Soft Power and the UK’s Influence (Select Committee Report)

Earl of Sandwich Excerpts

Tuesday 10th March 2015 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Sandwich (CB)]

My Lords, this is a fascinating subject for anyone who cares about international development and diplomacy. The noble Lord, Lord Howell, has, as always, shown great personal commitment both with the presenting of ideas in the report and in his introductory remarks. The only regret I have is that his powers of persuasion, which are famous, have not extended to the Liaison Committee, which is supposed to approve the formation of an international affairs committee. However, he has 30 signed-up Members today and I think we should make a new approach.

While in principle I am a believer in soft power, I start with some scepticism because it is really yesterday’s concept. It was identified in the late 1980s at a time when, with the end of the Cold War, political theorists were looking for something new. Strange as it seems, we even then expected Russia to drop its military guard and entertain European concepts of soft power.

As Europeans we are all advocates of soft power. As the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, reminded us, that is how the founding fathers set up the new Europe, not only as an economic community but as a means of achieving peaceful development and of sharing democratic ideals. The European Union has for many years been quietly following its own concept of soft power through the Copenhagen criteria, especially the rule of law. The very process of enlargement and of the CSDP missions, especially in the Balkans, demonstrates this determination.

Having read the authoritative British Academy report last year, I wonder whether the canvas of soft power is so wide that it has lost its central purpose. If translated into government policy it becomes almost meaningless. The noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, had a similar thought that such reports, unfortunately, end up as a catalogue of alternative ingredients. I therefore sympathise with the Minister in having to cover the whole à la carte menu.

Soft power takes many forms, as we have heard. We all acknowledge the work of the BBC, the British Council and Commonwealth, which is rightly and widely admired. The point of the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, was well taken, as was the point of the noble Baroness, Lady Suttie, about Russian propaganda. I am a huge fan of the BBC World Service and I have seen the British Council at work in Africa and south Asia. I know the potential value of the Commonwealth. The monarchy is itself a flagship of soft power. UK plc is another but it has not been mentioned a great deal. Of course, a lot of this is boasting, with some reason, that we are still a soft power superpower punching above our weight.

Having spent most of my time with NGOs I should like to deal mainly with the questions that arise when Governments engage in soft power through civil society, as raised by the noble Lord, Lord Judd. I know that this Government, especially DfID, have tried hard to work with civil society. The noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, gave examples. The British Council does a lot in this area but I am not sure how far it has succeeded as far as the MoD is concerned. We do not need Clausewitz to understand that our armed services have to be interested in soft power, especially in education and training, as is explained on page 67 of the report, and in stabilisation. Phrases such as “building stability” and “upstream conflict prevention” entered the language when this Government started to confront the failures of military intervention with a new concept of peace building.

Before Libya, Iraq and Afghanistan, we had at least one European success in Kosovo, in which it proved possible to push back conflict. Sierra Leone was another example. However, the resolution of both these conflicts required strong prior military intervention. Soft power remained in the rear.

In 2011 William Hague, Andrew Mitchell and Liam Fox announced a new Building Stability Overseas Strategy. They forecast that the ODA expenditure on fragile and conflict-affected states would increase to 30% by 2015. They also said that the resources of the joint conflict pool would increase to £1.1 billion over the spending review period. The ODA proportion of the budget was also due to rise to 65%.

In the context of this debate, that has been a considerable advance towards soft power. Learning from Afghanistan became a watchword and an opportunity for the Government to move beyond their own joined-up strategy into working more closely with civil society and organisations with direct experience of conflict prevention. I recognise the critical value of young volunteering and leadership training identified by the noble Baroness, Lady Armstrong. My noble friend Lord Janvrin also used the words “nurture and support”. One expert from the Institute of Development Studies has argued that three issues raised by this strategy still need to be addressed:

“The tension between impact … and upstream conflict prevention; … The meaning of stabilisation in upstream conflict prevention”,

and:

“The lack of attention to coordination with NGOs and capacity on the ground at the expense of cross-Whitehall integration”.

The soft power report pays much too little attention to NGOs. This is a pity. It is because of the spectrum of evidence that would have been required. The interface between military and civilian is well covered in the report. Recommendation 24, for example, calls for an analysis of smart and soft power. Can the Minister confirm that this will be carried through in the 2015 SDSR, if the Government win the election? The government response on page 37 twice refers to the Stabilisation Unit as “a key Government instrument” which,

“delivers more effective post-conflict work and actively champions co-operation between military and civilian actors”.

This is some advance but it will be interesting to hear the Minister’s view.

I turn to cultural diplomacy. I am a firm believer in the power of culture and sport in conflict or post-conflict states. Having followed the fortunes and misfortunes of South Sudan, once as a spectator of the famous Dinka dancing, I remember how cultural and sporting events, such as the Shakespeare exchanges and the Twic county Olympics in that country, deliberately created a new sense of dignity among people suffering from a lack of almost anything.

In Afghanistan, the Turquoise Mountain Foundation has demonstrated a similar success. It has played a part in creating an atmosphere of hope in the midst of conflict. I saw how this project had helped to rebuild the old quarter of Kabul and had trained or retrained countless artists, designers, craftsmen and those acquiring new business skills for the nation. I declare an interest because my daughter once worked on this project and is now active in a programme called Culture and Conflict which holds seminars and encourages artists in different areas of conflict. It is important to stress that the success and sustainability of these programmes depends entirely on direct engagement of local people and civil society in the country concerned. As the noble Lord, Lord Judd, said, they have credibility.

