Official Development Assistance

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Thursday 26th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

The hon. Gentleman says that it went up. That Government spent, on average, 0.36% of GNI on ODA. With a record like that, the hon. Gentleman, rather than chuntering from a sedentary position, should stay quiet on this subject. On the Government Benches, with our record, we will take no lectures from the Labour party when it comes to ODA.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

It feels almost rude to interrupt a private dialogue. I understand the pain that this economic collapse is causing all of us. I have just received the appalling news that the whole of Kent has gone into tier 3, and I am aware of the pain that this will cause communities across my constituency.

I supported the Foreign Secretary taking over the DFID portfolio because I knew that the rigour he would bring to ODA spending would mean that it was always in the British national interest. Indeed, the way he has spoken about it this morning reassures me of that. He has spoken quite rightly about girls’ education, not just because it is good for girls in other parts of the world but because it is good for Britain. He has spoken about climate change, not just because it is good for the poorest and most low-lying countries around the world but because it is good for Britain. He has spoken about vaccination, not just because it is most important for the most vulnerable in the world, but again, because it is good for Britain. So does he understand why so many of us are disappointed that, knowing how well he will spend this money, not only in the interests of others but in the British national interest, we hear that it has been cut? I am sure that he feels that, too.

Could I perhaps ask the Foreign Secretary to look at a slightly different way of counting, because we all know that the 1970s DAC rules need to be reformed? I am not alone in saying this. The French Government have said it; the Netherlands Government have said it; and the German Government have said it. In fact, I think that I am right in saying that everybody, except the Swedish Government, has said it. Could we not count the enormous sums that he is already spending on vaccination programmes through the vaccine taskforce and the enormous money he is spending on UN duties—not just the 15% that DAC allows him to count—and could we not count that stability as our ODA capability and reinforce what he has done? Then perhaps we can look at the Bill he may be forced to introduce and make sure that it is not an open-ended Bill but has a sunset clause in black and white that we can vote on, too.

[Dominic Raab]

I thank my hon. Friend the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee. He is absolutely right, and he said it at the outset: we make this decision with regret. I do not want to be in a position of having to change any of the ODA spend. I know how valuable it can be and, notwithstanding our absolute commitment to strategically focus it on the places and people who need it the most and the areas of maximum UK interest, of course this is something we do with regret. We do it as a matter of necessity, given the economic situation we face, and it will be temporary, in that we will revert to 0.7% as soon as the fiscal position allows.

My hon. Friend asked a range of questions about whether we could reconfigure money. We are not going to unilaterally pull out of the DAC rules, but he makes a good case for reform of the DAC rules. For example, some of the military spend, particularly on peace keeping and other things, is not counted. Clearly, it is not just good for military security in the countries where it is focused but an important element of soft power, and it is something we should do. However, I think that the right thing to do is to work on that reform from within DAC, rather than pulling out unilaterally, and that will take some time to do, but I take on board his comments.

My hon. Friend asked how we will make sure we get back to the target, and I am very happy to keep talking to him about that. The No. 1 thing in my view, and I would gently suggest this to him, is that we are still spending £10 billion next year on ODA. When I think of what he said about his constituents and how they will feel about the latest measures—we all are challenged by this—I think that they will think that we are making difficult decisions, but the right ones and the justifiable ones, in the very exacting situation in which we find ourselves.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Tuesday 24th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Nigel Adams]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise that. While I was in Manila last week, I met a range of Cabinet Secretaries, including the Health Secretary and the Foreign Minister, as I said, and the British Red Cross. As my hon. Friend knows, there is currently a ban on Filipino nurses leaving the country. They are fantastic, committed health workers and we are very grateful to the 30,000 of them in the national health service. I am pleased to report that we managed to secure important progress in that regard. Following the discussions that I had with the Health Secretary, the Philippines President has confirmed that he will lift the ban, allowing our NHS to recruit these highly skilled and excellent health service workers.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

I very much welcome my hon. Friend’s efforts with ASEAN and his emphasis on the Indo-Pacific. He will no doubt have seen the fantastic Policy Exchange report by my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Claire Coutinho), who has been instrumental in emphasising some of these points. Does he agree that this tilt towards the Asia-Pacific is fundamental to defending democracies in the region, to ensuring that British interests are valued and to respecting the individual rights of countries that for too long have been pressed by China to come under a different orbit?

