Draft European Union (Definition Of Treaties) (Association Agreement) (Central America) Order 2018 Draft European Union (Definition Of Treaties) (Political Dialogue And Cooperation Agreement) (Cuba) Order 2018

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Wednesday 11th July 2018 General Committees

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

It is very nice to see you in the chair, Sir Henry, on this warm, sunny, summer afternoon. I am grateful to the Minister for his explanation. I have a number of questions for him about both the substance and the process.

In general, Her Majesty’s Opposition welcome any arrangements that allow for the further integration of Latin American countries into the global economy. Arrangements to co-operate with them to encourage improvements in human rights, democracy, good governance and regional political relations, and to strengthen regional integration are all welcome. However, the Minister told us that the trade benefits to the United Kingdom from the draft central America order will amount to £700 million, but it was not clear over what period we would get that benefit.

According to one civil society group, ACT Alliance EU, and the Copenhagen Initiative for Central America, some civil society organisations in central America are opposed to ratification of the association agreement. As the Minister said, it was first signed in 2012, and since then events in those countries have moved on, not all in a positive direction. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Exeter said, Nicaragua has particular problems, and recent national unrest has so far led to the deaths of 300 people. The risk is obvious.

[Sir Hugo Swire (East Devon) (Con)]

This would be a good opportunity for the hon. Lady, who is speaking on behalf of Her Majesty’s loyal Opposition, to condemn, on behalf of Her Majesty’s loyal Opposition, what is going on in Nicaragua at the moment and in Venezuela, which poisons the region.

[Helen Goodman]

Of course. Her Majesty’s Opposition condemn all human rights abuses. I shall confine my remarks to Nicaragua, because that is what the draft order is about, but if the right hon. Gentleman is interested in my views on Venezuela, they were set out very fully in a Westminster Hall debate last September.

With Nicaragua, it is essential that the international mediation that has begun is followed through. We are extremely pleased that the United Nations is now on the ground and able to make a proper and full assessment of the problems and every single episode of violence that has taken place in the past three months. We do not, however, support calls from some parts of the American Administration to see a non-democratic change of Government. I would be interested to hear from the Minister whether he supports such calls from those parts of the American Administration.

The situation in Nicaragua is worse than it was when the documents we are considering were drafted. The situation is also extremely bad in El Salvador, where there is a lot of gender-based violence, which we are very concerned about. Hon. Members are probably aware of what Pope Francis said about what is happening in El Salvador, where, at the moment, women who have had abortions, even if as a result of being raped, are tried for murder. Some of them have consequently faced the death penalty. I am most concerned for the Minister to take seriously the human rights elements of the association agreements. No monitoring mechanisms seem to be set out to deal with violations. Will the Minister explain how violations will be monitored?

The explanatory memorandum highlights the importance of working with those countries on counter-narcotics. I remind the Minister that the value of illegal drugs smuggled into the United Kingdom peaked at £3.2 billion in 2016—more than double the imports of the previous year. Co-operation is covered in the association agreements, but what co-operation is being undertaken to address the international drugs trade, which is as much a problem for us as it is for the central American countries, with which we obviously have a shared interest?

[Sir Hugo Swire]

The hon. Lady makes an extraordinarily important point about the fact that the UK is the recipient of many of the drugs that are smuggled through the region. Will she take it from me, as a former Minister for the region, that the UK is involved disproportionately in trying to assist those countries, but that my right hon. Friend the Minister will be unable to go into much detail about the nature of that assistance?

[Helen Goodman]

The right hon. Gentleman is demonstrating what an excellent Foreign Office Minister he was, but I am directing my questions to the current Minister to see who is in charge of steering this through.

[Sir Alan Duncan]

Equally good, I would like to think.

[Helen Goodman]

We will find out whether the Minister is equally good at answering these questions, rather than seeing them deflected via Devon.

A related concern is the human rights of migrants from central America. This agreement contains a commitment to ensure the effective employment, protection and promotion of human rights for all migrants. I am interested to know from the Minister what representations have been made to the American Government with respect to the human rights of migrants from central America.

On the process, the Minister explained that if the association agreements are in force after our departure from the European Union, the United Kingdom will be bound by them during the implementation period. I want to ask him three questions about what happens once the implementation period comes to an end in December 2020, which is quite soon. These documents were drafted six years ago, and that date is only two years ahead of us. After the implementation period, if the association agreements are in place, is it the Minister’s intention to roll them over for what we might call the proper post-Brexit period? If it is not his intention simply to roll them over, what is his plan? What is his plan if they have not been implemented by December 2020?

The impact assessment provided to the Committee for this afternoon is outdated, as it was prepared in 2015. Is the Minister confident that there have been no significant changes in the intervening three years that might affect the assessment of the impact on British businesses? The explanatory memorandum says that the Government have committed to agreeing a transitional arrangement to ensure continuity in trade. Will he produce a new explanatory memorandum with a new impact assessment in 2019, once we have left the EU?

We are extremely pleased that Cuba is making progress in being integrated into the global economy. Again, the Cuba document was drafted and written some time ago. It would be helpful to know from the Minister how the outlook for trade with Cuba and the operation of this agreement are impacted by President Trump’s decision to reinstate restrictions on Americans travelling to Cuba and United States business dealings with Cuba. At the moment we have yet another rift between the policy approach of the European Union and that of the United States. What are the Ministers intentions with respect to continuing dialogue with Cuba alongside our European partners as we move forward?

This is a tricky issue. We have still not heard how the Government intend to co-ordinate common, foreign and security policy with the European Union post Brexit, which is highly relevant to what the rollover arrangements will be for both statutory instruments. It would be extremely welcome if the Minister updated us and gave some insight into that issue.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Alan Duncan]

I am grateful to the right hon. and hon. Members who have contributed this afternoon. As I outlined in my opening speech, these agreements will support our values and objectives long after we have left the European Union. By ratifying them, we are demonstrating our good will as a loyal and supportive partner of the European Union and to each of these countries seeking to expand their relations with the EU. These agreements do not detract in any way from our own prospects outside the EU. We are enhancing our co-operation with partners across Latin America as we leave the EU, in line with our ambitious vision to have a global Britain.

In response to the question from the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland about the financial benefits that we hope will ensue from these agreements, a figure of between £700 million and £1.1 billion was quoted. In answer to her question over what period, the trade benefits of the EU-central America association agreement are expected to be realised over a 10-year period. That is the calculation that has been applied, but that means by 2023, following the start of the provisional application of all this in 2013. That is set out in the impact assessment attached to the order. We are working to transfer the agreement to a UK-central America association agreement, which will result in our gaining equivalent benefits once we have left the EU.

I say to my right hon. Friend the Member for East Devon, a former Minister, that Cuba is very important. It is going through a significant transition and is a country with which we wish to develop a close association, to help it to transfer from being the preserve of the Castros into a country that looks more widely across the world and therefore serves the economic interests of its citizens. My right hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that one of the major obstacles to that is the constraint on dollar transactions that is applied to any kind of business in or around the country. That is a problem that we would like to see overcome, because a prosperous Cuba is more likely to be a free and co-operative Cuba. We hope that we can, in a benign way, without being over-didactic or instructive, help Cuba to move from the past into the future in a way that is of benefit to everybody.

As for what we have heard otherwise today, I hope, Sir Henry, that it is not inappropriate for me to point out that we are discussing a pair of very specific orders, rather than having a debate on the current affairs of the region, notwithstanding important issues in Guatemala, Nicaragua and, perhaps more than anywhere else, Venezuela, where many people are fleeing the country, because the President has basically destroyed its economy and people are being forced away for fear of being unable to buy the most basic goods, in a climate of hyper-inflation. This is not a debate about current events; it is a debate about these two orders. The agreements will do things such as enhance political dialogue and further co-operation in areas such as climate change, the environment, counter-narcotics, counter-terrorism, human rights and migration.

In the context of Cuba, which has been raised specifically, five annual dialogues are being established, on human rights, sustainable development, non-proliferation, the illicit trade in arms and unilateral coercive measures. The agreements are a framework within which good can be achieved, rather than a day-to-day narrative, which is more the preserve of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and our diplomacy.

To conclude, I note that the hon. Member for North East Fife, the Scottish National party spokesperson, is absent. In a parallel Delegated Legislation Committee this morning, in which we considered three similar orders on EU-third country agreements, the SNP Member tried to vote no. When I inquired why, they said that they did so on the grounds that the devolved Administrations had not been consulted. I would like to put it on record that although the UK’s foreign affairs policy is totally a reserved matter, the devolved Administrations were consulted during the preliminary stages of consultation on each of these agreements. All the devolved Administrations confirmed that they did not anticipate any legislative changes as a result of the agreements, and no specific concerns were expressed, so the argument put by the SNP in relation to this morning’s Committee was utterly erroneous, specious and unmerited.

