Commonwealth in 2020

Richard Graham Excerpts

Monday 9th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to be here today on Commonwealth Day and the day of the Commonwealth service, when all 53 flags are flying in Parliament Square—a day when the Birmingham Commonwealth Games Bill was brought before Parliament and the Minister has arranged for us to have a Commonwealth debate.

I think I arranged the first such debate in 2012 as the founding chair of the all-party group on the Commonwealth and, at that stage, Parliamentary Private Secretary to the first of two Ministers for the Commonwealth. It is a great treat to be here with him—the comeback kid of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. He puts the “C” firmly back into the FCO: three times returned to the FCO to keep that C flag flying. If he has been to only 18 out of the 19 Commonwealth countries in Africa, surely his officials have an opportunity to arrange a trip to the 19th—we could even have a sweepstake on which one he has not been to.

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford), the living symbol of UK-New Zealand partnership in this Chamber. His speech followed two maiden speeches of great distinction. My hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell (James Sunderland) typifies the concept of service before self, having moved seamlessly from the Army to Parliament, where I know he will put his constituents first. I shall return to one of his Commonwealth themes later.

We also heard a passionate speech from the hon. Member for Leicester East (Claudia Webbe). I have no doubt that everyone who lives in the Nevis Islands will celebrate her speech and her presence in the Chamber. She shared with us all a vivid talent for focusing on some of the crimes of the past, while perhaps skating lightly over some of the more recent scandals. We welcome her to the House. The Commonwealth is part of her, but it is also part of me, because I am a child of the Commonwealth. I was brought up in Kenya, and the atrocities in Hola to which she alluded were part of my childhood.

In the Chamber, although many of its Benches are empty at this late stage of the evening, people from all over the Commonwealth are celebrating today and what it means. This is a moment for congratulations, but also for us to reflect, each year, on what the Commonwealth means and how it is progressing. I must say that I do not share the intrinsic gloom of the hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle), who was ashamed of the past, apologetic for the present, and gloomy about the future. That, I am afraid, is my summary of his lengthy speech. He described finding “glimmers of hope” in the Commonwealth, but I think we can do better than that.

Let me give just one example of the symbol of the success of the modern Commonwealth and the countries within it. The whole business of being able to conduct financial transactions over a mobile telephone was not invented in some rich western country, or even by state-sponsored technology innovation programmes in China; it was invented and formed in Kenya. It is possible to travel over large chunks of that most lovely country and find Masai herdsmen nestling a spear in one hand while looking out over their goats and, with the other hand, transacting their business over their mobile telephones, often returning in the evening to their huts where the telephones can be recharged by a miniature solar panel. There is much to be proud of in all parts of the Commonwealth: there is innovation, and much more than “glimmers of hope”.

There has been huge progress on eliminating malaria and reducing blindness, and on the Prime Minister’s campaign in promoting 12 years of education across the Commonwealth and, indeed, across the world, supported by the Department for International Development. I believe that, in future, this country in particular will be able to offer considerable expertise to help other parts of the Commonwealth to thrive. Cyber-security is incredibly important to us all, and, as we know from what happened in the headquarters of the African Union in Addis Ababa, there are all sorts of reasons why it should be strengthened—not just across that continent, but in other parts of the Commonwealth, including the parts where I spend some of my time nowadays as the Prime Minister’s trade envoy in the far east: Malaysia, Brunei and Singapore, three nations of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, which are members of the Commonwealth.

[Fleur Anderson (Putney) (Lab)]

May I present another offer of hope, and a glimmer of light from the Commonwealth? Will the hon. Gentleman join me in congratulating Rwanda, where the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting will be held? It has made enormous strides in respect of water and sanitation, which is especially impressive because it is such a mountainous country. Many other Commonwealth countries need to go further in those respects to achieve health and wealth: through the Commonwealth and our work with DFID projects, we can achieve that as well. Water and sanitation need to be part of CHOGM, and part of our work with the Commonwealth.

[Richard Graham]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her considerable intervention, which demonstrated her love of Rwanda. No doubt she has spent a great deal of time there. I am occasionally in touch with a former Anglican bishop of Rwanda, who is equally proud of some of the great progress that has been made in that country.

