Malaria Vaccine

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

Wednesday 9th December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness is right. As I said to the noble Lord, Lord Collins, it is important that, although we have taken difficult decisions on the ODA budget, we continue to leverage to the utmost our diplomatic efforts to ensure that the priorities remain, through our multilateral partners and other member states, and to provide the level of reassurance that she described in Africa, and also compliance within countries. I have been proud of the leadership we have shown, particularly in supporting multilateral funds such as the Global Fund, which, as she knows, has helped to fight AIDS, TB and malaria, particularly in Africa. We are proud of that relationship. As we look at revising our ODA spend, I assure the noble Baroness that, when we face challenges on finance, we will look to bridge those gaps through extensive diplomatic engagement and leadership in that area.

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Russell of Liverpool) (CB)]

My Lords, all supplementary questions have been asked. We will now pause for a minute before the next piece of business.

LGBT International Rights

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

Monday 12th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sugg (Con)]

My Lords, of course we fully support the Commonwealth charter and we are working closely to make sure that we are seeing progress in this area. I join my noble friend in paying tribute to the brave organisations that are working across the world. These are exactly the kind of organisations that we are supporting through the Commonwealth Equality Network. They work tirelessly to protect the rights of fellow citizens and ensure that LGBT people can live free from discrimination and violence.

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Russell of Liverpool) (CB)]

My Lords, all supplementary questions have been asked, and we now move to the next Question.

Protecting Civilians in Armed Conflict

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

Monday 12th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, the United Kingdom remains committed to obligations of international humanitarian law and, as I said earlier, we call on other countries to respect their obligations to it. When we have differed on this issue, even from our strongest allies and at the top table—the UN Security Council—we have made known our difference and the importance of standing up for the sexual and reproductive health of all women, everywhere.

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Russell of Liverpool) (CB)]

My Lords, all supplementary questions have been asked. We now move to the next Question.

INSPIRE (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

Wednesday 9th September 2020 Grand Committee

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Russell of Liverpool) (CB)]

Lord Bhatia, I am afraid we have a problem with the quality of your connection. May I suggest that we try to sort that out and, in the meantime, we will move on to the next speaker and come back to you once it is sorted? I call the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering.

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con) [V]]

I welcome this opportunity and congratulate my noble friend the Minister on introducing the changes today. As these are technical changes, I hope I am permitted to ask some general questions about how the INSPIRE regulations have been working to date and what changes might flow from the end of the transition period. My question is not dissimilar to that of my noble friend Lord Naseby. Does the Minister know the costs for district councils, county authorities and unitary authorities, for example, to provide this information? It may seem an odd question, but who looks at this data? It seems an extraordinary amount of data is being collected and for anyone interested in the environment, as I am, it is immensely interesting, but do we know how widespread its use is? Is it mostly used by other public bodies, universities and official bodies such as the Commission itself? What is the purpose of collating all this data?

I notice that it says that charging arrangements are in place. Does my noble friend know roughly the average charge for accessing this data? If there is no right to appeal, how does my noble friend know that the charge that is being levied is fair? I would be particularly interested to know whether the charge relates, for example, to the mapping that is being done for flooding. I congratulate successive Governments and the Minister’s department for the mapping that has been done. Ideally, if one looks at the mapping that is available to a district council, this is much more detailed and it would be of enormous benefit to the householder to know to whether and to what extent, particularly in terms of surface water flooding, which is a relatively recent phenomenon—we have only really recognised it since 2007—they are likely to be specifically at risk of such flooding. The reason I ask this is that I understand that district councils are reluctant—this may have changed—to provide this level of detail, because it could have adverse implications for the householder’s insurance. Presumably the whole point of accessing this information is that the Environment Agency is giving more global mapping, but it would be extremely interesting to get hold of what the district and county councils are setting out. It would be helpful to know that.

How will any complaint be made about the way in which the data is accessed or how the cost of accessing such data is levied? It would also be helpful to know that. Also, is the Minister confident that public bodies have the resources, particularly looking at the fact that resources available to councils—to local authorities—is extremely tight? We have seen this in things such as environmental health and trading standards being potentially compromised. Is the Minister confident going forward that these public bodies have the resources available to fulfil their obligations under the regulations?

