Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill

Stephen Crabb Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 3rd July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Not at this point—I will in a second.

It is important to stress what the Bill does not do. It does not restrict local authorities adopting policies in line with formal, agreed Government sanctions, embargoes and restrictions. It does not impede local authorities considering legitimate commercial factors related to business with a foreign state, and exercising due diligence in the award of contracts. And it does not prevent a local authority from exercising due diligence when considering whether a supplier or investment target might be involved in environmental misconduct, bribery, competition law infringements or labour misconduct, including human trafficking and modern slavery. In no way does the Bill circumscribe anyone’s right to freedom of speech or conscience.

What the Bill does do is prevent local authorities from singling out individual nations for discriminatory treatment on the basis of an ideological opposition to that nation and its fundamental basis. Action is required here because there is an existing, organised and malign campaign that aims to target and delegitimise the world’s only Jewish state. That campaign seeks to persuade public bodies to make commercial decisions solely on the basis of harming that state and its people.

[Stephen Crabb (Preseli Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way so soon in this debate.

Is not the reason every single Conservative Member stood on a manifesto commitment to bring forward such legislation that we understand that there is something fundamentally illiberal, leftist and with deep, ugly connections to antisemitism at the heart of the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement? That is what we are trying to tackle today.

[Michael Gove]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. I shall go on to say more about the nature of the BDS campaign because we are not talking in the abstract; we are talking in concrete terms about a campaign that exists, and has been in operation now for nearly 20 years, based on a premise that seeks to delegitimise the state of Israel. The campaign also leads directly, as I shall point out, to antisemitic incidents and a loss of community cohesion.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

I beg to move an amendment, to leave out from “That” to the end of the Question and add:

“this House, while opposing any discrimination or prejudice in the economic activities of public bodies, believing that all such bodies must act without bias or selectivity when making ethical decisions on procurement and investment and recognising the impact selective and biased campaigns have had on the Jewish community in particular, declines to give a Second Reading to the Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill, because the Bill risks significantly undermining support for groups around the world facing persecution, for example the Uyghur, who are currently victims of grave and systemic human rights abuses, is incompatible with international law and the due diligence of public bodies, undermines the UK’s long-standing cross-party position in respect of the Occupied Palestinian Territories and Golan Heights by conflating these with the State of Israel and running counter to UN Security Council Resolutions, singles out the State of Israel in effect creating the issue it intends to solve, seeks to enforce its provisions by giving unprecedented powers to the Secretary of State beyond those enjoyed by the police and the security services, places unprecedented restrictions on the ability of public bodies, many of them directly elected, to express a view on policy, current, proposed and desired, has potential widespread and negative impacts on local government pension funds, limits freedom of speech and is likely to be subject to repeated and extended legal challenge by reason of its conflict with established legal principles; and therefore urges the Government to bring forward alternative proposals.”

I recognise the Secretary of State’s very touching words on Lord Kerslake. He was Lord Kerslake to some, but Bob to those of us who have benefited over many years from his ceaseless encouragement and advice. His knowledge of central Government and local government was unparalleled. His commitment as a genuine public servant who cared deeply about people will be badly missed. He was taken from us too soon, and I would like to add our voice to the very touching tribute from the Secretary of State.

It is perhaps in the spirit that Bob would have wanted that I approach the Bill—on a note of consensus, on something that ought to be a matter of consensus for Labour Members. I recognise that there are deeply held feelings about these issues, and I want to acknowledge that Members in this debate must be heard. I shall, of course, welcome interventions, but I will seek to balance that with the need of Members on both sides of the House, whether I disagree with them or not, to make their views known.

I want to begin by saying to the Secretary of State that we recognise the problem which he says the Bill is designed to tackle. It is therefore deeply frustrating that the Government have introduced a Bill that is needlessly broad, with sweeping, draconian powers and far-reaching effects. Instead of Members on both sides of the House having the opportunity to come together and welcome long-overdue action, he faces genuine, legitimate, heartfelt opposition from Conservative Members; from groups who face persecution, such as the Uyghur, who thought that we stood with them; from human rights groups; and from local government. I have watched the Secretary of State lose Government Members because of the tone that he has struck in the debate. I hope that as the debate progresses he will listen to some of those concerns.