There is a slight warning note about Rwanda, which is a remarkable member of the Commonwealth. Her history is different, as she joined 28 years ago—something like that—and there is a caveat for all of us: not to put its leader on a pedestal. We are all human, and we all have feet of clay. I remember vividly the disappointment felt by many hon. Members when Aung San Suu Kyi became Prime Minister of Burma, but then presided over one of the world’s saddest periods of internal conflict and possible genocide against the Rohingya people. That was a period in which those who had strongly supported her opening the new Labour offices when she visited London had cause to reflect on the fragility of all of us as humans.

I return to two or three things that I should like to ask the Minister. During our time as the chairing office, various initiatives were launched, all of which I supported strongly—for example, the new business Commonwealth standards network, the world trade-based trade facilitation agreement, the Commonwealth clean oceans alliance, and the marine economies programme. All those were good news, and worthy causes. Will the Minister give us a brief update on how they are doing, and whether the progress made during our time in the chair can be continued?

Will the Minister also consider something else, so that we can end on a note of great consensus among Members all parties in the Chamber, including the hon. Member for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady), who made a very good speech on the Commonwealth, wrapped in a more traditional speech about the European Union? The point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell about Commonwealth servicemen and women having to pay considerable amounts of money when applying for the right to remain here after five years’ service is something about which many of us feel strongly. In fact, I attracted 125 signatures to a letter that I wrote to the then Home Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Sajid Javid), last year. He was sympathetic, as were Ministers in the Ministry of Defence, who said that it was a Home Office decision.

I encourage my hon. Friend the Minister to take careful note of today’s debate and the feelings on this issue. I understand that there are problems—there always are—of precedence and cost. There are lots of different problems, as we want those Commonwealth servicemen to be motivated by the concept of serving in our armed forces rather than purely being attracted to the later possibility of being able to bring their whole family here. I understand all those problems, but my hon. Friend, who is nodding from a sedentary position, would probably agree on something about which many of us feel strongly, as does the British Legion. There must be an opportunity for the new Government to do us all a favour by taking a closer look at what can be done to help Commonwealth servicemen and women on Commonwealth Day, in a debate in which there is much good will across the House to make the Commonwealth prosper.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tom Hunt]

Absolutely. Things are not great at the moment for Ipswich Town—we are 10th in the third division and things look pretty bleak. Only four weeks ago we beat Lincoln 1-0 and we were top of the table, so how quickly things can change—maybe I was a bad omen. Cricket unites Commonwealth citizens across the continents and is truly a great symbol of what we share, as last year’s world cup demonstrated.

[Richard Graham]

One of the things that I hope the Minister will celebrate when he winds up this evening is the role of the Commonwealth within the United Kingdom today. As my hon. Friend has mentioned, we all have Commonwealth citizens serving in our hospitals and often in our armed forces, as has been mentioned. In many areas of life the children of the Commonwealth are playing such an important role, and we need to celebrate that this evening.

[Tom Hunt]

I could not agree more. They truly are the best of us, and that needs to be recognised to an even greater extent.

One point on which I agree with the hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle) is the issue of Commonwealth citizens serving in our armed forces. Currently, when Commonwealth personnel have served for at least four yours and wish to continue to live in this country, they face fees of nearly £2,400 per person for indefinite leave to remain. That means that a family of four faces a cost of over £9,500. The House does not need to be reminded of the enormous sacrifices made for us by those countries now in the Commonwealth during the great conflicts of the 20th Century. At least a quarter of those who laid down their lives for Britain’s cause in the first world war were not British. Commonwealth citizens still fill the shortages in our ranks today.

Those who sacrifice so much for our country, and who have travelled far from their families to do so, should not face such exorbitant fees to stay in the country they have served. I urge the Government to waive the fees for brave Commonwealth troops serving in the British military, as they did in 2018 when they waived immigration fees for Afghan interpreters who had aided British forces in Afghanistan. If anybody should not be considered a foreigner in our country, it is them.

This country’s decision to leave the European Union was not inward-looking or isolationist, but an opportunity to pursue a global future as an independent, sovereign country. It is an opportunity because leaving the European Union by itself is just the beginning of that effort. As we take our first steps as an independent country, reaching out to our partners in the Commonwealth should be one of our highest priorities. The theme for this year’s Commonwealth Day is “Delivering a Common Future: Connecting, Innovating, Transforming”. It is a message that we must embrace wholeheartedly. Whether it is trade, immigration, integration or co-operation, so many of the right preconditions already exist to create more Commonwealth success stories. People strongly believe in the Commonwealth links we share, in Ipswich and across the country. Let us act on these human relations and turn them into a reality for this country’s new relationship with the Commonwealth.

