"My Lords, it is time for the formal and ritual congratulations to the noble Baroness, Kidron, not merely on starting the debate but for recognising her enormous energy, concentration and focus on the real issues, which I am glad we are debating now at the end of this term. Of …..." Lord Howell of Guildford - View Speech
"My Lords, Herbert Laming, as Chairman of Committees, was the one who enabled us to set up a foreign affairs Committee; we called it the International Relations Committee. At last, after many struggles and many years, he enabled it to happen. That committee, of course, has been an outstanding success …..." Lord Howell of Guildford - View Speech
"My Lords, commitment is not enough. There is a mood going around the capitals of the world that Ukraine would be in much better shape today if it had kept its nuclear weapons. This has led a number of other countries to say that they want to be in on …..." Lord Howell of Guildford - View Speech
"My Lords, I know that we have signed the global ocean treaty, but have we ratified it yet? Does the Minister think that the Commonwealth, which is increasingly involved in maritime affairs, with 33 island states, has an important role to play and could it make it work still better?..." Lord Howell of Guildford - View Speech
"My Lords, I welcome part of this plan—it obviously has some holes in it, as we have already heard. I also welcome, as I do every time I hear the Minister speak, a great deal of his comments and his profound thinking. However, I wonder today whether the brief he …..." Lord Howell of Guildford - View Speech
"My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, on initiating this debate and bringing out into the open so many issues that we ought to discuss much more than we do. I will fill my seven minutes or less with one observation and one question to the …..." Lord Howell of Guildford - View Speech
"My Lords, might not the Government find it a bit easier to deal with their problems explaining defence spending if they distinguished much more clearly between the overall defence of the nation—where the budget spreads across many departments and takes a variety of new forms that change all the time—and …..." Lord Howell of Guildford - View Speech
"One of the problems is that we do not know where these hundreds of ghost ships are at any one time or where they are going. There is a need to identify that. We should have a better system of international port links, possibly working with the Commonwealth, to achieve …..." Lord Howell of Guildford - View Speech
"My Lords, is it not an idea to offer some rather candid advice to our Israeli friends about the inner nature of Lebanon and the vast distinction between the Hezbollah structure—which is like a poisonous spider, poisoning every aspect of Lebanese affairs, including its politics—and the good people of Lebanon, …..." Lord Howell of Guildford - View Speech
"My Lords, given the completely new structure and formation of the modern battlefield and the way war is being conducted, which is changing very quickly indeed, does the Minister or her colleague, the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, who was answering questions earlier—excellently—on defence and warfare, think that we have the …..." Lord Howell of Guildford - View Speech