[Helen Goodman]

On the issue of Scotland, I notice that the trade section of the impact assessment for the order relating to central America shows that one of the benefits that will flow to us is that our geographical indications on Scotch whisky will be protected in central American markets. In return, there will be a reduction in the tariffs that they impose on Scotch whisky. I have already asked the Minister how the rollovers will operate, but it is not clear how geographical indications on food and drink will be preserved post Brexit. Will that not be an issue in this context, as well as more widely?

[Sir Alan Duncan]

May I apologise to the hon. Lady? I did not properly answer her point about process, although I meant to. We are content that the orders will come into force within the implementation period, so her concerns will not apply.

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for pointing out the strength of the logic that I have put to the Committee, because what we are proposing will benefit Scotland. It is ironic, not to say illogical and absurd, that the Scottish National party should consider voting against something such as this, when its primary industry of Scotch whisky is likely to benefit. We find that the SNP is anti-Scotch whisky exports and that, had it been here, it would have perhaps voted against these orders, as it tried to this morning, on the grounds that it was not consulted, when it has been. The irony of the SNP position, added to its absence today, will not be lost on either side of the Committee. I thank you again, Sir Henry, for presiding over our proceedings, and I commend the orders to the Committee.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That the Committee has considered the draft European Union (Definition of Treaties) (Association Agreement) (Central America) Order 2018.

draft European Union (Definition of Treaties) (Political Dialogue and Cooperation Agreement) (Cuba) Order 2018

Resolved,

That the Committee has considered the draft European Union (Definition of Treaties) (Political Dialogue and Cooperation Agreement) (Cuba) Order 2018.—(Sir Alan Duncan.)

Oral Answers to Questions

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Tuesday 26th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

President Trump’s recent statement on the oceans did not mention sustainability, stewardship, ecosystems or climate. When he comes to London, will the Government challenge him on that, or do they think that it would, to coin a phrase, achieve absolutely nothing? If it is the latter, what is the point of the visit?

[Sir Alan Duncan]

Should I meet President Trump personally, I will look upwards, look him in the eye, and the first word on my lips will be “oceans”.

Christians Overseas

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd May 2018 Westminster Hall

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Hollobone, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp) on his powerful speech on an important subject.

Christianity has been dominant in this country for 1,000 years and, for us, it can be difficult to imagine what it is like to be the persecuted. We tend to think of the persecutions of the first century or of the Tudor TV dramas, but the scale of what hon. Members on both sides of the House have described shows that persecution is a large and growing problem. I want to say something about some particular countries, but we need to ask ourselves why this is happening before we can discuss what we need to do.

Hon. Members have spoken about the middle east. Between 50% and 80% of Christians in Syria and Iraq have been forced to move in recent years, according to Open Doors. I, too, commend that organisation’s excellent work in supporting those communities and in bringing the significant problems to our attention. I also commend the work of Christian Solidarity Worldwide, which came to see me recently.

Many hon. Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Preet Kaur Gill), talked about the problems in Nigeria, which are particularly concentrated in the north of the country and which have grown recently. My husband was born in Kaduna and his father, who had been a colonial civil servant, died in 2004. At that time, the persecution was a small cloud on the horizon, not the big problem it is today. We need to do more. It is, of course, not easy, and we cannot just go around threatening people, but we need to pay more attention to the problem, as we do to the oldest Christian community, the Copts, whom my hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn (Chris Evans) talked about, and their particular need for protection.

As hon. Members have said, the persecution takes different forms. In some places it is about a religious divide. In some places it is state-driven oppression, particularly in China. In some places it is about people being excluded, and that is what we see in Mexico where, for example, someone in the wrong denomination might have their water and electricity cut off—shocking things, which I will raise when I am in Mexico next week.

It is hard for us to understand why people feel that they are under threat from other religions, that what other religions do threatens their position, or that they are so entitled, and so confident in their own rightness, that they should impose their views on other people. It is important that we increase and improve religious understanding. The Minister probably knows that there is a very good centre for religious understanding at the London School of Economics and Political Science, led by Rev. James Walters. We also need to consider how we can use our aid money. We need to think more open-mindedly about what misunderstandings we have, as well as about those of other people, without in any way saying that any of the abuses are acceptable.

In Vietnam, there are arrests, imprisonments, torture and extrajudicial killings, yet the Home Office wants to send a constituent of mine, who is a Christian, back there. When I asked the Bishop of Durham for examples he knew of persecution, he raised that of a Jordanian Christian woman who came to this country and was then interned in Yarl’s Wood before she claimed asylum. We need to use the aid programme and we need to speak out, but will Foreign Office Ministers please also talk to the Home Office so that the very people who have been victims are not re-victimised in this country?

Oral Answers to Questions

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Tuesday 15th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Boris Johnson]

Not only that; I congratulate my hon. Friend on all the work he does to promote relations between the UK and ASEAN. He works tirelessly on that dossier. Malaysia certainly presents extraordinary opportunities for the UK. A massive friendship and partnership already exists with the country, and we look forward to building relations very fast with the new Government of Mahathir Mohamad.

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

We are all delighted that there was a successful Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting this year. Among the valued Commonwealth members are of course the Caribbean countries. We know that Caribbean Foreign Ministers raised the issue of Windrush deportations with the Foreign Office in 2014 and that high commissioners did so in 2016, so will the Foreign Secretary tell us what discussions he and his Ministers had at that time with their counterparts in the Home Office?

[Boris Johnson]

I must respectfully tell the hon. Lady what I am sure she knows very well: this is a matter for the Home Office. We certainly alerted the Home Office to the issue, but the question of how to manage immigrants in this country is a matter for the Home Office.

Draft European Organization for Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere and the European Space Agency (Immunities and Privileges) (Amendment) Order 2018

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Monday 14th May 2018 General Committees

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

It is nice to see you in the Chair this afternoon, Mr Sharma.

It is my understanding that space research is important for scientific and commercial reasons, and that we will do much better space research if we collaborate internationally. The European Organization for Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere is one of those international organisations for collaboration, and the statutory instrument will improve its functioning, so we should approve it.

I have just one question for the Minister: why are we using the affirmative procedure, and not the negative, for the statutory instrument?

Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill [Lords]

Helen Goodman Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 1st May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sir Alan Duncan]

No, not for the moment.

We do not want to legislate directly for the overseas territories, nor do we want to risk damaging our long-standing constitutional arrangements, which respect their autonomy. However, we have listened to the strength of feeling in the House on this issue and accept that it is, without a doubt, the majority view of this House that the overseas territories should have public registers ahead of their becoming the international standard, as set by the Financial Action Task Force.

We will accordingly respect the will of the House and not vote against new clause 6. Unless my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield chooses not to press the new clause, we accept that it will become part of the Bill. In the same spirit, I would appreciate it if the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland chose not to press new clause 14, which would add the Crown dependencies to that stipulation.

Her Majesty’s Government are acutely conscious of the sensitivities in the overseas territories and of the response that new clause 6 may provoke. I therefore give the overseas territories the fullest possible assurance that we will work very closely with them in shaping and implementing the Order in Council that the Bill may require. To that end, we will offer the fullest possible legal and logistical support that they might ask of us. Alongside that, we retain our fullest respect for the overseas territories and their constitutional rights, and we will work with them to protect their interests.

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

I am pleased to have the opportunity to take part in the debates on Report of this important Bill. I will follow the same order as the Minister in discussing the amendments.

I took the rather unusual step of signing the Government’s Magnitsky amendments, new clause 3 and amendments 10 to 13, so this House can present a united voice to the whole world in expressing our abhorrence for gross human rights abuses and our determination to tackle them together.

I thank the right hon. Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon) and my hon. Friends the Members for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) and for Dudley North (Ian Austin)—the latter is not in the Chamber at the moment—all of whom have campaigned on this issue for a long time. Her Majesty’s Opposition believe that human rights should be at the centre of foreign policy. The only way gross human rights abuses will stop is if those who perpetrate them, order them and facilitate them are brought personally to account. They must pay the price.

Sanctions against individuals for gross human rights abuses were originally conceived as a response to the terrible treatment of Sergei Magnitsky, but we believe there is a wider problem. We note, for example, that the United States has sanctioned Maung Maung Soe, one of the generals responsible for the ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya in Myanmar.

Last year, the Criminal Finances Act 2017 enabled the Government to freeze the assets of people responsible for such crimes, and this Bill will enable us to ban visas and prevent such people traveling here. The only question is why it took so long for the Government to come round to seeing the importance of this measure.

We introduced so-called Magnitsky amendments in Committee that would have given us the same ability as Canada and the United States to implement targeted sanctions. Unfortunately, the Government initially did all they could to reject our amendments. They rejected them in principle on Second Reading; they reordered the consideration of the Bill; they suspended the Committee; and then they downright voted against the amendments. After the Salisbury incident on 4 March, the Prime Minister announced a complete U-turn. We are pleased the Government have seen the light, but it is unfortunate that it took such a tragic event for them to change their mind.