[Nigel Adams]

I thank the Chairman of the Select Committee for his question. He is absolutely right, and I also applaud the work of my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey in this regard. Our tilt towards the Indo-Pacific region as part of the integrated review is testament to how much we value that part of the world. There are a number of issues that we will raise with China. We are concerned in particular about issues around the South China sea, and these are conversations that we have regularly with China. I made our legal position on that very clear here at the Dispatch Box a couple of months ago. Our support in that area has been widely supported by our ASEAN friends.

Nigeria: Sanctions Regime

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Monday 23rd November 2020 Westminster Hall

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

Thank you for calling me to speak, Mr Gray. It is a pleasure to follow my friend, the hon. Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor), who speaks quite rightly with passion about one of the world’s great countries, which is sadly being wracked by violence against young people.

There may be some debate about this, but I argue that the greatest book in the English language is “Things Fall Apart” by Chinua Achebe, the great Nigerian writer. The beauty of that book is the way it explains the challenge to changing generations of living together, and the way it speaks about values falling away and community being eroded by outside pressure.

What we are seeing in Nigeria today is part of that story. It is a tragedy that we are all watching and witnessing. As we see things falling apart, the pressure this time is not foreign colonialism, but corruption, violence and attempts at control. I totally agree with my friend, the hon. Member for Edmonton, that we need to call out the corruption and use the powers we have in this country to stop those who are profiting from the wealth of that great nation, and hiding it here.

Some people will remember when General Gowon left Nigeria with half the Central Bank of Nigeria, so it is said, and moved to London. We know that today, even now in this great city of ours, there are some people who have taken from the Nigerian people and hidden their ill-gotten gains here. Sadly, we know that our banks have been used for those profits and for that illegal transfer of assets. That means that the UK is in an almost unique position in being able to do something to exert pressure on those who have robbed the Nigerian people.

This puts a particular onus on my hon. Friend the Minister, and I know she knows it. Using Magnitsky sanctions today is not just about protecting Nigeria, although it is. It is not just about respecting Nigerian young people who have been robbed and murdered by the SARS units. It is about protecting the United Kingdom, because what happens in Nigeria matters fundamentally to us here.

This country is the third country of the Commonwealth and has 200 million people. It will be the great economic powerhouse of Africa and one of the great economic powerhouses of the world. Its wealth is not just in the oil of the Rivers state, but in the imagination and creativity of its people, as witnessed every day in Nollywood and, perhaps more my style, at the great University of Jos. It is a country that gives so much to the world already, despite the fact that it is ill governed, brutalised and robbed. Imagine what it could give if the Plateau state was not a scene of conflict and anti-SARS movements, but instead was the global centre of learning that it really and truly could be, and indeed was up until the 1960s.

This is an opportunity for the UK to do something real, not just in the interests of Nigerians, although it would be, and not just in the interests of Africans, although it would be that, too, but fundamentally in the interests of the British people. This is a moment when the petitioners have got it absolutely right. They are not just arguing for the rights of young Nigerians who are claiming their own rights, but for the rights of democrats, free people, and honourable people everywhere. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister and her colleague, the Secretary of State, will listen, look at the sanctions regime and choose carefully where they apply.

Hong Kong

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Thursday 12th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Nigel Adams]

I thank the hon. Lady for raising this urgent question. One of her points was about whether I would meet her; of course, I am more than happy to meet her. I know how important this issue is to her and other Members of this House, and my door is always open for conversations with me and my team. I can tell her that we have already seen statements from our partners thus far on this particular issue. Australia, the USA, Canada and Germany have all made statements on the matter and we will continue to work with all our Five Eyes partners to hold China to account. The actions we have taken at the UN over the last few months are testament to that and proof of our leading diplomatic role in this regard.

The hon. Lady asked about sanctions and we will continue to consider designations under our Magnitsky-style sanctions regime. She will appreciate it is not entirely appropriate to speculate on who may be designated under the sanctions regime in the future, as that could reduce the impact, but we are carefully considering further designations under the scheme.

She was right to mention the action we have taken on British nationals overseas. The Home Secretary issued a statement on 22 July on the new route for BNOs, which states that

“in compelling and compassionate circumstances, and where applications are made as a family unit, we will use discretion to grant a visa to the children”

of BNO status-holders

“who fall into this category…the existing youth mobility scheme is open to people in Hong Kong aged between 18 and 30, with 1,000 places currently available each year. Individuals from Hong Kong will also be able to apply to come to the UK under the terms of the UK’s new points-based system”.—[Official Report, 22 July 2020; Vol. 678, c. 115WS.]