I have some doubts about the interference of government in the activities of NGOs and the risk of it being misunderstood. One has only to look at the work of NGOs in Afghanistan and how they have had to work at a local level to avoid giving the Taliban the impression that they were somehow agents of foreign powers. There are many examples in developing countries of NGOs resisting such suspicion, especially when they are receiving foreign funds, and of Governments pursuing them for those reasons. The best answer is for NGOs to remain indigenous as far as possible and resolutely to pursue goals which belong to their own communities. That does not mean that our Government cannot work alongside them.

Finally, I pay tribute to my new noble friend Lady Wolf and her rigorous contribution which will make us all think. I join the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, and other noble Lords who have challenged the Home Office on its attitude to Indian students. The Government’s response to this report takes nothing away from the central argument that the inclusion of students in immigration statistics—whatever the formal necessity of OECD presentations, which is the normal excuse—is both cynical and wrong and should be reversed. That was a key message, widely publicised, and I hope that the Minister will give this House an end-of-term report on that issue.

National Parliaments (EUC Report)

Earl of Sandwich Excerpts

Monday 15th December 2014 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Sandwich (CB)]

My Lords, the idea of strengthening the role of national parliaments in the EU looks, on the surface, fairly obvious. The EU has gradually acquired additional competency and the Lisbon treaty, while giving more power to the European Parliament, has not led, as was intended—as we were reminded by the noble Baroness, Lady Smith—to a parallel development between the Commission and the parliaments of member states. However, the more I read about subsidiarity and reasoned opinions—I have to acknowledge early training in the old Sub-Committee E under the noble Lord, Lord Bowness, and our very patient legal adviser Mike Thomas—the more technical and legalistic are the arguments behind these Lisbon concepts and the related solutions. Today, for my own self-preservation among other things, I propose to step back to try to understand the view of the ordinary citizen.

To the UK public, Europe is still the continent: it is a vast bureaucratic union opposite our southern shores, which sends us regulations and with which we have to do business. People do not feel that they truly belong to it. It is a power bloc with which we need to trade and only an older minority—like most of us here—feel the emotion of solidarity since 1945, which bound the original founding fathers. The undoubted advantages of the single market and of political co-operation escape the ordinary citizen. I hope the noble Lord, Lord Judd, is right that we can correct that in time, although I have my doubts.

The more visible agenda is the athletic political stance of our Prime Minister, for whom there has to be a degree of sympathy. He has quite rightly aligned himself with reform and a gradual repatriation of national sovereignty. However, being British, he is also a bit of a loner: he stands out at EU summits—not unlike Mrs Thatcher before him—as an independent but somewhat isolated figure defending the nation of shopkeepers, while for some he can even be a source of fun or irritation. With his left hand he has to hold on to his coalition partner; with the other, as we approach the election, he is making increasing overtures to the right wing of his party and to potential defectors.

We all know the Prime Minister to be a pro-European at heart, but does he have what has been called a “Lust für Europa”? Is the UK still enjoying the luxury of not having been invaded in the last war? Can we overcome our island mentality, which makes us permanently different, difficult and ready to criticise, or do we have to make a virtue of it? Some of us were in Berlin a fortnight ago. We heard German Members of Parliament from the two Bundestag committees imploring us to stay in the EU to support a strong EU line against Russia, which is desperately needed at the moment. But why should they think we would leave the EU? Are we so aloof that we must continue to keep them guessing?

Political manoeuvring with the referendum and treaty change explains some, but not all, of this. I recognise that reform has been too sluggish. There were tactical arguments, for example, behind the recent opt-outs and opt-back-ins. I acknowledge that the UK is, in practice, an equal partner in the legislative sense. We take a lead in EU scrutiny through a range of committees, as I can see at first hand. Since the recession, there has also been a lot of alarm about the eurozone and whether there will be a two-tier Europe, but because of our strong financial position we have remained in that discussion. That is all good. Nevertheless, despite all that, I look forward to the day that we can pass on the role of prima ballerina to someone else.

Turning to subsidiarity, I have studied the two very helpful reports by the University of Copenhagen and the Tweede Kamer. The Danish analysis is fascinating, showing how national parliaments have suffered from disempowerment since Lisbon. We should all be encouraged by the acceleration of decision-making and the rapid rise of genuine early agreements in the European Parliament, which accounted for two-thirds of adopted proposals in 2012. However, this means that, as national parliaments, we need to do much more pre-legislative scrutiny. As has been said, we need to question Ministers before Council meetings as well as after. The Commission’s response shares this view and says that,

“very few national parliaments make their views known”,

at an early stage. That is very surprising. The voice of concerted national parliaments surely must be heard on the most important issues—yellow and green cards have been mentioned. As a member of the Select Committee, I was equally amazed and frustrated that the legally required number of reasoned opinions on the EPPO was still not enough to jog the Commission into action.

This attitude will surely change under President Jean-Claude Juncker. After all, he has promised to raise the profile of national parliaments and we must keep him to his word—whatever the Prime Minister’s view of his method of election, he will certainly find allies in this House on that subject. Perhaps he will pick up the suggestion made by the noble Lord, Lord Tugendhat, for a new Commissioner for Parliaments. I hope that he will.

Apart from that, the Tweede Kamer report sensibly recommends a more active stance in interparliamentary co-operation. The noble Lord, Lord Davies, went into that, but I do not think we made enough of it in our report. It is not easy, as has been said, and it can only work on single issues that draw like-minded parliaments and connected Members of the European Parliament together. Our Select Committee has discussed how that might be done in relation to reasoned opinions. One obvious practical suggestion is that the two UK Houses should increase their present liaison staff in Brussels. Strengthening the Commons Select Committees has also been mentioned, as has mainstreaming. Another solution is, of course, improving COSAC, which is a very long-term project. That could become a less formal and more flexible institution, although that also has its limitations.

