Cultural Property (Armed Conflicts) Bill [Lords]

Tim Loughton Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons
Monday 20th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Brennan]

I will give the hon. Gentleman five out of 10 on that basis. The Minister for the Armed Forces wrote:

“As my formal PQ response made clear—a definitive response to your question could only be provided at disproportionate cost.

However, it is roughly estimated that at least 200 members of foreign armed forces are either liaison officers or on exchange officer roles annually across the three services.”

He went on to confirm that the Department “does not routinely collect” the requested information about embedded foreign armed forces.

That does at least tell us what kind of numbers we are talking about, albeit not in precise terms. However, the point of my question was to get a general idea of how many people might be impacted by this legislation and to understand whether the Government had a grip on the rough ballpark figures.

Our concern was how the Bill would impact on foreign nationals embedded in the UK armed forces who were involved in the destruction or illegal exportation of cultural property. In her response to my amendment in Committee, the Minister said that

“if a foreign soldier were to commit an act set out in article 15(1)(d) or (e) while embedded in a UK unit, we would dismiss them and send them back to their home state to be dealt with for disobeying orders. The individual would face the consequences of their actions on their return home, and there is no loophole for embedded forces; that would apply whether or not a foreign state had ratified the convention or protocols, as the individual would be disobeying an order.”––[Official Report, Cultural Property (Armed Conflicts) Public Bill Committee, 15 November 2016; c. 14.]

Now that we have a figure from the Government on the number of foreign nationals to whom the Bill will apply, albeit a rough one, I just wonder—

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

I appreciate that these are probing amendments, because if the hon. Gentleman were to press them to the vote, I do not think he would get much support from the people behind him. However, will he explain what he thinks is the difference between the terminology in the Bill, which is

“a person subject to UK service jurisdiction”,

and that in his amendment, which is

“a foreign national serving under the military command of the UK Armed Forces”,

because he has not answered that question yet?

[Kevin Brennan]

I do not think that is a question for me to answer. It is one for the Minister to answer in her response. As for his comments about those on the Benches behind, I always prefer these odds when debating in the House of Commons.

What assessment has been made of whether this matter constitutes a risk or a loophole? In Committee, the Minister mentioned that when a foreign national is embedded,

“a bespoke status of forces agreement or memorandum of understanding is drawn up that sets out responsibility for the individual involved.”—[Official Report, Cultural Property (Armed Conflicts) Public Bill Committee, 15 November 2016; c. 14.]

Is responsibility for protecting cultural property a part of that understanding? If it is not, will it be following the passage of the Bill?

As the House knows, the UK armed forces already abide by the terms of the convention. I very much welcome that, and I want to take this opportunity to pay tribute to their work and their outstanding contribution. I hope the Minister will be able to reassure the House that although the armed forces are a complex organisation, the application of the Bill will be consistent for everybody who serves in them.

The other amendments in this group were tabled by Government Members. We had fairly extensive discussions in Committee on the impact of the Bill on the arts market so I do not propose to say anything further on that matter.

[Sir Edward Garnier (Harborough) (Con)]

I am very sympathetic to the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan). He has ploughed a lonely furrow with great elegance and humour. At least he can claim to have 100% support from the representatives of the Labour party today. I am not entirely sure that I can, but I will have a go and see whether I can tempt the House towards supporting my amendments—amendments 1, 2 and 3. I am very happy to say that they were co-signed by my hon. Friends the Members for Kensington (Victoria Borwick) and for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham). Like the shadow Minister, although we are few in number we are very high in quality.

[Tim Loughton]

And modesty.

[Sir Edward Garnier]

Modesty is not a word I have ever heard of. It may be, to refer to the Dealing in Cultural Objects (Offences) Act 2003, a cultural object, but clearly one that is far too expensive for me to have ever clapped eyes on.

If I may, I would like to tease out from the Government further information on, and their thoughts about, their policy in relation to clause 17, which sets up the offence of dealing in unlawfully exported cultural property. I should say by way of introduction—if, three minutes into my speech, I am entitled to call these words an introduction—that it strikes me that the Bill is, by and large, entirely uncontroversial, deeply unexciting and about 50 years too late. That said, if we are to introduce uncontroversial Bills 50 years too late, we might as well get the law right. It strikes me that clause 17 contains a self-evident defect, which I dealt with on Second Reading on 31 October 2016. If I may, I would like briefly to rehearse those arguments for the following reasons.

I convinced myself—I remain convinced and have yet to be persuaded otherwise by the Government—that the second element of the criminal intent provision in clause 17, which I criticised, is legally incoherent. Beyond that, I have yet to be persuaded by the Secretary of State and the Minister of either the content or quality of the counterpoints they made in response to the concerns identified in my three amendments. We have had a number of meetings, both one-on-one and collectively —possibly with my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington, but certainly with other representatives of the art market—and I think it is fair to say that our concerns about the wording “having reason to suspect” in clause 17 have not been answered satisfactorily.

There has been some assertion: “This wording is better,” say the Government. There has been further assertion that the wording that I prefer, which comes from the Dealing in Cultural Objects (Offences) Act 2003, has failed to lead to the prosecution of any people guilty or suspected of being guilty of offences under that Act and that therefore the level of criminal intent needs to be lowered.