Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Thursday 22nd April 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB) [V]]

My Lords, the Foreign Secretary, Dominic Raab, rightly says that the UK’s ambition should be to emerge as “a force for good”, while in his introduction to the integrated review, the Prime Minister says that

“liberal democracy and free markets remain the best model for the social and economic advancement of humankind.”

In drawing attention to the all-party groups of which I am an officer and to the current inquiry of the International Relations and Defence Select Committee, on which I serve, I want to drill down into the review’s objective that we will tilt towards the insufficiently defined Indo-Pacific and how we will constrain the Chinese Communist Party.

The integrated review recognises China’s increasing assertiveness as

“the most significant geopolitical factor of the 2020s”

and

“the biggest state-based threat to the UK’s economic security.”

It describes China as a “systemic competitor” and says the UK

“is likely to remain a priority target for such threats”,

including “cyber-attacks, disinformation and proxies.”

Yet, conspicuously, the review does not even mention Taiwan, which recently recorded its largest CCP air incursion yet. Why not? Combined with Russia’s opportunistic sabre-rattling against Ukraine, these challenges by autocracies pose a serious threat to international order. The Foreign Secretary has described the CCP’s industrial scale violations against the Uighurs and we call out China’s violations, including CCP sanctions on parliamentarians exercising their duties and BBC journalists committed to truth telling. We say we will stand up for them and for our values but continue to conduct and increase business.

I ask the Minister directly: is it licit for a signatory to the convention on the crime of genocide to do business as usual with a state credibly accused of genocide? Given what we know about Xinjiang’s concentration camps and slave labour, what changes are we making to our supply chains? What are we doing to make the UK less dependent on China, especially in strategic sectors?

Recent reports by Jo Johnson and Civitas warn of infiltration of UK higher education, intellectual property theft and worse. In its report Inadvertently Arming China?, Civitas says that more than half of the 24 Russell Group universities have worrying links with Chinese military-based institutions, including agencies involved in developing weapons of mass destruction. It says the UK’s response is

“a picture of strategic incoherence.”

We need to do better than that.

The threat to our way of life is symbolised by the treatment of Dr Li Wenliang after he tried to warn the world about Covid and the CCP’s imprisonment of a courageous young lawyer and citizen journalist, Zhang Zhan, tortured for going to Wuhan to expose the truth. It is symbolised by the jailing of Hong Kong’s democrats and the genocide of Uighurs.

In response, the review rightly emphasises and urges a multilateral response and for the UK to aim to be:

“the European partner with the broadest and most integrated presence”.

What can the Minister tell us of the proposed D10 alliance of democracies and President Biden’s suggested summit of democracies? What would the UK’s role be? Might potential allies like Singapore and Vietnam be excluded by too-narrow definitions? Strengthening ties with established Asian democracies, such as Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan, and encouraging emerging democracies, such as Indonesia and Malaysia, and enhancing alliances with long-standing friends such as Singapore and India, will be key.

We must stand with those fighting tyranny in Burma and Hong Kong, and those like Australia who are sanctioned for speaking out. Note that China’s threat that Five Eyes countries should be careful lest their eyes be poked blind—their words—has been followed by New Zealand’s decision to leave Five Eyes. To achieve the review’s laudable aims, we must strengthen our alliances, stand with our friends and see how the frequently suborned multilateral architecture, especially at the United Nations, can be salvaged.