International Development: Co-operation with the EU

Lord Lea of Crondall Excerpts

Tuesday 11th December 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bates]

One of the things that we can be incredibly proud of relating to the poorest countries in the world is the work done to give tariff-free, quota-free access to UK markets and to the EU for about 100 of the poorest countries in the world. We are committed to replicating that. In fact, we have already done so through the cross-border trade Act, which has already passed through your Lordships’ House.

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Lab)]

My Lords, would the noble Lord agree that if the EU did not exist, this sort of Question would be a very good reason for inventing it? I give the examples of Burundi and Gabon, which each have only about one person competent to deal with a whole number of areas. Would it not be ridiculous if each European country came and told them that the criteria for auditing and testing were to be done 27 different ways? It is vital that this kind of co-ordination continues, preferably by the EU with British participation.

[Lord Bates]

Actually, for the vast majority of interventions of the type the noble Lord mentions we are talking about not EU but UN systems where we seek to have greater harmony. A lot of the things we seek to do with the sustainable development goals are a UN commitment. Our climate change ambitions are driven by a UN framework. There are lots of things that we work together on, but they tend to be more supranational, rather than in large bodies such as the European Union.