Foreign Policy

Lord Bishop of St Albans Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd May 2023 Grand Committee

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[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

That the Grand Committee takes note of the United Kingdom’s changing role in the world and its implications for foreign policy.

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

My Lords, the people of these islands have made an extraordinary contribution to the world, much of which we can be immensely proud of. However, with the contraction of the British Empire, two world wars, the emergence of the Commonwealth and our renegotiated relations with mainland Europe post Brexit, we have to continue to adapt to the changing world around us, not least as we negotiate new trade deals—a theme which I know a number of speakers will pick up on during today’s debate.

Long gone are the days when we could boast that Britannia ruled the waves or when the UK was famous for being the home of the Industrial Revolution and known as the workshop of the world, but as some things have declined, others have emerged. Today, we are renowned as a major financial centre, a provider of some of the best tertiary education in the world, the home of some of the most exciting and innovative developments in science, medicine and technology, not least in the fields of computing and artificial intelligence, and a country which has been at the forefront of international development and human rights. All this is happening in a world with massive population growth, where international trade and travel have grown hugely, where environmental concerns and climate change are rising—rightly—up the agenda, and where the ever-present threat of war, not least nuclear war, continues.

We face many challenges as well as many opportunities. China continues to grow rapidly and, as the Integrated Review Refresh 2023 report says:

“The CCP is increasingly explicit in its aim to shape a China-centric international order more favourable to its authoritarian system”.


North Korea now has nuclear weapons and is conducting regular tests. As President Putin’s war against Ukraine continues, China and Iran are strengthening their links with Russia in what many consider a worrying alliance, not least for those of us in the West. Taiwan continues to be under threat by China and could easily become the focus of international conflict.

Meanwhile, population growth across the world continues apace and is unsustainable. The recent Covid-19 pandemic was also a wake-up call. The virus spread rapidly and no country was able to prevent it infecting its population. It gave us a real-time lesson that, whatever our racial and ethnic background, we are all part of one human race. The pandemic revealed our mutual dependence and we learned a lot about the vulnerability of some of our supply chains.

In every age, a major role of government is the defence of the realm, particularly in turbulent times. I was therefore interested to read the Integrated Review Refresh 2023. Having no expertise in defence, I am content to leave that area of foreign policy to those Members of your Lordships’ House who are experts. I look forward to their contribution in this debate. However, I note that the review is proposing that expenditure on defence should increase from 2% of GDP to 2.5% over time and as fiscal and economic circumstances allow. The reason I raise this is that His Majesty’s Government have made a conscious decision to reduce spending on overseas development assistance from 0.7% to 0.5%. In other words, this is a deliberate policy shift away from assisting foreign countries to develop to increasing our military capability instead.

Of course, there are times when tyrants and bullies have to be confronted. However, it is equally important to develop and deliver a foreign policy that seeks to build a more peaceful world—and peace is dependent on justice. Unaddressed injustices and inequalities breed resentment, and in that dark pool of bitterness is born conflict. It is well said that peace is not the absence of conflict but the presence of justice. This is why Christ calls us to share in the difficult and challenging work of building peace. It is why he said:

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God”.


This is why the Church of England and other major Christian churches around the world have collaborated and established a peacebuilding team, to support the Church in being a reconciling presence in the midst of conflict. We have urged and continue to urge the Foreign Office to make peacemaking a major plank of its work. It is good that the Office for Conflict, Stabilisation and Mediation in the Foreign Office has a negotiations and peace process department. As far as I know, it is the only place in His Majesty’s Civil Service and Armed Forces architecture where a dedicated unit is focused solely on peacebuilding. It is a significant step in the right direction and I congratulate the Government on this. I suggest that a dedicated expert team feeds directly into foreign and defence policy at the strategic level of all policy formation, to offer solutions to conflict built on negotiation, mediation, dialogue and conflict resolution. This is the important strand of a strategic level policy design that appears to be missing from the integrated review.

Allied to this is the need for us to develop and use all the forms of soft power also available to us. The BBC World Service is a vital element of this peacebuilding process, so it is disappointing to see the cuts to expenditure. Impartial reporting is one of the most important contributions we can make to a world that is often economical with the truth or promulgates false news. It was particularly shocking when, during the protests in Iran—when women and young children were being killed while protesting against the tyranny of the Iranian regime—our Government announced cuts to the BBC Persian radio services.

The Government have now pledged a £20 million uplift to the BBC World Service, but that will do very little to restrict the planned cuts. Many BBC language services, which have played a vital role in covering not only the protests in Iran but the war in Ethiopia and the pro-democracy protests in Myanmar, are set to be cut. For example, just £800,000 could save BBC Persian radio and preserve a service relied on by 1.6 million Iranians currently in an uprising against their Government.

Similarly, our overseas development aid not only provides much needed help for some of the most vulnerable people in the world but supports our strategic goals across the world. For example, countries in the Horn of Africa face devastating famine following war, drought and crop diseases. Nearly 22 million people are in desperate need of food. Many are likely to die but many others will join the ranks of those who decide to migrate and will be added to the queues of desperate people who want to get into the UK. There is a real reason why we need to think about trying to help these areas develop. We know that our failure to deliver aid to the very same region in 2011 led to millions of deaths, but it also led to increased security threats, as terrorist groups exploited hunger to recruit people to sign up to their radical groups.

