European Union (Withdrawal) (No. 2) Act 2019 (Rule of Law)

Patricia Gibson Excerpts

Monday 9th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Ian Blackford]

This is a debate about observing the law. If the hon. Gentleman wants to speak in a debate about an election, that debate is taking place later on.

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

Government Members have said time and again that the Prime Minister and the Government will obey the law, and yet we have heard the Prime Minister talk about how he would rather die in a ditch. Does my right hon. Friend share my concern that with backroom shenanigans the Government are looking for a way to evade the law?

[Ian Blackford]

My hon. Friend says shenanigans; I would perhaps prefer to use some other words that I am prohibited from doing in this place. Let’s just think about a Government threatening to break the law. What signal are we sending to the citizens of the United Kingdom, when the Prime Minister of this country, the highest office in the land, is telling the people it’s okay to break the law? It is a dereliction of duty and demonstrates he is not fit for the office of Prime Minister.

If the Prime Minister wants an election, he must obey the law and take a no-deal Brexit off the table. The UK Government’s Law Officers and the Secretary of State for Justice must intervene to ensure he respects the letter and the spirit of the law and removes the threat of no deal. They have responsibilities, first and foremost to uphold the law, and if they cannot receive those assurances tonight from the Prime Minister, their positions become untenable. How can they look themselves in the mirror in the full knowledge that nobody, but nobody, is above the law, and remain in office? This sorry saga should lead to more Ministers asking a simple question: are they prepared to remain in ministerial posts in a Government prepared to break the law? That is a fundamental question.

The Government should face reality. This House has legislated to remove no deal as an option at the end of October. They must signal tonight that they will comply with that legislation. Make no mistake—once the threat of no deal is off the table, we will move for an early election. Make no mistake—we in the Scottish National party want an election, but we must first satisfy ourselves that the Government will uphold the law and deliver an extension to remain in the EU. The people should not be shut out or silenced by this Prime Minister. They must be heard, and heard on the right terms, not on the terms of the Prime Minister’s shabby and shady stunts.

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[Steve McCabe]

I totally agree.

[Patricia Gibson]

Does the hon. Gentleman share my concern that, during this debate, we have heard two irreconcilable positions from Conservative Members? We have heard that the Government will obey the law, but we have also heard that the Government will deliver Brexit, do or die, on 31 October. Those two things are self-evidently contradictory, and therefore the conclusion must be that there are back-door shenanigans going on to evade the law, stretching every sinew to do so.

[Steve McCabe]

The terrible fear is that the Prime Minister and other members of the Government are saying one thing and doing another, which is what the recent resignation of the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions seemed to reveal.

It seems straightforward. If this man and this Government carry on like this, they will be responsible for destroying the very institutions in which the rule of law and democratic politics are based. We should all be fearful of a Government who are intent on moving down that road.

Women Human Rights Defenders

Patricia Gibson Excerpts

Tuesday 7th May 2019 Westminster Hall

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

I thank the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Catherine West) for securing this important debate on women’s work to defend human rights globally, and for pointing out, in her well-informed and comprehensive speech, the importance of the path set by the suffragettes in the UK to secure votes for women.

In the spirit of celebrating human rights defenders, as this debate seeks to do, I want to pay tribute to the fact that across the world, as we have heard, ordinary women commit acts of great self-sacrifice in the face of persistent abuse, threats to personal safety, persecution and violence, simply for standing up for what is right. All of us who believe in human rights, certainly in all western democracies, have a duty to stand shoulder to shoulder with those women and do all we can to support them. All states that believe in freedom should use every diplomatic means and avenue at their disposal to secure human rights for all—no ifs, no buts.

We should support all women who stand up for human rights in countries where women are seen as mere chattels—the legal property of their closest male relatives—such as in Saudi Arabia. Women all around the world are denied their basic human rights simply because they are women. We need to talk about that and learn more about it. I learned much from listening to the speech by the hon. Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) about the situation in West Papua.

The hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green referred to the appalling situation in Saudi Arabia. So-called wrongdoing in such regimes, such as women’s campaigning to be permitted to learn to drive, is sufficient to put one’s life in danger. We who believe in freedom must have the courage to stand up to those regimes and to support women, instead of turning a blind eye. We talk much in the west about the contribution of women in western societies, but we betray the women living under misogynistic regimes—such regimes are misogynistic, as the hon. Member for Leeds North Wests pointed out—where women have much lower status than men. We betray those women by staying silent about their plight.

We all welcome the recent decision of the Saudi regime to allow women to drive. According to some folk in Saudi, the lifting of the ban is controversial since they believe that it will lead to women becoming promiscuous. But we need to remember what we heard from the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green: in the month before the ban was lifted last year, more than a dozen female activists who had campaigned for the right to drive were rounded up and put in jail. At least nine of them remain in prison. The families of the activists say that they have been tortured and put in solitary confinement for long periods. No formal charges have been brought against the women, only a series of allegations of their having been involved in a foreign plot against the Government.

It has been pointed out to me—and to many of us, I am sure—that we should have a care for cultural sensitivities. I am sure that we are all in favour of being mindful of cultural sensitivities, but we must not be complicit with our silence about a regime that believes that women are not equal to men in any sense. They are not allowed to go out unless they are accompanied by their male owners, and they can be cruelly treated and imprisoned for having the temerity to hope to be seen as individuals in their own right, rather than the possession of a man. We must not be silent about that in the name of cultural sensitivities. When we are silent in the face of others being repressed, we become a friend of the oppressor, or perhaps even a useful idiot for the oppressor if we continue relations with that state as though it were not a tyrannical regime. That simply will not do.

There is deep concern about reports of the torture and ill treatment of detained women’s rights defenders in Saudi Arabia. They have been imprisoned since mid-2018 solely for peacefully campaigning for the protection and promotion of human rights, including women’s rights. Some were detained incommunicado, with no access to their families or lawyers during the first three months of their detention, and were subjected to chilling smear campaigns by state media. They all remain without access to legal representation.

Recent reports have emerged that some of the detained women activists have been subjected to electric shocks, flogging, sexual threats and other forms of torture. Testimonies recount that the abuse has left some of the women unable to walk or stand properly, with uncontrolled shaking and marks on their bodies. At least one of them has attempted suicide on several occasions. Those women have long been advocating for Saudi women’s right to drive, have called for an end to the discriminatory male guardianship system and have peacefully campaigned for greater respect for human rights. For that, they risk being tried and sentenced before the specialised criminal court, the country’s counter-terrorism court.

In 2016 the United Nations Committee Against Torture, in its second periodic report on Saudi Arabia, expressed concern at the application of terrorism legislation through the specialised criminal court, which enables the criminalisation of acts of peaceful expression considered as “endangering national unity” or

“undermining the reputation or position of the State”.

Those regulations have been used to try human rights defenders for exercising their fundamental rights. They violate international standards for the right to a fair trial and have enabled the authorities to detain individuals without providing them with access to legal representation during the investigation phase.

The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women further recommended in March 2018 that the Saudi state should facilitate women’s access to justice and institutionalise legal aid that is accessible, sustainable and responsive to the needs of women. If it were not so serious, it would be laughable that Saudi Arabia is a member of the UN Human Rights Council. As such, it is obligated to uphold the highest standards for the promotion and protection of human rights, and to co-operate fully with the Council’s mechanisms. However, the Saudi Government have been largely unco-operative with the Council and continue to exhibit a flagrant disregard for fundamental freedoms.

My concern is that the international community seeks to stay on good terms with this rich and powerful regime at any cost, and the Saudi Prince knows that. Where is the motivation for Saudi Arabia to care about international opinion? I urge the Minister and the UK Government to lead attempts to bring pressure to bear on the Saudi Government to persuade them that their action is simply incompatible with civilised, modern codes of behaviour. Halting UK arms sales to a country that deals in terror, killing and oppression would be a good start. As we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss), that would immediately benefit the people of Yemen.