I am pleased to offer the support of Her Majesty’s Opposition to new clause 6, tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge). I congratulate her on her long campaign, which began when she was Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee. She has stuck with it over many years, and we see in the Minister’s announcement today that the campaign was well worth while. I also congratulate the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) on putting together a fantastic coalition of support for this change.

We believe the time to act has come. In 2014, David Cameron wrote to the British overseas territories recommending that they introduce public registers—the UK introduced a public register in 2016—and new clause 6 sets out a timetable for them to do so by 2020. Money laundering through London is estimated by the National Crime Agency to total £90 billion, and it is facilitated by the secret ownership of companies allowed in tax havens. Unfortunately, the British overseas territories and Crown dependencies are major actors. They enable the corrupt to live in comfort on their ill-gotten gains and facilitate tax avoidance and evasion on a spectacular scale. The UK is estimated to lose £18.5 billion each year. I am only surprised that the Chancellor of the Exchequer did not also sign new clause 6.

The poorest countries in the world are estimated by the United Nations to lose £100 billion a year through these tax havens, which dwarfs any aid flows we supply. That is another reason why new clause 6 is very much to be welcomed.

The scope for hiding large funds facilitates serious international crimes: drug dealing, people trafficking, sanctions busting, illegal arms sales and terrorism. Over and again, the names of the British overseas territories and Crown dependencies come up when these crimes are finally uncovered.

[James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con)]

Clearly, it is important to remember that this is not just an overseas territories issue but a global one. Is the hon. Lady worried that this legislation will just displace all the activity to states such as Delaware, which do not have this transparency, and we will not gain any of the real benefits?

[Helen Goodman]

Of course the hon. Gentleman raises a worry, which has been expressed. My right hon. Friend the Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) and I were in the United States a fortnight ago, when we met several members of the US Congress who are keen to crack down on Delaware, Nebraska and the other states there. Leading by example, which is what the last Administration did, is a way to make progress on this issue. I will come back to the international links later in my speech.

[Mr Geoffrey Cox (Torridge and West Devon) (Con)]

What does the hon. Lady say to the 50,000 or 60,000 inhabitants of the Cayman Islands, who were given a constitution in which the responsibility for the governance of their financial and economic affairs was solemnly conveyed to them by this Parliament? The measure she is supporting will require that constitution to be amended so that the section that conveys on them the power to make their own orders in these affairs will have to be removed. What does she say to them?

[Helen Goodman]

My understanding is that the position on the British overseas territories, as set out by a White Paper when the hon. Member for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham) was a Foreign Office Minister, is that it is appropriate for this House to legislate for the Cayman Islands and the overseas territories if it is considered necessary. Given the long list of crimes, which I have just read out to the House, that are facilitated, it can be argued completely that when we are making changes in this respect, this is an international, foreign policy issue, as that is what we are talking about; we are talking about the financing of international crime and of terrorism. This is not like trying to intervene in street lighting or purely local matters. It simply has a completely different import for the world.

[Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)]

I understand the point the hon. Lady is making and, as a lawyer, I very much appreciate the importance of the international fight against crime and money laundering, but will she concede that at least some overseas territories take their obligations very seriously? For example, Gibraltar, which is part of the EU as well, has already publicly accepted that it will transpose the fifth anti-money laundering directive, which includes a public register of beneficial ownership, into place by December 2019? In a sense, such places do not need to be legislated for, because they are willing to do this. It is important to be proportionate in our approach, is it not?

[Helen Goodman]

Of course what the hon. Gentleman says about the fifth anti-money laundering directive is right, in so far as it does put obligations on Gibraltar. That was why I have linked new clause 14 to the fifth anti-money laundering directive, because clearly it is easier, in terms of international competitiveness, for many jurisdictions to move together.

[Sir Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk) (Con)]

The hon. Lady mentioned the 2012 White Paper on the overseas territories, in which we said that in extreme cases we would legislate on such matters but that we would always try to build consensus first, because of our great respect for the constitutions of those territories. I plan to make a few remarks about that, but given the Government’s announcement today, will she confirm that she will not press new clause 14, which would extend new clause 6 to the Crown dependencies?

[Helen Goodman]

I will come on to that at the end of my speech.

I was explaining that these crimes are significant and that we see money being laundered in the UK, and I wanted to give the example of Mr Temerko, who was once a senior figure in Russia’s defence industry and who rose to become a key player in the Russian oil giant Yukos. His engineering company, Offshore Group Newcastle Ltd, had a large site up in Hadrian’s yard in Newcastle, where it was doing some energy work. The company won a grant from the Government’s regional growth fund in 2013, but it later went into administration and the work in the north-east was left unfinished. OGN Ltd is owned by a parent company based in the secrecy jurisdiction of the British Virgin Islands. Clearly, the effects of the lack of transparency are not felt solely in London; they are felt across the United Kingdom.

As I have said, I acknowledge that progress has been made, in so far as registers of beneficial ownership or “similarly effective systems” have been set up, but these are not transparent.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

After the incident in Salisbury, I was led to understand that the Government were cracking down on money laundering in this country, particularly in respect of these Russian oligarchs. Does my hon. Friend not agree that the Government should pursue this a lot further than they have been doing?

[Helen Goodman]

I certainly agree with that. Obviously, the law enforcement agencies—the National Crime Agency, the police and the Serious Fraud Office—need more resources. They would then be in a better position to crack down on this money laundering.

The purpose of transparency is not for the entertainment and titillation of the curious; it is to facilitate the authorities’ ability to track down illicit flows, because they can see the connections and links. This effectiveness of transparency was demonstrated by the fact that the Panama and Paradise leaks enabled Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs to open civil and criminal investigations into 66 people, to pursue arrests for a £125 million fraud, to tackle insider trading and to place dozens of high net worth individuals under review.

I am extremely pleased that the Minister said what he did about not opposing new clause 6, which stands in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking. I welcome his change of heart on that. He has, in the written ministerial statement he produced this morning, bigged up the role of the Financial Action Task Force, and I was a bit surprised by that, as the FATF is a rather unsatisfactory forum. It is an inter- governmental body with no legal personality or explicit formal authority under international law and no enforcement powers. It has 37 members, which include Russia, China and the Gulf Co-operation Council. Foreign Office Ministers have been eloquent in recent months in saying that the United Nations Security Council is ineffective in upholding international law because of the Russian veto, yet here, when we want to tackle the financing of major crimes and terrorism, they seem content to hand over their moral compass to the Russians. The FATF is also highly secretive; in answer to my questions, Ministers have refused to publish future agendas or papers for discussion. Even the UK does not always ensure its FATF representative has a thorough-going commitment to reform—for years it was a person who had his family money in a secret Bahamas trust. So I will be very pleased if the House can unite behind new clause 6 this afternoon.

I turn now to new clause 14, which would require public registers in the Crown dependencies. The case in principle for acting to improve transparency in the Crown dependencies—the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man—is substantively the same: their secret ownership arrangements facilitate both money laundering and tax evasion.

[Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP)]

The hon. Lady will have heard what the Minister said in his speech about the response that the Isle of Man and other Crown dependencies are able to give within hours, whenever a request is made for information that falls within a terrorist category. Does she accept that the Crown dependencies forthrightly, earnestly and efficiently provide information to our law enforcement agencies within hours, when it is requested?

[Helen Goodman]

The hon. Gentleman makes the same point about the Crown dependencies as other Members have made about the British overseas territories. The current situation is as he describes it—if the law enforcement agencies want information and ask for it, the authorities in the relevant jurisdictions give it to them—but the problem is that, to crack down on serious and organised crime, it is really useful to see the whole picture, and we can see the whole picture only if we have all the information. That is the point of transparency and that is the lesson from the Panama and Paradise papers.

[Liam Byrne (Birmingham, Hodge Hill) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making a brilliant speech. Have we not learned that dark money will move to wherever the law is darkest? If we bring transparency to the overseas territories, most of the money is simply going to be relocated to the Crown dependencies, unless we change the law to cover them, too.

[Helen Goodman]

That point was made to me by the Minister and his officials when we discussed the Bill, and my right hon. Friend is absolutely right that, because we are making changes in respect of the overseas territories, we need to make changes in respect of the Crown dependencies.

[Ms Angela Eagle]

My hon. Friend is making an extremely good speech. Does she agree that the time for secrecy in all these jurisdictions is now over? We need transparency so that we can minimise the abuse—whether tax evasion, tax avoidance, or the laundering of criminal money—that is becoming more and more of a feature in these jurisdictions. Does my hon. Friend agree that once we have our own house in order, we can then campaign internationally to close down all tax havens?

