Commonwealth Summit 2018

Lord McNally Excerpts

Thursday 2nd November 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord McNally (LD)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure and a delight to follow the noble Lord, Lord Parekh; I may return to some of his remarks later. I thank my noble friend Lord Chidgey for a speech that was delivered with the authority which comes from his long experience of the Commonwealth. When you ask a question, it is always good when half the question is already answered. Interestingly, we received a good briefing from the City of London, which he referred to, and which explained how the corporation is getting behind the idea.

I will make one comment as background to this debate. There is a newsreel clip which will be shown many times between now and the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting next year. It is of the young Princess Elizabeth, in South Africa on her 21st birthday, pledging that her whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to the service of the British people and what is now the Commonwealth. Thankfully, the caveat about “long or short” has proved unnecessary, so the meetings in the spring of next year will be a celebration—as the noble Lord, Lord Mendelsohn, indicated—and a thanks for a promise so magnificently honoured for the last 70 years that have followed that pledge of service. In South Africa Her Majesty referred to the “imperial family”. Thanks in no small part to the Queen’s leadership, that “imperial family” has transmuted and transformed into a Commonwealth of Nations.

This debate calls for the meetings planned for next year to be more than Heads of Government meetings. We have already had indications that they will not be. Yesterday I attended a meeting in the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association Room here in Westminster Hall to hear about what the CPA was planning for next year. I was much encouraged to hear of work already in hand for meetings of parliamentarians as part of the programme, as well as other ideas about young people and communities, which have been referred to. This is all excellent news. I hope that the Chambers of both Houses and Westminster Hall can be used for such meetings. This building has much symbolism throughout the Commonwealth, and I think the groups covered by this debate today would welcome the opportunity to speak and take part in events in the mother of Parliaments.

Education has always been part of the cement which holds the Commonwealth together. I have the honour, along with the noble Lords, Lord Judd and Lord Luce, of being a patron of the Council for Education in the Commonwealth. Earlier this year the CEC held a very successful conference in Namibia and is already planning a series of seminars and lectures that look forward to the 20th Commonwealth Education Ministers’ meeting in Fiji in February 2018. They will be looking at the skills required for the jobs of tomorrow and the financing of higher education and early childhood education, and will feed those ideas into the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting.

The Commonwealth is at its best when it focuses on real problems and brings shared experience and expertise to a problem. It runs into problems when we start to lecture or patronise each other. I remember when I was a Minister at the Ministry of Justice attending a meeting of Commonwealth Justice Ministers, and my brief had me advocate no longer using the death penalty. This ran me into quite choppy waters with the representatives of Commonwealth countries that still retain the death penalty. It was a useful reminder that although we have many shared values, there is still a diversity of views on many issues in the Commonwealth.

I return to what the noble Lord, Lord Parekh, said. I thought I might be the only one to be the party pooper. If I have any advice to Ministers about the coming Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, it is on the need for some deft diplomacy and to resist trying to turn it into a showcase for the new, shiny, post-Brexit global Britain. Almost all Commonwealth countries are members of their own regional economic co-operation organisations. They will not take kindly to some kind of PR stunt through which the British Government try to package the Commonwealth as some ready-made alternative to our EU membership.

We must remember that it is the Commonwealth of which Britain is a proud and active member, not the British Commonwealth, and that next year we are hosting a conference, not a durbar. I trust the Minister to use his influence over some of his more exuberant colleagues to get the balance right. With that Gypsy’s warning, I look forward to a Heads of Government meeting where real work will be done and where we can say a heartfelt “Thank you, Ma’am” to Her Majesty, putting in place a programme of work that plays to the Commonwealth’s strengths as we grapple with the multifaceted problems of the 21st century.