Commonwealth Parliamentary Association

Lord Popat Excerpts

Thursday 8th September 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Popat]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the excellent contributions from many speakers in your Lordships’ House. I, too, am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Hooper, for initiating today's debate.

I wish to declare that in January I visited Pakistan as part of a CPA delegation and I will also shortly be visiting Mozambique with the CPA. I am a child of the Commonwealth. I was born in Uganda to a family of Indian origin. Those are two distant and vastly different lands, yet they share many characteristics and values aided by their ties to Britain and the Commonwealth. I would hope that my contribution today would be equally relevant if I were in the Parliament of either of those two countries rather than in this great House in the mother of all Parliaments.

I wish to focus on two elements: my experience of the CPA since being ennobled and the need for a more trade-based Commonwealth in the 21st century. Since my ennoblement a little over a year ago, I have been very impressed by my interactions with the CPA. Having had to flee my home country because of a brutal dictator, I know the value of democracy and how essential it is for the instruments of democracy to flourish. The CPA's continuous programme of visits and activities would be enviable in any organisation, but when it is fulfilling such a worthy function as promoting democracy, it is something that we parliamentarians should be grateful for.

On my visit to Pakistan, I was struck by the passion of many of the young parliamentarians there, who look up to the stability and empowerment of Britain's democracy. Many of them were educated in Britain, and all of them feared the alternatives to democracy. I very much look forward to visiting Mozambique, a former Portuguese colony and one of the newest of the 54 member states in the Commonwealth, as it joined in 1995. The country is performing very well, and its membership demonstrates the continued high regard in which the Commonwealth is still held in many parts of the world.

The Government's policy of putting trade at the heart of our foreign policy is a wise and necessary one. As the Foreign Secretary said in Japan last year:

“We will make economic objectives a central aspect of our international bilateral engagement alongside our other traditional objectives”.

The noble Baroness, Lady Hooper, is right to say that the less developed Commonwealth countries are a market for tomorrow. I believe that the future of the Commonwealth must be debated with this statement in mind. Just as the Commonwealth adapted, with the London Declaration in 1949, to allow India and other independent nations to join, so it must adapt again to become a driver for economic growth. It is not just in Britain's interests; this sort of approach would most favour the poorest members of the Commonwealth, areas where poverty is still, sadly, far too prevalent.

As President Obama, also a child of the Commonwealth, said in his address to both Houses, the development of countries like China, India and Brazil has lifted hundreds of millions from poverty around the globe. If we can deliver sustainable economic growth to the Commonwealth, there is no reason why we cannot do the same. The countries of the Commonwealth are collectively responsible for more than 20 per cent of world trade, with over $3 trillion in trade taking place within the Commonwealth every year. At a time of global economic uncertainty, it is vital that we use our common links and long-established networks to boost trade and investment opportunities within the Commonwealth, and, in particular, in Africa. The Government have, encouragingly, already started to set out this case. I welcome the Government’s Commonwealth strategy. As the Foreign Secretary said:

“In our view, the Commonwealth could and should become one of the leading voices in the global economy, working to liberalise trade and break down barriers for international business”.

My noble friend Lord Howell has said that the Commonwealth strategy was drawn up thinking about,

“what the Commonwealth could do for the UK, and what the UK should do for the Commonwealth”,

I believe that it is in our mutual interest for the Commonwealth to ensure free trade—resisting protection and breaking down barriers for international business; to make it easier for smaller and medium-sized enterprises to export and do business abroad, especially early in the life cycle of a product; and to ensure that representatives of the business community are actively involved in the work of the Commonwealth, including promoting more businessmen to high commissionerships.

I am not advocating a complete change in the values of the Commonwealth. Pursuing economic policies is not contradictory to the core values set out in Trinidad and Tobago in 2009. I believe that economic security and prosperity are vital to ensuring that values like peace and security, education and good governance succeed.

The mechanisms of democracy—the rule of law, a free press, separation of powers, and free and fair elections—are vital for economic confidence. Economic prosperity is vital for the development of nations and, crucially, the development of a middle class, which is so often a defining moment in a country’s political history. I congratulate the CPA on its anniversary and encourage the Commonwealth of the 21st century to take a lead from our Government and demonstrate that it is open for business.