International Criminal Court

Lord Lea of Crondall Excerpts

Wednesday 8th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

The noble Baroness raises a very important point. It is the case that countries which are states parties should, indeed, ensure that those who are indicted by them are then arrested. I was able, as I mentioned a moment ago to the noble and learned Lord, to discuss these wide matters with South Africa. The UK and EU partners have conducted demarches in countries which failed to arrest President Bashir. We agree with the noble Baroness that achieving justice for victims should be at the heart of the international community’s response to mass atrocity violence. It is important that fugitives from international justice do not just get away.

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Lab)]

My Lords, the substantive decision of the African Union, as I understand it, was not withdrawal but a call for regionalisation of the ICC. Does the Minister agree that one very important issue that arises about that concerns the consequences of regionalisation and the need to ensure continuation of three principles: first, due process of taking evidence; secondly, penalties meeting an international standard; and thirdly, the ability still to make appeals at a global level?

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, as I mentioned a little while ago, I think there has been a little misreporting or misunderstanding of what was decided at the African Union. However, the noble Lord makes an important point. We welcome initiatives, whether at regional or international level, to support international justice and accountability, so we are willing to listen to all ways that can take us forward. The most appropriate forum for discussion of issues that states may have with the ICC is the Assembly of States Parties, which I have attended in the two years for which I have had the justification, as Minister, for doing so. We make our points very strongly there, both in the forum itself and bilaterally.

Yemen: Breaches of International Humanitarian Law

Lord Lea of Crondall Excerpts

Monday 5th September 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

The noble Lord makes a very acute observation. I would call upon Iran to make best efforts to avoid doing anything to protract the conflict in Yemen. It is important that in both circumstances Saudi Arabia and Iran are in a position where they make sure that peace can happen. For any country anywhere to carry out a proxy war is something we should deplore.

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Lab)]

My Lords, is it not a concern to Her Majesty’s Government that, although in the UN system and so-on ex-President Saleh is not the legitimate Government, the legitimate Government have been attacked? The attacks on the ex-government forces are legitimate, according to the UN system. I am following the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, here. The Statement says it,

“would … not be possible in conflicts to which the UK is not a party”.

Are the Government not concerned that we are thought to have a dog in this fight and that we are on the side of the Saudis?

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, to use the noble Lord’s rather straightforward analogy, we do not see ourselves as a dog in the fight. We see ourselves as the dog in the peace, working through the United Nations to try to achieve peace. The quad met last week, and we are disappointed that it was not possible for peace to be achieved. We are not going to give up on that. We will continue our work through our allies, and particularly through the UN, to achieve what Yemen needs: to be in a position where 80% of its population can feed themselves instead of being in such dire conditions.

Outcome of the European Union Referendum

Lord Lea of Crondall Excerpts

Wednesday 6th July 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Lab)]

My Lords, in retrospect and in the light of 52:48—or more or less half for in and half for out—it could be argued that the people of this country should have been given a third option in the referendum. There should have been some variation of—if I may play with words—half in, half out, which is what a huge swathe of people probably wanted. To put the point another way round, the binary question “In or out?” is not the only way of looking at the question in people’s world view, or economic view for that matter.

One of the many questions is whether there is—certainly now at least—such a viable option, either economically or politically across the European Union. What I am saying is not, in one respect, a million miles away from what the noble Lord, Lord Maude of Horsham, was, I think, arguing in an interesting speech yesterday. He pointed out that we are already not fully in, in the sense that we are not in Schengen or the euro. Whether you call that 65% in, 75% in, or any other per cent in, I think that, as a nation, we probably want to be at least more than half in. Stated in those terms, I think it is what the noble Lord, Lord Maude, referred to as “variable geometry”. The question arises: why should people in the Council of Ministers not take fright if they think that Denmark, Sweden, Portugal, Greece, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Slovakia, et cetera, can also do their own thing along such lines?

What is the brief that the Cabinet Office or No. 10 will have ready for the new Prime Minister in only a few weeks’ time? Presumably whoever it is—let us say Mrs May—will go to see Mrs Merkel within days and put on the table an agenda for something such as staying in the internal market but somehow having fewer obligations. I think that the first reaction would certainly be that there is no such thing as a free lunch. I say that because it is contrary to the shameful propaganda of many Brexiteers who presented their fraudulent prospectus as if indeed there were. They deluded themselves and the voters that there was such a thing.

