South Sudan

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Wednesday 7th December 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the humanitarian situation in South Sudan.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts, although it is no pleasure to consider the scale and depth of the plight of South Sudan today. We probably all remember that back in July 2011, we greeted what was then the world’s newest country, South Sudan. The hope was that decades of violence would end and there would be new beginnings for the South Sudanese people. Five years on, the country has been plunged into civil war once again, with the rebel leader Riek Machar calling for armed struggle against President Salva Kiir’s Government in Juba.

Although violence erupted again in July, we know that it had never been far away: the country has essentially been in conflict since 2013. We have seen instability and conflict spread throughout South Sudan, into some previously untouched areas such as the Equatorias and greater Bahr el Ghazal. The conflict has also taken on an ethnic dimension and brought to the surface historical injustices, along with present day grievances.

Humanitarian indicators rarely tell the whole story, but in the case of South Sudan, the numbers are staggering. Out of a population of 12 million, some 3 million people are displaced. Of those, 1.8 million are internally displaced inside the country—most people believe that is a conservative figure—and 1.2 million have fled as refugees to neighbouring countries. The indications are that 4.8 million people are currently food-insecure and that one in five South Sudanese women in the protection of civilian camps have reported sexual abuse. We know that women and girls have been disproportionately affected by the crisis in South Sudan, as they account for 57% of the registered internally displaced people. The situation is expected to deteriorate even further in 2017, with increased conflict, deepening food insecurity and a further deterioration of the country’s already desperate economic situation.

We recently had a clear warning from the United Nations special adviser on the prevention of genocide, Adama Dieng, that there is a strong risk of violence escalating along ethnic lines, with the possibility of genocide. We see hate speech, stereotyping and polarising rhetoric on South Sudanese radio and social media. Trust in an inclusive, distinctive South Sudanese national identity is at its lowest ebb. With the dry season approaching, there are fears of a large-scale Government offensive in the coming weeks.

[Sir Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. He mentioned the UN special adviser. Does he agree that there is an incredibly important role for the United Nations Mission in the Republic of South Sudan, which has been spectacularly under-delivering, with poor leadership, and that UNMISS needs to be beefed up substantially and have its role extended and expanded, in line with the recent UN inquiry?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mark Durkan]

The hon. Gentleman has an acute insight into the country, from his time as the Minister for Africa. I pay tribute to his sterling work on the all-party parliamentary group for Sudan and South Sudan, which he vice-chairs; I serve alongside him as chair. He rightly raises the recurring criticism of the performance of UNMISS, but I do not want to turn this debate simply into a critique of its failures, although they are many. I want to see how together, at a UK level and internationally, we can better respond to the situation in South Sudan.

This is not to pretend that there are not other dire situations crying out for our attention and further effort. All of us will have been moved by the reports from Yemen on television and radio last night and this morning. We know that hon. Members right across this House are seized with the plight of people in and fleeing from Syria and surrounding countries. This debate is not an attempt to single out South Sudan as the only humanitarian crisis that warrants our attention and consideration.

In trying to help the situation in South Sudan, we have to confront the failures there. Those include failures in political leadership in the country, in terms of the President and the former vice-president, who is now in South Africa. Government and opposition forces are prepared to visit violence on their own people, and in parts of the country that were previously spared some of that violence. We have to be up front about those failures. Of course, we also have to recognise, as some have highlighted, how corruption and conflict have been drivers of each other in South Sudan. We saw that spelled out clearly in the report a few months ago by the Sentry, backed by George Clooney, in respect of both Government and opposition players there.

Faced with those challenges and difficulties, the hon. Member for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham) is right to call into question the performance and effort of the UN mission in South Sudan, and particularly the questionable leadership. However, rather than just offering rightful criticism, it is incumbent on the international community to provide a new resolve.

[Dame Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. The UN is a multifarious organisation. We should recognise that it is the UN’s special adviser on genocide who has sounded the alarm over the risk of genocide in the country and reminded people that all of us in the international community bear responsibility for monitoring the incitement to hatred.

[Mark Durkan]

I fully accept what the right hon. Lady has said. That is why I specifically quoted the UN adviser.

We have to look at what further actions can be taken to help people in South Sudan who want to stand up against hate speech. We can talk about the scale of devastation in the country and forget that there are still people there trying to hold on to the fragment of civil society that remains. There are people in a range of churches who are trying to hold on and offer degrees of decency and cohesion. They should be our partners in trying to create some sort of coalition of hopeful purpose within South Sudan and internationally.

It is important that where we have political and diplomatic engagement at an international level in South Sudan, we must be straight and blunt with both Government and opposition forces and do what we can to get them to engage better and more consistently in dialogue. We also have to be much more active in our partnership with those who stand for the interests and rights of the South Sudanese people, and who do so without being implicated in any sort of corruption whatever.

There are non-governmental organisations in South Sudan, and they are well supported by some of the international NGOs, which of course find it harder to cope there because of the deteriorating security situation and the poor infrastructure. NGOs are finding it hard to keep themselves safe and to reach different parts of the country to provide the level of aid and services they want to give. Nevertheless, we need to stay fully engaged with them.

I recognise that the UK Government have made a point of ensuring a relatively joint effort for both Sudan and South Sudan on the part of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Department for International Development, just as we in the all-party group have made a point of staying together and covering both Sudan and South Sudan. I welcome the Government’s effort. I am not here to say that whatever failures there have been in South Sudan are a result of a failure of effort, initiative and intent on the part of the UK Government, but we always have to ask whether there is more that we could do and whether there are other partners with whom we can engage more actively.

I should mention the work done by the churches, not least the Catholic Church. Ahead of the debate, as well as the very good Library briefing, Members will have received excellent briefings from World Vision and the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development, which works in South Sudan alongside its Irish counterpart, Trócaire, an organisation with which I am very familiar. We have also had important briefings from Amnesty International, Oxfam and others. When considering the role that the churches might play, we first have to show that we have listened to and heard many of the voices inside South Sudan. They have pointed to the scale of the problem and indicated the need for aid; they have also indicated their faith in the efforts of the international community.

We are seeing a deterioration into violence. That violence is being targeted more and more viciously at people who might previously have regarded themselves as safe, so the question arises whether there should be an arms embargo. The all-party group recently held a session at which we were informatively briefed by Dame Rosalind Marsden of Chatham House, who has deep experience of Sudan and South Sudan, as well as by Anna Oosterlinck from the UN panel of experts and Emma Fanning from Oxfam. The question of an arms embargo came up in the course of our discussions, and some people present said, “Well, there’s no point having an arms embargo because that will affect sophisticated arms, whereas people in South Sudan are being killed with machetes and fairly crude weapons.” That is a counsel of irresponsibility.

If the international community is in a position to impose an arms embargo on a situation that is clearly deteriorating, and if the violence involves not only crude traditional weapons but more sophisticated ammunition, then a clear stance has to be taken. The UK Government will say that they have reflected that stance at the UN, but some of these things need much more direct effort and engagement.

The deteriorating humanitarian situation exists in a political context, of course. I have no wish to rehearse the recent political history of South Sudan—the political destabilisation and how the conflict has emerged—but there are obviously questions about how the new Government formation is going to work. Many people have doubts about whether the new vice-president really has the capacity and standing to carry people in the same way as many people would say that, unfortunately, the displaced vice-president might be able to. There are dilemmas and challenges in taking forward the peace process.

Not only are there concerns about the humanitarian situation, with people not having the means of life and a place to live, but we have seen the return of cholera. It is present in nine counties, and it has returned largely because so many people are on the move. Their moving away from home has bought about diseases of that sort. That is an indicator of the further deterioration we are likely to see.

We are also witnessing continued human rights abuses by both the Government and the opposition, with attacks on their own people and violence being visited on civilians—people who would not be identified as combatants or as harbouring combatants in any way, and who should not be considered as such under any normal interpretation of conflict. They have found themselves grossly victimised. Ahead of the debate, Members will have received significant briefings from Amnesty International, which reissued its report from several weeks ago called “We did not believe we would survive”. The report sets out a dire narrative of killings, rape, looting and all sorts of other depredations in Juba, which are now spreading more widely in South Sudan.