[Helen Goodman]

My hon. Friend has succinctly made my whole case for me. She is absolutely right. Those people who think that the situation in the Crown dependencies is not as serious as that in the British overseas territories need only to remember the 957 helicopters that were registered on the Isle of Man to avoid VAT.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Helen Goodman]

I shall make a little more progress, because many Members want to speak.

I have linked new clause 14 to the fifth anti-money laundering directive, so that we would see a number of jurisdictions moving together. I am pleased that the Government have accepted the secrecy jurisdictions and that we have a role with respect to the overseas territories, but we need an effective path to bring change according to a timetable, within the current Parliament, and new clause 6 tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking would provide that. I will not press new clause 14 to a vote—I was not going to press it in any case—because I think we can reach an agreement on how to proceed on these matters.

[Dame Margaret Hodge (Barking) (Lab)]

Let me start by saying how grateful I am to all right hon. and hon. Members from all parties who support new clause 6. I am particularly grateful to the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell), who has worked with me on this important issue and shown his particular skills and experience as a former Government Chief Whip.

The fact that the new clause commands such wide support throughout the House speaks volumes for what it says. Our proposal is right in principle and will be effective in practice. When it is passed—I am grateful to the Minister for conceding that the Government will not oppose it—this simple measure to require British overseas territories, our tax havens, to publish public registers of beneficial ownership will transform the landscape that allows tax avoiders, tax evaders, kleptocrats, criminals, gangs involved in organised crime, money launderers or those wanting to fund terrorism to operate. It will stop them exploiting our secret regime, hiding their toxic wealth and laundering money into the legitimate system, often for nefarious purposes.

Transparency is a powerful tool. With open registers, we will know who owns what and where and will be able to see where the money flows. We will thereby be better equipped to root out dirty money and deal with the related issues, and we will be better able to prevent others from using secretive jurisdictions to hide their ill-gotten gains.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alison Thewliss]

I rise to speak to the amendments in my name, on behalf of the Scottish National party. As I said earlier, I will formally withdraw amendments 31 to 33, which the cross-party amendments have dealt with adequately.

First, I would like to thank the Government and their advisers and civil servants for their time and expertise in the run-up to the Bill, as well as all those who sent me information and briefings, which have been incredibly helpful. I also want to particularly thank the experts at the Law Society, UK Finance, Roger Mullin, Richard Smith and David Leask for their thoughts on Scottish limited partnerships.

A lot has changed since the Bill began its process. Salisbury has focused minds and, I hope, will now result in some action. The UK Government went from trying to find a way to wriggle out of the Magnitsky amendment to the Prime Minister giving it her full support. Regardless of how the Government have come to that decision, I am grateful that they have finally come on board, and we can all be grateful that that move has been made.

I spent the weekend finishing Bill Browder’s disturbing book “Red Notice”, which details the lengths to which the rich and powerful in Russia are willing to go to preserve their ill-gotten gains. I recommend that all Members read it as an object lesson in Russian oligarchs’ power, which we need to be mindful of. It is a complex trail which finally led to the brave lawyer Sergei Magnitsky being wrongfully imprisoned, maltreated, tortured and eventually beaten to death in prison because he refused to perjure himself. He stood for the truth. He documented the human rights abuses against him, and, after his death, Bill Browder and his team campaigned steadfastly to bring some justice to the situation. That led to the Magnitsky Act in the US, which introduced Government sanctions prohibiting entry to the US and access to the US banking system for those involved in Sergei Magnitsky’s death. It has since been expanded in scope to become the Global Magnitsky Act, tackling more dirty money and dubious people.

The UK Government made moves on that with section 13 of the Criminal Finances Act 2017. The amendments today expand on that in a very welcome way, and I am glad to give my party’s support to them. It is crucial that the names go on the record, and I am glad that the Government have committed to an administrative list being publicly available. I could read out right now all the names that are currently on the American Magnitsky list, because they are in the public domain and everybody can see them. There is transparency and accountability, with nowhere to hide once someone is on that list. It is crucial that the list is used in the same way in the UK and that the webpage, or wherever the names are held, is available and updated regularly.

I appreciate that this is not an issue for the House, but I hope that Members will give further thought to how the process of parliamentary scrutiny will work. Will it be through a Committee? If so, which Committee? Will that Committee have powers to add names and conduct reviews? We must hold ourselves to the same standard as the existing Magnitsky list for this to be fully effective.

I want to speak about the issue of Scottish limited partnerships, which is dealt with in new clauses 1 and 19. We believe that linking an SLP with a human individual would go a considerable way to cracking down on the abuse of SLPs, so we suggest that a limited partner and a general partner must both be British citizens and that a general and a limited partner must have a UK bank account. That would, at a stroke, remove a great deal of illegitimate SLPs, while protecting those in agriculture and other areas who would be easily able to fulfil those simple requirements. The anti-money laundering requirements of our banks would act as a degree of deterrent to those seeking to abuse the system.

On new clause 1, until 2009 registrants of limited partnerships were required under the Limited Partnerships Act 1907 to provide the full name of the partners. However, the Legislative Reform (Limited Partnerships) Order 2009 confirmed that the legally required level of registration disclosure needed to be less expansive. The new clause would restore the basic information requested at the time of registration and introduce a requirement for one of the general partners to be a British citizen.

New clause 19, on the UK bank account requirement, would tie this a bit more tightly. Although SLPs’ name and country of incorporation may give them the veneer of a UK-regulated entity, at the moment their bank account and all their financial transactions can be run through overseas bank accounts that have few, if any, anti-money laundering checks on their account holders. We want to tighten that up significantly, because allowing that kind of abuse could severely damage the credibility of UK legal entities abroad.

[Helen Goodman]

I am most grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way. I took so many interventions on overseas territories that I forgot to comment on new clauses 1 and 19. We think that both are very sensible, given the explosion in SLPs in recent years and the complete failure to act on what has happened in the past year. New clause 19 is particularly powerful because it would mean that these people were within the ambit of the anti-money laundering legislation for the banking system.

[Alison Thewliss]

I thank the hon. Lady for her support. I hope to at least press new clause 19 to a vote, because there needs to be some action on SLPs, and tying it to a bank account is a good way of doing that.

The SNP is extremely proud of Scotland’s reputation as a successful place to conduct business, but with SLPs continuing to generate new scandals, there is an ever-growing reputational risk to Scotland, and indeed the UK, if action is not taken. I would like to take this opportunity to dig the Government up for their shenanigans on SLPs.

Owing to the diligent campaigning by the former Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath, Roger Mullin, the UK Government launched a consultation on SLPs on 16 January last year and closed it on 17 March last year. We then had an election, in which my dear friend did not get re-elected. We waited. Questions were tabled, and we were told again and again by Government that a response on the consultation was imminent. There was nothing. A month ago, we were told that it would be a matter of weeks, but probably not until after the Bill came back. Last week, we were told by officials that the report on SLPs was awaiting sign-off in Government, and on Sunday there was an announcement in the press that action was going to be taken, with a “Crackdown on abuse of UK businesses for foreign money laundering”. When we get to the detail, what in fact is it? It is another consultation—it is a consultation about a consultation.

That simply will not do. The UK Government are well aware of the problems with SLPs, which are well documented. The Secretary of State mentioned earlier the evidence that led to the bringing into scope of the person of significant control. We know that that was required, and there was evidence on it. We are waiting for fines to be levied on people who have not registered their persons of significant control.

--- Later in debate ---

[Richard Benyon]

We have it in our power to create something in Parliament that will hold future Governments as well as this Government to account. I am full of respect for what our security Ministers have been doing recently to freeze the bank accounts of certain individuals, and I absolutely believe that the Government have the will to ensure that we get our economy sorted out so that we cannot be a safe haven for these people. However, what we are talking about will be happening way into the future. It will affect future Governments as well, and we must hold them to account.

We could put this in the hands of an existing Committee —perhaps a Select Committee—but I suggest that that might not be the right framework. A Select Committee has the specific role of holding a Department of State to account and looking into certain details. I personally like the idea of a bespoke Committee that would draw together members of different Committees. The example that I would throw out there for others more important than me to grab is the Committees on Arms Export Controls—the CAEC. It has a specific remit, with members from various Select Committees, and I think it would be an effective model.

[Helen Goodman]

May I urge the right hon. Gentleman to read new clause 10, which sets out a proposal for a scrutiny Committee?

[Richard Benyon]

Well, I have. I just think new clause 3 leaves it much more open for Parliament to make a decision, and I am quite content with that, although I am open to other suggestions. Some people say that the Joint Committee on Human Rights might be best placed to carry out this scrutiny, but I see, from delving into the Standing Orders, that Standing Order No. 152B(2)(a) states that the Joint Committee has a remit to look at

“matters relating to human rights in the United Kingdom”.

