Oral Answers to Questions
Gregory Campbell Excerpts(4 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
James Duddridge
My hon. Friend demonstrates his excellence in this area and makes the very valid point that it is about not just bilateral activity, but multilateral activity and the leadership role we have, particularly now as the chair of the Commonwealth and in handing over the baton in Kigali to the Rwandans. We will continue to raise these issues, which we do not see in isolation. These are thematic issues that we raise consistently, both bilaterally and multilaterally.
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)
During the recent discussions, did the Nigerian authorities hold out any hope or prospect that Christian groups and other faith-based groups can look forward to the immediate prospect of a cessation of violence, and some safety and security for the future?
James Duddridge
All parties are looking for a greater degree of safety and security, particularly in the north-east. It is a complicated situation that does keep coming back. As one suppresses some problems, others come out. We are working very closely with our Nigerian and international partners in the north-east and across the whole of Nigeria. Nigeria is one of our biggest partners on these and a number of other issues. I will raise them with our high commissioner again. I met our high commissioner last week and will continue to work on these issues, and I look forward to going back to Nigeria to visit friends and colleagues.
Climate Justice
Gregory Campbell Excerpts(4 years, 2 months ago)
Westminster HallRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Zarah Sultana (Coventry South) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship, Sir Charles. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham East (Nadia Whittome) on securing this debate.
My generation grew up to the sound of climate warnings. Before I was even born, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change had said that human activity was to blame for a planet that was quickly getting hotter, and every few years since, it has warned that we are on course to do “irreversible damage” to ecosystems and species. Two years ago, it said that preventing climate catastrophe would require,
“rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society”.
Since its first meeting more than three decades ago, CO2 emissions have risen by more than 40%. They continue to rise, and the powerful continue to ignore the warnings.
The effects are with us now. This winter, Australia burned and Indonesia drowned. Twenty-nine people died in the fires and 66 people drowned in the floods. Across the world, we see it again and again. The Solomon Islands are disappearing beneath the Pacific, forcing people to flee. Mozambique was battered by two of the worst storms in the continent’s history last year, which claimed the lives of more than 1,300 people. The Amazon rainforest—the lungs of our planet—was set alight by warmer, drier weather and reckless profiteers. Here in Britain, floods are hitting us harder and more often. Climate breakdown is with us already, but still the powerful ignore the warnings.
Zarah Sultana
I apologise to the hon. Member—because of the time limit, I must progress.
There was a time when many denied the science, but today there is a different kind of denialism. They do not deny the science—they deny the politics. They pretend that business as usual can combat the climate emergency, and that banning plastic straws, using bags for life or tweaking the system is enough. I am sorry—it is not, because the problems are not individual. They are collective. It is the same politicians who tell us to ban plastic straws who have left MPs’ pensions invested in deadly fossil fuels, so hon. Members will understand why we do not have high hopes for COP26 later this year and why we expect more platitudes and more hypocrisy. I ask hon. Members to take a lead from the students who have forced their universities to divest, and to divest now.
To prevent the climate emergency from becoming a climate catastrophe, we have to face up to what is driving the crisis. The answer is clear. It is a capitalist crisis, driven by capitalism’s need for expansion and exploitation. It is not the fault of a few bad apples; the entire system is rotten. It is a system that rose with the coal mines and steam mills that powered Britain to global dominance, and trashed the world’s climate to win wealth for colonial powers. Today, the global south still pays the price. If the climate crisis is a capitalist crisis, it is a neocolonial crisis too. Those least to blame—the global south and the global working class—will be hardest hit. While the world burns, the rich will build higher walls to protect themselves. They will let climate refugees drown and the dispossessed starve.
That is one future, but there is another. If we unite people across borders, and recognise that in this fight our enemy travels by private jet and not migrant dinghy, we can have a global green new deal, and it will look like this: dismantling the fossil fuel industry; taking resources away from a handful of private profiteers, and using them to plan a better future; insulating our homes and designing new green industries; building free public transport and creating millions of good, unionised jobs. That is how we unite black and white, north and south, migrants and those born here, people in Britain and people overseas. We all have an interest in survival. That is how we can build a world that is truly our own, with opportunities for all.
Plenty of people will call me naive, but the real naivety is to pretend we have another choice. My generation grew up watching global leaders bail out banks but ignore the warnings of a planet on fire. To stop that, we must finally make good on the promise of an old socialist hymn. With a global green new deal, we will
“bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old”.
Oral Answers to Questions
Gregory Campbell Excerpts(4 years, 2 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Dominic Raab
As with all strong partnerships within NATO, if we have issues we raise them candidly and clearly, and the relationship has the depth and the maturity to enable us to do so. We have expressed our disappointment, for example, that Turkey chose to acquire Russian S-400 air defence systems. None the less, Turkey remains a valued NATO ally, on the frontline of some of our most difficult security challenges, and I raised with the Turkish Foreign Minister on 5 January the positives and our concerns.
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)
The Minister rightly speaks of the success of NATO as an international peacekeeping force. Does he agree that part of the problem is that it does not get the international recognition for being that successful alliance? What more can we do to ensure that that is the case?
Dominic Raab
The hon. Gentleman is right: a lot of the solid, steady work that NATO is doing, and the work in bringing our allies together, goes unnoticed, as is often the case in security. The most important thing the UK can do is continue to lead by example. We contribute to every NATO mission. This includes: leading the enhanced forward presence battle group in Estonia; contributing to the US battle group in Poland; and working with our NATO allies on operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, and we will continue to do all those things.