Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill

Richard Graham Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 3rd July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I think my right hon. Friend is completely right. Local government has a critical role in delivering public services, including support for the most vulnerable in our communities. It is vital that central Government support it in that endeavour and that local government should not be diverted from its core purpose by other temptations.

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

The Secretary of State said earlier that the Bill fulfils a manifesto commitment, but the manifesto commitment was not country-specific; it was country-agnostic. There was no mention of Israel or BDS in it. Indeed, another manifesto commitment was that we would champion freedom of expression and tolerance. He will recall that a former Secretary of State for Education wrote to all our universities to ensure that they allowed freedom of expression. How is that compatible with clause 4(1)(b), which states that any person who

“would intend to act in such a way”—

of having a boycott on any part of a foreign country—

“were it lawful to do so”,

would be prohibited from doing so and would be penalised by the courts for doing so? How does that represent championing freedom of expression and tolerance?

[Michael Gove]

I should say to my hon. Friend, whose commitment to advancing peace and to freedom of speech I respect, that all the Bill seeks to do is to ensure that boycotts and boycotts in name only cannot be brought forward. It has absolutely no effect—chilling or otherwise—on the exercise of freedom of speech.

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[Lisa Nandy]

This is precisely the question that the Government have yet to answer, but we hope that will be forthcoming during this debate. I would add to what the right hon. Gentleman said that the local government pension service is already under a fiduciary duty to take prudent investment decisions based on an assessment of the financial consequence of a number of matters, including environmental and social governance, and when it divests on the basis of non-financial factors, it should follow the Law Commission direction that any financial impact should not be significant and that the decision would likely be supported by scheme members. I am not sure what happens when a local government pension fund is taking decisions that would not be supported by scheme members. We are talking about the pensions of 6 million people in this country, and I think these are important questions that the Government must answer.

I want to turn to one of our chief concerns about this Bill, which is the concentration of the decision making and judgment of hundreds of public bodies in the hands of just one person and the implications of that for some of the most persecuted people in the world. There will be significant effects on the Uyghur in Xinjiang, who are suffering such serious crimes against humanity that the Biden Administration have recognised it as genocide. The Secretary of State will have read the impassioned letter from those groups in The Times about the effects of this Bill. Surely we cannot abandon them to their fate. For the Rohingya in Myanmar, for the Tamils in Sri Lanka and for countless others, the concern is that this bad law prevents not just economic action to uphold human rights everywhere, but solidarity with some of the most persecuted people in the world.

As was said earlier, the Bill goes further and clause 7 grants to the Secretary of State or other relevant body the power to issue notices requiring all information to be handed over, if they suspect that a prohibited statement expressing a moral or political view about foreign conduct is in the process of or about to be made, including information in subsection (8) that would normally be protected by legal privilege. Let me clear about the effect of that: this hands over to the Office for Students, the Secretary of State, and the Treasury, greater powers than those available to the security services. I know there are Members on both sides of the House who are deeply troubled by that, and those who are not should consider for a moment how they might feel about this Bill if their party was not in power.

We should not be here. We have long fought for legislation to tackle what is a real problem, and we are determined to give the Government the opportunity to do the right thing. That is why today we are proposing an alternative that allows the Government and this House to keep our promise to tackle a long-standing issue of deep concern to the Jewish community, but avoids tearing up our commitment to human rights, local democracy and free speech, in a Bill that does not even appear to tackle the very problem it seeks to solve.

[Richard Graham]

The hon. Lady has made a number of powerful points. She will have heard me question the Secretary of State about the fact that the Bill is not country agnostic; it is directed primarily at one country and one issue, which is BDS. The question for her is, in a way, the opposite of that, which is that this problem has come to be because of decisions made by Leicester City Council and Lancaster City Council, which are Labour-run councils acting arguably in cahoots with BDS. What does she think the Labour party can do to take away the perceived requirement to have a Bill that seems, at the moment, largely to argue against BDS’s actions against Israel?