It is often said that this House operates a better system of scrutiny and reporting than, shall we say, most other EU chambers. Should we therefore reach out a little further into Europe and hold seminars on topical issues of subsidiarity that might attract MPs and MEPs from other nations? The imperative in the EU always seems to be aiming for uniformity, but we already have disunity. We have natural coalitions with the Dutch and Germans. We could, for example, work more closely with Poland and the more recent EU members in eastern Europe.

I have said enough, but I stand by the recommendations in our report and I hope that they attract a much wider readership throughout the EU. The Government already mainly agree with us and the Minister is bound to say that this is a matter for Parliament. All the same, I am sure that he will be more generous than that and I look forward to what he is going to tell us.

Sudan and South Sudan

Earl of Sandwich Excerpts

Monday 8th December 2014 Grand Committee

Asked by

[The Earl of Sandwich]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they are taking a lead in the diplomatic and humanitarian response to the conflicts in Sudan and South Sudan.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the timing of this debate is very tight. The current allocation of time comes to 58 minutes, and we have a request for a two-minute speech in the gap. I would therefore be very grateful if noble Lords could be succinct.

[The Earl of Sandwich (CB)]

My Lords, I warmly welcome the Minister and thank all colleagues for joining this debate. I have chosen the anniversary of the fateful coup in South Sudan last December as a reminder of the continuing conflict in the north and the south.

I start with a brief interview with a woman from Upper Nile called Nyantay, who went blind at the time of South Sudan’s referendum and then became a refugee. Nyantay, a mother of four, fled from gunfire in her village but then found herself alone. “I just kept running”, she said. She fell into holes, ran into trees and suffered from heat exhaustion. At one point she sat down expecting death. She went on, “I thought, if the animals eat me, that’s fine. If the soldiers kill me, that’s fine. I no longer felt fear”. Luckily, she was found and taken across the border into Ethiopia and later reunited with her family, whom she had presumed had died.

Nyantay has survived but many thousands have not. At least 10,000 have died in the south—perhaps twice that number. Nearly 2 million have fled from their homes; half of them are in neighbouring countries. Ethiopia now has the largest refugee population in Africa. Some 100,000 are in UN camps in the south but many of them still live in fear for their lives, the Nuer from Salva Kiir’s SPLA and the Dinka from Riek Machar’s opposition SPLA 1.0. There have been terrible massacres on both sides. With the onset of the dry season, fighting will resume and further genocide may be around the corner. One-third of children are acutely malnourished and literacy levels for women remain among the lowest anywhere.

South Sudan is now a level 3 crisis, which is the highest UN category. The figures from UNOCHA’s situation reports are staggering: 618,000 are displaced in Jonglei state alone. Can we even imagine the challenge this presents to aid workers? Nyantay, the blind refugee, nearly gave up hope and, as onlookers, we, too, at times feel helpless and hopeless. So long as the warring parties fail to agree, South Sudan—the world’s youngest country—will remain in a state of chaos.

We may ask why we should care. We should care because people are suffering; because we may have friends living or working there; because any failed state threatens its neighbours; because we, as a country, have a historic commitment, not least as one of the troika who have been continually present at the talks in Addis; and because if we do not end the conflict in South Sudan, more refugees will come to Britain.

If we do help, will aid through the Government reach the people, considering that oil revenues have gone direct to the SPLA and South Sudan is near the top of the corruption list? Did not the World Bank health programme seize up altogether so that NGOs had to take over? Is this not a reason for some to argue that we should reduce our aid budget, or will the Minister confirm my view, which is that through the UN, aid agencies and NGOs, we can and do help effectively if we apply strict conditionality? In principle, humanitarian aid is given safe passage by both sides but there are many obstacles and restrictions, especially on foreign aid workers. The UN doctrine of responsibility to protect is the hardest to apply in such conditions.

I do not want to imply that South Sudan is not functioning, because it has a professional elite and a vigorous civil society—and not only in Juba—with many NGOs and heroic individuals providing essential services where the Government have failed. I remember them from my last visit. For the moment, famine has been averted. Although the UN mission is constantly harassed by the Government, the ICRC is now active again. The British Council has stayed open for most of the conflict. Ministers and celebrities such as David Miliband are also constantly visiting. There is a Jamaican singer in town this week. The churches are preaching reconciliation and, despite widespread unemployment, people are getting by. So I ask the Minister: what part has the UK played in the recent Addis negotiations, and to what does she attribute their failure? Does membership of the troika give the UK a particular advantage? Can the Ugandan army remain on one side of the conflict when IGAD, the regional authority, is promoting dialogue?

In Sudan itself, while there is a so-called national dialogue at the political level, whole areas of the country are still cut off by civil war. The UN say that 6.9 million are in need of humanitarian assistance across the north. Over half of these are in Darfur, with 431,000 displaced up to November of this year alone. Peace negotiations with the JEM and SLM factions in Doha, and more recently in Addis under Thabo Mbeki, have stalled yet again. One can sympathise with the writer who said that Addis is just a paid holiday for wealthy male negotiators in large cars who bring home nothing for anyone else.

Meanwhile UNAMID, the UN mission, has been severely criticised by NGOs and others for inaction and providing too little security. The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, can testify that it was slow to respond to allegations of rape of 200 women and girls by Sudanese soldiers. Lubna Hussein, the human rights activist, says the UK should stop funding UNAMID, as it may be causing more harm than good. DfID has turned lately more to WFP and the other humanitarian agencies. In any case, UN peacekeepers have been progressively opposed and are now reduced in numbers by Khartoum. South Kordofan and Blue Nile are the other two provinces most affected, with civilians now caught between two wars, with the overspill from the southern conflict, and continuing hostilities between north and south. Um Dorein county has suffered renewed aerial bombardment since October. Other counties see regular overflying and troop movements. Only last week, Antonovs dropped 32 bombs in six different locations. The two areas have also suffered heavy rainfall, although it is said that SPLA-controlled counties are less affected by flooding and damage to crops. However, food insecurity has raised market prices in general, and there has been a higher incidence of malaria and malnutrition.

