Russia and the Council of Europe

Roger Gale Excerpts

Wednesday 18th July 2018 Westminster Hall

[Sir Roger Gale (North Thanet) (Con)]

I understand the time constraint, Mr Howarth, but because I am the leader of the UK delegation there are certain things that I need to say. I shall do my best to stick to five minutes, as you asked.

First, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Henley (John Howell). I want immediately to express my appreciation for the collegiate attitude taken by the entire United Kingdom delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, and for the cross-party basis on which we work in the interest of the United Kingdom.

I am particularly grateful for the support of my friend the hon. Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith), who recently accompanied me to the Struthof concentration camp to lay a wreath. That was a stark reminder, in Alsace, of why the Council of Europe was founded and the principles on which it was founded by Winston Churchill and nine other countries after the war.

There is no doubt in my mind that Russia is in flagrant breach of the principles of the Council of Europe by its actions in Crimea, Ukraine and the Donbass; by shooting down a civilian passenger aircraft; by the invasion of Georgia and Moldova; by the poisoning of the Skripals; and, as has been mentioned by hon. Members, by its breaches of human rights across the piece. The list is almost endless.

I must underscore the fact that in 2014, following the annexation of Crimea, the Parliamentary Assembly suspended the voting rights of the Russian delegation, but they were not expelled. Aleksey Pushkov, the leader of the Russian delegation, stage-managed a press conference, walked out of the Hemicycle and led his delegation out of the Parliamentary Assembly. Since that time, it is the Russians who have declined to present their credentials. The idea that they have somehow been excluded is a myth. As has been said, the Council of Europe is a bicameral body and the Russians still attend and contribute to the Committee of Ministers. For reasons that none of us really understand, they have also been allowed to participate in Michele Nicoletti’s ad hoc committee.

My hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) indicated that we took away the Russian voting rights, which is apparently why they are allowed to suspend their payments. I suspect that if Spain were to annex Gibraltar, which is a fairly direct comparison, my hon. Friend might have something to say about it. If the Spanish then persecuted part of the population of the Rock and imprisoned some of them, he might have even more to say about it. That is precisely what has happened in Crimea. The Russian Federation is clearly in flagrant breach of the terms of the convention on human rights.

Another myth, which has been said by Secretary-General Jagland and propagated by others, is that if Russia were expelled from the Council of Europe, the Russian people would not have access to the European Court of Human Rights. That is, quite simply, wrong. The Committee of Ministers has no power to expel Russia; it can only suspend. If Russia does not pay next year, the Committee of Ministers will do precisely that. That suspension, however, will not deny the Russian people the right to take cases before the European Court of Human Rights.

We are facing a straightforward attempt at blackmail. The secretary-general of the Council of Europe has realised that money is more important to him than principle and that he is not prepared to make the necessary budget savings to accommodate the loss of funding from Russia. The delegation that I am proud to lead is united in saying that principle is more important than money, that the Council of Europe is not for sale and that we will fight the proposals to readmit Russia—on its own terms and nobody else’s—in the presidential committee, the bureau, the rules committee and the next plenary session. Unless and until the Russians acknowledge the transgressions and make concessions themselves, they will not, for our money, come back into the Parliamentary Assembly.

[Several hon. Members rose—]