[Lisa Nandy]

I listened carefully to what the hon. Gentleman had to say and I support it, but he should please not try to tarnish Labour Members with a record on antisemitism. There are those of us who stood up not just to those who are supposed to be our opponents, but to those who are supposed to be our friends as well. And we will always do that. I give my word, and I give our word on behalf of the Labour party.

As I am about to outline, we have provided the Government with an alternative. Earlier this year we sought to amend the Procurement Bill to ensure that no single country, especially in the cases that we have been describing and the world’s only Jewish state, can be singled out for different standards from others, and in doing so whip up hate and hostility against the Jewish community. It is a real problem. We provided the Government with a solution. They refused it, but we remain convinced that co-operation and consensus is the right approach to tackle what we accept is a very real problem.

Today, the Secretary of State will hear this refrain again and again from Members on his own Back Benches, and across the House: two important principles—the need to tackle racism and antisemitism, which are a scourge on our society, and the need to stand up for human rights, freedom of expression, democracy and our long-standing position on Israel and Palestine, and act in accordance with international law—and those things should never be seen as mutually exclusive or allowed to be pitted against one another.

We have a number of serious suggestions about the way that this problem can be tackled. We have outlined an alternative approach. We have provided the Secretary of State with a solution, and we urge him to take it. Otherwise, he should know that Labour Members will be compelled to vote against the Bill on Third Reading, as I suspect will significant numbers of his own colleagues. It is an outcome we should all strive to avoid. If a pledge to tackle division, around which there is broad consensus, was derailed by a combative approach and a Government who refuse to listen to the wide range of voices that have expressed their concerns, that would be a crying shame. With good will and good faith on the part of the Government, we can proceed together. We have proposed how. The ball is now in the court of the right hon. Gentleman.

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[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

I agree with much of the sentiment of the shadow Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy), for whom I have a great deal of regard, as she knows. However, fine words butter no parsnips. It is easy to identify the source of the problem, but it is a little more difficult to legislate in such a complex area.

I would respond to some of the things that the hon. Lady said on two fronts. First, it is okay for people to make reference to the political views and other writings of a KC who is advising her and her right hon. and hon. Friends. That is a perfectly legitimate thing to bring to the House’s attention. King’s counsels are not Gods and they are not beyond any criticism. Secondly, she made the point, in many ways, for why we require the Bill—specifically, clause 3(7). She highlighted her own work—for which I applaud her—during a very difficult time in her party’s history. She stood up and received all sorts of appalling abuse because of the position she was prepared to take on what was going on in her party. I am grateful for and impressed by her bravery in doing that. It was an incredible thing for Opposition Members to do at that time. Precisely because we ended up in the position we did, where people with sympathies for the BDS campaign came very close to power in this country, we require clause 3(7) and the specification of Israel.

BDS is an antisemitic, racist campaign—there is no doubt about that. It singles out the state of Israel for special treatment. There is something peculiarly sinister about those who obsess about Israel while being blind to the behaviour of despots and dictators across the world. I hope that is not the case for most Members in the House, but it is for some who oppose this view. That is not my view, but that of the German Parliament, the Bundestag, which passed a motion a few years ago that stated that the actions of the BDS were reminiscent of the terrifying Nazi campaign against Jewish people under Adolf Hitler. It went on to say:

“The ‘don’t buy’ stickers of the BDS movement on Israeli products”

could be associated with

“the Nazi call ‘don’t buy from Jews’ and other corresponding graffiti…on shop windows”.

I would hope that none in the Chamber would support those sorts of actions or behaviours. It is a little off subject, but today we learned that the last French D-day fighter of Nazism Léon Gautier has passed away. It would be nice for us to remember his name today.

Sadly, that behaviour rooted in the Nazi period has not passed. We have seen so many examples of it, as Members have reminded us this afternoon. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green (Mike Freer) for reminding me of some experiences of his constituents in recent years. I will not repeat them due to time constraints, but they include the removal of kosher products because of the pernicious, racist BDS movement and the fact that film festivals in this country have been cancelled because they dared to take a small amount of sponsorship from the Israeli embassy.