In Abyei, since the murder of the Ngok Dinka chief in May last year by a member of the Misseriya tribe, there has been no progress in negotiations. The town is scarcely functioning, even with the presence of peacekeepers, and the hospital is short of drugs. The national dialogue, which has offered some hope to reformers, has stalled again, with Khartoum resiling from AU-backed agreement, and Islamist rhetoric taking over from serious commitment on the part of the National Congress Party. The landmarks this year have been the Paris declaration in August which brought together the Umma party and the Sudanese Revolutionary Front; the Addis Ababa agreement in September, which included members of the Government’s dialogue mechanism; and valiant attempts by the AU Peace and Security Council to bring parties to all the conflicts together. Some of us had a positive glimpse of this dialogue when Sadiq al-Mahdi came to address our All-Party Group on Sudan and South Sudan, although it is hard even for a seasoned politician to hold the line between so many power blocs.

Two points emerge. First, we should not—in our natural concern in the UK for the Christian south—be diverted from the necessity of a political solution in the north, intractable as it is. We must give the strongest support to the AU high-level panel and IGAD forums. Taking account of Sudan’s oil revenue, there needs to be a concerted international effort on the scale of the peace agreement between north and south, which, in spite of its many failures, at least led to South Sudan’s independence.

Secondly, Khartoum seems to be reverting to its old habit of suppressing legitimate opinion in the media and civil society, and there our embassy and the NGOs must be especially watchful. There have been some alarming attacks on universities and discrimination against Christians in Khartoum, including the partial demolition of a church last week.

What is HMG’s response to the Government’s attempts—and, more recently, their failure—to achieve greater openness to dialogue? How do they judge the performance of the UN mission in Darfur and the security of aid workers? Can our Government, as a major contributor to the UN’s Common Humanitarian Fund, match their generosity with more diplomatic effort and results? Finally, will they give an assurance that the Sudan unit in the FCO will survive the cuts and be strengthened, if necessary, to inform and advise diplomats, politicians and civil society? Does the Minister share my regret that the position of EU special representative was combined with that for the Horn of Africa?

We should remember that ECHO, the EU’s humanitarian agency, has warned of famine in the south. I end with the words of the new Commissioner, Kristalina Georgieva:

“Aid operations will remain inadequate as long as the conflict continues. It is the responsibility of the political leadership of South Sudan to end the unnecessary suffering of its people”.

India: General Election 2014

Earl of Sandwich Excerpts

Thursday 23rd October 2014 Grand Committee

[The Earl of Sandwich (CB)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, has done us great service in introducing this debate, and I am honoured to be among so many Indian friends. We know that the noble Lord has done this country a service as the Deputy Prime Minister’s adviser. We give him full credit for what he has achieved.

I acknowledge Prime Minister Modi’s success in the election. I fully accept that he has made an excellent start in both foreign and domestic policies. I am sure his support for the business community will have attracted a lot of admirers in this country, although I take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, about our immigration rules possibly keeping out some of those people. In his Independence Day speech, Prime Minister Modi made some impressive and even moving promises. He said he comes from a poor family and wants dignity for the poor. He spoke up for gender equality and the low castes. He expressed disgust with poor sanitation and the condition in which millions have to live in his country.

Last year, the noble Lord, Lord McColl, and I took part in a march in Nepal for better water and sanitation and in a conference attended by MPs from all over South Asia. I know how important the WASH programme is worldwide and how seriously it is being taken by India. I know Prime Minister Modi’s visit to Kathmandu went down well in Nepal and it should mean greater co-operation between the two countries, not least on energy.

Prime Minister Modi was not elected for promising these things but because of the business sector’s confidence in him since the Gujarat miracle as well as the electoral failures of Congress and, even more, perhaps, the momentum of the BJP in building support over many years. He also stands before the vast majority of the electors as one of the poor. They will identify him with themselves and expect him to live up to these promises. On the global scale, despite its economic advance under Manmohan Singh, which has now faltered, India remains one of the poorest countries yet one of the most influential. With its membership of the BRICS group, the post-2015 agenda coming up and the setting of new UN sustainable goals, Modi is going to have to deliver a range of promises both to the world at large and to his own people. As he says, good days are coming.

The stakes are, as usual, very high. The report of the high-level panel, on which the UK played a leading role, states that the new order must “leave no one behind”, transform economies, build peace and effective institutions and forge a new global partnership. No one will be surprised that, when you come closer down to earth, India falls very short of these aspirations, especially when it comes to the situation of the low caste and the minorities. The fact is that there are atrocities and examples of hatred or prejudice every day against the lowest caste, the Dalits, and no one is stopping or reporting them except a fairly small number of NGOs that have the power to attract law enforcement agencies to these cases. I have personal experience of this in Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. Only last week the Guardian reported that a 15 year-old Dalit boy was set alight with petrol for allowing his goat to stray into a neighbouring landowner’s field. One extraordinary recent case is of the newly elected Chief Minister of Bihar, himself a Dalit, who visited a local temple, after which the whole temple was disinfected by high-caste Hindus.

A European Parliament library note says that there are 112 newly elected MPs in the Lok Sabha with a serious criminal record; that is one in five. Many of them, perhaps most, are of course in the ruling party. Against that background, can we expect legislation any time soon? In fact, there is a positive move by the Indian Government to translate the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Ordinance 2014, enacted by the previous Government, into a new Bill. Many human rights organisations are hopeful that the new legislation, which is under consideration now, will be passed at the earliest opportunity and be able to fix many loopholes in the existing law to protect the excluded communities. I also assume that our own DfID will do its best to support the NGOs working in this field, and perhaps the Minister could confirm that on the record.