I pay tribute not only to those in the all-party group but to other Members who have raised many of the issues I am discussing relating to the violation of human rights, including the hon. Member for Bradford East (Imran Hussain), who will respond to the debate on behalf of the Opposition. They have raised a number of questions, and in fairness, the Government have acknowledge those issues. I stress that I am not here to criticise the Government for just providing commentary on the situation. I know just how difficult the situation is, but there is a danger if we in this House decide that somewhere like South Sudan is in the box marked “Too intractable” or “Just too difficult,” because that would ignore the dire plight of the people there. Not only would that be at the expense of the people of South Sudan, but we would deny support and solidarity to the many people who are trying to help them, whether they are from the international agencies in various arms of the UN or the key international NGOs and charities.

I have acknowledged the shadow Minister; I should also acknowledge the Minister, who recently attended a meeting, sponsored by the all-party group on women, peace and security, which focused specifically on South Sudan and was attended by several charities and campaign groups. Against the backdrop of the unprecedented levels of displacement, security and violence, the meeting highlighted how all that was bearing down on women and girls. We heard evidence on how circumstances for women and girls, which were already dire before 2013, have further deteriorated. One in five pregnant women die in childbirth and one in three pregnant or lactating women are malnourished. Of the children still in school, only 40% are girls. An adolescent girl in South Sudan is three times more likely to die in childbirth than to complete primary school.

Violence against women and girls is widespread—other hon. Members and I have previously debated that topic in this Chamber and elsewhere—particularly intimate partner violence. Rape, sexual assault and exploitation, early and forced marriage and abduction all continue to be reported to humanitarian agencies and other organisations. I am sure the Minister will recall from the meeting he attended that although the assumption when we talk about violence against women and girls in conflict situations is often that active combatants are committing the violence and abuses, it is happening much more widely and nefariously as well.

Initial analysis from the first prevalence study on violence against women and girls in South Sudan shows that in some areas of the country, more than 70% of women have experienced sexual and/or physical intimate partner violence, and one in three women have experienced some form of sexual abuse, which could include rape and transactional sex.

In that situation, when delivering whatever interventions we are part of—either directly or through shared international input—we must ensure that, in our support for conflict resolution and peace building in South Sudan, there is space for women’s participation both in formal conflict prevention and in the ongoing peace process. Of course, that participation is limited at the minute, if it exists at all. We should support people and organisations such as the South Sudan Women’s Peace Network, as well as the churches, as they make the call for at least 25% representation of women in institutional and constitutional reform processes, instead of the marginalisation and neglect that women in South Sudan face at the moment.

We were told back in 2013 that the UK was shifting away from “business as usual” in South Sudan. I do not decry the contribution that the UK has made to peace and development in the country; it has been significant. I pay tribute to DFID for the leadership that it has been able to provide in very difficult circumstances, and for what will hopefully be the UK’s role in helping with peacekeeping operations, including as a member of the troika overseeing South Sudan’s peace process. In addition, as part of the UN’s high-level review of women, peace and security, the UK made eight global commitments on women, peace and security a year ago, many of which apply particularly to South Sudan and should be given real and active application in the country.

However, despite all those commitments and all that intent from the UK Government and others, the sad reality is that “business as usual” persists for women and girls in South Sudan, where the situation has now deteriorated well below even what might be called critical levels. More is needed from the international community to try to achieve some standard of wellbeing, and to try to underpin the safety and protection—and, of course, the empowerment and longer term protection—of women.

I have referred to the fact that a number of organisations that are very familiar with and engaged in South Sudan have issued good briefings. Not all of them have been able to give their name, because many of their operatives are exposed and at risk, which tells us something about the scale of the problem. In fairness, it also shows us that the situation is difficult even for Government and international agency representatives working in that environment; that is all acknowledged.

Nevertheless, when it comes to addressing the humanitarian situation, we should not divorce that from the appalling human rights abuses that have taken place on all sides in South Sudan. The fact that they take place on all sides does not excuse them in any way, and it does not absolve the international community from its duty to try to hold people properly to account for them. The churches in South Sudan are clear that part of the reason for the destabilisation in South Sudan, and part of what has helped to eat at whatever passed for a moral fabric in that nation, is the fact that there was a sense of impunity and a lack of accountability. For people who want to live by good standards and ensure that others can live their life well, those things are hugely difficult and a source of scandal and frustration.

As well as highlighting the position of women and girls, I want to acknowledge the fact that, as we all know is the case in all conflict situations, there is the dire danger of a lost generation being created, as we see the crisis and the humanitarian need worsening. Given the impulse and the imperative to meet that need in the short term, we often forget some of the longer term consequences. I pay tribute to other all-party groups in the House, including the all-party group on global education for all, which has often made the point that education is often neglected in areas of conflict, because it is not seen as requiring first-order humanitarian intervention. Similarly, a former all-party group in a previous Parliament—the all-party group on protecting children in armed conflict, which was led by Fiona O’Donnell—highlighted these issues.

There were some very good points in the briefing that we received from World Vision, which perhaps other hon. Members might want to take up when they speak, about the effort that can and must be made to ensure that there are interventions in the terrible situation that exists in South Sudan to try to ensure that some semblance of an educational opportunity is afforded to children. That is not just about giving them their right to education, which should be a part of a universal right; it is also about helping to create a sense of stability in an area. Education helps to consolidate some sense of community and some fabric of normality in a situation where people are being displaced and then further displaced, where there is more and more fear of violence and, of course, where there are the problems of hunger, which in a country such as South Sudan are complicated by the ravages of climate change.

Having at least the offer of an educational opportunity for children is one of the things that can help to keep people in an area; it can be one of the anchors to build a community. Of course, it is also one of the ways of lowering the risk of children, particularly boys, being lured into the life of child soldiers and being used as agents of conflict, not just suffering as victims of conflict.

I have referred to a number of the briefings that exist. I hope that other hon. Members who will speak after me might be able to give more articulate voice to some of the worthy points in a number of those briefings, and I also look forward to hearing the response from all the Front-Bench spokespersons.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

--- Later in debate ---

[Mark Durkan]

I thank the Minister for replying to so many of the points made by many right hon. and hon. Members. I thank the right hon. Member for Meriden (Dame Caroline Spelman) and the hon. Members for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham), for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge), for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), for Strangford (Jim Shannon), for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady) and for Bradford East (Imran Hussain) for their contributions. They all articulated a number of the issues and factors to do with the existing problems in South Sudan and the possible actions to mitigate some of them in the short and the long term.

The Minister rightly touched on a number of the points that were made, and he acknowledged the problems with UNMISS, as did other hon. Members. I would not wish UNMISS to escape any criticism, but I did not want the debate only to focus on it and its failure.

We must remember that UNMISS failed not only the people of South Sudan but the very good people of the NGOs who had made a commitment there. The hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby mentioned the Terrain hotel incident, which involved NGO people being victimised. We should offer solidarity and sympathy to NGO workers who have had to leave South Sudan, perhaps for their own safety, or who have been evicted more cruelly. It must be hugely frustrating for them, knowing the problems of the country, to be denied the opportunity to add their bit of capacity.

The other people to whom we must of course offer solidarity are the people of South Sudan themselves. Emma Fanning from Oxfam, when she spoke to the APPG, made the point that it is the resilience of the South Sudanese people, in offering solidarity themselves, to which we have to pay tribute.

Motion lapsed (Standing Order No. 10(6)).

Commonwealth Development Corporation Bill

Mark Durkan Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons
Tuesday 29th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con)]

I suspect I am going to have the privilege of serving on the Committee with the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty). I will not go into this at the same length as he did, but he should beware: we are both supporters of DFID and of the 0.7% budget, but our enemies out there will use his comments and his narrative to criticise the fundamentals we believe in. I do not want to stand in the way of proper scrutiny, but hon. Members on both sides of the House should be very careful about the tone of the language we use, because we do now have consensus going forward.

I draw attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests and say from the outset that I am incredibly proud of our 0.7% commitment and of the work that the CDC does. I would find it strange to find any Conservative MP standing to support the work of Clement Attlee and Clare Short in one sentence, let alone one debate, but we do stand united in this work, despite the blips over the years, many of which my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) has resolved or has at least been able to point in the right direction.

