope to achieve alone.

When it comes to domestic security, whether we face the threat of terrorism or organised crime, we are made safer by working with our allies, sharing information and bringing criminals to justice through the European arrest warrant. In relation to national security and dealing with climate change, Europe has shown great leadership. The Iran nuclear deal was led by the European Union. As for standing up to Russian aggression in Ukraine, the sanctions to which the Foreign Secretary referred are clearly biting on the Russian economy. I am sure that the whole House will support what he said earlier about the renewal of those sanctions in July, until such time as the Minsk agreement is fully observed by Russia.

As well as thanking our diplomats, we should thank the police, the security services and our armed forces for their commitment and for the sacrifices that they have made in order to keep us safe. It is important that, in the legislation promised in the Gracious Speech, we update the law on investigatory powers to enable them to go on doing that effectively; but Labour will hold the Government to account to ensure that, by means of strong safeguards, the right balance is struck between security and privacy.

All this shows that the European Union gives us influence in the world, and a louder voice. It is the very opposite of the picture painted by the leave campaign of “poor old Britain”, put upon and unable to cope. For those who remember the ad, “The Seven Stone Weakling” is having sand kicked in its face by the other member states. What nonsense! What a lack of faith in our abilities as a nation! The truth is that we are a strong and influential member state. That is certainly how other EU member states see us, and it is time that the leave campaign stopped trying to sell us short.

[Crispin Blunt (Reigate) (Con)]

rose—

[Hilary Benn]

I will give way to the Chairman of the Select Committee.

[Crispin Blunt]

I thought that the right hon. Gentleman was making an excellent case in the first part of his speech, but he is now entering a different territory in which he is putting up Aunt Sallies to be attacked. Two internationalisms are competing here, one that takes a global view of the world, and one that is within the European Union. Those are both perfectly respectable views, and they are based on internationalism. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will continue to make a positive case for his side of the argument, rather than putting up Aunt Sallies which are not actually true.

[Hilary Benn]

I hope the hon. Gentleman will acknowledge that I am making a positive case. However, I can see that the charge that I just levelled at the leave campaigners has wounded precisely because that is what they argue: that somehow Britain cannot cope with being in the European Union—that we cannot manage the place that we have in the institution.

I also say to the hon. Gentleman that it is a fallacy to suggest that somehow, in this referendum, we are faced with a choice between the one and the other. We hear that in the debate about trade. People say that we should be trading with other parts of the world, but our trade with China has doubled since 2010. Have we been prevented from increasing our trade with China because we are part of the European Union? Of course we have not. We can do both. Indeed, Britain’s tradition suggests that not only are we capable of doing both, but we will benefit from doing both.

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[Mr Clarke]

No, I will not.

I do not think we will deliver much in this area unless we tackle one other problem, which is the enormous number of people we incarcerate. In large part, that is a response to the populist demands that have led to our toughening up sentencing for the past two decades. We now have 86,000 prisoners, which is about double the figure of 20 years ago when I was Home Secretary. As Justice Secretary, I signed up to quite substantial reductions in public spending in my Department on the basis that we would reduce the number of prisoners to something like the level that we ought to have in our jails. I was not able to deliver that and after I left, the number started drifting up again. That has the effect that we do not have the money to deliver programmes in areas such as education, which I have mentioned.

[Crispin Blunt]

Will my right hon. and learned Friend give way?

[Mr Clarke]

No, I will not give way; sorry.

Between 2012-13 and 2014-15, there was an 85% fall in the number of prisoners taking A-level-standard qualifications and a 42% drop in those going for Open University qualifications. When we lower the number of prisoners, we will be able to finance what we wish to do. In my opinion, proper rehabilitation programmes cannot be delivered in overcrowded slums.

If I went through all the other topics in the Bill that I would like to support, I would start to exclude other Members from the debate, which, as I have said, I am anxious not to do and which I promise you, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will not do. However, may I briefly welcome the criminal finances Bill?

On the fight against crime—I think my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is replying to the debate—we in this country are very bad at dealing with white-collar crime, and there is growing awareness of that. If someone wishes to rob a bank, they go to the LIBOR market; they do not put on a balaclava and pick up a shotgun—that is much less profitable. At last we are starting to do something about that, and I hope I can be reassured that the Bill will tackle not just tax evasion, which is quite rightly high on the public agenda, but money laundering. London is still the money-laundering capital of the world. For an African despot or a serious international criminal, London is the best place to put their money, because they can trust the bankers to look after it and not to steal it from them. I welcome the fact that we are going to improve the reporting of suspicious activities. I hope we will also impose a duty on those at the head of the institutions involved to ensure that they take positive steps to stop those working for them encouraging such activities.

I will continue to follow progress on the Investigatory Powers Bill. We have to get the balance right between the powers our agencies must have in order to deal with the threat of terrorism and crime, and the privacy that we retain in our society to defend the freedoms we want.