The hon. Lady asked about the number of BNOs. From July 2020, BNO citizens and their dependants have been eligible to be granted six months’ leave outside the rules at the border to the UK, and from 15 July to 14 October 2020, a total of 2,116 BNO citizens and their dependants have been granted that. That data is not a reliable proxy for the number of people who may apply for the visa when it opens in January, but it does suggest that the number of BNO citizens seeking to come to the UK in the short term is unlikely to be at the high end of the scale.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

I welcome my hon. Friend’s designation that this is the third breach of the Sino-British joint declaration, and I do not think that anybody in this House disagrees with him. After all, we are now seeing that China really does believe in “one man, one vote”, and that man, of course, is Chairman Xi. We now need Her Majesty’s Government to respond not just, as my hon. Friend quite rightly said, by looking at our own laws and Magnitsky sanctions, or, indeed, by seeking to work with others, but by working on the international trade platform as well. What conversations has my hon. Friend had with the Department for International Trade, partners at the World Trade Organisation and others around the world to make sure that Hong Kong is designated correctly as a part of China and that it no longer has a separate status for customs or, indeed, any other form of commerce?

[Nigel Adams]

I thank the Chair of the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs for his question and for his ongoing leadership on this particular issue. Trade with China is absolutely pivotal and crucial to the UK. Figures over the last six months show that China is only one of two countries where our exports have actually grown over a very difficult period. We have a high level of ambition for our trade partnership. We want to work with it to increase trade, but as we strive for that positive relationship we will not sacrifice our values or our security. We are very clear-sighted about the challenges. As we continue to engage, we will always protect our national interests. Absolutely and imperatively, as the Foreign Secretary has said at this Dispatch Box on many occasions, we will continue to hold China to its international commitments and its promises.

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd November 2020 Commons Chamber

[James Cleverly]

I pay tribute to the hon. Lady, for whom I have a huge amount of respect, for her tireless campaigning on behalf of her constituent and more widely on the other British dual national detainees in Iran. It is commendable. She raises the question of the delay in the hearing about the IMS debt. As she said in her comments, these are unrelated issues. However, the adjournment of the November hearing is at the request of the Iranian Ministry of Defence. It would be inappropriate for me to comment further on ongoing legal positions in regard to that.

The hon. Lady also speaks about our requests for access to Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe and the other British dual national detainees. That is something we continue to do. Requesting does not guarantee us access—indeed, demanding does not guarantee us access. What we are doing at every stage, while working with the Iranian Government at every level, is what we genuinely believe is in the best interests of our dual national detainees to secure their permanent release on humanitarian grounds, so that they can return home and be with their families.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) for securing this urgent question on such an important matter. Her campaign for her constituent Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has been inspiring, but the Minister knows that many other Brits are being held. Will he please confirm that he will be dealing with all Brits being held by the Iranian regime? Will he also agree that the attempts by the Iranian Government to connect the IMS debt and the release of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe would seem to suggest that she is not being held on the charges that they claim, but actually is just a hostage? That would cheapen Iranian justice. Surely the Iranian Government would never argue that case again.

[James Cleverly]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question. The British Government’s position is clear. We do not link this to the debt, but we do not dispute that there is a 40-year-old debt, and we continue to explore options to resolve it. I will not comment further, because this is an ongoing situation. He is right to raise the plight of other British dual nationals in detention in Iran. We make the case strongly and regularly for the full, permanent release—not just release on furlough—of all British dual nationals held in detention.

Syria: Humanitarian Situation

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd November 2020 Westminster Hall

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David. Most of all, it is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern). She was extremely kind at the beginning of her speech about several of us. Perhaps I can mention how I was about 80% through writing “The Cost of Doing Nothing” with my friend, Jo Cox, when she was murdered on that terrible day in June 2016. It was a very difficult time for all of us not only because we lost a friend, but because there were so many projects unfinished and so many deeds undone that would have been at least the beginning of what was so obviously a glorious career in the service of our country. It was difficult for many of us to understand how we could complete that work and how we could put flesh on those bones. The hon. Member for Wirral South was not only kind and generous but hugely courageous in helping me to finish that paper and in making sure that it lived in the spirit in which it was written—one of co-operation, care and compassion. I have nothing but praise for her, and her extraordinary speech today demonstrates that compassion that we all love her for, so I thank her for it.