What emerges from these reflections? I think that it is the need to drill down into what people think it means to be a member of the European Economic Area. That is indeed, it could be said, half in and half out—let us call it 60%—paying country fees but not green fees, doing perhaps like the Norwegians do in terms of subsidising agriculture and fish. But Norway obeys all the rules of the internal market, paying something like half per head, proportionate to what it would be paying if it were a full member, but not sitting in on any of the meetings—at least not formally.

It should not be beyond the wit of man or, in this case, woman, presumably in a private talk with Mrs Merkel—as I have said, there will have to be such early contact; indeed, the Prime Minister in the first sentence of his Statement on the outcome of the referendum said that there were already informal discussions—to discuss what on earth, politically, is possible. They will have to bring the politics of Brussels and the so-called contagion argument, as one has to acknowledge that we cannot make a formula so attractive that everyone would like to follow it. In any event, the fact is that more and more things—far from opting out of them—have to be done together and be subject to common standards, whether in the field of energy, trade, investment, the City of London, running railways or airlines, pharmaceuticals, big science, not to mention agriculture, consumer standards, and so on.

This is not, I say in passing, in contradiction to the European Union’s role in the wider world, to which the noble Lord, Lord Howell, and others have referred. Much of the growth in the third world will of course be higher than ours—that is what we want; that is what we have been trying to do in international development all my life. Some of that is to do with differential population growth, but we also want to help with growth in productivity. That will of course help to reduce the push factor.

I am wearing my trade union hat to talk about workers’ rights. Some people do not seem to understand that the reason we have things like part-time workers’ rules across Europe is precisely because employers in single countries do not want to do it on their own, because they could be undercut. The social programme still, in my opinion, has to be taken further forward on such things as information and consultation rights and, indeed, on zero-hours contracts. This will also help with the labour migration question. Finally on that, I think that, yes, there is now scope for considering free movement. Let us take the new candidates in the Balkans. Some of us met the ambassadors of all the Balkan countries yesterday. Two, as we know, are already EU members—Croatia and Slovenia—but there were also Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Albania. The discussion touched on this question of whether a seven-year transition period would now be enough or whether some economic criterion—GDP per head—or other criteria, which would reduce the push factor as well as the pull factor, might be some sort of ceiling. Again, all these ideas have to be put in the pot. Who knows? Some may well be welcomed in some European capitals as helpful rather than disruptive.

We have to give what we think is a positive lead to what will happen in the autumn. I have made this attempt to begin setting out the bare bones of a programme. The Brexit campaign, ludicrously enough, did not have to be pinned down on a programme, unlike in a general election campaign. One Brexiteer said the other day that they had won on their manifesto— that is clearly one thing that they did not do. They did not have a manifesto. That is why, as the noble Lord, Lord Armstrong of Ilminster, opined—and I share his view—referendums are not really, on this sort of issue, our cup of tea.

European Union Referendum Bill

Lord Lea of Crondall Excerpts

Monday 23rd November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Pearson of Rannoch]

My Lords, I think I am addressing it. I am going into the fundamental reasons why the amendment is misguided. I will continue, if I may. Only 9% of our economy goes to the single market and this is the percentage of our exports and economy for which we would have to follow EU rules. Of course we would, just as it pays to put the steering wheel on the left if you are selling a car to the United States.

Talking of cars, Europhiles give our car industry as one which would suffer if we left the EU. Once again, I remind noble Lords of Global Britain’s briefing note No. 96, which shows why that is nonsense. We import twice as many cars from the single market as we export to it—1.4 million in and 0.6 million out. EU manufacturers actually own 53% of our domestic car market. Why would they want to impose a tariff against their own profitable business? Indeed, I can go further and recommend that Europhiles particularly, and our civil servants, should take a little time to read the Global Britain briefing notes, which briefly but comprehensively destroy the economic case for staying in the EU.

In conclusion, the amendment makes the basic Europhile mistake of thinking that any area of our national life is funded by the EU, whereas of course for every £1 it sends us at the moment we have sent it £2.63. According to the latest Pink Book figures for 2014, we sent £19.994 billion gross in 2014 and the EU sent us back £7.665 billion for things such as our research budget, structural funds, farmers and so forth, as covered by the amendment. That leaves our net contribution at £12.329 billion per annum. That is £34 million a day, which goes down the drain in Brussels. Or we could look at it as the annual salaries of 352,257 policemen—of whom we could do with a few more right now—or nurses or any other public servant your Lordships may care to mention, at £35,000 a year each.

