Trade Bill

Earl of Caithness Excerpts

Report stage & Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 15th December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Curry of Kirkharle (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I will be brief. I shall speak to Amendment 14 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Oates. It is a privilege to follow the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, whose knowledge and experience is so impressive on these matters.

The issue of climate change is dominating our lives. It is already, quite rightly, impacting on the way we live, and will do so increasingly. The Government have set ambitious targets, as has already been mentioned, to reduce carbon emissions by banning the sale of new petrol and diesel vehicles by 2030 and to achieve net zero emissions nationally by 2050. In the farming sector, the NFU has set a net zero target by 2040. These are challenging targets, but it is my impression that the farming sector, businesses generally and the wider public are now willing to try to rise to the challenge and find solutions in order to adapt and thus reduce our carbon footprint.

It would be bizarre indeed if, having committed to meet these targets, we completely ignored the carbon impact of imported products. Meeting the climate change targets will not be achieved without significant investment and added costs on the part of businesses and disruption to our lives generally. It would be inconsistent to place domestic industries in an uncompetitive position by importing products that are not subject to the same ambitions. Not only could that negate progress, it could lead to the undermining of innovation and investment, which would be to the detriment of the UK economy.

If we do not accept this principle, the Government risk being accused of delivering conflicting messages: a commitment to the climate change agenda and taking a leading role in COP 26 on the one hand and being willing to undermine the progress of our domestic industries by allowing the import of products that are not produced to the same ambitious standards on the other. I hope that the Minister will consider this important amendment.

[The Earl of Caithness (Con)]

My Lords, I support these two amendments. There is an overlap between them and the next ones tabled in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Purvis of Tweed. As my noble friend on the Front Bench will remember, I highlighted the environment as one of the key areas in which ISDS could cause problems for the United Kingdom. I will say a little more about that in the debate on the next amendment.

Suffice to say on this amendment that we must realise that the trade deals we are making now will have a huge impact on each and every one of us. They are much more complicated than they were in the past. Some 80% of our fruit comes from Europe, along with 50% of our vegetables. If we do not have a sensible trade agreement with Europe which takes that into account, it will cause increased problems for the Prime Minister’s campaign against obesity and the problems that the poorest in our country are already suffering with malnutrition and poor-quality food. It is well known that obesity rates increased in both Canada and Mexico after signing free trade agreements with the United States of America because the nutritional quality of food was lower than before. These free trade agreements are going to impact on us in all sorts of ways.

I am reminded that when we discussed this Bill on the first day of Report, my noble friend Lord Grimstone said that public health considerations would be excluded by the Trade and Agriculture Commission, although reports about them would be taken into account. Perhaps I may therefore press my noble friend: who or which institution is going to provide those reports on public health? We do not know. Public Health England is about to die a death. Which organisation will produce those reports? That is important. The reason I raise this is because the words “human” or “public” health are included in the proposed new clause in subsection (3)(b) of Amendment 21.

The other important area when it comes to health is the traffic light system that we put on packages to notify people about the nutritional quality of food. We all know that the United States of America hates the idea of a traffic light system and thoroughly disagrees with it. However, if we are trying to improve the quality of the food that we eat and get rid of some of the dependency that we have on processed foodstuffs, the traffic light system, which is currently the subject of further discussion, will play a hugely important part in that. This was part of the discussion and recommendations made by the Food, Poverty, Health and Environment Committee, whose report we have yet to debate. However, if we do not get things like this right, we will pay a huge price, and it is for that reason that I support these amendments.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, first, I thank the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, for supporting what I said on the earlier amendment. It encourages me greatly, because the campaign for our rejoining the European Union is gaining momentum day by day.

Returning to this amendment, like the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, I am also a member of Peers for the Planet, an excellent organisation, involving Peers from all parties, for raising awareness about the dangers of climate change. Indeed, it was the noble Baroness who recruited me to that organisation, and I agree with absolutely every word that she said and have very little to add.

Just to underline what the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, said, I add just one thing, in relation to the United States of America. It will now be much easier to have a trade deal with the United States that incorporates these requirements. The election of President-elect Biden—and we can all, I hope, rejoice in the fact that he has now been confirmed as the President-elect—is a great step forward in that regard. He has pledged that one of his first actions in office will be to rejoin the Paris climate change agreement, and the United States could therefore formally be a member of that agreement before the beginning of March 2021. His transition website suggests an aspiration for net zero by 2050, which is a great improvement even on what President Obama agreed. President-elect Biden has named former Secretary of State John Kerry as his special envoy for climate change, with a seat on the National Security Council. That is very important, because it underlines the fact that climate change is also a national security issue.

I look forward to being around, if not in, Glasgow next November and welcoming to Scotland and the United Kingdom delegates from all countries from around the world in the COP 26. I say “welcome to Scotland”—I know that the Minister will agree with me wholeheartedly on that. We hope, expect and believe that it will remain part of the United Kingdom for many years to come.

--- Later in debate ---

Briefly—because I think this may be slightly academic so I will not take too much of the House’s time—I suggest that a multilateral investment tribunal and appellate mechanism, as suggested by Amendment 15, is essentially an ISDS wolf in sheep’s clothing. It is arguably a little more transparent and slightly less slanted in favour of the multinational interests, but it is still not what we need; we need to be able to rely on the courts and on democratic Governments.

[The Earl of Caithness (Con)]

My Lords, my memory goes back to Committee and the powerful speech of the noble Lord, Lord Hendy, who set out the arguments against ISDS extremely well. There was a lot of powerful argument there. But I am also grateful for the intervention of my noble friend Lord Lansley, who always manages to sow those little seeds of doubt as to whether we are going in the right direction. Notwithstanding those seeds of doubt, I believe we are going in the right direction with these amendments, on the simple basis that ISDS permits any investor in this country to sue the UK Government for anything that might harm their profits in any way.

Therefore, I have one particular question on this matter for my noble friend Lord Grimstone. I believe I am right in saying that, since 1986, we have had an ISDS agreement with China. If that is the case, are the UK Government not widely exposed on the Huawei case? In relation to banning Huawei from operating in this country, there is no clause within the agreement, as I understand it, that says that we can ban a company from operating for national security purposes—so is not the UK hopelessly exposed? As a result of that, should not all our bilateral agreements be rethought, as suggested by my noble friend Lord, Lansley, because there is this loophole?

My second question to my noble friend concerns the Government’s eagerness to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership. As my noble friend will be aware, New Zealand is seeking an exemption from the ISDS. In our negotiations to join this organisation, will we also seek an exemption from ISDS, and if not, why not? If New Zealand has set a precedent, it would be only logical for us to follow because that must be the right way forward.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, it is a pleasure briefly to follow those who have already spoken on this group, and I support Amendment 19 in particular. I am no expert in international trade law, but I rest assured that my noble friend Lord Hendy will speak very shortly.

Briefly, my concerns about ISDS are that the mechanism overrides the supremacy of Parliament—including your Lordships’ House and the other place—overrides the domestic rule of law, discriminates on grounds of nationality in favour of foreign investment corporations and prioritises the profits of investor corporations over people and the planet, as we heard from the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle. Therefore, I see the mechanism as a fundamental challenge to the rule of law, both domestically and internationally, and not what taking back control is about in the minds of most people in the United Kingdom and further afield, I suggest.

My one question to the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, who spoke so clearly about her own concerns, is: will the multilateral tribunal that she anticipates really be capable of addressing those fundamental concerns about prioritising corporations over the wider public interest—climate catastrophe, human rights and so on? Will it be capable of designing something that is not the wolf in sheep’s clothing that the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, described? With those concerns firmly on the table, I support Amendment 19.