Sri Lanka

Lord Wharton of Yarm Excerpts

Tuesday 8th January 2013 Westminster Hall

[James Wharton (Stockton South) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley), who speaks passionately, with experience of post-conflict life and of rebuilding communities after a very difficult period. He gives us all cause to pause and to reflect on what the debate is really about. There was a great deal that I wanted to say, but as I have a very short time, I will significantly cut down my comments.

I have been to Sri Lanka a number of times, and the visits are all declared in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I have gone there with colleagues, some of whom are here today. What worries me is how much misinformation is out there about what is happening on the ground. My hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North (Mr Scott), who follows matters in Sri Lanka keenly, has a different position from mine, but it is a genuinely felt one. He was absolutely right to say that we must not forget the past, but we must not misinterpret or misrepresent it either.

A problem that Sri Lanka has faced in the debate in the western world, in this Parliament, in the media and in other places across the globe is that, for a variety of reasons, too many people try to change what happened in the past, to change the accepted facts of what went on. The reality is that a lot of what we see is not based on facts or in reality. I have raised the point before in the House that even the Darusman report, which preceded the UN report that has led to the debate today, specifically states, in paragraph 53:

“This account should not be taken as proven facts, and any effort to determine specific liabilities would require a higher threshold.”

It is made clear that the report establishes a narrative that can be used to work forwards but that none of the data—for example, on the numbers of casualties—should be quoted as specific figures. The facts on the ground regarding the provision of food and medical supplies are starkly different from some of the evidence given by unnamed sources to the expert committee that put together the report.

I am conscious of the time, so I just want to draw the House’s attention to a few areas in which progress is being made in Sri Lanka. Most of the 300,000 internally displaced persons have now been resettled. I visited Menik farm, one of the welfare camps set up to house the huge numbers of people displaced by conflict in January of last year. There were about 6,000 people left, and the camp has now closed and the people have gone home. They have been able to do so because demining operations have proceeded at an amazing pace, with more than 900,000 mines and unexploded ordnance having been cleared, primarily by the Sri Lankan army but also by the HALO Trust with support from UK aid, and I congratulate the UK on its contribution.

More than 120,000 houses have been constructed in the north and the east, nearly 600 child soldiers have been rehabilitated and more than 10,000 adult combatants have been rehabilitated or reintegrated into Sri Lankan society. Some 900 Tamil speakers have been recruited into the police force in the north and east, and that is important in building trust in a community that does not have historic trust in its Government and the organisations that represent it. Investment is key, as is infrastructure, so that the economy can grow and people can improve their lives.

When I went to Sri Lanka with the charity International Alert, we visited a group of young Tamil people in the Vanni, and they talked about jobs and employment prospects, about what they were going to do and what they wanted to do. They talked about the challenges that they faced at home and about how they wanted to get education and the cost of education. They talked about the same things that young people in colleges in my constituency talk to me about; they share some of the same problems. They wanted to look forward and go forward.

The tone of debate in the House too often worries me, because we focus on what we can do to punish the Government of Sri Lanka, whether by the removal of the generalised system of preferences or the UK’s pulling out of the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting. Such things will not damage the Government of Sri Lanka; they will damage progress towards peace and the prosperity of the people who live in Sri Lanka. The tone of the debate here needs to change. We need to work constructively with the Government of Sri Lanka to put pressure where it is due and, where we can, to deliver improvement.