I would rather welcome the amendment if it were honestly fulfilled because the voters would understand better what a complete disaster is our membership of the European Union and they might even start to ask what is the point of the European Union itself. They might start to see it for what it is. It is an emperor whose clothes have long since fallen off.

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Lab)]

My Lords, it would appear that despite our best efforts, this whole objective of some degree of dispassionate analysis will nevertheless wind up as a dog’s breakfast. We have to persist in trying to follow what the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, accurately described as the distinction between things that are facts and things that are for debate between the two opposing camps. A good example in the Brexit scenario is one that I will cover now.

A key distinction behind these amendments is similar to what Mr Rumsfeld would have described as the difference between a known known and a known unknown. I have an example. I have in my hand a copy of the pamphlet that I helped to put together entitled Europe and Your Rights at Work. Since Maastricht, there have been 10 or a dozen very important reforms that are now on the statute book, such as protection when a business changes hands, equal rights for part-time workers, maternity and paternity rights, equal rights for fixed-term workers, four weeks’ paid holiday—although that falls under the health and safety regime. Other reforms include having a voice at work, European Works Councils, the posting of workers in Europe and health and safety at work.

Those were negotiated—I did a lot of that myself for some years—in Brussels between the leaders of the trade unions and the leaders of the employers. The result is that, despite the sound and fury at the beginning, we do not hear too much complaint now because everyone, including the employers, appreciates that they are a useful floor for employment rights in this country.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Grocott (Lab)]

Of course, my noble friend is quite right that these measures could be repealed, but they could also be extended and improved on by a British Government. If we are looking for good conditions for people at work, I would say that a huge advance in recent years was that wonderful national minimum wage introduced not by the EU but by the last Labour Government. Ultimately, the terms and conditions of people at work about whom he and I care most passionately are better protected by a Labour Government in Britain than by any decision in Brussels.

[Lord Lea of Crondall]

I have the highest respect for my noble friend but I am afraid that on this one he is wrong. In international trade, employers will claim we are at a competitive disadvantage if we do not do things together. This is what Europe is about. That is what Delors pointed out in Bournemouth in 1988.

If we were to say to an employer in Holland, Italy or Spain, “You can lead the race to the bottom”, all the employers, one by one, would scream that they had to go in that direction. I will be calling for a European identity card the way I am going, but if we had a floor for all European workers in all these areas, the comparison with the minimum wage—although we do not have a European minimum wage—would be valid in that all workers and employers would be protected. If noble Lords will allow me to conceptualise, we will have a European ring-fence—let us not start getting into the argument about competition with China or Japan; it is a good argument but quite different from the one we are considering at the moment. This is for the parties in the referendum debate to discuss, and they are valid points to discuss.

Another factor that will determine how Brexit would work would be, no doubt, the majority in the country and the state of agitation on how best to progress matters on the Back Benches of the Conservative Party—and indeed, the Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats and everybody else in the House of Commons. To get to the nub of the point for this debate, and maybe to add some value to what I am about to say, we have a difficulty which would have been avoided if we had followed what we called in an earlier debate the OBR-type of authorship because all these amendments look to HMG to produce these studies. How will Ministers avoid the charge of cherry picking, as and when they deal with what are, with good will all round—and there will not be an oversupply of that—difficult analytical distinctions between things that we know and things that are going to be debated?

In conclusion, I will try to answer my own question.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

You are the only one who understands it.

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[Lord Lea of Crondall]

For once in his life, my noble friend may care to pay a little more attention to what I am about to say, and he may even be convinced by it. I think that there is scope for an inter-party agreement on the preparation of a statement of intent, as it were, between the two camps that neither will accuse the other, or even the Government, of bias, if not dishonesty, simply as a consequence of having conducted an insufficiently robust analysis of the distinction between the facts—the known knowns—and the unknowns. What I am saying may prove to be true or untrue, but on the percentage chance that it is true, can we follow up the worries of the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, about tsunamis by saying that they will be prevented only if we can avoid charges of bad faith when these reports are published? Therefore, the leaders of the two campaigns should swear an oath—as in ancient Rome, or some such—that they will accept that the assessment is dispassionate and that neither side will try to shoot the messenger, as and when these surveys are produced.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, I back up what the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, said, with which I entirely agree. To make the noble Lord, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, happy, I should say that my receipt of a pension from the European Parliament is on my declaration of interests. As far as I know, I do not have to mention it every time we discuss the EU, as that would bore the House greatly.