What we are talking about here is matters relating to human rights anywhere. We could be talking about someone who is evicting the Rohingya, for example, or actions taken in conflicts or situations as yet unknown and unforeseen. We need to ensure that we can look at human rights everywhere.

--- Later in debate ---

Amendment 7, which stands in the names of the hon. Members for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) and for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds), would change “may include guidance about” to “must include” in respect of three stated areas of guidance. The amendment could be interpreted as limiting the areas on which the Government have committed to providing guidance to just the areas listed in the clause. With amendment 8, the hon. Members also wish the Government to review guidance issued under clause 38 on a yearly basis and submit a report to Parliament containing the results of that review. I see no grounds for instituting an additional review and reporting requirement in the Bill as there is already one in the Bill.

[Helen Goodman]

Those two amendments were tabled by the SNP.

[John Glen]

I am happy to be corrected, and I apologise to the hon. Lady.

Amendment 29 relates to the procedure by which individuals or entities apply for licences and exceptions to be included in the regulations. Retaining the application procedures in guidance will give the Government the flexibility to update them as needed and to respond to stakeholder feedback.

The Government have tabled new clause 4 because we recognise the concern raised by the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation and the Joint Committee on Human Rights that the repeal of part 1 of the Terrorist Asset-Freezing etc. Act 2010 would remove the independent reviewer’s oversight of domestic counter-terrorism asset freezes. Government new clauses 15 to 17 and amendments 23 to 26 will provide the UK Government with the powers necessary to enforce UK sanctions regulations against ships in international and foreign waters. These powers will ensure adherence to the standards set out in relevant UN Security Council resolutions and provide protection against the transportation of dangerous and harmful goods in international waters. These provisions contain important safeguards on the use of these powers, including a requirement to have reasonable grounds to suspect that sanctions are being flouted before enforcement action can be taken as well as flag state and foreign state consent where relevant.

New clause 20, tabled by the hon. Member for Glasgow Central—I hope I have got that one right—would oblige the Secretary of State to lay a report before Parliament each year on the exercise of the powers in the Bill. We have a range of reporting requirements in the Bill already, including an annual report on the sanctions regulations in force, and further reports when sanctions are imposed or amended. In addition, new clause 3 sets out reporting requirements for regulations made under the human rights purpose. We consider it unnecessary, therefore, to add an additional report on top of these, given that the issues that would be addressed in the report would be mirrored by those already required in the Bill.

Amendments 3 to 6, also tabled by the hon. Lady, would require that every sanctions designation be comprehensively re-examined annually. We agree that sanctions should only be in place for as long as there are good reasons for them to be so, and the Bill contains a range of procedures to ensure that all our sanctions are subject to regular scrutiny and review. We believe that three-year comprehensive reviews, combined with a robust package of procedural safeguards in the Bill, will ensure that these standards are at least maintained, so we would ask that she consider not pressing her amendments.

New clause 10, tabled by the hon. Members for Bishop Auckland and for Oxford East, would require statutory instruments that are to be considered under the draft affirmative procedure to receive a positive recommendation from a House of Commons Committee before being laid. All secondary legislation to which it would apply requires affirmative votes before coming into force, and we believe that that negates the need for additional parliamentary scrutiny. Sanctions are a manifestation of the UK’s foreign policy. They are not stand-alone or independent initiatives. Indeed, a number of existing parliamentary Committees have considered, or are planning to consider, sanctions issues, including the House of Lords EU Committee and the House of Commons Treasury Committee. It is not clear why further layers of scrutiny are necessary or desirable.

Amendment 22 would remove the requirement for Ministers to publish a written statement of explanation if they did not comply with a reporting provision. I should make it clear that this provision does not in any way displace the statutory duty to report; Ministers who fail to comply with that duty must face the consequences, regardless of whether an explanation is given.

Amendment 1, tabled by the hon. Member for Glasgow Central, would mean that sanctions regulations could be created only when that was deemed “necessary” for the purposes of the Bill, rather than when it was deemed “appropriate”. For many years the use of sanctions has been an essential part of international diplomacy, to respond to threats such as terrorism or to change unacceptable or threatening behaviour. It is important for the Government of the day to have the flexibility to impose sanctions or not to do so, after a thorough review of the prevailing political situation. Changing “appropriate” to “necessary” would mean that the Government could consider sanctions only as the last resort.

Amendment 9 would require the legislative consent of the devolved Administrations for any sanctions regulation made under section 1, if that regulation included a consequential repeal of, revocation of, or amendment to any law created by those Administrations. The power to create sanctions regulations falls under matters that are reserved to Westminster, and that includes modifications consequential on those regulations. Under the UK’s constitutional settlement, foreign policy is a reserved matter. The Bill gives the Government the power to impose sanctions as a foreign policy and national security tool.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Alan Duncan]

Yes, really.

[Helen Goodman]

Surely not!

[Sir Alan Duncan]

I salute them for all their efforts.

On what my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Victoria Prentis) said about the overseas territories, I am grateful that, in response to the point of order made by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Torridge and West Devon (Mr Cox), Mr Speaker made it absolutely clear that procedurally the Government’s proposed amendments were in order. The compromise amendment was tabled rather late in the day, but it was not out of order for being late. We fully recognise that the Speaker has the discretion to select or not to select an amendment for debate. We were obviously disappointed that the compromise amendment was not selected, but we respect Mr Speaker’s decision.

[Sir Alan Duncan]

I am very short of time. Does the shadow Minister wish to speak?

[Helen Goodman]

indicated assent.

[Sir Alan Duncan]

She does; I shall therefore not take an intervention so that I can leave a couple of minutes for her.

I thank my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Government Benches who would have supported the compromise amendment. I apologise if I marched them up to the top of the hill only for them to find that the hill had disappeared. I put on record my thanks to all who have helped with the Bill and, indeed, my thanks to the Opposition Front-Bench team for their co-operation on Magnitsky. Out of courtesy and shortness of time, with apologies for leaving her so little of it, I leave the last couple of minutes to the shadow Minister.

[Helen Goodman]

When the Minister began with his historical overview, I thought he was going to go back to Thucydides, who was of course the first person to write about sanctions; but no, his history was not quite so extensive.

The Opposition accept the need for this Bill in the post-Brexit environment. When it was first introduced in the other place, it had several major flaws. It presented a bundle of Henry VIII powers that gave the Government and the Executive too much power. An effective coalition of Labour and Cross-Bench peers improved the Bill substantially.

Another weakness of the Bill was that, although it was titled the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill, only one of its 53 clauses was devoted to anti-money laundering. Through a series of measures, both those that the Government did not support and those that they were forced to support, we have inserted stronger anti-money laundering provisions.

When the Bill came to this House, it was clear that more needed to be done on the human rights front. We tabled Magnitsky amendments, and we are pleased that the House is now united on the need for a Magnitsky law in this country. The Paradise and Panama papers have shown how British overseas territories and Crown dependencies play a major role in aiding tax evasion and money laundering. Without the great investigative journalism, many of the cases to which we have referred might never have been uncovered. Under David Cameron’s Administration, the Government promised to extend the United Kingdom’s—

Myanmar: Rohingya Minority

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Monday 16th April 2018 Westminster Hall

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hanson. I commend the excellent speech made by my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington North (Helen Jones), who clearly set out the issues—the history and the main matters that need to be addressed. She reminded us all of the terrible situation faced by the Rohingya and the great urgency of the need to tackle it, both the immediate humanitarian crisis and the underlying political issues. It is significant that we have six petitions from the public that have triggered today’s debate, showing that the British people are extremely concerned about the fate of the Rohingya and that they will not be forgotten.

Colleagues have said that the monsoon is coming. My understanding is that the United Nations and non-governmental organisations last month issued a new call for a larger aid programme of $951 million. I would be grateful if the Minister reported on how that appeal is going and how much of that money has been raised.

Many of us are concerned about the proposal to put some of the refugees on the island of Bhashan Char. Will the Minister also give an update on that and tell us what representations he has made to the Bangladeshis about it? Of course, we all appreciate that the Bangladeshis are in an extremely difficult situation. Bangladesh is a very poor country, in receipt of aid itself, and it has had an overwhelming number of refugees to deal with, but the international community must look at whether this is the best way to deal with the immediate crisis.

[Paul Scully]

When we talk about the island, we should call it what it is. It is actually a sandbank—something that did not exist just a few years ago. It is quite extraordinary that it is being considered, but I take the hon. Lady’s point.

[Helen Goodman]

The hon. Gentleman is extremely well informed and makes a useful contribution to the debate and our understanding of this matter. I am grateful to him for that intervention.