My experience of the CDC has been substantive over time. I was a young banker in a small place called Nhlangano, one of the poorest places in Swaziland. It was CDC investment in the Shiselweni Forestry Company, my main client, that really generated wealth for that area. It put food on the table for the thousands of citizens and the hundreds of other clients that I had as a banker in that country. Over the years, Swaziland has been helped by 16 different CDC projects. The one for which I was the banker has now moved on—it is profitable and continuing, but not under a CDC auspice—but the CDC is still in the forestry sector in Pigg’s Peak, Swaziland.

In the Ivory Coast, I was interested in delving into a francophone country, looking beyond the Commonwealth, to see what we were doing in developing middle-income countries that can provide inspiration and trade throughout the geography of west Africa. Although I did not have any clients from the the CDC, I used to work for Banque Atlantique Côte d’Ivoire, now part of the Atlantic Bank Group, in which the CDC has invested. The small bank I was a member of had only about 30 employees. I am not sure exactly what has happened subsequently, but during that investment period that small bank has become much larger, with banks in Benin, Niger, Burkina Faso, Mali, Togo, Senegal and Cameroon. Those countries—a real mix of countries—are hard for British development aid to reach, but are a really good example of where the CDC can assist.

I wish to mention, as other colleagues have, the great work of Diana Noble, who took on the job at a difficult time and who has transformed the organisation and led a very strong team. I wish her well in her future beyond the CDC.

To those who work at the CDC, I say thank you, because in many ways they are between a rock and a hard place. People involved in African private equity feel that those at the CDC are putting development before profit and are not earning lots of money. The non-governmental organisations think that they are putting profit before development. In truth, they are in a sweet spot in the middle, and they do exactly what Clement Attlee wanted: to do good without losing money. In many ways, this is the gift that keeps on giving. Comparison has been made between a pound that goes into traditional aid and a pound that goes into the CDC. The main difference is that the pound that goes into aid is spent immediately, which is very positive, but the pound that goes into the CDC is retained—it is an investment that grows, whether that is by the 7.8% that we have seen over the past five years, or by a slightly more modest investment target of 3%, which focuses more on the development aspect.

As a former banker, I am perhaps the only Member in the House who can get thoroughly excited about compound interest, but, over time, this is a growing pool of money. There are those who will wonder why we are talking about £1.5 billion, when the assets of the CDC are nearly £3.9 billion. That shows the power of investment—of retaining the money. It is the gift that keeps on giving.

I, too, have looked at the investment in palm oil in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where 9,000 workers are employed. I have dealt with places such as the DRC and Burundi—other colleagues have interacted with them—and they are horrendously difficult places in which to work. They are also politically difficult for the UK Government, but the CDC, through its intermediaries, provides inspiration in those places.

The CDC also actively targets countries that are low on the World Bank’s ease of doing business index, of which I am a great advocate, as a way of proving that business can be conducted more effectively if one can speed up the ease of doing business.

Celtel has been mentioned. Indorama in Nigeria is fantastic. Like Sir Paul Collier, I very much believe that the real benefits and advantages of economic development in Nigeria will come through Port Harcourt and not through the oil industry.

This is, to reiterate a point I made in an intervention, a progressive Bill. I do not share the concerns of the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth that it is a Machiavellian way of diverting money. A business case will come. I do not believe that the Secretary of State will bring forward a business case to spend the full £6 billion over the course of this Parliament. Even if she does, it will still only be 8% of the overall DFID budget for those years. Obviously, the £12 billion of investment is compounded over time. It should not be compared with the slightly larger figure, which is our annual investment in the budget. We need to be careful that our enemies do not take advantage of our criticisms and use the similarity of the figures to make it look like there has been a sea-change on this Bill. If this Bill was about taking money from the poor and making money for the sake of it in India and South Africa, I would not support it.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

rose—

[James Duddridge]

I will not take the intervention, because I want to conclude.

I strongly support the CDC. It is the right move and it is a progressive move. I hope that Members from both sides of the House will agree to have a proper debate in Committee and to support the Bill on Third Reading to start to grow Africa in particular but also Asia out of poverty.

Developing Countries: Jobs and Livelihoods

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Wednesday 15th June 2016 Westminster Hall

[Imran Hussain (Bradford East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Moon. I follow other hon. Members in congratulating the Minister on his recent knighthood and elevation. In months to come, we may disagree on many things, but we can agree that there is no question of his commitment and passion to his current role and public service.

I also congratulate the hon. Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy) on securing and introducing this important debate. He has a long-standing commitment and expertise in this area. Indeed, he was present when this important matter was last considered by the Select Committee on International Development. He made some important points in his excellent speech today and emphasised the importance of supporting industries such as construction and agriculture. He also made an important point about young people and putting more emphasis on education and training.

Hon. Members on both sides of the Chamber made passionate and important contributions about ending extreme poverty, at the heart of which is corruption. It is real and must be addressed. It is a major roadblock to economic development around the world.

Hon. Members referred to another important point: the SDG and whether it is over ambitious. I think it is time we were ambitious and aspirational. Unemployment around the world may not be eradicated by 2030, but we can have that vision and I ask the Minister to ensure we thoroughly mark the SDG8 indicators.

Regardless of who someone is and regardless of where they live in the world, a good job can change their life. Decent opportunities and decent wages provide families with shelter, food and security. That not only provides direct benefits for the earner, but their wage gets passed around the community and benefits others. We know this and it presents obvious reasons for helping to create jobs in developing countries. However, around half of the world’s population still lives on roughly $2 a day and the World Bank’s World Development Report 2013 estimated that 200 million people around the world were unemployed and looking for work.

Evidence shows that 600 million new jobs that are needed globally for a growing population and particularly in developing countries, so it is clear that much more needs to be done.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

Should we not recognise that, even when people seem to be outside extreme poverty according to statistics and are earning more money, many are in newly urbanised centres in the developing world? Their income may be above the indicators, but that does not take account of the fact that they are paying crippling rents to live in shanty-town conditions, even though their working environment may be quite modern, and they pay huge costs for water. They may have a livelihood, but their living conditions may not be good.

[Imran Hussain]

The hon. Gentleman makes a pertinent and timely intervention. He is absolutely right: there is strong evidence to suggest that, for many people, employment does not mean they are not living in poverty or even extreme poverty in some cases. The other issue with regard to urban areas, which I raised in an intervention, is urban planning. That is another barrier and we need to give it a lot more thought.

Certain aspects of DFID’s overall record can be commended. For instance, it provided £752 million of bilateral aid directly related to jobs, business and the economy in 2014. However, the figure fluctuated throughout the time of the last Government before the strategic framework for economic development set aside £1.8 billion, so I would be grateful if the Minister gave an assurance that that spending will be maintained following the bilateral aid review. Can he also indicate when we will have the findings of the bilateral aid review or report?

There are also specific areas where I will give credit where credit is due. DFID is regarded as an expert on mid-level private sector development programmes, and I hope it learns from the success in that area and applies it to others. The International Development Committee, whose Chair, my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), is here today, noted that DFID also has excellent examples of work in areas such as public financial management that it should build on.

Nevertheless, I seek clarification from the Minister on a number of areas. First, on SDG 8, can he assure me that the indicators will be thorough when we get them? With regard to private sector development, we welcome work that facilitates the development of sustainable and secure jobs in developing countries, and we recognise that the majority of jobs will be created in the private sector. Indeed, the private sector provides some 90% of jobs in developing countries, according to various reports.

That is not to say that we are supportive of all measures. I have a particular concern about the expertise of staff in DFID working on private sector development—the Independent Commission for Aid Impact found in its May 2014 report that there were gaps in knowledge and experience. I would therefore be grateful if the Minister told me whether progress has been made in addressing the concerns raised by the commission. How many full-time staff in DFID are working on private sector development? How many, if any, are externally contracted staff brought in to advise on private sector development projects? How many staff working on private sector development come from backgrounds of working in the private sector and working on businesses in developing countries? Does DFID make training and mentoring opportunities available to staff working on private sector development, so that they can build their expertise? I appreciate that the Minister may not have all the answers to hand, but I would appreciate a response, even if it is a written one, at some stage.