The BDS campaign has consequences. It is no wonder a Jewish driver was attacked in Golders Green outside Kosher Kingdom for daring to have an Israeli flag on his vehicle. It is no wonder we end up with the appalling antisemitic incidents and attacks on British campuses. British Jews become the targets and victims of the campaign—none of us should forget that. We cannot divorce BDS from its impacts on the Jewish citizens of our country.

We have seen record numbers of antisemitic incidents in recent years—it is important to remind the House of those. Last year, 1,652 antisemitic incidents were recorded by the Community Security Trust. Worryingly, the proportion of victims who were minors has increased. Perhaps even worse, the proportion of minors perpetrating those attacks has also increased; in 2022, 20% were recorded as minors—a number that has doubled in recent years. We must do everything we can to abate the trend among younger people, some of which is motivated by the BDS campaign. Every time there is a flare-up in the middle east conflict, British Jews are on the receiving end. The current issues, which the Chair of the Select Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Melton (Alicia Kearns) referenced, of rising tensions in the regions are the biggest argument for the legislation in the form in which it has been produced.

Any rise in tensions in the middle east will result in an uptick in BDS activities. I was interested in what the Scottish National party spokesman, the hon. Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens), said on that. He was careful to say, “Of course, we disassociate ourselves from people in the BDS movement who delegitimise the state of Israel through boycotts.” However, he did not tell us his view of those people when they argue for boycotts in the Occupied Palestinian Territories or in the settlements. The problem is that they are not different people, but the same. He cannot separate them from the people seeking to delegitimise Israel, and say, “Those people are wrong, and racist and antisemitic”, as many in the BDS movement are, and then infer, as I think he was doing, that their activities and what they demand are okay when they relate to other parts. They are the same people who hold the same pernicious, racist views.

Many people with issues about the Bill have legitimate concerns—there is no doubt about that. The Secretary of State said at the Dispatch Box that he was prepared to work in Committee to see how we can improve the Bill if required. That was a sensible thing to say. However, I am afraid that for some who oppose the Bill, it is always about Israel. Their beef is always the state of Israel. I have heard some bizarre arguments against the Bill, one of which is that it will increase antisemitism. That is a strange argument, to put it mildly. Just because some people do not like the legislation, saying that it might result in an increase in antisemitism and “Oh, in which case, let’s not bother with it” rather proves the point of the Bill.

[Richard Graham]

rose—

[Andrew Percy]

I will give way, because I like my hon. Friend.

[Richard Graham]

It is not really about liking each other, important though that is. It is about what the Jewish Chronicle itself has said:

“Boycotting Israel is wrong but this anti BDS bill is not the answer…This is a bad bill…and bad especially for British Jews”.

Is my hon. Friend aware of that, and does he realise that many Jews are not in favour of this way of trying to protect themselves from antisemitism?

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[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

I welcome many of the remarks made by the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe), and particularly his final comments about wanting to work together across the House to see how the Bill can be improved. It will, I think, come as no surprise to many that I am uncomfortable with the Bill as it stands—and arguably more, not less, so after hearing the Secretary of State’s almost exclusive focus on the BDS movement and its antisemitic agenda.

The point of the Bill was to fulfil a Conservative party manifesto commitment, so let me explain why I am unhappy with it. First, as it stands, the Bill fulfils something different from our manifesto commitment; secondly, it seriously undermines our commitment to freedom and tolerance; thirdly, it gives a special and exclusive right not just to Israel but to parts of Israel that are either annexed or illegally occupied; fourthly, it effectively outlaws even the express thought of disagreeing with the Bill, should it be passed; and lastly, it could backfire—and it is elements of the Jewish communities who say that, not me.