I would also be grateful to hear the Minister’s analysis of the Muslim vote. Here we have a country with a vast Muslim population—the world’s third largest—grossly underrepresented in the Lok Sabha with only 20 MPs, its lowest ever number, with no seats among the ruling party. I am told, and indeed have read, that there were Muslim families, especially those who had admired the BJP’s success among the business class in Gujarat, who were not only sympathetic to but actually voted for the BJP. This seems extraordinary in the light of the terrible events in Gujarat in 2002, when hundreds died, mainly Muslims. Everyone remembers the Prime Minister’s long involvement with the RSS/Jan Sangh movement. However, it also perhaps shows the depth to which traditional Muslim support for Congress has fallen over the years.

According to one source, there was one Muslim group that completely turned a blind eye to anti-Muslim violence in 2002 because “as a thriving business community they didn’t want principles to come in the way of their market share in goods and commodities”. Having said that, I know from talking to Muslim friends before and since the election that the BJP still inspires fear among many Muslim minorities in several states, especially in Gujarat, Maharashtra and UP. There are deep divisions in many urban communities, amounting in some places to ghettoes. Basharat Peer, a well known Kashmiri journalist, writing in the New York Times earlier this year just before the election, described the situation in Ahmedabad. I will not quote the whole story, but it provides an example. He writes that he rode around Juhapura—the city’s largest Muslim ghetto at about 400,000 people—

“on the back of a friend’s scooter … The deeper we went into the neighborhood, the narrower the streets, the shabbier the buildings, the thicker the crowds. The edge of the ghetto came abruptly … ‘This is The Border,’ my friend said. Beyond the field was a massive concrete wall topped with barbed wire and oval surveillance cameras. On the other side, we could see a neat row of beige apartment blocks with air conditioners securely attached to the windows—housing for middle-class Hindu families”.

He quotes a 41 year-old resident, Mr Pathan, who says,

“‘The sun is allowed into Juhapura. The rain is allowed into Juhapura. The wind is allowed into Juhapura … I get a bill for water tax and pay it, but we don’t get piped water here.’ The locals rely on bore wells, which cough up salty, insalubrious water”.

Mr Pathan explained:

“‘My father said, ‘When the storm comes, you don’t get more than 10 minutes to run’”—

a clear reference to the threat of sectarian violence.

I quote that story because a friend of mine lives in Ahmedabad and he knows it to be true. He says that there are two very separate real estate markets, originally arising from the Disturbed Areas Act, which prevents Hindus from selling property to Muslims. That was originally intended to prevent communal violence, but in practice it is a recipe for apartheid.

Finally, another concern of Muslims is that, whatever assurances are given, the Prime Minister refuses to condemn his own MPs and senior leaders when they indulge in inflammatory rhetoric. I quote no less an authority than Siddharth Varadarajan, former editor of the Hindu, who has regularly described the BJP’s demonisation of Muslims and its dirty tricks during political campaigning in UP. It being Diwali, I wish the new Indian Government continuing success, but the point is that, however many promises the Prime Minister makes, he has to live down a long record of prejudice and discrimination in his own party. More importantly, he has to carry out and implement the legislation that he is proposing so that minorities can all see and believe what they are hearing.

Voluntary and Charitable Sectors

Earl of Sandwich Excerpts

Thursday 26th June 2014 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Sandwich (CB)]

My Lords, my interest in charities and my work with Christian Aid, Save the Children and Care International are recorded in the register. I thank the noble Baroness for this opportunity, and I have learnt a lot from what she said about charities today. I would like to speak about one particular aspect of charitable campaigning which was highlighted by a recent attack on Greenpeace in India. It raises issues for us both here in the UK and in Europe.

The Intelligence Bureau in India is perhaps the world’s oldest intelligence agency. It comes under the Ministry of Home Affairs in Delhi, but it also reports directly to the Prime Minister, rather like our own intelligence agencies. On 3 June, it published a report accusing Greenpeace and NGOs in general of subverting India’s economic development through their campaigning activities. Activists from Greenpeace and other NGOs had, the report said, targeted nuclear power plants, uranium mines, coal-fired power plants, farm biotechnology, mega-industrial projects, hydroelectric plants and extractive industries. This had amounted to a negative impact on GDP growth in India of 2% to 3% per annum. The report identified seven sectors or projects that had been stalled because of NGO activity.

More than that, the bureau said that NGOs receiving foreign donations from countries like the USA, the UK and Germany were “anti-development” and were opposed to national projects such as Gujarat’s special investment regions, the Narmada River interlinking project and the Delhi-Mumbai industrial corridor project. And it gets worse. Foreign donors, says the report,

“lead local NGOs ... to build a record against India and serve as tools for the strategic foreign policy interests of the Western governments”.

Greenpeace and other NGOs have already denied this and say that they have complied with all the regulations. They maintain that they campaign quite legitimately on issues of public interest. The Narmada Dam was a major issue some years ago, as noble Lords may remember, but such campaigning by civil society is the sign of a healthy democracy. The NGOs argue that they are already scrutinised via the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act 2010, which requires prior notification and reporting of all foreign donations. Over the years there have been assaults on NGOs in different states. I can remember one in West Bengal where foreign funding was banned altogether under the then Chief Minister. These are serious charges from the Intelligence Bureau. If Greenpeace is taken to court, there could be consequences not just for that organisation but for any international organisation that is linked with the indigenous NGOs. There has been a flurry of reaction among NGOs and academics and in the media, some in protest, but some admitting that not all NGOs are perfect. It might be time for the new Government to look again at the Act and tighten up its implementation.