Hon. Members have spoken about gender-based violence and the rape and abuse of women and children. It is clear that that is part of the Myanmar military’s strategy. Its strategy has been to kill the men from the villages and then rape the women and children. That is not some soldiers who are out of control; it is clearly a thought-through approach to terrorise the Rohingya people. We have debated that over the last eight months and we have repeatedly asked Ministers how many of our experts in dealing with sexual violence and trauma have been sent to Cox’s Bazar. I think I have asked the Minister about it four times now. He wrote me a long, very informative letter on 27 March, but he still has not told us how many of our experts have been sent to support the victims.

When the then Foreign Secretary, William Hague, announced that Foreign Office initiative, everyone was extremely pleased that we would have the capacity to deal with that kind of violence as crises arose. We have 70 people who can do that work, but the latest number the Minister gave us was that two people are there. I would like to have from the Minister today an update on that number.

[Mark Field]

If I may, I will give the number now, not least because the hon. Member for Warrington North (Helen Jones) also pointed it out. We have now deployed four members of the UK Preventing Sexual Violence Initiative response team of experts directly to Cox’s Bazar, most recently the additional two members in March who are delivering training in evidence-gathering for local partners on the ground. I appreciate that, compared to the large number of 70, not all of whom are specialist experts in the field, that seems like a small number. We are trying to get some more training on the ground with other NGOs and the like. At the moment, we regard this as a reasonable level; obviously, we would like to be able to deploy more and we will deploy as many as we feel is appropriate in this particular case. One of the issues at stake, which the hon. Lady raised earlier, is trying to get as much testimony as possible to hold people to account.

[Helen Goodman]

I am sorry, but I do not think it is acceptable to send four people. My hon. Friend the Member for Warrington North pointed out that 13 women’s centres have been set out and that the British effort can help 10,000 people. We have that resource for a purpose; let us now deploy it in significant numbers, because it will make a significant difference not just in helping people to cope with this trauma, but in bringing to justice those who perpetrated the crimes and those who ordered them. It is central to that. My hon. Friend said that we should learn the lessons, but we will not get people in other wars to learn the lessons unless, on previous occasions, those responsible have been brought to book. We can bring them to book only by putting in the resource to secure the testimony. I could not urge the Minister more strongly than I do now to increase that resource.

[Kate Green]

One of the lessons of previous conflicts is the very long-tail implications for people’s mental health. The trauma does not end with the crisis, but sits with them for decades afterwards. Does my hon. Friend agree that it would be useful to know whether our Government can help to train partners on the ground to provide that long-term mental health and psychotherapeutic support as well?

[Helen Goodman]

I think that is what the Government are doing, but given that we have the resource, we should deploy it on a much greater scale.

My hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Afzal Khan) spoke about the CHOGM conference this week. CHOGM is an opportunity for Ministers to do two things: encourage our Commonwealth partners to put money toward the $951 million and build support for stronger action in the UN. I would like to know what is going to happen at CHOGM this week to strengthen that process.

Last week, the shadow Foreign Secretary and I went to New York and had some meetings at the UN. We saw the person on the Myanmar desk, and I understood from her that the UN Security Council itself intends a visit to the region. That should be useful, because it should be an opportunity to build, among a wider group of nations, some sense of the enormity and seriousness of the crisis and the reasons we want it to go up the UN agenda. The UN secretariat also explained to us that the UN is trying to appoint a special envoy.

One block to progress has been the fact that the Chinese have regarded this as an internal matter in Myanmar, not an international crisis. That seems somewhat incredible to me, when almost 1 million people have been forced over the border into Bangladesh. I hope the British Government are challenging the Chinese at both ministerial and official level on that interpretation of what is going on. It is not really a credible posture.

[Phil Wilson in the Chair]

Another opportunity for multilateral action is represented by the European Union. My understanding is that, while we are having this debate, there is a meeting of European Union Foreign Ministers in Brussels. I do not know which of the Minister’s colleagues is in Brussels, but it would be interesting to know whether this matter is on the agenda and what progress he anticipates in strengthening the will to take action among European colleagues. Of course, Europe has imposed sanctions, but we need the support of our European colleagues in the United Nations to raise this to a new level.

Turning to what else we can do multilaterally with our colleagues, we have debated the use of sanctions. My hon. Friend the Member for Tower Hamlets—

[Rushanara Ali]

Bethnal Green and Bow.

[Helen Goodman]

I beg my hon. Friend’s pardon. How could I make that mistake?

My hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Rushanara Ali) has been pressing the case for stronger sanctions for some time. There are three elements to this, which I hope the Foreign Office will carry forward. The first is the Magnitsky sanctions, which are sanctions on individuals for gross human rights abuses. We debated them before Easter when considering the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill. When we began considering that Bill, the Government’s position was that they did not want to go down the Magnitsky route. After consideration in Committee, I had fruitful discussions with the Minister’s colleague, the Minister for Europe and the Americas, and the Prime Minister later said that Magnitsky-style sanctions will be implemented through the Bill. The Americans already have such sanctions available, which has enabled them to sanction Maung Maung Soe, who is one of the people in Myanmar responsible for those gross human rights abuses.

In fact, the Criminal Finances Act 2017 already gives us the power to impose sanctions on individuals for gross human rights abuses, by freezing their assets and preventing them from putting money through London. Ministers could do that, and I really do not know why they have not been doing it for some of the people we have heard about. Min Aung Hlaing is another candidate for these financial sanctions.

If we had the sanctions available that we want to have in the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill, we could put travel bans on those people as well. I do not know why, having agreed between those on the two Front Benches to implement the sanction powers, Ministers did not come back and get consideration on Report done before Easter. We could have done it. We are ready to do it. We are ready to help the Government. We want to crack on with this, but we still do not know when we will consider the Bill on Report. Those measures would be an important additional tool in our box.

The second element, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Bow said, is extending the financial sanctions to that part of the economy controlled by the military. That has been the Opposition’s position for some time now, and Ministers should look at it. The third is extending the arms embargo from Europe to the rest of the world.

Ministers might say that they could not get such a resolution through the UN Security Council. I do not know whether that is true, but in the past week we have seen Ministers supporting other draft Security Council resolutions that had a much lower chance of getting through than that resolution would have, so I cannot see that the risk of it not working is a good reason not to support it. Britain is the penholder on Myanmar, and as soon as the UN Security Council permanent representatives come back would be an opportune moment for the British Government to give a new push to this piece of work and to get something more to happen. I urge the Minister to do that.

One thing the petitioners want is to stop the genocide. We all understand that we do not want to validate the exodus of the Rohingya; we want their safe, dignified and voluntary return to Rakhine state. That means UN oversight, but it also means, as other hon. Members have said, the implementation of the recommendations on citizenship that were put forward in the Annan commission report. That must be the basis for the long- term settlement.

Finally, I will talk about the International Criminal Court and what might happen there. The ICC is important in bringing these people to book, but also important in deterring future such crimes in other places and in other conflicts. I understand that Myanmar has not signed up to the ICC, but I note that, last Monday, ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda asked the Court’s judges to rule on whether the ICC could exercise jurisdiction over the alleged deportation of the Rohingya people from Myanmar to Bangladesh.

This is essentially an attempt to assert jurisdiction over deportation, which is one of the well-documented crimes, as the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Scully) pointed out. It is based on the ICC’s ability to assert jurisdiction if the “conduct in question” for a deportation was committed in the territory of a member state. It looks as if the ICC is beefing up its approach. I would like to hear the Minister’s interpretation of what is going on there and also how he is going to support that important measure.

[The Minister for Asia and the Pacific (Mark Field)]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Warrington North (Helen Jones) for introducing the debate. I pay tribute to her industry and—at times, I am sure—patience as Chair of the Petitions Committee.

The debate was inspired by six public and e-petitions that attracted some hundreds of thousands of signatures, and that demonstrate the British public’s heartfelt concern for the desperate plight of the Rohingya. Hon. Members will reflect that the overall lack of contributions—quantity rather than quality—does not reflect the strength of feeling of the House. Everyone will realise that the debate on Syria that is going on has unfortunately resulted in a clash. I very much hope that those hundreds of thousands of British citizens who signed these petitions will not believe in any disparaging way that there are not strong feelings.

Some motion and energy has taken place, and I am happy that I will spend much of my speech reporting the progress we have made. I will be honest: any progress that we make diplomatically and politically is not enough, which is a great frustration. I very much agree with the kind words from the hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Rushanara Ali) about my involvement. This takes up a considerable amount of my time, not just in the House but wherever I go abroad. I will come to that in a moment or two.

Only last month, I saw for myself the intensity of the domestic concern—I ought to make an apology while I am here, because that happened in the constituency of the hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Bow. I met representatives from a network of British Rohingya communities and the British Bangladeshi community at an exhibition of photographs from the refugee camps held in Spitalfields. Some of those present had family in the refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar and were able to pass on day-to-day details. Others had been brought up here in the UK as refugees from previous waves of Rohingya flight over the decades. They were understandably very close to despair.