Let me bring the detail alive. Our manifesto did not mention Israel or the BDS; it focused on preventing

“public bodies from imposing their own direct or indirect …sanctions…against foreign countries.”

That commitment was, absolutely rightly, country-agnostic, yet clause 3(7) specifically protects not just Israel but the Golan Heights and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, which are of course not countries. The provisions exempt Israel alone from any change in Government policy—for example, the sanctions on Russia—and that could be changed only by primary legislation.

Our manifesto also rightly committed to championing free speech and tolerance. As I mentioned earlier, as have others, the Secretary of State for Education legislated only recently specifically to enforce that commitment on our universities; now, however, as a university vice-chancellor put it to me, the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has told him that he cannot even say, were it allowed, that he would prefer his university not to purchase anything manufactured on illegal settlements in the occupied territories. Is that really what is intended?

This Bill, as presented on Second Reading, appears to be a pro-Israel and anti-BDS Bill much more than the country-agnostic anti-boycott Bill promised in our manifesto. In turn, that has caused—there was no point in some Members denying this earlier—some Jewish commentators in Jewish media, Jewish student unions and Jewish civic society groups to express real concern that the Bill risks backfiring. As The Jewish Chronicle said, it would be

“bitterly ironic if this…bill”

to tackle the

“anti-Israel BDS, ends up hurting those who so many…have sought to help”.

The Union of Jewish Students went further and said that the Bill may

“pit Jews against other minorities”.

So what to do? The Labour party solution is to rip the Bill up and start again in unspecified ways. Our solution should be different. We should fulfil our manifesto commitment to legislate against public-body sanctions in a country-agnostic way, but we do not need a special rule for Israel, let alone for annexed or occupied areas that the United Kingdom does not recognise as a legitimate part of Israel. I very much hope that on Third Reading the Government will reconsider clause 4(1)(b), which as it stands is antidemocratic, and drop clause 3(7), which is neither necessary nor appropriate. I will therefore abstain in the vote on Second Reading. I very much hope that the commitment of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State to consider drafting amendments will be strongly realised on Third Reading.

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[Felicity Buchan]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Given the focus of the BDS campaign on Israel, we are simply saying in this clause that, for Israel to be exempted from the legislation, it will require primary legislation. I want to make that very clear. This policy does not affect our foreign policy position. We are not legislating for the UK’s foreign policy on Israel or on any other country in the Bill. The purpose of the Bill is to ensure a consistent approach to foreign policy across our public bodies, led by the UK Government. The Bill will not prevent the UK Government from imposing sanctions, or otherwise changing our foreign policy on any country in future.

I stress that none of the provisions in the Bill changes the UK’s position on Israeli settlements in the west bank and the Golan Heights. We are continuing to urge Israel not to take steps that move us away from our shared goals of peace and security. We support a negotiated settlement leading to a safe and secure Israel living alongside a viable and sovereign Palestinian state, based on 1967 borders with agreed land swaps, Jerusalem as the shared capital of both states and a just, fair and realistic settlement for refugees.

Furthermore, our position on settlements is clear: they are illegal under international law; present an obstacle to peace; and threaten the physical viability of a two-state solution. Our position is reflected in our continued support for UN Security Council resolution 2334, with which the Bill is compliant.

[Richard Graham]

What the Minister says is not really what is reflected in the Bill because a specific exemption is given not just to Israel, in what should be a country-agnostic Bill—just like our manifesto commitment—but to two parts of Israel which we do not recognise as part of Israel under international law. Therefore, there is specifically an exemption for Israel. Does she agree—the Secretary of State said earlier that he would listen very carefully to suggested amendments—that this is something that needs to be worked on during the Bill Committee?

[Felicity Buchan]

UN Security Council resolution 2334 asks countries to differentiate between Israel and the occupied territories. We have done that in this clause; they are clearly separated out in different paragraphs. However, as the Secretary of State said in his opening remarks, we are open to any discussions on the Bill and of course we want the best legislation here.