Inevitably there will be some who see the Intelligence Bureau report as a manifestation of the incoming BJP Government’s policy under the new Prime Minister, Narendra Modi. Modi’s election campaign was bitterly opposed by groups representing ethnic and religious minorities who fear that they may become a target for Hindu politicians. However, this is unlikely since the gestation of the report dates far back into the time of the previous Congress Administration under the previous Prime Minister.

Much of the concern behind the foreign contribution Act was about foreign funding of private NGOs that support individual election candidates. This is a subject that we have recently discussed at length here with regard to our own election spending thresholds. However, if the Modi Government come in behind their Intelligence Bureau, as a new broom among the NGOs, there could be a problem for other non-governmental development projects such as our own DfID has supported in the fields of environment, roads, water and sanitation, education and health, and poverty reduction. Admittedly DfID is winding down its programme in India, but the Intelligence Bureau could also turn its attention to the work of British NGOs engaged in legitimate partnerships with local campaigns on human rights issues such as the rights of Dalits and religious minorities, both of which could be regarded as foreign interference.

I am looking forward to the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Judd, because like him, but on a more minor scale, I have some experience of local campaigns in India. I know for a fact that NGOs can and should sometimes fill a vacuum in the absence of government or any legal authority, or in any situation where government is inept or incapable of meeting humanitarian need. I sincerely hope that the work of NGOs, whether in India, Britain or anywhere else, will be stoutly defended, especially when they may be the only avenue of justice for a given community.

Perhaps the Government could help me to relieve these fears here and now, if their intelligence is good enough. Are the Government aware that India’s Intelligence Bureau is accusing Greenpeace and others of undermining India’s development? Does the Minister recognise that there could be consequences for international funding of development projects in India? What steps could the Government take to defend the interests of British and international NGOs such as Greenpeace, and will they reiterate their support for campaigning charities in general?

Finally, perhaps I may say a word about the value of networks of NGOs. Among aid agencies, one example, Bond, now brings together about 400 overseas aid organisations which are able to respond rapidly to humanitarian disasters as well as to support smaller development agencies. As Bond says, effectively tackling global poverty and inequality requires complex solutions, and it is critical that there is a spectrum of organisations active in this sector. This richness and joint expertise worldwide should be celebrated.

House of Lords: Labour Peers’ Working Group Report

Earl of Sandwich Excerpts

Thursday 19th June 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, I am not an expert on the dark arts of Downing Street—perhaps the noble Lord is. I simply stress that the question of age balance is important, and the idea of a House that stops recruiting new Members and simply grows older and older relatively gracefully is not one that we would accept or recognise.

[The Earl of Sandwich (CB)]

I am grateful to the Minister. He rather dismissed the suggestion of the noble Lord, Lord Norton, but does it not cope with the problem of topping up after the election? He has not addressed that.

House of Lords: Membership

Earl of Sandwich Excerpts

Thursday 24th October 2013 Grand Committee

[The Earl of Sandwich (CB)]

My Lords, I have joined the noble Lord, Lord Higgins, in this debate because I am another who believes in the modest reforms in the original Steel Bill, unfilleted. The noble Lord, Lord Hattersley, made a few comments in Dublin last month before the Irish people sensibly threw out the Taoiseach’s proposal to abolish the Senate. He said, quite fairly, that you cannot have a modern democracy in which one House of Parliament is appointed by the Prime Minister. We know that already, and we know the Lords is slowly moving away from Downing Street by means of the Independent Appointment Committee. Most people see that committee as the way out of patronage. We would like it to have statutory powers extending to party-nominated Peers and to have a better control of numbers.

The noble Lord, Lord Hattersley, has kept up our interest in Lords reform. I believe that the coalition is beginning to see the sense of incremental change. Today we are concerned only with housekeeping, with whether we can better organise our numbers and be more effective. The Clerk’s paper makes sensible suggestions, and I would like to discuss the more personal side of retirement.

This House has developed quite a range of services to Members, the sort of things you would expect from any modern corporation or institution. There is one service not offered to Members, although it is given to staff, and that is in human resources. You can talk to your party leader or convenor, you can get comfort in the Clerk of the Parliament’s office or chat to colleagues, but there is no one, apart from these offices, with whom you can discuss your future in the House.

I have worked in a number of businesses and charities, large and small. I have even been in a multinational. I have come to appreciate the role of human-resources managers in offices. I am not talking of career advice, because it might be impertinent to give career advice to a Peer, although some of the under-50s might appreciate it. Opening a small, comfortable office in an upstairs room would, I am sure, give Members a chance of opening up that they might not have elsewhere.

I tried to persuade the noble Lord, Lord Walton, to join this debate. He is unavailable today, but he knows that I am mentioning him as someone seriously contemplating retirement. He is an obvious candidate for human resources. I have spoken to others in the same situation, in which we will all be at some future date. I therefore propose that serious thought be given to the establishment of a human-resources officer, with an assistant, for Peers—not a department—who can talk to Members at any time of their parliamentary life.

This might be a suitable job for an existing Member of the House, someone of a sympathetic nature, who has been in the House for some time and already knows most of the characters. It could even be job-shared. There should not be a formal retirement age, but, like the noble Lord, Lord Higgins, I have for some time thought that the House should be able to afford a modest incentive out of internal funds. I remain in favour of the equivalent of one or, at the most, two years’ expenses. This would cost nothing because the Peer would remain for that extra year or two, and it might save the expenses of subsequent years. The Treasury does not need convincing of that mathematics. Nor does the Daily Telegraph.

