United Nations General Assembly 2018: IRC Report

Lord McConnell of Glenscorrodale Excerpts

Thursday 6th September 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord McConnell of Glenscorrodale (Lab)]

My Lords, I too thank both the noble Lord, Lord Howell, and the International Relations Committee for producing their report and therefore for prompting this debate this evening in advance of the UN General Assembly. The report is timely and the debate will, I hope, be a positive contribution to the impact that the UK can have at the General Assembly and at the associated events over the next month.

I want briefly to reference Kofi Annan. He was probably the nicest, most diplomatic but almost the most determined international figure that I had the experience of meeting in my ministerial life and since. His death is a real loss to the international community, but his impact lives on in the agreement of the millennium development goals, the endorsement of the original concept of responsibility to protect and a whole number of other areas. He moved the United Nations into a new century with real leadership and he is sadly missed.

I refer to my register of interest, in particular my position as vice-president of UNICEF, which no doubt will be launching many new initiatives over the next three weeks.

I will focus on the issues identified in the report. The report is strong because it has at its heart the issue of human rights, which are in so much danger these days in so many different parts of the world. The report also identifies the complexity of the current challenges facing the United Nations and the international community. It identifies the importance of the sustainable development goals and rightly identifies the great work being done by the current Secretary-General and others to initiate and deliver reform inside the United Nations system.

As the noble Lord, Lord Judd, has said, we live in a world that is increasingly interdependent, where the solution to problems has to be complex, as the problems themselves are increasingly complex. In a world where conflicts may in most cases be internal within countries but have impacts far and wide across the globe; in a world where climate is changing and the response to that is so inadequate; and in a world where international finance and the resultant impact on technology, poverty and job creation across the world is so complex for individual countries to handle, the role of the United Nations and other international organisations becomes much more important. Their reform, to make sure that they are efficient, deliver for people and have the trust of people, is essential.

As these international organisations are facing so many challenges and the rules-based system is being challenged by so many leaders, either by their actions or their words, I would like this Chamber to hold a specific debate in which we could discuss the wider issues of that rules-based international system—not just the United Nations but other organisations, including the World Trade Organization, which is perhaps going to play a more prominent role in our future over the coming years. I would like to see a proper debate on that in this Chamber over the coming months.

I will address migration in the context of the sustainable development goals. When I was in New York last year, the Secretary-General made the valid point that in a place such as the Sahel in Africa, the complexity of the challenges that lead to mass migration—poverty and economic challenges, conflict or climate, or all three—lead us to one conclusion: that the sustainable development goals are the answer. The comprehensive nature of those goals is the answer to these complex challenges. The pace of delivery on the SDGs in 2018, three years into a 15-year programme, is just not good enough.

What will the UK do at this year’s UN General Assembly and in the Security Council and the other meetings that take place? One year in advance of our voluntary national review next September at the United Nations, what will the UK be doing to up the pace of delivery of the SDGs? What will we be doing to make sure that the data is available and that countries are producing honest strategies and measuring themselves against the goals they have set? What will we be doing to make sure that the whole UN system, in every agency and every arm, is focused on delivering the goals?

In particular, what will we be doing to make sure that goal 16 is not relegated to the bottom of the pile and ignored, because peace, justice and strong institutions are vital for the delivery of all the other goals? Will we be supporting the UN’s role in peace building—not just peacekeeping—to make sure that the conflict prevention work identified by the Secretary-General as his top priority gets the support it deserves from us and from others?