However, I want to build on her words. What we are seeing in Syria today is the deliberate act of people. It is the deliberate act of the Assad regime and family. It is the deliberate act of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps and its sponsors—the theocracy and theocrats in Tehran. It is the deliberate act of China and Russia, which have chosen to block humanitarian aid. It is the deliberate act of others in the region who have funded militias, inspired hatred and stirred up violence. But, here in Westminster, we must also remember that it is the deliberate act of our country too, and of others in the west who have not acted and are now finding out the true cost of doing nothing.

The paper I wrote with Jo for Policy Exchange is available online. The tragedy is that although the times have changed, the words do not need to. What it sets out—the cost of inaction and the implication of death and suffering that follows—is merely clearer, more obvious and more painful. Now, it is not 1 or 2 million refugees in Syria; it is 4 or 5 million. There are 9.3 million dependent on food aid, according to the World Food Programme. There are 11 million dependent on humanitarian assistance. This is no longer a failed state. It is barely a state at all.

The decision we have to take, and that I urge the Minister to push forward on, is to work with our partners and allies and to recognise that if the UN route fails, that does not mean a veto on our action; it is a veto on only one route of action. We do have difficult relationships in the region, and I am not going to gloss over them. We know that many of our partners make at best difficult, and sometimes frankly unpleasant, bedfellows. However, the truth is that when we are looking at tens of millions of people affected, hundreds of thousands killed, and refugee convoys and movements leading to the destabilisation of our allies and partners in NATO and eastern Europe, this is not, anymore, a matter of choice.

This is a decision that Her Majesty’s Government have to be involved in, because it affects us here in the UK. This is a decision that Her Majesty’s Government must be involved in, because our allies and partners are being torn apart by it. This is a decision that her Majesty’s Government must be involved in, because, as my dear friend, the hon. Member for Wirral South correctly said, this is a humanitarian disaster that we can change.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Tuesday 13th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

I thank the hon. Lady. As I have made clear, the Bill is a defensive, precautionary measure to safeguard the integrity of the UK. If the hon. Lady wants to know what people outside the United Kingdom and the EU say about the United Kingdom when it comes to upholding the international rule of law, perhaps she would like to listen to Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, the Belarusian opposition leader, who said on 5 October in an interview:

“I am really grateful to the United Kingdom. For them to be so vocal, for them to be so brave, for them to be so strong in their position—it was all action. The United Kingdom has really shown itself as an example to the whole world.”

That is what they say about the United Kingdom outside the EU.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend is rightly addressing the rule of law in a particular negotiation. Will he recognise, however, that the negotiations we are conducting around the world, including with the Japanese Government and the beginning of the conversation with the comprehensive and progressive agreement for trans-Pacific partnership will rely on the UK making deals that will endure the future? Those deals will only endure truly if the UK holds together and values all parts of this United Kingdom. Will he recognise, therefore, that his role is to promote the voices of Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland together to make sure all those four nations achieve the best for the whole United Kingdom?

[Dominic Raab]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We have just signed a deal with Japan, and we have signed a continuity deal with South Korea. We are looking at a second one, and we have ambitions for scoping talks in relation to that, so that we can improve in areas such as data. We are making good progress on Vietnam. That is precisely the way in trade negotiations we will represent the businesses and consumers of all four nations of the United Kingdom, and that is the way we will continue.

China’s Policy on its Uyghur Population

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Monday 12th October 2020 Westminster Hall

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow such eminent speakers. I agree with so many of the points made that I will skip to others, which have not. We do not seek to hold China to either a standard that we would not hold ourselves to, or indeed one that China has not already agreed to. China has already agreed and signed the international convention on the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination, the convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide, the UN convention against torture and other cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment, the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women, the UN convention on the rights of the child, the slavery convention 1926 and the international covenant on civil and political rights. Perhaps most importantly, it was China or, rather, a Chinese diplomat who drafted the individual rights into the UN declaration. P.C. Chang, then a representative of the Chinese Government, held the pen and wrote into international law the principles of individual rights that we value so highly today.

These are not western values; they are universal values that China has agreed to, that the Chinese state has accepted and pledged to obey, and which it is now violating among one of the ethnic minority populations within its borders. This is not something to which we can look idly by and pretend is not happening, because this is not just about the torture, murder and forced sterilisation of Uyghur Muslims—it is of course about that. It is also not just about the violation of freedom of faith and the repression of the Islamic community in western China—and, by the way, the repression of the Christian community across China. It is also—fundamentally for this House—about the liberty of the British people, whom we are here to represent. Our ability to represent and to defend the rights and interests of the people of these islands is contingent on the rights and liberties of other people being respected. We cannot trade and travel freely and fairly if the people of those countries are not free to enjoy the liberties that we think matter.