The final issue I want to raise is working conditions. We cannot overlook the potential influence that DFID has in helping to reform labour practices and working conditions in developing countries, so I would like assurances from the Minister that any aid or assistance provided by DFID or other Departments to foreign states or businesses is provided only with assurances that they abide by working standards.

Foreign Aid Expenditure

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Monday 13th June 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

I apologise for missing the opening contribution of the hon. Member for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double) owing to a flight delay.

Like others, I am here because I have been contacted by a number of constituents, most of whom support the 0.7% commitment for many of the reasons that hon. Members have given. Indeed, Foyle is the constituency where the sixth fewest people have signed the petition. In fact, of the constituencies with MPs who take their seats here, only the two small island constituencies represented by the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) and the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil) have had fewer signatories to the petition. That is because the city of Derry has always had an outward-looking approach, and the diocese of Derry has always made the highest per capita contribution to the annual Lenten collections for Trócaire, the Irish equivalent of the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development. People support the 0.7% contribution not just because, after many years, it is about time that we finally stepped up to meet that long-standing commitment, but because they know that such a commitment will, of itself, be transformative. Aid should not just be transactional; it should be transformational.

The petition talks instead about taking action on a case-by-case basis. If we were to reduce aid by doing that, the situation would be impossible; the problems would far outstrip the solutions. There is a gear change that results from the sort of commitment that the UK has made—we would see that if we could get more Governments to follow the UK’s excellent example—as we have seen in recent years with the commitment to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, which has made a big difference.

Big differences have also been made on education; 20 years ago, one in 10 children died before they reached the age of five, and now that is down to one in 20. Of course, not only are more children reaching the age of five and going to school, but there are more schools for them. We need to do more. We should not be content to get more children, particularly girls, into education; we should move on to guaranteeing them 12 years of education. In responding to humanitarian crises, we should think about education, which is often one of the last things to be thought about because of all the other pressures and crises. Front-loaded commitments to a healthy level of predictable and sustainable aid can ensure that we make our commitment to the sustainable development goals meaningful. We cannot meet our goals through intermittent top-ups. The sustainable development goals need sustained aid at 0.7%.

Violence against Women and Girls (Sustainable Development Goals)

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Wednesday 27th April 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered violence against women and girls and the Sustainable Development Goals.

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Owen, on this fine crisp morning. I do not need to rehearse to many Members in the Chamber the importance of the sustainable development goals. Many Members and the Minister and his Department have worked hard on refining and developing the goals. Goal 5 is to

“Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls”.

That is the most important goal in our efforts to combat violence against women and girls. A number of targets flow from it, directly addressing the issue. In particular, the second target under goal 5 is to

“Eliminate all forms of violence against all women and girls in the public and private spheres, including trafficking and sexual and other types of exploitation”.

The third target is to

“Eliminate all harmful practices, such as child, early and forced marriage and female genital mutilation”.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

May I suggest that we add breast ironing to that list of harmful practices? People do not know much about it, but it tries to damage the young breast to stop it developing because of a misconception that the child will then not go through puberty and develop. It is incredibly destructive. People do not know about it, in the same way that we did not know about FGM.

[Mark Durkan]

I thank the hon. Lady for that point. So much work has been done under the sustainable development goals. We have a target that gives examples, and we now have awareness of other things that might well have been included as examples, such as breast ironing. Her point proves that the sustainable development goals should not be seen as frozen in cold print on the page. They are meant to be an ongoing, changing, ever-improving and ever-strengthening commitment on all our parts. Remember, they are universal goals. That is one reason why we need to demarcate the sustainable development goals from the millennium development goals in terms of their universality. We want to see the infrastructure of commitment, investment and intervention underpinning the sustainable development goals.

The Minister will face many questions and hear many suggestions in this debate on assurances that he can give on behalf of the Department for International Development and the Government more widely. He is responding on behalf of DFID, but the universal goals are not just about what happens in other countries. We should be supporting and helping to foster those goals, but the goals also involve commitments and standards in our countries and jurisdictions. That is not just the responsibility of Ministers and all of us who serve in this House, but people at other levels, including devolved levels.

[Dr Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab)]

I completely agree with the hon. Gentleman’s point that this is not just a DFID issue. These things happen in this country every day. The pressure group End Violence Against Women has pointed out that 146,000 domestic violence incidents were recorded in London in 2015. There were 5,500 rapes, 300 cases of forced marriage and honour-based violence and thousands of prostitution cases. Specialist support services for all those things are being cut. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that we need to be looking at the issue at home, too?

[Mark Durkan]

Absolutely. The issues do not just happen elsewhere; they happen here, and we need to fully understand that. We also need to understand the range of interventions and support required not only to raise awareness and improve behavioural standards and expectations, but to respond better to violence against women and girls where it happens. We need to ensure that women and girls feel more empowered, more enabled, much better supported and truly vindicated and justified when they come forward to report and to tell. We have to give them that comfort and confidence.

There are huge issues that we need to address, and that is why the universality of the goals can be so important. It allows Governments and Parliaments in the developed world to make it clear to our colleagues in the developing world that this is not just about us saying that they have to catch up with us; we, too, are on a page of learning and a journey of understanding in our awareness of the issues. In that context, I acknowledge the range of briefings we have received from many different charities, non-governmental organisations and campaign groups.

I am sure many Members will have questions for the Minister, but we have to ask questions as parliamentarians about how we do our bit to ensure meaningful coherence around the range of sustainable development goals and their interpretation and application. We also need to ensure better adherence in their implementation and realisation. We therfore have to ask not only how Government will provide joined-up management and oversight of the issues, but how we as a Parliament can get better at providing joined-up scrutiny of and support for such initiatives and investments.

It will not be enough for us just to say, “The International Development Committee will be able to oversee all these things, and we are leaving domestic and sexual violence at home to the Home Affairs Committee and the Justice Committee.” We need to think about something more bespoke and dedicated. We need to recognise that though some of the goals and targets will be amenable to particular scrutiny and oversight by respective Select Committees, others will fall in the shadows between Select Committees and perhaps need a more dedicated audit mechanism to pick them up.

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab)]

My helpful advice to the hon. Gentleman is that leaving anything to the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice will leave enormous gaps, because domestic violence and sexual violence commissioning are almost exclusively done by local government and devolved authorities. I suggest we call on the Minister to look for something that will tie everything together and not just leave domestic violence in its silos.

[Mark Durkan]

I am sure that the Minister will have heard that call and will ensure that others hear that call, but there are questions for us at a parliamentary level on what we do to ensure real parliamentary tracking and backing of what is happening with the goals, particularly with the vexed, serious and sometimes invisible issue of violence against women and girls.

I called this debate in response to a long lobbying campaign by ActionAid. I am just one of many MPs who responded to that fearless campaign by applying for this debate. I acknowledge the work of ActionAid and all its supporters in campaigning and the quality of the briefing it provided to us. I hope I can leave it to other Members to pick up on that in their contributions.

[Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. Will he join me in condemning the state-sanctioned violence against women and girls in North Korea? Technically, that country joined in support of the SDGs last autumn, but it operates violence against women and girls as a tool of oppression. Even the UN has described it in a report as having human rights violations that

“reveal a State that does not have any parallel in the contemporary world”.

Those violations include sexual violence; exploitation; rape; forced abortion; human trafficking; institutional, economic and psychological violence; slavery; and torture, even until death. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the UK must use what limited engagement it has with North Korea—it is mainly via the Foreign and Commonwealth Office—to press for change? Also, will he join with me and other parliamentarians in putting on the record that the abused women of North Korea are not forgotten here?

[Mark Durkan]

Yes to all those points and questions. That is not to belittle or trivialise the seriousness of them, but as the chair of the all-party group for Sudan and South Sudan I want to address other countries’ specific issues.

I mentioned that we have received a strong briefing from ActionAid, and it has been working with Womankind Worldwide. The Minister will know everything that ActionAid is arguing for in respect of how we take forward the goal and the targets, including its work with Womankind Worldwide in advocating for a voice, choice and control fund. He knows the main argument: such a fund would take an integrated approach that would address the structural causes of gender inequality, giving women’s rights organisations the support that they need to lead the transformation of societies and economies towards an enabling environment, so that women can realise their full potential and enjoy their whole spectrum of rights.

