Ivory Bill

Lord Jones of Cheltenham Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 17th July 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jones of Cheltenham (LD)]

My Lords, I welcome this Bill to ban dealing in ivory. It is good that the UK is one of the leading countries legislating in the war against elephant poaching, along with China, Hong Kong and, possibly, the USA. I say possibly because it was reported recently that the US President’s wildlife board will permit wildlife trophies to be brought back to America. A young person told me that if this is true, we may have to change the song “Nellie the Elephant” to remove the words “Trump, trump, trump”.

We are in the midst of a global poaching crisis, which threatens decades of conservation successes as well as the survival of many species: rhinos, lions, tigers, leopards, cheetahs, elephants and, as we have heard today, hippos and pangolins. The illegal wildlife trade is estimated to be the fourth largest transnational illegal trade, after narcotics, counterfeiting and human trafficking, and it is worth up to £19 billion a year.

There are two elements to the problem: the market for ivory, and poaching. The big market for ivory was China, along with Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia. China is now banning trade in ivory, or it says it is, but elephant populations continue to fall due to illegal killing and other human activities, notably loss of habitat, while seizures of large-scale illegal ivory shipments were at record highs in 2016. In east Africa, where elephant populations have nearly halved in a decade, illegal killing has dropped back to pre-2008 levels, and in southern Africa elephant numbers are stable or increasing. However, in central Africa illegal killing remains high.

Education remains key. I read a survey some time ago which revealed that three-quarters of people in east Asia believe that ivory is a mineral. Documentaries such as those made by Sir David Attenborough and others should be distributed worldwide, particularly to schools, so that the next generation will appreciate better that ivory comes from dead elephants and that wildlife is precious only when it is alive. If the market could be eradicated, poaching would stop, because there would be no point.

However, in the meantime, steps must be taken in those countries where poaching occurs by helping the wildlife wardens to do their job. There needs to be a tangible reward for information on poachers and their whereabouts. When park rangers, game wardens and other law enforcement agencies receive intelligence on poachers, they need to act and need training and equipping to meet the task. This costs money and a long-term commitment, although in reality the finances are marginal in global terms.

I am not in favour of the death penalty, but to stop poaching it may be necessary to eradicate a few poachers until the message sinks in that poachers are effectively on licence all day, every day, of every year, from now on. Botswana’s ministry of wildlife and tourism has a policy of zero tolerance: it does not negotiate with poachers. They are told to lay down their weapons, and if they resist, they do not resist for long.

In some countries, poachers with machine guns use helicopters in their murky exploits. They shoot elephants and rhinos, land, take the ivory or horns and take off again. This is not random poaching; as the noble Baroness, Lady Chalker, said, it is highly financed organised crime. There is now hard evidence that these helicopter missions are linked to terrorism, drug money laundering and arms smuggling. They kill for ivory to fund terrorist activity or drug activity elsewhere in the world.

I favour the bazooka option for the helicopter raids. It needs only a few of these aircraft to be blasted out of the sky to ram home the message that the poachers are not going to win. It follows, therefore, that declaring war on terrorists and terrorism by removing sources of income extends to eliminating the poachers, and this could most usefully be tasked and funded from anti-terrorism budgets.

Our Government, to their credit, have ring-fenced foreign aid. It is about time we spent more of that budget on crushing the four linked crimes of terrorism, gun running, drug money laundering and wildlife poaching, perhaps using the fees for exemption certificates being brought in by this Bill. I note that we are sending more troops to Afghanistan. Perhaps they could be offered some R&R when they return, by training more wildlife wardens in areas where elephant poaching goes on. A few British soldiers armed with portable plastic bazookas should do the trick.

One shining example of where elephant populations are increasing is Botswana; I draw attention to my declared interest in that country. Botswana’s rulers pay attention to, and love, their wildlife. The country’s first President, Seretse Khama, and successive Presidents, knew and know the value of wildlife—not for its ivory and skins, but to attract visitors from around the world to see these magnificent creatures in their natural habitat. I understand that, should noble Lords wish to have elephants on their estates, Botswana will allow as many as you like free of charge; you just need to arrange the transport.

I should like to end with this personal experience. A few years ago, I was on a boat on the River Chobe near Kasane in northern Botswana. In the distance, I could see a large, dark object in the river; it was a very large elephant. As we got closer, I asked the guide why the elephant was there. “She is dying”, he said. “She is in the water to keep cool; she is the matriarch”. All around, there were hundreds, maybe thousands, of elephants of all shapes and sizes. A few weeks later, I went back to ask what had happened to the elephant. I was told that she had died, that the wildlife wardens had dragged her body on to the river bank and removed the tusks—that is what they do with dead elephants in Botswana; the Government take control of the ivory. Then, for hour upon hour, elephants had filed past her in an orderly fashion, touching her body with their trunks; they were her family, paying their respects.