I wish to amplify two of the points in Amendment 24C, in the name, principally, of the noble Lord, Lord Hannay. The Prime Minister said recently that the EU was essential—I cannot remember whether he said “essential”, but he at least meant that it was very important—to the UK’s national security. I think that is the first time he has made that very valid point. Therefore, it is important that the report the Government promise to publish in the very welcome amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, should cover the law enforcement, security and justice point because the public have a right to know what that consists of. For instance, the report should state that we are a full member of Europol and not stray into the domain covered by Amendment 25, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, by implying that if we are not in the EU we will not be a full member of Europol, as Norway is not—it has a sort of observer status. The same applies to referring to Eurojust as a sort of club of prosecutors which makes sure that we catch, and can prosecute, these major criminals.

As the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, said, we have full membership of the European arrest warrant. We could even push for reform. I wish that Ministers, the Government and the Commission would take up the report that I wrote as one of my last acts in the European Parliament. This was about multilateral reform of the European arrest warrant. We could not do that simply as law takers outside the EU, even if we had some kind of other arrangement.

On proposed new paragraph (d) in Amendment 24C and the rights of UK citizens living in another country, a lot of work is being done here, to which the UK, being in the European Union, has a great deal to contribute. This work is about complementing the rights of free movement. We have maybe 2 million citizens living in the rest of the EU. We can take a leading part, with our strong civil as well as criminal legal traditions, in influencing the work on the mutual recognition of documents and of civil partnerships and marriages, including of course same-sex marriages, and on the rights that help our citizens in their daily lives in other EU countries.

It is important that our citizens understand the full implications of those EU measures, and the rights and obligations that arise under EU law enabling us to help defend our national security and ourselves against terrorism, to catch criminals and to help people taking advantage of free-movement rights through civil-law issues. I hope the Minister will say that the report will have some focus on these sectors of law enforcement, security and justice, including civil justice.

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[Lord Lamont of Lerwick]

By interrupting, the noble Baroness illustrated exactly my point. She just said that it is more complicated than I had said. I am saying that government by fax is an oversimplification as well. These things are not capable of a single interpretation; they cannot all be reduced to numbers. In this debate, we have a series of people with different motives putting forward different lists that they think would help their case.

The noble Lord, Lord Lea, had an interesting exchange with the noble Lord, Lord Grocott. The noble Lord, Lord Grocott, responded to the reference of the noble Lord, Lord Lea, to various rights that existed, and made the point: could not the UK Parliament just legislate for each of those rights? I thought that the noble Lord, Lord Lea, did not answer that question satisfactorily.

It reminded me of a conversation I had many years ago with a friend before we joined the European Economic Community. My friend was an enthusiastic supporter of joining; I was a bit sceptical. I voted to join and made my maiden speech in the House of Commons in favour of joining, but I objected to the argument that my friend put forward for joining the EEC, as it then was. He said, “The reason for joining the EEC is that we can irreversibly freeze into law capitalism, free markets and deregulation”. That is how the EEC appeared at the time: it was something that appealed to economic liberals.

Of course, the whole nature of the EU changed as it involved and we had what the noble Lord, Lord Lea, referred to as the Delors doctrine, which was that you would enshrine permanently in EU law certain social rights. That is why the TUC changed its mind over membership, I think. The noble Lord, Lord Grocott, was quite right to say that you can have all those lists put forward in different amendments, but actually the UK Parliament is perfectly capable of implementing whatever rights or limitations on rights it wishes. That is one of the fundamental points about the EU and one of the fundamental objections to it: it is so difficult to repeal legislation because it is enshrined almost in aspic.

[Lord Lea of Crondall]

My point was that employers would not be happy to do that just as one country because they would become less competitive; they want to do it as a continent. I know that the noble Lord will not think that a good argument, but that was the point being made.