A second objective would be to increase the quality of funding available to organisations and movements, including those led by adolescent girls, women with disabilities and LGBTI groups.

[Dr Philippa Whitford]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way again. Does he agree that, from the developmental point of view, putting more of our effort and money into helping girls and women strengthens the whole community?

[Mark Durkan]

Yes, it is one of the best ways of fulfilling the “leave no one behind” principle. Investments and interventions to support women and girls would be one of the best multiplier contributions that could be made towards fulfilling not only those targets and objectives, but others as well. The enablement and empowerment that comes with advancing the position of women and girls, allowing them to counter the ravages of sexual and other violence, would be one of the most transformative things. So if we want a real change multiplier in any society, we must address the position of women and girls. Our own history and social experience demonstrate that.

[Mrs Helen Grant (Maidstone and The Weald) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Foyle on securing this important debate. Women and girls are rightly at the forefront and at the heart of DFID’s activities. I commend the Secretary of State at DFID for fighting so hard in the face of real opposition to achieve stand-alone goal 5, which is a gender equality and empowerment goal that is very important indeed. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that if the goals are to be achieved, including goal 5, we have to turn billions into trillions in development finance? For that to happen, we have to do much more work with the private sector.

[Mark Durkan]

I fully accept what the hon. Lady has said. Again, that raises the question of our long-term commitment. It is great that we are able to celebrate the sustainable development goals, but we have to plan for what will be achieved by them. Making commitments is important, but making the commitments work well and developing them and growing them is even more important, and that is what we need to do.

I want to acknowledge the briefings that we have received; I hope that other hon. Members will be able to do more justice to them than I can in the time that I want to take—and the time I do not want to take—in this opening speech. We have received an important contribution from UNICEF, which has done so much in terms of the sustainable development goals and on the whole question of violence in all its forms as it affects children, particularly girls. I say that as a parliamentary champion of UNICEF.

We have also had important briefings from Christian Aid and Amnesty International. I hope other hon. Members will be able to take up some of the asks suggested in those briefings to ask the Minister about how DFID will pursue these goals alongside the others. Similarly, we have a useful contribution from the Bond SDG group, which raises the question of the parliamentary commitment to oversight of the goals, rather than simply the governmental commitment.

I told the hon. Member for Congleton that I had a country-specific issue of my own to raise as the chair of the all-party group on Sudan and South Sudan.

[Lady Hermon (North Down) (Ind)]

Before the hon. Gentleman moves on to Sudan, may I take him across the world to Afghanistan? British troops made an enormous sacrifice in terms of lives lost in Afghanistan, but they also made a tremendous contribution to rebuilding schools for girls and women teachers to avoid the violence that had been meted out to them by the Taliban and others. Is the hon. Gentleman able to update us on the status of women and girls in terms of education in Afghanistan post the withdrawal of British troops?

[Mark Durkan]

I am not in a position to speak authoritatively on that, but I am sure the Minister will be able to answer those points. The hon. Member for North Down has drawn attention to the issue of education and schools, an issue that the all-party group on protecting children in armed conflict, which existed in the previous Parliament, addressed. In the context of conflict and humanitarian crises, education was not always to the forefront in the immediate interventions that were planned, and DFID acknowledged that it was not so much a lower order but a later order consideration in its response to crisis and emergencies.

The points in the report, which were well supported by the charity War Child when the APPG was chaired by Fiona O’Donnell, are being taken forward now in the APPG on global education for all, working with the Global Campaign for Education. The urgency of delivering children’s right to education during crisis is highlighted in the report, “Education cannot wait”. One of the points emphasised is that education investment in schools in conflict and post-conflict situations is good because it helps to save boys from falling prey to being recruited as child soldiers and then being corrupted into engagement in violence against women and girls. It also gives girls the opportunity of education and the transformative empowerment that that gives them.

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that in order to ensure that girls can be taught safely in Afghanistan, security is absolutely key? Will he urge the Minister to look at the situation in the federally administered tribal areas of Pakistan, the buffer zone between Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the Pakistani army is keeping the peace, but no one is sure for how long? Can we urge DFID to look into that?

[Mark Durkan]

I am happy to be a conduit to the Minister on that point. I know he understands that when any of us make points in such debates, we do so on the basis of urging rather than begrudging the very good efforts that have already been made by Government. We are urging the Government because they have earned the position of leading positively on various issues internationally.

As chair of the APPG on Sudan and South Sudan, I am conscious of the report by the charity Waging Peace last November: “Rape in Darfur—A History of Predation”. It had nine key recommendations and some telling observations. If I may advertise, hon. Members can sign early-day motion 903, which takes points from the report, before the end of this Session.

Waging Peace stated:

“Our testimonies indicate that in Darfur the measure that works best at preventing sexual violence is the physical protection offered by the region’s...United Nations-African Union peacekeeping mission, UNAMID...However, it is in the immediate vicinity of the UNAMID-controlled compounds that our testimonies indicate that the worst abuses occur. Almost two-thirds of the victims report being raped upon leaving the relative safety of UNAMID-controlled zones: either to collect firewood, perform agricultural work while living in temporary accommodation near farms, or to collect personal belongings immediately following a displacement. The similarity in the accounts provided in the testimonies suggests that such attacks...have become routine.”

In the context of UNAMID, it goes on to suggest community liaison assistants on a model similar to that in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The criticism of what is happening near UNAMID’s location is supported by a former spokesperson for the African Union-UN mission in Darfur, Aicha Elbasri, who has effectively turned whistleblower. She says,

“Victims of rape, systematic rape and mass rape in Darfur suffer in silence, as the use of these horrible crimes as weapons of war no longer commands international attention. But brutal attacks on the bodies and souls of women and girls continue unabated, and may have worsened in the absence of public scrutiny.”

Reports by Waging Peace go some way to redressing the balance.

I want to draw particular attention to the law in Sudan and the issue of zina, which really affects victims there. Waging Peace says:

“While we recognise that international pressure contributed to the Sudanese government amending controversial laws around rape in early 2015, the changes did not go far enough. Formerly, under Article 149 of the Sudanese Criminal Code of 1991, rape was defined as ‘zina’, meaning intercourse outside marriage, without consent. If women or girls reported a rape but could not produce the necessary evidence, including witness statements from four males confirming that the act was ‘without consent’, they would instead be charged with ‘zina’ (adultery), and face being jailed, flogged or stoned to death. The law was changed in 2015 to reflect the fact that rape involves physical or psychological coercion, but Article 62 of the country’s 1994 Evidence Act remains unchanged, meaning four male witnesses are still required in cases of this kind. This places a prohibitive burden of proof on victims of sexual violence.”

It also means that victims still fear that they, not their attackers, will be punished if they reveal what has happened to them. In the context of the renewal of dialogue between the UK and Sudan and with Governments being invited to be involved in the wider Khartoum process, as it is known, there are issues that must be addressed.

If you will allow me, Mr Owen, I want to put in a further plug. One of the key reporters of the mass rape of girls in Darfur is Eric Reeves, who will meet the all-party group on Sudan and South Sudan on 7 June, I think—certainly that week. He has called the continuing mass rape of girls in Darfur the “most heinous crime” that “generates no international outrage”. I hope that we can reflect some of that outrage.

The problem does not exist only in Sudan. A recent report by the Humanitarian Aid Relief Trust—HART—addresses the issues in South Sudan. It says:

“Some 185,000 internally displaced people (IDPs) have sought refuge in UN Protection of Civilians (PoC) sites, while around 90 per cent of IDPs are on the run or sheltering outside PoC sites…Nearly one in every three schools in South Sudan has been destroyed, damaged, occupied or closed, impacting on the education of more than 900,000 children, including some 350,000 who have been forced out of school by the conflict.”

Elsewhere in the report is the observation:

“An adolescent girl in South Sudan is three times more likely to die in childbirth than complete primary school.”