I particularly welcome the fact that there was no mention whatever in the Queen’s Speech of repealing the Human Rights Act or any legislation on human rights. I hope that means we are proceeding on this front with very considerable caution. I looked at the speech by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary in which she was reported to have said things on the subject of the European convention on human rights. Actually, what she said was rather ambiguous; it was not a change of Government policy. I hope I am correctly reassured that there is not the slightest question of our giving up the convention or trying to weaken the jurisdiction in Strasbourg.

I wait to hear a good reason for getting rid of the Human Rights Act and for stopping British judges applying the principles of the convention. When we are taken to Strasbourg, which is where people will go again if we get rid of the Human Rights Act, we lose only 2% of cases. I do not get frightfully worried about air hostesses being allowed to wear crucifixes with their uniform, which is the kind of case we actually lose. As someone has rightly pointed out, the Council of Europe has systems, so we are not in fact being forced to give prisoners voting rights.

Our reputation for human rights will be damaged if we are seen to retreat from where we are. The Court in Strasbourg and the convention are the best levers we have to make sure that liberal values are defended in Russia, Azerbaijan, Ukraine, Georgia and other countries, which do abide by the judgments in Strasbourg—and they get defeated many more times there than we do. I therefore trust that very considerable thought is being given to this subject. I am not aware of any harm being done at the moment.

Of course I believe in the supremacy of Parliament, but even Parliament must pass legislation consistent with the high standards of human rights that we have always had. I see no harm whatever in British judges, or judges in Strasbourg, being allowed occasionally to challenge the way in which our legislation is interpreted by officials in the Home Office or elsewhere, and even occasionally by Ministers, when that interpretation really ought to be reconsidered.

Subject to that, and assuming we are all putting human rights in our foreign policy, as the Foreign Secretary eloquently said we are, for which he has my full approval, I think we will see, once the slight madness of this referendum is over—I am of the generation who do not think that referendums are the best way of determining this country’s foreign policy or the basis of its trade and economic prosperity in tomorrow’s world—that this is not the programme of a Government who have been driven off their agenda, but the very solid reforming programme of a Government who have the best interests of the country in mind. We should be able to achieve some very real social advances if we implement it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Crispin Blunt (Reigate) (Con)]

I shall try to proceed with Twitter-like brevity in this Twitter age, Mr Deputy Speaker.

I want to reinforce the points made by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke) on prisons, although I gently remind him that, given the position we inherited, there would now be 96,000 people in prison had we not done anything. That the number has stabilised at 85,000 is a signal achievement, therefore, even if it is disappointing that it has not gone down.

On the European convention on human rights, I entirely endorse the sentiments expressed in the speeches of the right hon. and learned Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman) and my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve). I do so having just returned from Russia with the Foreign Affairs Committee.

While pausing to put on record my thanks to Laurie Bristow, our ambassador, and his team in Russia for the programme they put on for us, I should say that part of it included meeting human rights activists in Russia. The convention is often the only resort they have as they go through the Russian courts. The Russian legal system is presided over by a Duma passing laws that are going in an illiberal direction, but there is at least a contested space of some kind. It is possible to get some protection, and overseeing that is the protection provided by the convention itself. We had some good briefings while we were in Russia, and the message came back clearly to us that this House should think about Russian human rights activists when we are considering British support for the European convention. Issues such as whether a few prisoners should have the right to vote stand pretty small in comparison with the quality of the work being done there and the courage behind it.

When it comes to reflecting on our overall relations with Russia, it is the case that they are absolutely in the deep freeze right now. Our bilateral relations are in an extremely poor place. I am struck by the fact that both the Russian mission here in London and our mission in Moscow are largely obstructed by tit-for-tat measures that prevent them from carrying out their duties effectively. Both missions are reduced to that situation, with both complaining about the measures imposed on them.

In our meeting with a Russian official in the Russian Foreign Office who oversees British affairs, I suggested that it might be an idea to start relaxing some of the measures on British representation in Moscow to begin to try to get out of this downward spiral. Let us see if some micro-measures can be made to make the work of British diplomats easier and start this process off.

What has gone wrong, of course, is the strategic relationship fall-out at the end of the cold war. Probably rightly, the west decided to secure the position of central and eastern European people, but the price was the failure subsequently to get an effective strategic relationship with Russia. That is now being made infinitely more difficult by Russia’s departure from the international rules of the road.

There is an issue about whether we are going to try to help the Russians out of the cul-de-sac that they have got themselves into. Even if it is initially at the level of cultural exchanges and students coming over here and so forth, we should invest in this relationship in any way we can. It is a very important relationship; Russia is a very important country. That is why it becomes even more critical when a country of that size is under the leadership that it is—a leadership that underneath it all has a deep lack of self-confidence, even though tactically it might feel strong.

Finally, on the European Union debate, I thought the first part of the shadow Foreign Secretary’s speech was terrific, but then he set up the Aunt Sallies about the opposition case. There are two internationalisms competing here, and there are very good arguments to show why geopolitically the United Kingdom has a choice here. I believe we need positive arguments on both sides. I cannot go into those arguments because of the time limit, but I urge all colleagues to be positive in how they present their case on this issue.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Let me say that Chris Elmore’s will be a maiden speech. I call Chris Elmore.