Ivory Bill

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 24th October 2018 Lords Chamber

The House should be made aware that other countries use 20% as a cut-off. For example, in France, items incorporating less than 20% ivory do not need to apply for a sales certificate. Those with more than 20% need government confirmation that they were created before 1947. New York state also employs a cut-off of 20%. The amendment proposed by my noble friend Lord Cormack would change the Clause 7 threshold from 10% to 20% and thus bring consistency to the new law, rendering it fairer and simpler to understand and apply, without in any way fuelling ivory markets in the Far East.

[Lord Inglewood (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I shall speak to my Amendments 24, 32 and 36. Before so doing, I reiterate my declarations of interest in the register from Committee stage. In particular, I am president of the British Art Market Federation. I also own a number of ivory objects, as defined in the Bill. At least as relevant as that, I begin by saying that I like and am interested in old things. I had the privilege to chair for 10 years the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art. I am proud that I was appointed by the party opposite and reappointed by the party on this side of the House.

The purpose of my three amendments, which are linked, is simply to remove the requirement for registration of those items containing a de minimis amount of ivory, as described in Clause 7, prior to any possible sale. My arguments seem, in general terms, rather aligned with those of the noble Baroness, Lady Quin, and those concerned about musical instruments. The fundamental point is that my amendments entail no change to the substantive law being proposed, nor to the fundamental structure of the scheme around which the Bill is made.

We all know, as others have said, that we all support the underlying purpose of the Bill, which is to stop elephants being slaughtered for their tusks. The means that have been deployed to bring that about is to stamp on and out the trade in ivory that endangers elephants, graphically and appropriately known as bloody tusks.

The point behind my amendment is simple. The category of items I am looking at has no impact on the trade in ivory to the Far East that is endangering elephants. This point is recognised on all sides. The Government have spelled that out in the Bill’s Explanatory Notes. The conservation movement has specifically said the same, for example in the World Wildlife Fund’s briefing on the Bill. TRAFFIC, probably the most respected collector and interpreter of data about the ivory trade, as reported in the Art Newspaper, agrees. The art world—I draw your Lordships’ attention to a couple of articles by that respected authority Anna Somers Cocks in the Art Newspaper over the summer—is absolutely clear that these items in no way have anything to do with the demand in the east for ivory. Rather, we are talking about—as has been mentioned—inlays, shards and veneers: thin slivers of ivory, not the kind of thing that the noble Lord, Lord Hague, saw at a London airport. The Far Eastern market likes chunks and lumps of ivory that can be carved. The kind of things that I am concerned about cannot be, because they are physically no longer capable of being dealt with in that way.

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[Viscount Hailsham (Con)]

If that happens, there is a real risk that the artefact in question will be destroyed.

[Lord Inglewood]

It is as the noble Viscount rightly says. But some will then say, as mentioned in Committee, that it is not necessary: “Selling it doesn’t matter—give it away to a charity shop”. What is a charity shop to do with it? It will want to sell it to somebody else, so it will be caught by the requirements for prior legislation. The only way that I can see this chain of argument evolving is that we may end up with refugees from other parts of the world surrounded by battered Georgian furniture, which seems a pretty surreal destination.

As the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham, said, the likely result of all this is that a significant quantity of all the items—which, let us not forget, have real cultural and historical significance for this country—will end up on the tip. In addition, let us not forget that going to the tip along with the ivory will be a lot of tropical hardwoods such as mahogany, rosewood and so on. For a country that cares about these things and tells the world how much they matter, as we do, to legislate and consign them to the tip in Britain seems ludicrous, and a sad end to the ivory and mahogany involved. If I might misquote John Betjeman:

“Goodbye to old things. We who loved you are sorry

They’ve carted you off by refuseman’s lorry”.

By no stretch of the imagination could these things harm anyone or anything. In a free country one should, as a matter of principle, be able to sell freely items of that character. You should not need a state commissar’s authorisation to do so. From what I have heard, the Government’s case for this registration is illogical, not based on the evidence, completely disproportionate, philistine and a gratuitously destructive proposal. As a consequence, I am strongly opposed to it.

[The Duke of Wellington (Con)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 22 but, before doing so, I should like to support the noble Baroness, Lady Quin. I knew little about Northumbrian pipes until she spoke in Committee but her amendment seems entirely reasonable and I really hope that the Government will support it.

As I did in Committee, I declare an interest in that my family’s collection of works of art includes many items containing ivory but, as I also said in Committee, this is really a non-interest as I have no interest whatever in selling any of those items. However, the main point of the Bill, which I think we all support, is to try to protect elephants. I therefore completely support it and am very persuaded by what the noble Lord, Lord Hague, said in respect of Amendment 1. I agree with him that to exclude exports from the Bill would undermine some of its objectives and am very pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, withdrew that amendment.

However, I say to the Government that some of the restrictions on the exemptions are too restrictive. Amendment 22, which I am speaking to, has great substance and we should support it. After all, the Government have accepted the principle that portrait miniatures should be exempt. As we all know, they are painted on a tiny sliver of ivory. In no way does the value of a portrait miniature consist of its ivory content; it is in the quality of the painting or the identity of the sitter. Therefore, one really cannot pretend that it is a significant factor that so many portrait miniatures are painted on ivory.

The Government, therefore, have rightly accepted this principle. However, it is so surprising that they then restrict this to miniatures with an area of 320 square centimetres. I think I remember the noble Lord, Lord Gardiner, in replying in Committee, saying that this restriction would capture 90% to 95% of miniatures. I have to say to the Government that if you accept the principle of exempting miniatures but wish to capture only 90% to 95%, why not exempt all portrait miniatures? That seems logical and I cannot imagine that it creates a loophole that would give any concern to all of us who support this Bill.

That is really the main thrust of what I wanted to say. I really hope the Government will think again on the matter. I am minded to support a number of other amendments about percentage of content and other matters, which seem to make the Bill a little more flexible. It will be easier to establish that an object is exempt if we do not define the percentage of ivory content too narrowly. Therefore, I hope some of these other amendments will be put to the vote.

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Moved by

[Lord Inglewood]

24: Clause 7, page 5, line 15, leave out paragraph (d)
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment removes registration as a precondition of allowed sales of de minimis objects containing ivory.

[Lord Inglewood]

I am very grateful to the Minister for the way in which he responded to my earlier concerns in our previous debate. I found myself almost seduced by his silver tongue. I found myself wondering whether perhaps he was right, but all along there was a niggling doubt in the back of my mind. As I said in my remarks, the scheme which is being adopted globally to deal with ivory poaching is basically the same right around the globe. The interesting thing about that is that there is nowhere else on earth where there is a registration scheme associated with de minimis exemptions. It is also interesting that in the consultation that was held prior to the Bill, there was no mention of registration. It was a matter that came into the frame—if I may put it that way—right at the last minute. That makes me wonder.

My amendment does not change the substantive law, nor does it change the scheme that this Bill is intended to put into effect. If this amendment were to be passed, two things would follow. The first one is that the very real concern of my noble friend Lord Hague—that somehow we would be outside the scope and general thrust of the international efforts to deal with ivory poaching—could not be the case. We would merely be doing what other people are doing. Equally, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, made the important point that we do not want to be out of synch with other people. Indeed, you could make quite a strong case for saying that, on the basis of the facts, by including my amendment, we would actually be more aligned with other countries around the world rather than less so. I find it odd that we are being told that the right way to tackle this is rather different from the way that the rest of the world does so. It should be a matter for your Lordships to decide whether we want to be a bit different from everybody else or whether we follow the international pattern. Against that background, I would like to test the opinion of the House on this important matter.