I am not in favour of the enforced-attendance proposals in the Clerk’s paper, echoed in Dan Byles’s latest Bill, because it would dislodge one of the cornerstones of the House to discourage part-time attendance, especially among Cross-Benchers, among whom there are individuals with experience to offer, who can come in only occasionally. I believe part-time attendance also helps to keep down those extra numbers which come from the good concept of working Peers.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Higgins, for helping the House to go into some of these apparently minor, but important, reforms.

Georgia

Earl of Sandwich Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, at Bucharest some years ago NATO agreed to accept Georgia as a candidate member. The largest non-NATO, non-British force at Helmand at the moment is two Georgian battalions. We support Georgia’s aspiration to join NATO but it will necessarily, unavoidably be a long process. There are, indeed, British military trainers in Georgia.

[The Earl of Sandwich]

My Lords, the right reverend Prelate mentioned Ukraine as a possible parallel. However, is not Ukraine a good deal behind Georgia politically, and therefore could not Georgia qualify much earlier, given also that the Ukrainian opposition leader is still in prison?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, it is entirely fair to say that Ukraine is considerably behind Georgia in many ways. There was a free and fair election in Georgia last spring which resulted in a change of Government. The Georgian Government have just announced that on 31 October this year there will be a presidential election. Of course, that is not to say that it is a perfect democracy. There are a number of issues, including cases against members of the previous Administration, about which we are concerned. However, when I was in Tbilisi I had lunch at the British embassy with MPs both from the governing party and from the opposition. There are many countries in what was formerly the Soviet Union in which one could not do that.

The Future of EU Enlargement

Earl of Sandwich Excerpts

Wednesday 26th June 2013 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Sandwich]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for his balanced introduction to the debate. It has been a pleasure to work on this report because it shows the European Commission at its very best. If we must have an EU referendum, surely the progressive enlargement of the European Union in the Balkans is one of the strongest arguments for a yes vote. The war in the former Yugoslavia is still a recent and bitter memory for the communities involved.

As the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, said, it is undeniable that there has been greater stability in Europe since the Kosovo war ended with the KFOR-Serbia treaty of June 1999 and the EU in its various forms took over responsibility. Every new member of the EU has benefited economically from trade within the EU —even more recently while the older member states have suffered recession. This debate is timely, not because the UK is quietly marking its ruby anniversary in the EU but because in a few days, as we all know, Croatia will become the latest example of enlargement as the 28th member of the Union, following Bulgaria and Romania.

Perhaps we can now dispense with the phrase “enlargement fatigue”, since more candidate states and even eastern neighbours, such as Ukraine, are in the pipeline to the EU, as the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, said. Perhaps this is a moment for us to congratulate the Ukrainian tennis player, Sergiy Stakhovsky, for conquering the long-term Wimbledon champion this evening. Yet the road to enlargement in most cases will be painfully slow and beset with obstacles, and some may never make it. Indeed, I believe, in the case of Turkey, EU membership may not be an ideal solution.

Kosovo, one of the potential candidates, which seems to have the furthest to travel, nevertheless at times symbolises the EU’s determination to move forward. Perhaps that is because, as the noble Lords, Lord Foulkes and Lord Hannay, said, it does not want to make the Cyprus mistake again. Peace in Kosovo today is one of the cornerstones of EU foreign policy, stoutly defended by the EEAS through various policy channels. It is a major EU project. In fact, it is the largest recipient of EU investment per head anywhere in the world. Quite apart from security guarantees, there is a huge human and financial investment in Kosovo’s future as Europe’s youngest independent country. Yet, for their own reasons, Cyprus, Greece, Spain, Slovakia and Romania are still refusing to recognise it. Even some of its neighbours—as I will mention later—will not invite it to their regional meetings.

Much depends on Serbia. As a result of a carefully crafted diplomatic effort over the last two years, an important agreement was reached—as the noble Lord, Lord Boswell, mentioned—between Belgrade and Pristina in Brussels on 19 April. Indeed, an earlier agreement was announced by Commissioner Füle on the very day that the committee took evidence from him in Brussels. Just two more border points between Kosovo and Serbia had been established. I well remember the excitement in the Commission that yet another small but significant step had been achieved. Implementation followed in May. The noble Baroness, Lady Ashton, met Prime Ministers Dacic and Thaçi last Thursday and reported on Friday that the EEAS had reviewed the implementation plan and that there had been concrete progress and further agreements on justice, police and the forthcoming municipal elections. This is important detail and much is owed to the recent meeting of Serbia’s First Deputy Prime Minister, Aleksandar Vucic, with representatives of northern Kosovo Serbs in Belgrade. There, he commendably laid down the law to the four mayors and councillors.

The EU’s approach is nothing if not methodical and this seems to be achieving political results, which are remarkable when set against the violence of civil war only 15 years ago. Yet we know that, under the surface, the old rivalries are simmering. The worst forms of extortion and corruption can still be found as much within the KLF ex-combatants now in power in Kosovo as among the criminal mafia and the Serb no-go areas in the north. The EU is still, of course, backed by NATO in any emergencies such as shooting incidents in Mitrovica, but the key Copenhagen principles of the rule of law, human rights and democratic government are at stake.

On the rule of law, the EU has a long way to go and even, at times, appears to be losing the battle. The project known as EULEX, the biggest tool in the EU’s armoury, is failing to meet its objectives. The European Court of Auditors reported last October that its assistance had not been effective, as levels of organised crime and corruption in Kosovo remained high and the judiciary continued to suffer from political interference, inefficiency and a lack of transparency and enforcement. The court found that there had been no progress in establishing the rule of law in the north. That is a serious matter but the ECA report did not surprise the people of Kosovo, who for some time have watched the failure of the EU’s flagship project—which employs hundreds of judges, barristers, police and other officials. The UK has been one of the key investors, so can the Minister explain how this vital project has foundered? What action has been taken since to reform and rebuild the EULEX programme?