Anyone who does not think that that is true should ask the family of Michael Kovrig, a Canadian diplomat who worked for the International Crisis Group who was arrested and has been detained for two years by the Chinese Government. The Chinese state—this communist state—is violating the rights of not only Chinese citizens, but all citizens, which is why it is right that this House speak out.

Belarus: Presidential Elections

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Thursday 24th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

I thank the shadow Foreign Secretary for her statement and her support. It is powerful for all Members, on all political sides of the House, to stand in solidarity with the people of Belarus, and I welcome that support. Like her, I am appalled at the arbitrary detention and the abuse of protesters in detention, including any activity that amounts to torture or inhumane and degrading treatment. We absolutely stand for the absolute prohibition of torture, as reflected in various human rights treaties to which we are a party.

The hon. Lady referred to sanctions, and we are consider the whole range of potential individuals. She also mentioned corruption, which she will know is not covered by the Magnitsky sanctions; they deal with a slew of the most serious human rights violations, although they do cover those who might profit from those human rights abuses. I can tell her that I am looking carefully at how we extend the next step of the Magnitsky sanctions to corruption and similar types of offences—I will say more about that in due course.

In terms of money for civil society, including journalists, we have doubled that amount of money, as I explained, and will look very carefully at how it is targeted, not just to journalists, but to writers and the members of the arts that the hon. Lady described. I will not pre-empt the comprehensive spending review, notwithstanding her deft attempt, but I can tell her on media freedom that we have a campaign that we do side by side with the Canadians, which is encouraging those countries that are willing to sign up to new legislation, and also providing support to journalists who are either in detention or have litigation against them. That is progressing. We have worked very hard with the Canadians on it, and the numbers joining that media freedom campaign have grown.

Finally, the hon. Lady asked about the OSCE. I can tell her that obviously we work very carefully with our partners in the OSCE. It was the United Kingdom that pushed for the Moscow mechanism to get an international review both into the human rights abuses and the vote rigging, and we are proud of the role we play with our partners.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to hear the statement from my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary, who has laid out an impressive, decent and strong series of proposals, and it is very pleasing to hear the Opposition agree as well. Building on the discussions that he has so clearly had with various of our allies, what conversations has he had with Germany? I raise Germany, in particular, because the Nord Stream 2 project that is currently going through is allowing the Russian Government to salami-slice our eastern neighbours and friends one by one, and what we are seeing in Belarus could easily happen in other countries. Although Belarus is the last country in the world still to have an active KGB, we hope that it will not become the first of many to have an active SVR base very soon.

[Dominic Raab]

I thank my hon. Friend and pay tribute to him and the work of his Committee. I had a detailed discussion on this with Heiko Maas, my German opposite number, at Chevening, along with Jean-Yves Le Drian, my French opposite number. We have made it clear, as my hon. Friend will know, that we have our reservations and concerns about Nord Stream 2, both from the point of view of its encouraging European energy dependence on Russia, but also the impact on Ukraine. Equally, it is quite important, given the lead Germany has taken with Alexei Navalny and in relation to the work we need to do together on Belarus, that we maintain European solidarity. My hon. Friend’s points are well made and, of course, our European partners know the UK position.

Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Tuesday 8th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend knows very well that one of the reasons for the proximity between the United Arab Emirates and Israel is the pressure put on both by the Iranian regime, and the work that his Department has done in holding the Iranian regime to account at the UN has been hugely impressive. Applying the rule of law and applying the principles of non-violable international treaty to international negotiation has been so important. Could he please tell me that the UK will read the letter of the treaty of United Nations Security Council resolution 2231, and recognise that any of the named states has the opportunity to snapback sanctions on the violating state of Iran? Will he recognise as well that those international treaties are not for interpretation, but are actually pretty clearly laid out in black and white?

[Dominic Raab]

I thank my hon. Friend the Chair of the Select Committee. Lawyers will always have different views on the precise permutations, but I think the position on snapback in relation to the joint comprehensive plan of action is tolerably clear. He is absolutely right also to point to the role that Iran plays not just with its own activities—those it engages in directly—but working through Hamas and Hezbollah and other proxies throughout the middle east as a source of tension and instability. We are working with all of our allies to try to make sure we limit and hold to account Iran for those activities.