Global Britain

Ruth Jones Excerpts

Monday 11th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab) [V]]

This evening, we have heard a great deal about global Britain. I think of the 60 million people who call this country home. They each have a unique story, history and background. Many of those 60 million people were born on foreign shores, or are the children, grandchildren or great grandchildren of those who came to the United Kingdom in search of a job, prosperity, hope and peace. Now we have left the European Union, it is vital that we do things in the right way.

In 2009, the UK signed up to the principle that all new trade treaties signed by the EU should contain commitments on the protection of human rights as an essential element of each agreement, giving the EU the power to suspend or revoke those treaties if the other party was engaging in serious abuses of human rights. Nowhere in the entire of the four-and-a-half years of the Brexit process did this Government state that leaving the EU would mean departing from that principle for our own future trade agreements, yet last month we signed new treaties with Singapore, Vietnam and Turkey, none of which have clauses relating to human rights as an essential element of the agreement.

While we welcome the continuity agreements with 10 countries that were signed in December, some 11 other countries were sadly left out in the cold. Members of this House have received no formal or appropriate explanation for the failure with those 11 countries, so I hope the Minister will explain in detail the reason why deals could not be done in time with Albania, Algeria, Bosnia, Ghana, Montenegro and Serbia. Will he tell the House the exact status of those negotiations now? Could he also tell us the status of negotiations with the other five members of the East African Community besides Kenya—Rwanda, Uganda, Tanzania, South Sudan and Burundi—which have been left to rely on a generalised preferences scheme, rather than the formal trade deal with the UK that they previously enjoyed and hoped to build on?

The treatment of our Commonwealth cousins in Ghana is a shame on all of us. The Republic of Ghana has been treated disgracefully by Ministers in recent weeks and months. We know now from the Ghanaian Government that the UK negotiators turned up late for meetings and were badly briefed. They left early with nothing resolved. We also know that the Ghanaians expected to meet the Secretary of State, only to be faced with one of her junior Ministers.

I say to those on the Treasury Bench, and I do so objectively, that we must proceed with caution. We need the help, co-operation, good will and respect of nations across the world if we are to make this work. That means we need to be professional, respectful and act like adults. We need to ensure that we take our place as a global advocate of good governance, human rights, decency, respect and co-operation, and the sooner the better.