[Lord Lamont of Lerwick]

I know that the noble Lord made the point about acting together, but I do not think that it really answers the point made to him by the noble Lord, Lord Grocott. These lists are highly selective. In the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, all right, some items stand on their own, but let us take paragraph (e) in Amendment 24C, which covers,

“law enforcement, security and justice in the United Kingdom and in the devolved jurisdictions”.

Of course there will be arguments both ways. One noble Baroness referred to the European arrest warrant as though that were self-evidently all in one direction, but a published analysis of it might give rise to a lot of argument about the rights of people who are wrongly prosecuted, or of the innocent who are extradited.

Many people have anxieties about the whole theory of parity of esteem of the justice systems of different countries in the EU. Can anyone really say that the justice systems of Bulgaria or Romania are equal to ours—that we have as much confidence in them as we do in our own UK system—and that therefore there should be automaticity of extradition? I say that because the idea that these things can be reduced to simple formulae, to black and white or to one particular viewpoint is not correct.

European Union Referendum Bill

Lord Lea of Crondall Excerpts

Monday 23rd November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, for pointing out that this is a probing amendment. She was able to give us enough advance notice of this late-stage amendment to enable us, I hope, to gather together the reassurances that she and others rightly seek. Under charity law, political activity by charities is subject to strict rules. Charities are also subject to requirements of electoral law. My noble friend Lord Hamilton asked for some clarification on what appears to be obfuscation. That is what I hope to do at this stage, because he is right: it is important that the role of charities is clear and respected.

In England and Wales under charity law, a charity may engage in non-party political activity to support its charitable purpose where the trustees consider it to be an effective use of the charity’s resources. One is thereby pursuing the reason why the charity has been set up—what its mission is—but one is not permitted to take part in party-political activity. A charity must never support a political party or candidate, and must always take care to preserve its independence when engaging in any political activity.

Charity law is devolved in Scotland and Northern Ireland, but the rules are similar. There is already guidance for charities on referendums: for example, the Charity Commission for England and Wales published guidance in July 2014 entitled Charities, Elections and Referendums. The Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator published guidance last year ahead of the referendum on Scottish independence. The Charity Commission for Northern Ireland has produced general guidance for charities in Northern Ireland on political activity.

So we have had Charity Commission guidance in England and Wales, and the Scottish Charity Regulator and Northern Ireland Charity Commission have issued guidance. To complete the picture, the Charity Commission for England and Wales has already said that in principle it will be happy to work with the Electoral Commission, the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator and the Charity Commission for Northern Ireland on this subject. However, it does not believe that there is a need for much additional material given the existing guidance for charities across the UK, some of which I have just referred to.

The Charity Commission for England and Wales and the Electoral Commission are meeting tomorrow to discuss the joint promotion and communication of their guidance in order to promote charities’ awareness and understanding of the rules that apply. I also understand that the UK charity regulators are due to meet later this week, providing a timely opportunity to discuss this issue and consider the potential for collaboration on such guidance. While the provisions of the Bill apply across the UK, we must recognise that charity law is devolved in Scotland and Northern Ireland. We must therefore also respect the independence of the different regulators and their entitlement to reach their own views in particular cases.

Given my explanation about the collaboration that is not just happening normally but is happening now, we do not believe that the amendment is necessary, given the willingness of the Electoral Commission and UK charity regulators to work collaboratively on this specific subject.

I do not think that the noble Baroness intended her amendment to be self-operative, because clearly it will create an unnecessary burden for the regulators, which she does not intend. She asked me to say whether the regulators have demonstrated a willingness to collaborate on guidelines. I say yes, and they are coming up with the evidence for that, as well.

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Lab)]

Before the Minister sits down, I am intrigued by whether she is saying that this is a one-off issue of conversation to do with the referendum, or is the word “political” and how it is used by the Charity Commission for England and Wales going to be subject to some new regime?

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, perhaps I can unpack two parts of my response. With regard to the word “political”, clearly there are regulations and guidance that cover political activity across the whole range of what may happen in the United Kingdom, obviously including Scotland and Northern Ireland. So there is therefore a basis on which the regulators and charities work.

I then referred separately to the meetings that are taking place this week, which are looking specifically at the referendum and what it might entail. So we are applying the general to the particular to ensure that the way they collaborate is effective for the particular referendum. I hope that that is helpful.