What was hopeful was the sense of a network of people together. The network is promoted in part by the Home Office to try to ensure that there is a constructive approach towards their work—not just their campaigning, but their work within that community. We do not want an approach that could in any way lead to the militancy that many have been very concerned about ever since this crisis reached a new point on 25 August last year. I reassured them on that night and I reassure Parliament again today that the Foreign Office and the Department for International Development will not ever forget their plight.

I shall set out what action we have taken so far in response to the crisis, on which many contributions have been made today, and what we plan to do. Understandably, many of the petitions have called first and foremost for an end to the violence. Needless to say, we would like that too. In so far as there has been a reduction in violence in recent weeks and months, I fear that it is only because there are fewer people in Burma to whom violence can be meted out. As I have said, we keep a very close eye on the sexual violence taking place across the Bangladeshi border.

I share the sense of horror felt by many hon. Members at the accounts from survivors of what they have experienced at the hands of the Burmese military in Rakhine state. As my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Scully) pointed out, that unspeakable violence includes rape and savage assault. It is appalling, and all hon. Members call for it to end. I wish we could do more than just express words, but words sometimes matter. One pledge I will make to the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) is that I will do all I can to try to discover in my Department whether there is any way in which more resource can usefully be implemented by the sexual violence team. One of the most important aspects of our work is training other people on the ground—non-governmental organisations—because of my Department’s expertise. I understand that on paper it looks as though the resource for specialists in this field does not seem anything like enough to take account of the day-to-day problems that continue to occur in Cox’s Bazar, albeit that it has doubled in the last month or so. The hon. Lady’s words and those of the hon. Member for Warrington North have not fallen on deaf ears: I will do all I can in the Foreign Office to try to find out more about exactly what is happening and whether we can, as a matter of urgency, put some more resource in place.

It is obvious that while the violence continues, there can be no hope of reassuring the Rohingya that they would be able to return safely, voluntarily and with dignity. As I said in my statement to the House last month, the violence that broke out in August 2017 was only the latest episode in a long-running cycle of persecution suffered by the Rohingya in Rakhine. As the hon. Member for Dundee West (Chris Law) pointed out, in many ways it existed even pre-1982. The truth is that, from the moment the Burmese state came into being, the Rohingya were regarded at best as second-class citizens or non-citizens, as the case may be. The 1982 issue only brought into sharper focus the way in which that sense of statelessness was underpinned.

We have urged the civilian Government of Burma to take action to stop the situation deteriorating since they took office two years ago, and we will continue to do so. The UN estimates that since last August more than 680,000 people have fled from Rakhine into Bangladesh. Our Government have repeatedly condemned the violence, as have this Parliament and the British people. We shall and must continue to work tirelessly with our international partners to seek a lasting solution to this terrible situation.

Last September, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs convened in New York a meeting of Foreign Ministers, calling on the Burmese authorities to end the violence. In November, the UK proposed and secured a UN Security Council presidential statement on Burma, which called on the Burmese authorities urgently to stop the violence, to create the necessary conditions for refugee returns and to hold to account those responsible for acts of violence.

I continue actively to address this crisis with counterparts across Asia. Last week, I was in Malaysia and Japan. A number of hon Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam, pointed out that there is potentially a role for ASEAN. He knows, and hon. Members will understand, the tensions and conflicts within ASEAN. It rightly does not like to wash its laundry in public. On the one hand, Malaysia has been one of the strongest supporters, and Brunei has worked well and perhaps more quietly behind the scenes with some of the aid it passes into the area. On the other hand, there are countries such as Thailand, which is fundamentally a Buddhist state.

One of the broadest concerns I have about the region is the sense in which so much is becoming atomised. Burma, Thailand and Sri Lanka are predominantly Buddhist nations, and concerns have been raised by some about Hindu nationalism in parts of India and elsewhere. There is a dangerous sense—dare I say it?—that that will lead to a backlash from predominantly Muslim nations in the area. It is a very dangerous state of affairs. I will say a little more about social media in the concluding part of my speech.

Tomorrow, the Foreign Secretary will co-chair a meeting on the Rohingya crisis with fellow Commonwealth Foreign Ministers. We will urgently explore how to support Bangladesh and how to ensure that Burma responds to international concerns. I have had to deputise for the Foreign Secretary—he is the relevant Minister but was in Brussels and had to rush back and go straight into the main Chamber—in a number of meetings at CHOGM, including a very fruitful meeting with my counterpart the Foreign Minister of Brunei. We talked at length and in constructive terms about the progress being made behind the scenes. Unfortunately, as a result, I did not have a chance to speak to David Miliband, the president of the International Rescue Committee, who had wanted to speak with me. He has a letter in the Evening Standard today, setting out what I suspect he wanted to talk to me about. He rightly says that there is an opportunity at the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting

“to mobilise much needed support for the Rohingya crisis. Economic and cultural ties between Commonwealth countries should be the basis for increased international solidarity with Bangladesh”.

As we know, it is currently hosting almost 1 million Rohingya in various ways. David Miliband has a plan afoot. I hope to speak to him later in the week and will pass on the comments made in this debate. There will be continued meetings. I make this pledge: I will do all I can at every meeting with any Foreign Ministers from that region and ASEAN to make the case that the international community needs to hold together.

To be frank, one difficulty is that too few of the Rohingya are entrepreneurial enough to have a similar situation to the one that applied to Syrian refugees in Jordan, where businesses that were already up and running and had existing supply chains were able to keep going. I do not despair. There is more we can do to develop economic connections.

The Foreign Secretary will discuss the crisis at Sunday’s G7 Foreign Ministers meeting, which I expect will send a strong and united message to the Burmese authorities. At the end of this month, the UK will be co-leading the visit of the UN Security Council to Burma and Bangladesh, which has been referred to. We are confident that the very act of visiting the camps in Bangladesh and seeing the situation in Rakhine will further strengthen council members’ resolve to find a solution to the crisis. I have not been able to get out to the frontline in Bangladesh, although a number of other Ministers have, but going to Rakhine was a salutary lesson. Some camps had been up and running for five or six years, and what struck me was the thought that the conditions there are as good as it gets for any Rohingya who return anytime soon. Things were barely acceptable. It was a guarded camp. The education and health situation was dire. It opened one’s eyes to the magnitude of the problem.

I hope that the visit from the leading lights in the UN Security Council will prompt the Burmese authorities to accelerate the implementation of the presidential statement’s call for urgent action. There are not too many European nations other than ourselves and France. I believe that the Dutch, at the moment, are a member of the Security Council, but there are a number of—

[Helen Goodman]

So are the Swedes.

Oral Answers to Questions

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Tuesday 27th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Harriett Baldwin]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend and her remarkable track record of campaigning on this issue. She is absolutely right to highlight the fact that, according to the Living Planet Index, global populations of fish, birds, mammals, amphibians and reptiles declined by 58% between 1970 and 2012. It is therefore crucial that, as a world, we work together to tackle this terrible crime.

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

On average, the UK Border Force seized 130 kg of illegally trafficked ivory in the years from 2013 to 2016, but in 2017 the figure fell to 40 kg. Is that because the trade is shrinking or because the Government are not catching as much?

[Harriett Baldwin]

It is testament to the incredibly important work that is done by the UK Border Force and the work that we do through the National Crime Agency overseas. In Côte d’Ivoire recently, I saw the work that we are doing with the police force on this worldwide phenomenon. We need to work together internationally to tackle this heinous crime.

Burma

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Thursday 15th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for that clear and comprehensive update on the situation of the Rohingya, and for giving me advance sight of his statement. No one can doubt the effort and commitment that he and his officials in the Foreign Office and on the ground are putting into resolving this issue.

I also welcome several specific aspects of the Minister’s update. First, the interim report of the UN fact-finding mission—both in its level of detail about the atrocities suffered by the Rohingya and in the unflinching language it uses to describe those genocidal acts—is a vital first step in building a case against the individuals responsible. Secondly, I welcome the public’s generosity, and the Government’s continued commitment to providing humanitarian relief to the Rohingya refugees trapped in Cox’s Bazar and elsewhere. I applaud the tireless work of British medical professionals seeking to stop the spread of disease in the camps.

Thirdly, I welcome the Minister’s words on the role of UNHCR in ensuring a safe, dignified and voluntary return, and a sustainable future for those refugees. The international community must continue to put pressure on the Government in Myanmar to allow UNHCR to dictate when and how it will be appropriate to begin that repatriation process. Fourthly, I welcome the Minister’s continued support for the Kofi Annan report, and the vital long-term reforms it sets out to give full rights and lasting protection to the Rohingya community in Myanmar. Democratic and civil society development did not improve as we hoped two years ago, and only this week I heard also about 100,000 displaced people in Kachin state.