Finally—I am sorry not to use up all my time but my noble friend might well be relieved about that—can my noble friend confirm that this information is also provided to the European authorities, such as the European Commission, the European Environment Agency and others? Will that continue to be the case? Obviously, in terms of the European environmental directives such as the water framework directive and the waste water directive, this type of information is extremely useful for seeing whether patterns are emerging, particularly in terms of climate change.

Sorry, I did say “finally” but it was very inadvertent. Does my noble friend have plans to look, for example, at data that is currently being collected by water companies through their normal daily work? That could show at a very early stage that Covid may be present in a particular community—perhaps not narrowing it down to a household but to a community. Do the Government have access to that information, which will be extremely important in preventing and controlling community outbreaks?

I am grateful to my noble friend for bringing these regulations before us in the form of a statutory instrument.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Russell of Liverpool) (CB)]

I understand that the sound issues have now been sorted out, so I again call the noble Lord, Lord Bhatia.

[Lord Bhatia (Non-Afl) [V]]

[Inaudible.]

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Russell of Liverpool) (CB)]

Lord Bhatia, I am afraid that we still have major problems understanding you. The problem has not been resolved. We will try to come back to you; the staff will try to do that. I call the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Russell of Liverpool) (CB)]

The Grand Committee stands adjourned until 3.45 pm. I remind Members to sanitise their desks and chairs before leaving the Room.

Council of Europe: House of Lords Members’ Contribution

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

Wednesday 24th July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, for making this evening’s discussion possible.

I have had the pleasure and privilege of being a member of PACE since January 2018. This has been my first experience in my working life of working in cohabitation with professional politicians, and I would describe it as very educational. I am the only member of the UK delegation who is politically unaffiliated—I am the only representative of the 180-odd Cross-Benchers. I sit with the European Conservatives Group because that happens to be the political grouping of the Government of today. Should there be a general election and our new Prime Minister gets it wrong, as he is quite capable of doing, I will move across to whichever political grouping the next Government of the day happen to belong to. All I would say about sitting with the European Conservatives is that it is even more educational.

The UK, as has been said, was a founding member of the Council, and its work over the years has been and is highly regarded. However, it would be fair to say—and the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, referred to this—that Brexit has caused a considerable amount of baffled and rather genuine concern about our current democratic well-being. I now introduce myself in Strasbourg as Simon Russell from the “Dis-United Kingdom”, which breaks the ice diplomatically; people then feel free to ask the questions they are dying to ask, such as, “What on earth is really going on in your country?” I tend to respond, “How long have you got?”

I have the privilege of being a member of the Committee on Migration, Refugees and Displaced Persons, where it is an enormous privilege to work alongside other colleagues of very diverse political hues, ranging from extreme internationalist left to hard-line, and frankly slightly unpleasant, anti-immigrant nationalist right. The committee was able to visit Jordan in March last year, together with the noble Earl, Lord Dundee—or, as he is known in the Council of Europe, Mr Dundee, since our international colleagues find dealing with our titles somewhat challenging. We went to the largest refugee camp in Jordan, which contains no less than 80,000 Syrians. We also had an interesting experience when we met His Majesty the King of Jordan and our slightly overwrought and overcome chair kept addressing him as “Her Majesty”. The benefits of a British boarding school education followed by Sandhurst meant that he kept a completely stiff upper lip.

Helping emerging democracies evolve and mature, as the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, has mentioned, is a key element in our work, particularly since the break-up of the USSR. I had the privilege, along with the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, of being part of the PACE monitoring team for the 2019 Ukrainian presidential election. They elected a comedian. Our Conservative Party has followed suit. In both cases, it is too early to tell whether this will be a successful strategy.

To return to the question of the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, about what the Council of Europe is for and what we get out of it, I was reminded when he was speaking of John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s famous phrase, “ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country”. With our long traditions in this country of democracy, human rights, freedom and habeas corpus, one of the gifts we try to give to countries which have been less privileged in their history is the insight and benefit of the ups and downs of our journey in trying to establish that sort of democracy.

It is vital to maintain a focus and international dialogue which are above and beyond the mindlessness and sheer ill will which seem to feature in our often-intemperate political discourse. The Council reminds us of a higher purpose and enduring values and is a salutary antidote to the atomisation of the international order and the raucous sounds of testosterone-rich nation states. Standing up for and seeking to reinforce and extend human rights provides a moral compass and a universal theme which our continent and—goodness knows—our country, in its current rather febrile state, sorely need.