[Dr Lisa Cameron (East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow) (SNP)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this extremely important debate. Does he agree that it is really important that we obtain disaggregated data on young women and girls with disability? They are doubly at risk because of their vulnerability to violence and sexual violence and because they could be left behind.

[Mark Durkan]

I fully concur with the hon. Lady. Her point echoes one made in a previous Westminster Hall debate. The issue is not only girls with disabilities, but indigenous people and others who might be marginalised in their society.

I want to read out one more quote from the HART report:

“The overall death toll is unknown. In Leer, Mayendit and Koch counties of Unity State alone, an estimated 1,000 civilians were killed, 1,300 women and girls were raped and 1,600 women and children were abducted from April to September 2015.”

That was not so long ago. The report is aptly titled “They are killing us loudly, but no one is listening”. This debate is an opportunity for us to show that we are listening, and hopefully we will be able to show how we will follow through on the commitments and targets in goal 5.

We must show that we are not just listening but working effectively in support of those women and girls who are confronted by violence and those who are trying to be advocates for them. Let us remember that in many areas women who are active human rights and women’s rights defenders are particularly targeted. Violence and sexual violence are used against them in so many countries. I am sure that other Members will address some of those points in their contributions.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

--- Later in debate ---

[Mark Durkan]

I thank everyone who has spoken. We have heard about the issue from so many different angles and with so many different accents. That is hugely important. As others have said, we need to take the matter further and to debate it for longer. Our task is to keep narrowing the gap between what is and what ought to be until we close it and eradicate it.

Motion lapsed (Standing Order No. 10(6)).

Sustainable Development Goals

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Wednesday 13th April 2016 Westminster Hall

[Dr Cameron]

I agree entirely. It is key that we show leadership in this area, in which we historically have very good ability and understanding, and we can certainly lend our expertise to the rest of the world, including developing countries.

Data must be gathered from various sources. For example, if they exist at all, governmental data on child marriage are linked to the legality of child marriage. In countries where child marriage is illegal but still exists, such marriages are often not conducted in registered settings; they are cultural ceremonies and therefore unrecorded. People know that they are happening, but they are excluded from the data. We must therefore collect accurate data. Governmental data may not themselves be accurate. Household survey data are required, as are data from technologies such as mobile phones, imaging and other sources, to make sure that the data are accurate, particularly for people—such as women—who may feel too vulnerable to provide accurate data to governmental agencies that are collecting such data. Will the Minister comment on the support that DFID is providing for data collection, and the use of technology in that collection, and the methods it uses to verify statistics, so that it does not just accept them at face value?

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

There is also the issue of the disaggregation of data. In terms of what the targets are—leaving no one behind—the data need to be articulate and specific, not least for groups that could easily be overlooked, such as ethnic minorities and indigenous peoples. The way in which DFID deals with its own statistics is hugely important.

[Dr Cameron]

I thank the hon. Gentleman. He shows his expertise in the area. Disaggregated data will be crucial in our understanding of whether we meet indicators.

Before I finish I will speak of another particularly important part of the implementation—the “leave no one behind” agenda. As a member of the International Development Committee, I have been fortunate to visit a number of developing countries, and I must say that I have visited few projects that reach out and undertake interventions for people with disabilities. Many of those people continue to be left behind and marginalised, and are missing from the programmes that I have visited. Do we have data on their numbers? The data may vary across countries. What are we doing to ensure that people with disabilities are not continually left behind, and to ensure that we do not think we are doing enough because we are simply not reaching out and noticing that they are there? That should be integral to DFID’s programmes.

Summing up, because I am aware of the time and want the Minister to be able to respond, the SDGs are a welcome step forward. Their implementation is complex and requires funding, although I agree with other hon. Members that there should be investment, so that it is a partnership. Data collection and verification will be key, but what a worthwhile aim it is to make sure that we implement the sustainable development goals, and that the most vulnerable people across our world are no longer left behind.

Ebola: Sierra Leone

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Tuesday 19th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

My hon. Friend makes his points extremely well, and the role of the diaspora and the links that people naturally have with Sierra Leone are critical. I remember meetings that I held with the diaspora in this country to ensure open lines of communication between the work being done by DFID and the Foreign Office, and that done by people on the ground. He speaks about the need and hope that Sierra Leone will bounce back from what it has been through. It was a terrible, terrible outbreak, and I visited three times in a short period. Only on my third visit did I feel that I got to see some of the country and its spirit, because the first two times were so embedded in crisis that it was really a different place.

Before this crisis hit, Sierra Leone was one of the fastest growing economies in the world, and our hope and ambition must be that it will now bounce back. The challenge is to bring the same urgency as we saw in the response to Ebola to the rest of that country’s development. We saw in that response that when we work together and there is a country-owned strategy, and when all different stakeholders pull in the same direction—when there is the political will—we can cover a lot of ground quickly. That has much broader lessons for development progress internationally, and we will try to ensure that that momentum is kept up in Sierra Leone, even though the outbreak is steadily being eradicated.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

Further to that welcome point, will the Secretary of State ensure that support for resilience will involve not just support for the infrastructure of a fragile healthcare system that clearly needs such support but support for village development committees in Sierra Leone? They have proved themselves to be an effective and important network of mobilisation, and their capacity will be relevant to other challenges, including those diseases that lost priority during the Ebola crisis.

[Justine Greening]

The hon. Gentleman mentions a number of different but related points, and the work that happened at community level proved pivotal in enabling us to tackle Ebola, both by steadily ensuring that victims of Ebola were buried safely and did not pass the virus on, and by improving surveillance. Surveillance is now a key plank of ensuring that no other case of Ebola romps away in the way it did when it took hold in 2014. There is a lot more work to be done, and improving district and community level healthcare is vital. Indeed, the lack of a strong district and community level healthcare system enabled the virus to take hold—I spoke about the legacy of Ebola, and if we were able to put one thing in place, it was good command and control that went from the Ministry of Health and the President right down to the most remote communities. That was put in place to deal with the crisis, but as a structure it can help us to drive improvements in community healthcare, and to build on the back of that framework to improve health more generally in Sierra Leone.

Oral Answers to Questions

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Wednesday 28th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I do agree. John from Weaver Vale has demonstrated more sense in his email than the Leader of the Opposition did in at least six of his questions. The point is that not only have we seen an economy that is growing—2 million more people in work—inflation that is low and living standards that are rising, but there are 680,000 fewer workless households and 480,000 fewer children in workless households. If we want to measure the real difference that the growth in our economy is making, think of those children, those households and the dignity of work.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

Q12. Last weekend was the first anniversary of the death from cervical cancer of Derry girl Sorcha Glenn, aged 23. In June 2013, she had been concerned enough to ask for an early smear test, but was refused because she was under 25. As Team Sorcha, which highlights other cases, her family has now written an open letter to the Prime Minister. May I ask him not to offer here a reflex repeat of the rationale for current screening age policy, but to reflect on the questions raised about how that translates into refusing smear tests to young women such as Sorcha, and to consider the age-related data since the screening age was increased in 2004?

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Gentleman raises an absolutely tragic case, and our thoughts go out to the family and friends involved. He raises an important case, because the UK National Screening Committee set the age at 25. My understanding is that that was not a resources-based decision. The reason was to do with the potential perverse medical consequences of carrying out screening routinely below that age. It is felt that there could potentially be a number of false positives because of the anatomical changes that go on at that age. As he says though, the matter is worth considering, as there are people who fear that they have family history and who ask for a test. I will certainly write to him on that specific issue.

Tropical Diseases

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Tuesday 27th October 2015 Westminster Hall

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this morning, Mr Davies. Like others, I commend the hon. Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy) on securing this debate and on the helpful way in which he set out the terms of the debate, which was helpful not least because, as the hon. Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) said, he covered all the technical terms and jargon, meaning that none of the rest of us has to go over those hurdles. I also pay tribute to the hon. Member for Stafford for his steadfast and sterling work as the chairman of the all-party parliamentary group on malaria and neglected tropical diseases. I try to attend the group’s meetings as often as I can, and I appreciate not only the quality of his work, but the calibre of the evidence and engagement that is brought to the group, which powerfully demonstrates the range of commitment of a number of charities and campaign groups. We have also heard directly from companies, not only about the quality of the work and their research, but about the commitment that they have been prepared to make on things such as price sensitivity. We have also been able to see and hear how important the work of DFID is and about its various partners in the NGO sector, and internationally and multilaterally.