Beyond Kosovo and Serbia there have been many other concerns about justice and the rule of law in the region. The situation in Romania and Bulgaria has already been mentioned. Our report is another reminder that the co-operation and verification mechanism process used in those countries must come at the very beginning and not as an afterthought. That is also relevant, as has been said, to Kosovo and Serbia. Our report makes much of these processes and formulae such as the Copenhagen criteria. That reminds me that people working on EU issues must be careful not to use too much jargon or too many clever acronyms or we will be seen for what we are: an in-group with a temporary knowledge of EU institutions who speak a language only we can understand. Of course, I make a general point.

The committee also notes that the great fears expressed about the effects of enlargement on the Common Agricultural Policy turned out to be unnecessary. The proportion of agriculture in the EU has risen and is still rising with the accession of new members. The NFU and other witnesses have expressed concerns about lower standards of cultivation and flouting of health and safety, but these tendencies have not prevented a healthy trading partnership between old and new member states.

We must not forget that poverty persists in many areas of former Yugoslavia, including parts of Kosovo, where our DfID office has only recently closed, for a reason that I still cannot fathom. While Croatia is level with Hungary in terms of gross national income per head, at about $13,000, the average income in Albania, Kosovo, Bosnia and even Serbia is less than half that, below $6,000 per head. Through the EEAS and the Commission, the EU sometimes has to fill the combined roles of a teacher and a nanny on local government or regional co-operation, and I wonder whether it has the necessary skills.

Take the fiasco of the Ohrid summit this month, for example. It was a regional meeting, scheduled for 1 and 2 June in the Macedonian beauty spot. The summit was cancelled after Albania and Croatia announced that they would not attend because Kosovo had not received an invitation, which was in clear breach of the April agreement. There is no point in having agreements if they are not implemented. Like it or not, the EEAS has to be sure not only that the parties follow them to the letter but that the neighbours do as well. This may be a tall order in the Balkans, but it is the litmus paper of the success of enlargement.

The balance of competence review is coming soon, we hope, and it will confirm that we are on the whole getting satisfaction in Europe. I trust that this understanding continues well beyond the next election.

Commonwealth and Commonwealth Charter

Earl of Sandwich Excerpts

Thursday 7th March 2013 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Sandwich]

My Lords, I asked a relation of mine what she thought of the Commonwealth, and she said, “Well, it’s a sentimental thing, isn’t it?”. She made it sound like a keepsake or a woolly rabbit, but then she said, “If the members like it, then it must have value”. Judging from its latest report, the Foreign Affairs Select Committee would not be satisfied with that.

The Commonwealth obviously does a lot of good, but is it trying hard enough and can it do better? Having spent most of my working life in voluntary organisations, I see it as a rather cumbersome NGO gently nudging member states around the world towards better modes of governance, democracy, education, human rights and economic development. Some countries move forward, and some, as the noble Lords, Lord Anderson and Lord Watson, have pointed out, slip backwards.

NGOs, including church agencies, can have a potent effect, especially at a local level. I have seen the best ones working around officialdom and engaging directly with the community, and often representing them where elected politicians fail them. Some are bureaucratic, but most give value for money. Some are dominated by strong personalities with political motives, but there is no harm in that. My own interest in politics stems from working with Christian Aid. I firmly believe in the potential of civil society to influence events, and for similar reasons I see the Commonwealth as a force for good in the world.

However, as the FAC says, the Commonwealth needs to tighten up its act. As we have heard, the new charter adopted at the Perth CHOGM last year brings together the key values uniting the Commonwealth: democracy, human rights and the rule of law. The charter emphasises the role of civil society, albeit in its final paragraph 16. I welcome that because it is not only a hallmark of such a diverse organisation but a means of extending important principles that might otherwise remain mere aspirations. For example, I can think of a number of countries where there is little progress towards those values but where civil society nevertheless has a strong tradition of resistance.

Parliamentary strengthening is of course a key activity, and I have seen this through CPA visits. However, in this we must move further away from a Westminster-centred approach towards a more respectful recognition of local traditions. Here I concur with what the noble Baroness, Lady Prashar, said. This may be why the Commonwealth has recently focused on human rights. The Secretary-General intends to deepen the secretariat’s strategic partnership with the High Commissioner for Human Rights. I wonder if the Minister can explain what that means, remembering that the next CHOGM will be in Colombo. When the FAC complained about this, Her Majesty’s Government’s reply was rather lame. They said:

“We look to Sri Lanka … to demonstrate its commitment to upholding Commonwealth values”.

The Minister repeated something similar just now. It is undoubtedly an embarrassment for everyone except the Sri Lankan Government that CHOGM is taking place in Colombo.

I would like to see South Sudan become the latest member of the Commonwealth. It applied informally after independence in 2011 and its application was universally welcomed in Perth. However, it seems that the Commonwealth may be suffering from enlargement fatigue, a condition normally associated with the European Union. Is there any reason why a post-conflict and least developed country, having survived 30 years of war, desperately in need of international assistance and near the top of every development agency’s priorities, should be made to wait for formalities?

I telephoned and e-mailed the secretariat last week and it told me that essentially the process has no timeframes. It depends on how quickly the aspiring member state follows the requirements, which include a resolution by the country’s parliament. It said that the secretariat does not push the process. Well, who does? Suspecting that South Sudan had been left to its own devices, I rang the South Sudanese Ambassador, Mr Sebit Aley, and he told me that that was indeed the position. His Minister had discussed the application with his Australian counterpart. The FCO was present, and he had received an assurance that South Sudan would be assisted in its application. However, he said that he had heard nothing since then and was still waiting for the list of requirements. I have mentioned all this to our new ambassador to South Sudan. Capacity-building is a familiar concept, and I hope that the Minister will now be able to move things further forward.