Elephants are amazingly intelligent creatures with feelings, just like humans. In my view, they are far more intelligent than poachers, the organisers of poaching, those involved in the ivory trade and, indeed, the end consumers. Bad humans have caused the current crisis. It is now up to good humans to ensure the species survives by eradicating once and for all the trade in ivory, which has led to the horrible and indefensible crime of poaching. This Bill is one step along that road, and I welcome it.

Air and Water Pollution: Impact

Lord Jones of Cheltenham Excerpts

Thursday 26th October 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jones of Cheltenham (LD)]

My Lords, I too thank my noble friend Lady Miller for this important debate. We have heard a lot of figures about the number of deaths caused by pollution, but the Lancet Commission on Pollution and Health estimates that 16%—one in six—of all deaths worldwide are caused by pollution. It is a worldwide problem, not just one for this country.

I will say a few words on a topic about which I have had a bee in my bonnet for many years: clean water supply. Yesterday on TV I saw an advert by the charity WaterAid. It told the story of a little girl aged about six, somewhere in Africa. Every day she gets up and has to walk for hours, carrying a large plastic container to collect water for the family. The water she fills that container with is not clean water like we get out of our taps, but water full of harmful bacteria. Instead of going to school, this little girl spends a large part of her waking hours fetching water that is positively harmful to her and her family. Every time I visit Africa I come back full of anger that we in the developed world allow so many people in poor countries to live like that little girl, with no clean water to drink.

I once went as an observer to elections in Sierra Leone. The village where I stayed had been in a rebel-held area during the civil war. Most of the buildings were damaged, many with no roof, no water supply and no communications. Every day a rusty United Nations tanker would visit, disgorging into old oil drums what they euphemistically called “water”. This “water” was either brown with green bits floating in it or green with brown bits floating in it. I drank bottled water I had brought from the capital Freetown, but the villagers had no choice. They used this substance for washing, drinking and cooking. I have seen similar conditions in other countries—Kenya, Malawi, Uganda, Cameroon and Mozambique.

Yet, I met a professor of meteorology in Namibia who told me it does not need to be like this. Enough rain falls on the African continent that everyone could have access to clean water. The issue is how to store the rain and then distribute it to the people—water infrastructure. Charities such as WaterAid do what they can and should be supported, but I learned some time ago that WaterAid’s entire worldwide budget is less than what is spent by Thames Water on trying to improve the purity of the water supply in its area from 99 point something per cent to slightly more than 99 point something per cent.

We are very good at water in this country and, post Brexit, we are going to need friends all over the world. I can think of no better way to win the hearts and minds of people like the little girl with the plastic container than to help put in the infrastructure so that they can access clean water, so that she can go to school and many fewer people will die from drinking polluted water. So here is a challenge for our Government and for President Trump and our American cousins, too. Instead of threatening to destroy countries such as North Korea, why not use that money instead to help give Africa a decent water supply? Make long-term friends instead of long-term enemies.

We heard from the noble Earl that pollution is also a huge problem for animals and our wildlife. Animals are exposed to air pollutants through inhalation or ingestion or by absorbing gases through their skin. It is mostly the soft-bodied invertebrates, such as earthworms, or animals with thin, moist skins, such as frogs and toads, which are affected by the absorption of pollutants, while birds are more susceptible to air pollution by inhalation, due to their higher respiratory rates. Plants take up pollutants from the air, which are then deposited on leaves, ready to be ingested by an unsuspecting herbivore.

Just as long-term exposure to air pollution can lead to chronic respiratory disease, lung cancer and heart disease in humans, the ways in which pollutants affect these animals are diverse and frightening and include respiratory stress, physiological impairment, gross malformations of bones and teeth, birth defects, and, in birds, decreases in egg production and embryo survival. This can lead to changes in birth, growth and death rates and problems in migrating, which can have disastrous consequences for many species of birds. Of course, problems intensify when pollutants enter the food chain.

Acid rain changes the ecology of our waterways. An acidic stream or river does not make a happy home for our otters, for example, and fish-eating birds such as the osprey will need to find an alternative place to live. Pollution is destroying the environment by impairing its natural beauty, ruining its natural features and depleting natural resources. It is weakening our ecosystem and decimating biodiversity. While humans can, to some degree, protect ourselves from pollution in air and water, our wildlife simply has no defence against it.

When I discuss these issues with friends they ask, “Well, what can I do?”. Here are six things off the top of my head. Next time you change your car, buy an electric or hybrid model. Secondly, stop using insecticides and weed-killers in your garden. Thirdly, investigate using renewable energy in your home. Fourthly, recycle more, particularly plastic, which the noble Lord, Lord Robathan, told us about. Fifthly, contribute to charities such as WaterAid, which are trying, successfully, to supply more people with clean water. Sixthly, encourage your friends, relatives and local representatives—councillors, MPs, even, dare I say, Peers—to take an interest and take action themselves. Air and water: we cannot live without them.