The rate of progress and advance highlighted by the hon. Member for Stafford in his introduction in many ways proves the power of marshalled will when we have multilateral actions and well defined global goals. For some it is fashionable to knock such initiatives, but seeing real success against declared goals should incentivise us to do more and to go further. As the hon. Gentleman said, when we might still be looking at 450,000 or more children dying from malaria and neglected tropical diseases, we clearly need to do more.

This is a time for renewed commitment, rather than complacency about the challenges. Tackling malaria and neglected tropical diseases will be key to achieving the sustainable development goals, especially the health goal, the realisation of universal health coverage and the reduction in maternal and child mortality. Achievement of the global malaria targets by 2030 will mean more than 10 million lives saved, giving all that added productivity, releasing all that quality of life and increasing economic activity.

The UK should be seen to be prioritising sustainable development goal 3. We should therefore sustain and, I hope, increase the annual investment—£536 million at present—to achieve malaria elimination. The UK’s malaria and reproductive health framework for results will run out this year, so we need a renewed vision and a new plan for the UK’s contribution to global efforts towards elimination.

DFID has the credibility, so it should be seen to ensure that SDG 3 is more articulate about neglected tropical diseases by using its own working indicator on the number of people requiring interventions against neglected tropical diseases by 2030. Furthermore, we should heed the caution of the hon. Gentleman about silo approaches, which are understandable in the face of so many difficult challenges and so many pressures, but it is vital that we do not miss the opportunity to use disease-specific vertical programmes for other diseases and other health challenges to contribute towards the defeat of other diseases. It is therefore important for the UK to continue to fund bilateral, disease-specific programmes if we are to sustain the gains that have been made.

There has already been some discussion of “elimination” or “eradication”. It is important whether we use and how we qualify such terms and the differences between them. The goal is, in essence, one of emancipation. When we achieve elimination or eradication, we will have conquered a disease, with all the ravages that it can bring, including death, disability or diverting the life opportunities of those who have to care for the sufferers—women and children in poor countries are affected in particular. At the same time we will need to remember that malaria and neglected tropical diseases are not only a face of poverty, but a force for poverty, not least in their impact on women and children.

We need to see the whole effort as one of emancipation, creating alternatives for people—not only lives no longer lost, but lives that can be better lived and more fulfillingly expressed through economic contribution and in public life. That is why it is so timely that the hon. Member for Stafford has secured the debate and that is why it is so important that we encourage the Minister and everyone he works with in DFID to do everything that they can.

[Geraint Davies (in the Chair)]

I was hoping to get two speakers in before 10.30 am, but I know that will be rather difficult.

Humanitarian Crisis in the Mediterranean and Europe

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Wednesday 9th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Gareth Johnson]

I would argue that if we send out a green light to people by saying that if they come over to mainland Europe, they will find sanctuary, there is a huge danger that we will inadvertently encourage people to make the perilous journey that has cost so many lives. It is clear that if we suggest to people that all will be well if they come over the Mediterranean to mainland Europe, it will encourage more people to take the journey and hundreds more people will die in the boats, as has happened before.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

Does the hon. Gentleman not accept that that was exactly the catastrophic rationale that lay at the heart of the decision in autumn 2014 to suspend Mare Nostrum? That decision was taken on the basis that rescuing people was encouraging more people on to the seas. The decision to suspend Mare Nostrum exacerbated the problem and cost many, many lives, and the folly that he is stating will do the same.

[Gareth Johnson]

I have to disagree with the hon. Gentleman. There will not be a long-term solution to this problem until we sort out the problems that Syria faces within Syria. If we ensure that there is a safe place to live there, the necessity to make the dangerous journey will go away. That is the positive way forward.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)]

It is good to speak in this important debate. I listened carefully to the contribution from the hon. Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) and the remarks that he made about whether numbers matter. Of course, it is not numbers that matter, but need. If some of us are exasperated about numbers, it is because the Government are not doing enough and we are trying to encourage them in that direction.

I want to send out a message from this House that I hope everyone will agree with. It was a fine innovation when we decided that it would not just be for the Government to dictate our agenda, but for the public. Hundreds of thousands of people have signed e-petitions and the House has listened and put the issues that matter onto our agenda. One of those issues is one that the British people care about not for their own sakes, but for the sake of others. It is testimony to everybody who bothered to sign the petition that they are changing politics today.

One of the great moral puzzles is working out what we owe to others who are far away—who are not of our own family but of someone else’s family far away—and the Secretary of State answered that question in her contribution. She has met refugees and she told us about them. She has met people who have fled Syria, and she told us what she had heard from them. I ask whether anyone can hear those stories, or the contributions from the hon. Members for Glasgow North East (Anne McLaughlin) and for Oxford West and Abingdon (Nicola Blackwood), and not wonder if we can do a little more.

When we meet people, we realise they are just like us. I want to read out the words of Hassan, who is 14 and from Syria. He said:

“The children in Syria need help. They need help because they are being tortured, shelled, shot at. They take children and put them in front of them. They create a human shield of children. They know that the people in the town will not shoot their own children. I saw this with my own eyes.

I want children in Syria to escape. They should run away so they don’t die in the shelling.

What do I remember of Syria? I remember that whenever shelling took place we ran to a shelter. Inside, children shouted and wept a lot, they were so afraid. I remember that so many children were being tortured.

Because of what is happening in Syria we don’t play any more. I miss my house. I miss my neighbourhood. I miss playing football.”

Football, the universal language. The more we find out about the refugees, the more we realise that we are just like them, and that is why we need to help them.

The problem is that progress feels painfully slow. Back in 2014, we had a debate about whether the Government should join the UN resettlement scheme. The Government said that they would not join it, and in the end they came up with their own scheme. As Member after Member has said, that scheme has taken insufficient numbers. My right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) mentioned the debate I held about refugees. In June, I asked the Prime Minister whether he felt that we were doing enough to help vulnerable children from Syria. In his words, he said that he was “convinced that we are”. It took the events in August to make him realise how wrong he was. Forgive me, Madam Deputy Speaker, if I am a little bit infuriated at times at such very slow progress.

I want to make two brief points and then say a final word. First, I know that the Government are capable of listening. The Secretary of State for International Development has listened and, as evidence has come before her, she has changed her position. She is a reasonable person who has done the right thing. I know that Ministers are prepared to do the right thing, so I say this to them. Let us be a part of Europe. Let us see what is happening on the southern coast of our continent, in Greece and in Italy, and say to the people there, “We stand with you. We know that you cannot deal with this alone.” Let us in this House listen to Matteo Renzi’s call to be a part of Europe and to demonstrate our European values by saying that we believe in freedom, tolerance and respect, as well as a place to live and a decent life for each and every person. Let us show some leadership. My right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East, the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, said that leadership has been lacking. Let us change that, because the rest of Europe is crying out for the UK to play a role, in part by offering sanctuary to some of the people who, perhaps in exceptional circumstances, are already in Europe.

[Mark Durkan]

My hon. Friend may recall that she questioned the Prime Minister in October 2013, following the EU Council, on precisely these issues in the Mediterranean. At that time, the Prime Minister told her that

“we should try to avoid the sense that there are…front-line states…that are under particular pressure.”—[Official Report, 28 October 2013; Vol. 569, c. 664.]

He went on to use Hungary as a comparator to show that the UK was taking its fair share of the burden.

[Alison McGovern]

In this debate, several hon. Members have reminded me of my previous contributions, and I thank them for doing so. I will not shut up about this because these people matter. In response to what we said in 2013, 2014 and this year, the Government have demonstrated that they have the capacity to change their mind. All I ask is that they show what sensible, reasonable people they are and change their mind again.

We need to play such a role in Europe. We need to demonstrate—whether in exceptional circumstances, or under whatever definition we set—that we are prepared to help our friends in Europe. The UK needs to be

“a piece of the Continent, a part of the main”,

as John Donne, one of our country’s finest poets, said.