I welcome the progress that the Minister mentioned on agreeing EU-wide sanctions against leading Myanmar generals. Only two weeks ago, Foreign Office Ministers were avoiding a debate and voting down Labour’s Magnitsky amendments. I was therefore pleased that the Prime Minister expressed a change of heart yesterday, not least because we noticed that the United States used Magnitsky provisions to sanction one of the generals, Maung Maung Soe.

The Minister spoke about the importance of providing support for the victims of sexual violence, and documenting the abuses that they have suffered, with a view to bringing prosecutions against those responsible at some future date. He will know the concern across the House that when we last received an update on Myanmar, it was confirmed that only two of the 70 sexual violence experts employed as part of the Government’s preventing sexual violence initiative in 2012 had been deployed to work on those cases. Have more of those staff now been deployed in the refugee camps? Are those two experts still there? How many people are now working to support victims and document their evidence? What percentage of the victims of sexual violence does he estimate have now received support and had their cases documented, whether by UK experts or other agencies working on this issue?

The Minister noted the impending monsoon season, and we are all aware of the risk that those heavy rains could turn the existing humanitarian crisis in the refugee camps into something even more catastrophic, including through the spread of waterborne disease. What assessment have the Minister’s officials, and their counterparts in the United Nations, made of the current shortfall in humanitarian funding to support the refugees, and of the expected shortfall if the monsoon season makes the crisis worse? If those numbers are as high as many of us fear, what emergency action will the Government take with our international partners to try to plug those gaps?

Finally, we must return to how we can best ensure the safe, voluntary and dignified repatriation of and a sustainable future for the Rohingya refugees, and how we can ensure that those responsible for the atrocities against them are brought to justice. I appreciate what the Minister has said about the pressure the United Kingdom has exerted behind the scenes at the United Nations in terms of setting up the fact-finding mission and obtaining the Security Council presidential statement. However, he will understand the long-standing view on the Labour Benches that it is time to go further and be more public in using the UK’s formal role as penholder on Myanmar on the United Nations Security Council to table resolutions on these vital issues: first, to table a resolution setting out the terms under which the repatriation process should proceed, and the future rights and protections that must be accorded to the Rohingya refugees, obliging the Myanmar authorities to accede to those terms. Secondly, at the appropriate time, a resolution should be tabled referring Myanmar to the International Criminal Court, so that the generals, who this week scandalously dismissed the UN’s claims of ethnic cleansing and genocide by saying the Rohingya had burned down their own houses, can be brought to account.

The Minister spoke with candour on that second point, admitting that such a resolution would be difficult to get past the Security Council. I ask him to expand on that. What steps have the Government taken to engage with Myanmar’s near neighbour China and did the Prime Minister raise this issue with the Chinese on her recent trip?

Many of us fear that, if we do not act quickly to break the stalemate, especially with the monsoon season coming, we will have these types of updates for too many months to come, and the humanitarian crisis the Minister described will only get worse.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)]

May I just give a little bit of advice to both Front Benchers? The speeches are meant to be 10 and five minutes. I think one was nearly 16 and the other was seven. I did not want to stop them, because this is a very important subject, but I would like us to keep to that in future.

Diplomatic Service and Resources

Helen Goodman Excerpts

Tuesday 13th March 2018 Westminster Hall

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

It is very nice to see you in the Chair, Mr Bailey. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon) on securing this timely debate. He described the context in which we live at the moment as extremely turbulent, which is undoubtedly true, both in the short term, with our relations with Russia, and also with these big, strategic changes with the growth of China. I agree with him; I saw it 15 months ago in Lusophone Africa, where the Chinese are investing a great deal more than Portugal.

As the right hon. Gentleman said, everything is about context. In 1990, as a Treasury civil servant—we have heard about the divide between the Treasury and the Foreign Office; I am afraid to say that I was a Treasury civil servant—I was sent to Prague. It was obviously a very turbulent time. The Berlin wall had fallen and the Czechoslovak Government were extremely worried that they would face the sort of energy crisis that Ukraine has suffered from, because the Russians were ramping up the prices for the oil and gas that the Czechoslovaks were wholly dependent on.

I was sent to work for a few months in the Czechoslovak Prime Minister’s office. It was a very confused and chaotic time. Havel was in the Castle, but the rest of the Government contained communist members. The first thing I did was report to the head of mission. I went off, and I sat and waited, and the meeting was delayed and delayed. It took place an hour later. When I went in, he was incredibly stressed. I asked him what the matter was, and he said that his servants were on strike and he had been trying to sort it out.

I hope that the Foreign Office has moved on since 1990 in that respect, because it is extremely important that Foreign Office officials project Britain as we are now. I could not agree more with the right hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Sir Nicholas Soames) on Britain’s place in the world today. We are a middle-sized nation, not a superpower, and it is extremely important that we behave intelligently and appropriately. Fantasising about what we were and where we have been is distinctly unhelpful. He was also absolutely right that, in order to maximise our power and influence at the moment, we need to build relationships, whether with EU colleagues, in the United Nations or in NATO. We will never achieve anything except by collaborating with other countries.

[Sir Nicholas Soames]

The hon. Lady is making an impressive speech, but may I disagree with her on one tiny point? Although it is important that we do not think that we are what we were, we do have this absolutely wonderful architecture and a brilliant inheritance of vast experience all over the world, in good times and bad times. Our values and everything we stand for are built on rock-firm footings. It is now our job to see that that legacy is expressed in contemporary terms, which requires a much more aggressive approach.

[Helen Goodman]

I will come to the soft power aspects and the institutions that contribute to that in a moment. First, I want to look at the numbers and the reductions that the Foreign Office budget has had since 2010 and is projected to have.

[Chris Bryant]

I slightly disagree with the right hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Sir Nicholas Soames). I do not know whether my hon. Friend noticed, but Emmanuel Macron went to India the other day and said, notwithstanding our historic relationship with India, as part of the former empire and all the rest of it, that he intends France to be India’s prime access point to the European Union in the future. We have to be very careful about not relying on the past.

[Helen Goodman]

If we leave the European Union, we obviously cannot be the prime access point to the European Union. That stands to reason.

I will come to the soft power assets in a moment, but I just want to say something about the numbers. The Foreign Office budget reduction is slightly unclear. Is it 16%, 30% or 40% over the 10-year period? Whatever it is, it is quite a significant amount of resource. I realise that some of the Foreign Office budget has gone into the Department for International Trade and some into the Department for Exiting the European Union, but the smallest cut that one can glean from looking at the numbers is about 16%, which is none the less extremely large. It seems to me that it is difficult for the Government to project the global Britain role while at the same time reducing resources in the Foreign Office.

Turning to our soft power assets, we are all very proud of the World Service and pleased with the British Council, and we all think that the Commonwealth is a fantastic network. There is another soft power asset, which I think we should look at alongside those assets. I am talking about our universities and higher education. We have soft power assets in this country as well as overseas.

[Sir Hugo Swire]

Will the hon. Lady take this opportunity to applaud the Foreign and Commonwealth Office for the Chevening scholarship programme and the Commonwealth programme? These are hugely important ways of promoting the United Kingdom domestically to an international audience.

[Helen Goodman]

Yes, and of course the English language is the root of much of this.

However, I disagree with what was said previously in this debate about overseas aid. The Labour Government set up the Department for International Development as a separate Department in order that we could be absolutely clear that the aid budget had aid objectives—sustainable development objectives—and we have now agreed, on a cross-party basis, on the 0.7% target. We believe that aid has been much more effective and much better because it has not been jumbled up with other policy objectives. In my opinion, the foreign policy benefits from a good aid programme are greater than can be achieved when people try to go along to the Development Assistance Committee and fiddle with the rules, saying, “Oh, couldn’t we please put the hurricane money for the Caribbean into the overseas aid programme?” No. The reason why we get credibility and support from those countries that are receiving our aid is the very high quality of the aid, so I would certainly not wish to pull those two things together again.

One thing that is not very clear in the Foreign Office annual report and accounts is how the money is spent. In particular, it is not clear how the conflict, stability and security fund, which is the share of the budget going from the aid Department to the Foreign Office, is spent. I think the Government should be extremely cautious about merging those two.

I also think we need to put a question mark over the switch from Africa, Latin America and Asia to the European Union. Perhaps the Foreign Office simply does not have enough resource, in which case Foreign Office Ministers need to go back to their colleagues in the Treasury and make the case, but it seems to Opposition Members that if we want to develop our relationships across the globe, we cannot be cutting our resource in those other parts of the world. I submit that the switch of 50 people to the European Union will probably be quite a short-sighted change.

The question is really whether global Britain is a slogan or a policy. As the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs said, there is a risk that it is becoming a slogan rather than a policy. If Ministers need to bid for more money, so be it. We do not see holding to the current limit as necessarily a hard line. We should be investing in our relationships across the globe.