Over the past few months, I have asked His Majesty’s Government a series of Written Questions. It is significant that we have slashed our aid to these very countries. The return to the 0.7% aid commitment would help promote security around the globe—let us be in no doubt. Meanwhile, China is entering into the vacuum and buying its way into these countries across Africa and other parts of the world.

I move briefly on to climate change, which is set to have important consequences for foreign policy in the next decade. We have already witnessed how climate-caused famine can lead to instability in the developing world. Furthermore, as the situation gets worse in the Middle East and Africa, we can expect more refugees to arrive on our borders. The UK’s long-term strategy needs to be aware of the consequences of climate change and focus on environmental peacebuilding. This includes providing loss and damage payments for regions most affected by climate change, be that through famine, rising sea levels or other extreme weather events.

Going forward, our foreign policy needs to be conscious of the severe impact of climate change on the developing world and to ensure that we can adequately protect against its consequences. This also means supporting sustainable development, investing in renewable energy and promoting environmentally responsible policies across the globe. One way we can do this is by investing in green technologies, which not only support the developing world but promote British business.

At a fundamental level, the UK has been, and should continue to be, a country that stands up for human rights across our world. Tyrants are watching with interest as some people in our country want to water down some of our human rights. Surely this is the very time when we need to defend such rights and work with all those who promote them, not least in places such as Myanmar, where Rohingya Muslims are being persecuted and killed.

China’s disregard for human rights is a significant threat to the world. The CCP’s treatment of its own citizens, particularly those of religious and ethnic minorities, political dissidents and activists, is deeply concerning. I am shocked to see the continued ill treatment of Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang province by Chinese authorities, or Beijing’s increasingly harsh treatment of Hong Kong protesters and activists, such as Jimmy Lai, who has recently been given a very long sentence.

We have to face the fact that China is not taking a lot of attention from the rest of the world, but we must continue to protest for the sake of all those other countries which may be seeing how the majority respond to China’s bullying tactics. China’s increasing assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific region presents a particular challenge to what the strategic review calls “our Indo-Pacific tilt”. How do the Government plan to counter an increasingly active and aggressive China while simultaneously favouring a strategy promoting relationships in the Indo-Pacific?

I turn briefly to the role of and the treatment of women around the globe. This is an area in which our country has been proud to take a lead. The takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban just two years ago stands as a clear example of how quickly hard-won victories can be lost. This was a country where the vast majority of women were getting education; they were taking roles in leadership in all sectors of society. What representations have His Majesty’s Government made to the authorities in Afghanistan to ensure that girls will again be able to get an education? This is a fundamental issue that we need to stand for.

Another important area is found at the intersection of our foreign policy and our domestic policy. One of the great successes of the UK is our universities and, in particular, the many overseas students who study at them. This is one of the main forms of soft power that we can exercise in the world, and we have been brilliantly successful at it in the past. A study as recently as 2017 found that 58 world leaders had been educated at British universities, compared with only 57 in America and 33 in France. Not only did these students bring in very welcome income, but it means that we sometimes recruit from their ranks as well some very bright people. Even more importantly, they will get a taste of what it is to live in a different sort of world.

Of course, the problem is that this sort of soft power does not cash out immediately in tangible ways, but it does further our values. For example, to go back to the point I made a few minutes ago on women’s rights, someone educated here will have a deep experience over several years of studying as equals with women. This is something we cannot simply argue; the experience will far outweigh any theory.

These are just some of the many aspects of our role in the world. There are many others that I have not been able to touch on. I am looking forward to hearing how those who are experts in our Committee can speak particularly on areas of defence and trade, in which I have very little experience. I hope this brief introduction will set the scene for others as we reflect on our place in today’s world.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

My Lords, sometimes I am asked what it is like being a Member of your Lordships’ House, and I often say that it sometimes feels like sitting in an incredibly informed, fascinating seminar with a number of world experts, and today has been just that. I will not try to name all the different speakers and the points they have made. I will just say that, for me, the fascinating speech by the noble Lord, Lord Popat, on Africa was very good, as was the speech on the Commonwealth from the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford; I was particularly grateful for that.

I am also grateful to the Minister for responding. His Majesty’s Government will hear a lot more from our House on three main clusters of areas, which I hope will be received helpfully. One, which I pick up from many of the speeches, is concern for a long-term strategy worked out with our partners as we address China, including human rights, defence and security. That was coming out loud and clear in many of the speeches. Secondly, the huge importance of the UK’s soft power, particularly in universities, in our aid budgets and in the BBC, was echoed on a number of occasions by noble Lords. Third is the vital importance of integrating climate change and environmental issues into our foreign policy. We will return to these, I am sure. Meanwhile, I thank noble Lords for their fascinating contributions.

Motion agreed.