Secondly, we need truly to respond in policy terms to the outpouring of good will towards refugees and victims of the conflict in Syria. Never mind the numbers; let us show that we have heard what the people of Britain think and take refugees out of the migration target. I think that the Government have failed on their migration target, which was ill-conceived for loads of reasons to do with the place of universities in our economy and the needs of great businesses, such as Unilever in my patch. It was a bad idea, but they are the Government and they have a right to do it. What they do not have the right to do is to say that we should decide whether we are living up to our duty towards the people coming to our country needing our help and needing sanctuary on the basis of some arbitrary statistical target that they have set for themselves in the heat of an election.

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[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

I sat through the debates yesterday and today and want to address a number of the points that have come up rather than just rely on some of the helpful and poignant briefings we have received from so many people.

One of the first things I want to do is acknowledge the tenor and content of the speech made by the hon. Member for Moray (Angus Robertson) as well as the scope of the motion. Contrary to the attempts by the hon. Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) and others to misrepresent it, people need to recognise that the motion clearly listened to the points that many Government Members made in yesterday’s debate, when they said that in all the focus on the refugee crisis as it is manifesting itself in Europe we should not forget the refugee crisis in the camps in some of the countries surrounding Syria or the significant commitment that the Government are making to the efforts to support people affected by conflict in Syria and elsewhere. The motion clearly does that. It attempts to achieve consensus on some of those concerns and on the valid points made by Government Members yesterday.

The most questionable point made by the hon. Member for Gloucester was when he complained that the motion

“calls for a Government report to be laid before the House by 12 October 2015 detailing how that number can be increased”

and stopped there. He forgot to say that the motion continues:

“encompassing refugees already in Europe and including a plan for the remainder of this year to reflect the overwhelming urgency of this humanitarian crisis”.

That is the point. If those of us who have signed the motion had been saying that we wanted to see refugees who are already in Europe admitted as part of the 20,000 the Government are looking to admit over the next few years, Government Members would say that we were trying to deny people in the camps the opportunity to be part of that number. Our concern is not that people who are in the camps should not be admitted—we welcome the Government’s interest, although again we would welcome an increase in the numbers—but that we cannot ignore those who are already in Europe. It was the overtone of disqualification in the Prime Minister’s statement the other day that particularly concerned me.

In the debate yesterday and today, many hon. Members touched on what prompted so many of our constituents to mobilise and get in touch with us. A little over a week after the media were full of the photographs of the Prime Minister on a beach in Cornwall, a different beach photograph emerged in the media. It brought out those words of Seamus Heaney about something having the ability to

“catch the heart off guard and blow it open.”

That is what that photograph of Alan Kurdi did.

We heard the response from so many of our constituents and we know what the response has been internationally, but let us be clear. That photograph stirred our constituents and in turn seemed to spur the Prime Minister into altering his tone, but let us think about another Alan who might arrive on a beach or somewhere else in Europe, having survived his perilous journey, but alone and unaccompanied. What is the message in the Government’s response to that Alan? “He is disqualified. He is outside our consideration.” We even heard from the Prime Minister today that, yes, we do have to take care as to what we do with unaccompanied children and how we treat them, but being careful is no reason not to show them care and consideration, which appears to be the Government’s position. That needs to be revised, improved and altered.

I welcome the fact that the Prime Minister has had his attitudes to this long-running problem reconditioned. Remember, he was one of the leaders at the EU Council who went along with the idea that Operation Mare Nostrum was somehow encouraging people on to the seas. The line back then in autumn 2013 was, “If we run rescue operations, we will only be encouraging more people on to the seas.” At least now, thankfully, we have the Royal Navy, the Irish navy and others helping to rescue, but it took the disasters of April this year to force that rethink. The same caution from the Government Benches that we have heard in the past two days—that we have to be careful not to encourage people to make those perilous journeys—was exactly what was behind the disastrous decision in relation to Operation Mare Nostrum, which did nothing to discourage the perilous journeys and meant that people were not saved and too many lives were lost.

[Mr MacNeil]

The perilous journeys would, of course, be ended if people could fly. Sadly, they cannot because an EU aviation directive prevents that, which means that at four times the cost they are taking those perilous journeys.

[Mark Durkan]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for making that point, which is correct. We know from Amnesty and others that a cogent case has been made in relation to a number of deficiencies in the Schengen agreement and the Dublin regulation, which clearly need to be overhauled in the light of recent events.

I agree with so many Government Members on a number of points that they have made, not least the hon. and learned Member for South East Cambridgeshire (Lucy Frazer) and the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Nicola Blackwood). We need to recognise the scale of the whole humanitarian crisis and not concentrate just on those who are arriving in Europe. We have to meet our responsibilities in relation to those who have made it to Europe and in relation to the wider crisis.

The Secretary of State for International Development spoke of her concern not only that other countries were not matching the 0.7% aid target, but that there was a significant shortfall in so many relevant UN appeals. Some of us would say that one of the ways to deal with that is through a global financial transaction tax. Part of the aim of those of us who have supported that idea is precisely to support funding for the sort of international mechanisms and measures that are needed, rather than different UN funds having to busk around different countries trying to gather money for programmes. Although we have heard in these debates about the very good work in the refugee camps and elsewhere that is being funded through DFID and so many NGOs, let us also be clear that UN funding in a number of those camps is being reduced. The level of food aid in some of the camps is being reduced, and education support is not what it should be.

In the previous Parliament the all-party group on protecting children in armed conflict, led by Fiona O’Donnell, produced a report that drew heavily on the lessons being learned from what is happening in Syria, particularly in relation to the millions of children who have had to flee. It noted that when DFID and other organisations respond to such emergencies, in the first order of things little thought is given to education. That might be understandable, but when we consider just how long term many refugee camps have become for other conflicts—look at the Palestinian experience—we see that clearly more needs to be done. The world must respond not only to the immediacy of the refugee crisis, but to the wider lessons about the inadequacy. Obviously the convention on refugees will have to be overhauled, and so many other rules, such as Schengen and Dublin, will have to be revised.

Of course, these islands are outside Schengen. One of the things that I would like to see the UK Government do, along with the Irish Government, is convene a meeting of the British-Irish Council to co-ordinate across the devolved Administrations and with the Irish Government what the response will be across these islands in order to meet our responsibilities for accommodating refugees. That would ensure optimum co-ordination across jurisdictions and between services so that there is no fall-down, breakdown or confusion facing international agencies or domestic charities when it comes to responding. The Government might find, as a result of the information and ideas that would emerge from such collaboration, that they are in a position to reconsider the number of refugees they are taking and the time scale, not least by accommodating some of those who are already in Europe.

Let us be clear that the Government, having previously been averse to engaging with the UNHCR resettlement scheme, and then having been very dilatory in relation to the vulnerable persons scheme, have now moved to strike a tone of some urgency in this regard, but of course limits have been put on it—the Prime Minister appears to have put the guard up on his heart again. The Government must be prepared to do more, but those of us who are criticising them for the number of refugees they will admit or on the time scale must face the wider question about the scale of the problem in the camps, about other conflicts, not least in Sudan and South Sudan, that are driving people into refugee status, and about the need for a much bigger and longer-term response, including proper support for the UN, and a global financial transactions tax would be a good start.

--- Later in debate ---

[Simon Hoare]

I hear what the hon. Gentleman says, but the sovereign Government of Greece signed up to an arrangement of open borders, which they now have to justify to their people. Her Majesty’s Government, on previous occasions, took a different point of view.

[Mark Durkan]

The hon. Gentleman has clearly overcome whatever emotions afflicted him when he scrolled through his family photographs by conjuring up the most bizarre rationale. Does he not understand that many of us fully accept why Government Members want at every opportunity to stand outside a common currency in Europe, but not to stand outside common decency?

[Simon Hoare]

With the greatest respect to the hon. Gentleman—I do have a huge amount of respect for his views on many issues—I think that point seeks to deliberately debase the debate. This is nothing at all to do with either decency or indecency. The difference between opposition and government is that Opposition parties can let only their hearts dictate the narrative; the governing party has to use heart and head. I shall come on briefly to some of the issues—whether we are talking about 20,000 and whether they will come from within the camps or elsewhere—that are pertinent for Ministers to consider.