European Union Referendum Bill

Lord Lea of Crondall Excerpts

Monday 2nd November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

I was tempted to support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Kerr. As I listened to his speech, he said, “The Commission is there to maintain the EU decision-making autonomy”. What a ghastly phrase. It suggests that an unelected body has autonomy. The noble Lord, Lord Liddle, said that the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, should be circulated as part of the campaign. I agree with that because in summary he said, “Look, we’re stuck with this organisation. They’re in charge. If you try to do anything about it, they’ll all gang up against you and throw your people out of work”. If that is the best argument that we can come up with for staying in this organisation, I despair. If that is the position, the sooner we get out the better, because we are being told that we are part of an EU decision-making autonomy.

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Lab)]

Taking the analogy of Ministers and the UK Civil Service, is the noble Lord saying that if you do not like the word “autonomy” there must be some other word that is not going to be suborned by politicians? With regard to the Office for Budget Responsibility, no one doubts that we are looking for some degree of independence. If the noble Lord does not like the word “autonomy”, how will he handle the problem of not wanting self-interested politicians to give advice—it is people who, in the analogy with Britain, are not politicians?

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

The noble Lord must go on because he is making my case for me. He is saying that we do not want politicians and that we need to think of another word for “autonomy”. How about “dictatorship”? If by EU decision-making autonomy you mean, “We don’t want politicians”, then that is dictatorship. Politicians, however much they may be despised or disliked, are accountable to the electorate. These people are accountable to no one, and we are now being told that we cannot possibly go against the EU decision-making autonomy.

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[The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Anelay of St Johns) (Con)]

My Lords, Amendment 24 moved by the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, calls for the Government to set out the relationship that it envisages having with the European Union in the event of a vote to leave. The amendment states that this report would have to be published 12 weeks before the date of the referendum and goes even further than that. It requires the Government to provide detail on the acceptability of hypothetical arrangements from the point of view of the 27 other member states. That seems unrealistic. I have just been listening to the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, give details of some of the implications of Article 50. Amendment 24 seems to be asking the Government to put the cart before the horse before the horse has even bolted.

[Lord Lea of Crondall]

My Lords, I am sorry. There will not be many interruptions to the noble Baroness’s speech from the Labour Benches. Is she saying that it is unrealistic to consider the acceptability of this arrangement to every other member state? Does she not accept that that is very important? Indeed, it would be game, set and match if it were the case that not all 27 other member states agreed. Is it not essential to consider how it would be with all those vetoes around the place? If we are not careful, we will be in a very difficult position. She cannot utter that little phrase and have nothing more to say about it. Is it not rather important?

Zhang Kai

Lord Lea of Crondall Excerpts

Thursday 22nd October 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, I always do my very best to meet those who seek to meet me. I have to say that my attention has been somewhat diverted at the moment by the European Union Referendum Bill. However, I will certainly see what I can do with regard to his request. I am very glad that the noble Lord, Lord Alton, has put on record the work of Zhang Kai, which is significant. He is one of those people whose bravery can only be admired by those of us who see the importance of human rights defenders around the world.

The noble Lord is right: we are extremely concerned about the activity of crosses being removed. We are told that, sometimes, the rationale behind that is that there are planning restrictions, but it seems odd to us. Certainly, detention and disappearance should not be part and parcel of a normal judicial system. Perhaps we will have the opportunity to look at this further when the noble Lord has a Question for Short Debate in the Moses Room about Article 18.

It is important that we continue our discussions on these matters. Last week at the FCO, my right honourable friend Hugo Swire, who has country-specific responsibility for China, met 14 people from the China NGO Network, representing those who have a particular interest in fighting for human rights in China.

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Lab)]

My Lords, does the Minister think that one way of responding to the disconnect alluded to by the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, is to say that the deepening of our relations on industrial and such matters reinforces the need and the moral duty to raise human rights issues?

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

My Lords, I certainly believe that a constructive economic relationship with another country gives one the opportunity to have a stronger voice on why human rights should underpin a stable and responsible government. That voice does not have to be a clarion call; it can be more modest. I am reminded that Tony Blair made the point that,

“ persuasion and dialogue achieve more than confrontation and empty rhetoric”.

I cannot often agree with him, but I do there.