--- Later in debate ---

[Richard Graham]

The Minister will remember that a year ago, he and I sat down together and discussed a project, which is now known as CP4G—the Commonwealth Partnership for Good—between the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, the Westminster Foundation for Democracy and other partners. As he knows, that partnership has been put together. Its focus is on trying to help youth, women, LGBT and those with disabilities into parliamentary democracy. Does he agree that this helps to answer some of the questions asked by the Opposition, and that it is proving successful?

[James Duddridge]

I thank my hon. Friend for that contribution. It has been a very successful programme, which drills down into specific countries rather than being about generalities, and gives covering fire to discuss problematic issues in those countries under the guise of discussing a whole number of matters.

A number of colleagues and the Labour Front Benchers mentioned the issue of Commonwealth veterans. I have listened very carefully to those comments, and I will be seeking a discussion with the Minister for Defence People and Veterans, who is now separate from the Ministry of Defence and from the Home Office. I was asked to have a meeting with him, and I think that is the right way forward. There is also the issue of the veterans of the second world war. I have not yet received parliamentary questions on that, although I understand that there have been historical questions. I am more than happy to review those questions and to respond to further such questions.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell (James Sunderland) was introduced incorrectly, I think, as a new Member of Parliament, so competent and lucid was he. However, I will never ever be able to listen to the phrase “blue rosette on a donkey” or “blue rosette on a monkey” without hearing the example from Bracknell of a blue rosette on a dog turd. I do not thank my hon. Friend for that analogy. I think he is a very modest man—we heard later in an intervention of his service in the Falkland Islands—and a very sensible man from the Logistics Corps who praised in advance the logistics of this House, which serve us all incredibly well.

The hon. Member for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady) pointed out that we have served together a number of times in debates on this issue and will continue to do so. I look forward to working with my Scottish colleagues and will be visiting the joint headquarters of the Department for International Development next week in East Kilbride.

My hon. Friend the Member for Romford (Andrew Rosindell) has been an advocate for all things overseas territories and dependencies. I cannot promise him an outcome, but the trajectory of travel is to work closer and closer with the overseas territories and Crown dependencies. He raised a very good point about the flags, and he asked me not to take them down tomorrow. I can confirm that I will not take them down tomorrow, and that I will consult Government protocol to find out why they cannot stay up for longer, so that we can celebrate the Commonwealth over a longer period. I know that he has been passionate about flags, and that he has had a big flag raised at the other end of this building, and I am keen to support the celebrations further.

We had an excellent speech from the hon. Member for Leicester East (Claudia Webbe). I am not sure what it says about her parents—they spent all that time on Nevis, an island state of 11,000 people, without meeting and then they nipped over to Leicester and suddenly they were together. I am minded to say that there must be something in the water, or perhaps it is the Pukka Pies that she was advocating in her speech. On behalf of the whole House, I would like to wish Keith Vaz a happy retirement from politics and thank him for his service on the Commonwealth parliamentary executive, among his other achievements. I will now also always think of Leicester East as the minorities that make up the majority; that is rather a lovely way of describing an eclectic and interesting constituency.

My hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) explained to me the rivalry between New Zealand and Australia, and I welcome his putting on record that my brother is now an Australian. He also talked of coastal states and small states, and climate change—an issue that we will follow closely as part of the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting and COP26.

My hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) thanked me for being the comeback kid and for putting the C back into the Commonwealth. I did wonder what he was talking about, and then I realised that the C stood for Commonwealth. I thank him for his experience and passion, and for setting up his all-party group.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Tom Hunt) talked eloquently of historic bonds and mentioned the trade benefits from the Commonwealth post EU. My hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Melton (Alicia Kearns) talked about us coming together as equals in a tour de force of speech. I thought she was going to break the convention of not interrupting a maiden speech; she was writhing in her seat in anger at references by the hon. Member for Leicester East to Pukka Pies, because she maintains that Melton Mowbray pork pies that are the best pies in the whole Commonwealth.

This has been an excellent debate, and I hope it is an annual one. With that, I do not intend to detain the House further.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the Commonwealth in 2020.