Lord Haskel
Main Page: Lord Haskel (Labour - Life peer)
Lord Haskel (Lab) [V]
Like other noble Lords, I welcome the principles of human rights, equality and tolerance expressed in the Commonwealth charter. Renewing trade with the Commonwealth has an important contribution to make in maintaining those values, thanks to the average 19% reduced costs for bilateral trade.
The Commonwealth is diverse. It incorporates some of the world’s richest nations and some of its poorest. A working paper from the Commonwealth Secretariat shows that this will inevitably mean that, as our trade increases with the better-off members such as Australia, the poorer Commonwealth countries will lose trade and suffer a decline in GDP. The Government have promised a scheme to help the less-developed members to overcome that with duty-free or quota-free arrangements. Is that in place?
The pandemic and resulting economic slowdown will put a strain on Commonwealth trade. That will require special efforts in healthcare and biotechnology, as my noble friend Lady Chapman explained. As more business goes online, so digital technology and connectivity will be important, as the noble Lord, Lord Howell, and others have told us. As the Prime Minister is the current chair-in-office of the Commonwealth, are we focusing on the connectivity section of the Commonwealth leaders’ agreement of 2018?
Some of the smaller, less-developed Commonwealth countries have enjoyed selling products such as textiles and clothing to the EU and Britain at zero tariffs under the most favoured nation arrangement. Presumably, that will continue. Surely the Commonwealth Secretariat should undertake an analysis of that trade to see if it can be developed.
At a time when, as others have put it, we are waking up to the legacy of our colonial history, we must ensure that it is not used to damage Commonwealth trade by undermining the shared values mentioned by my noble friend Lady Chapman, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans and others.
In spite of many speakers’ enthusiasm, renewing trade with the Commonwealth will provide only a minor boost to our economy. Surely our priority must be to find ways to boost productivity and innovation here, to equip workers with the necessary skills and, as my noble friend Lord Triesman said, to build bridges with our nearest and largest market.