European Union Referendum Bill

Lord Lea of Crondall Excerpts

Tuesday 13th October 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Lab)]

My Lords, the leitmotiv of this debate seems to be “Come back, Harold Wilson, all is forgiven”. He may have kidded the rest of us sometimes, but I do not think he ever kidded himself. I only wish that were true of his successor in 10 Downing Street today.

My qualification, such as it is, for speaking is a little along the lines of that of the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, in that I wrote the TUC pamphlet in 1975, saying, “Vote no”. Albeit brilliantly argued, two-thirds of our members voted yes. That is the sort of thing one tends to remember. Jack Jones subsequently said to me, “I thought I asked you to write a popular pamphlet saying, ‘Vote no’.” I said, “I did, Jack, I did.” He replied, “Well, it wasn’t very popular, was it?”

The trade union movement has now, I think it fair to say, come to terms with the reality of multinational but accountable capitalism. I say “but accountable”. There is a question mark there. I hope no one in this Chamber thinks there should be any withdrawing of the degree of accountability of multinational capitalism, be it Volkswagen, which we have been very conscious of in the past few days, or, indeed, the hedge funds. The noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, said that we do not want people financed according to the ratio that applied in 1975, but it seems that hedge funds are now the epitome of our national interest. Are they not multinational, or does he not want any of the money coming from the hedge funds? That is a rhetorical question, but he will forgive me for that.

We want a debate with proper rules of engagement.

[Lord Stoddart of Swindon]

I am very sorry to interrupt, but I do not quite understand the reference to hedge funds. I do not think I made any reference to hedge funds.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Lea of Crondall]

The noble Lord did not make a reference to hedge funds, but the point I am making is that, according to the papers, there is a very prominent role for hedge funds in financing the “get out” campaign. I assume that he is not unhappy to take their money.

[Lord Stoddart of Swindon]

I did not take anybody’s money.

[Lord Lea of Crondall]

One of the most complicated points we have been discussing is describing what “out” looks like. It is a genuinely difficult problem. There are two issues which are very hard to separate out. First, as the FT says today, Paris, Berlin and Brussels are increasingly exasperated about what Britain wants. The noble Lord, Lord Kerr, said he was baffled by the negotiating strategy. The problem is that it is very hard to pin down what the “out” position would be and what, therefore, is the correct comparison with the “in” position.

People such as the noble Lord, Lord Lawson, are not really interested in renegotiation. He makes no bones about it: he wants out. But there are others who say it depends on the outcome of the renegotiation. I think it is fair for us to give more thought to what it is that the British people will be looking at. They will be able to look at what “in” means a lot more easily and unambiguously than what “out” means, so I want to spend my other four minutes on what “out” might mean.

I agree very much with my noble friend Lady Morgan of Ely, who said that the Office for Budget Responsibility or an organisation of that ilk could look at some of the economic consequences. Of course, the rest of the picture is very hard to give to the OBR or Whitehall. It is far too speculative, and it probably will be a picture of a future period, let us say in three years’ time, involving a vote to say “out” and further negotiation with the countries of the 28 as to what “out” actually means.

As Donald Rumsfeld said, there are known knowns and known unknowns, and there are both types in this quandary as to how we present what “out” looks like in an objective and unambiguous way. The answer is that we do not know, because the negotiation beginning now would have to be followed by another negotiation about what “out” actually meant in terms of customs, tariffs, industrial standards and so on.

The throwaway line of the noble Lord, Lord Blackwell, about the EU raising trade barriers against us as some sort of eccentric thing to do—that is only the converse of our getting out. If we think that the trading arrangements within the EU have no substance, being out of the EU will not present us with any difficulties, because according to his hypothesis, if we were out, there would be no change at all. Thus, we all disappear, chasing our own tails. If that is the position, clearly it is misleading. Getting out would have some consequences. We have only Greenland to go on at the moment, and that is a slightly odd comparison, given that it has just a few thousand people and millions of fish, and Denmark controls its foreign policy. Before the referendum, we must give more thought to how the “out” question can be better identified.

I conclude with one quick point about the franchise. The dog that has not barked today, and it is an important one, is the dire state of the electoral register. In many places—but equally, in the inner circles—it is a scandal. Will the Government agree to examine the steps that could be taken with the electoral authorities to address this deepening problem? It is not a million miles away from the other work that they will be doing if the amendment on age limitation and so on is accepted.