I say to the House that it does not have to be this way. It is not, in our view, wrong for public bodies to take ethical investment and procurement decisions. In fact, there is a long history of councils, universities and others taking a stance in defence of freedom and human rights. In the case of elected councils, their electors often expect them to do just that. There is a difference between legitimate criticism of a foreign state’s Government and what some individuals and organisations have tried to do in recent years, which the Secretary of State outlined well. To seek to target Israel alone, to hold it to different standards from other countries, to question its right to exist, to equate the actions of the Israeli Government with Jewish people, and in doing so create hate and hostility against Jewish people here in the UK is completely wrong.

There is at least one example of a publicly funded body that has taken a stance against the state of Israel that has effectively cancelled Jewish culture here in the UK. We will always stand against that. Most public bodies would not dream of behaving like that, but even one incident has unacceptable and far-reaching consequences for the Jewish community, increasing hate and hostility at a time when antisemitic attacks have reached a peak, children learn behind gates, and security guards stand outside synagogues.

[Stephen Crabb]

The hon. Lady is speaking really well, and she gave a remarkable Second Reading speech on the Holocaust Memorial Bill.

The hon. Lady is trying to suggest that examples of BDS are few and far between, and that it is a legitimate field of activity for public bodies to comment on foreign policy and express ethical concerns. The trouble is, time and time again, it is about BDS and it is about targeting Israel. When the Welsh Government issued a procurement advice note two years ago, they were trying to single out Israel yet again, and no Labour MP said a thing about it. Is that not the problem?

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen Crabb (Preseli Pembrokeshire) (Con)]

I rise to speak in support of the legislation this evening. I welcome the fact that we are following through on a manifesto commitment to bring forward legislation in this difficult, sensitive and complicated area. I very much agree with the remarks made by my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy), and my right hon. Friends the Members for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland (Sir Simon Clarke) and for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers).

We have had a number of speeches striking slightly different tones. There was a very good speech from the hon. Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy), who tried to strike a reasonable tone and explained the rationale behind Labour’s reasoned amendment. Unfortunately for her and for the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe), who also made a thoughtful and intelligent speech, many of the speeches from the Opposition Benches seemed to be in favour of boycotts, and wanting to keep a candle burning for being able to use boycotts, divestment and sanctions as tools at a local authority level, or among other public bodies. We on the Conservative Benches are clear that we do not want to see public money being used in that way. We are clear about the main purpose of this legislation, which is to tackle, as has already been discussed, the BDS movement, with its pernicious effects, its links to antisemitism and the very ugly and divisive character behind it. To any Conservative Member who stands up and says that that was not the purpose of our commitment in the manifesto, I say that that is just not true. The gestation of the Bill—the process that it has gone through and the internal discussion—has very much centred on trying to do something for the first time about the BDS movement.

To those Members who argue that the problem with this legislation is that it will attract legal challenge, I say that every single time we have tried to do something about the BDS movement it gets a legal challenge. We know that the BDS movement will try to fight this in the court. That is not a surprise, but that should not be a reason for us to resile from our commitment to do something about the matter.

There will be Members in the House today who believe that the BDS movement, leaving aside its ugly antisemitic characteristics, is a legitimate way of trying to challenge the state of Israel. We heard that in some of the speeches. The trouble with the BDS movement, as we know, is that time and again it singles out the state of Israel in a way that it does not do with other countries.

As for the Labour party trying to maintain a reasonableness about its position, I say look at what it does when it is in government. When the Welsh Labour Government tried to introduce a new national procurement note in 2020, what did they do? Surprise, surprise, they singled out one state for potential sanctions—the state of Israel. I am talking about Labour Ministers of the Crown today serving in the Welsh Government in Cardiff, so Members will forgive me if I do not have total confidence in the reasonableness of the Labour position that it is trying to put forward.

[Crispin Blunt]

The BDS is a Palestinian-led movement. Who else is it supposed to protest against? I realise that it has a global application, but it is a Palestinian-led movement about Palestine.

[Stephen Crabb]

My hon. Friend is right: it is a Palestinian-led movement. When we consider the individuals and organisations—Palestinian and otherwise—at the root of it, we can see that the movement is deeply problematic. I do not believe that any Conservative should be identifying and aligning themselves with any aspect of the BDS movement.

I welcome the legislation. I welcome, too, the fact that the Secretary of State has made a very strong commitment to working with others and seeing whether improvements can be made to the Bill. He has shown a genuine openness in that regard. None the less, improving the Bill cannot mean watering it down to make it ineffective, which we know the opponents of the Bill—the BDS movement outside this place—want us to do. I hope that the Government will remain robust and clear-sighted on this, but I also hope that we can work pragmatically and get good legislation on the statute book.