It is worth noting that the Saudi Government require visiting reporters to be accompanied by a Government minder. That really says it all. I want to challenge the UK Minister to urge the UK Government to lead support for all women human rights defenders in the international community, as pointed out by the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green. As my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow Central pointed out, our constituents really care about these matters.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I apologise for being late—my plane was delayed and I ran the whole way here, so I am still catching my breath. Women have been at the forefront of the defence of human rights for many years, such as Maud Kells from Northern Ireland, who has spent 50 years providing maternity care for Congolese women, even after she was shot by a bandit while in the missionary hospital she helped to found. Women like her deserve recognition and the utmost respect. That is what this debate is all about: giving women the recognition that they rightly deserve.

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[Patricia Gibson]

I fully agree with the hon. Gentleman. It is amazing that such women are ordinary women, who are doing extraordinary things in some of the most barbaric conditions and regimes.

Women human rights defenders not only face the challenges and attacks suffered by male human rights defenders, but suffer more due to the historical and structural inequalities in power relations and discrimination. They suffer heightened risks and acts of violence because of their gender and the specific, often marginalised, human rights issues they work on. For example, women human rights defenders are more likely to experience sexualised smear campaigns, sexual assault and rape, including at police stations. Targeting of their children also takes place. There is also sometimes marginalisation within their own movements and communities, which must be extremely difficult to bear.

That is why this debate is important. We cannot forget—we must not forget—the struggles and risks faced by women human rights defenders. They stand up to repression, barbarity and cruelty every single day, risking everything to have the kinds of rights and freedoms that we in the west take for granted. They must not be forgotten, no matter how rich, powerful or important the state perpetrating the oppression happens to be. It is right that we celebrate them, salute their courage and stand beside them in their struggle. I look forward to hearing how the Minister intends to put the UK at the forefront of those efforts.

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[Patricia Gibson]

We all have concerns about how Saudi Arabia treats women and human rights defenders. Given that we are aware of the barbarity of the Saudi regime—notably, that it appears to have no qualms about bombing innocent civilians in Yemen—is the Minister comfortable with the UK continuing to sell arms to such a blood-thirsty regime?

[Mark Field]

The situation in Yemen is far more complicated than the hon. Lady puts it. I could rehearse the issues that have resulted in the civil war in Yemen. As she is aware, there are the most rigorous arms control codes in place, which have been adhered to by all UK Governments for the last 20 years. All Ministers take the issue extremely seriously. I can assure her that there are opportunities, challenges and responsibilities in signing off any arms sales, and there are strict criteria, in UK and international law, to which we adhere.

I have talked about our bilateral work, but we also work multilaterally through the UN. The UK is working with partners to strengthen the resolve of the international community to support women human rights defenders. A year ago, we committed £1.6 million to support efforts to get more women participating in peace processes, as mediators and peace builders, across the Commonwealth. The hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes) is right that that is an important part of the process. The UN is continually aware of the issue through Security Council resolution 1325. It is trying to raise interest across the globe and to create female advocates, who will make a real difference.

Working with partners means continuing to work with the many thousands of non-governmental organisations that share our human rights values and objectives, a number of whom have been referred to during the debate. They are the experts; it is their expertise and passion, alongside that of Governments, that helps to deliver change. They also support the human rights defenders on the frontline of human rights.

We are actively supporting women’s political participation because we recognise that political empowerment gives women the opportunity to share their views, to challenge the status quo and to make informed decisions. That is why women’s empowerment is at the heart of the Department for International Development’s latest “Strategic Vision for Gender Equality”, which was launched last year. That strategic vision aims to build gender equality from the ground up through the education, employment and empowerment of women and girls, including in conflict, crises and humanitarian emergencies.

Let me touch on the specific points that were brought up in the debate. I hope Members will forgive me if I do not fully answer all of them, and I will respond in writing if necessary. The hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green asked when the Government intend to publish the UK guidelines on working with human rights defenders. The guidelines are an internal document to help diplomatic staff in our embassies and high commissions to support human rights defenders. We have worked with NGOs to update the guidelines, and Lord Ahmad agreed in December to make UK support for human rights defenders more transparent. We intend to publish a document setting out UK support for human rights defenders in 2019, in consultation with NGOs. We hope to have something published within the next few months, but I am sure the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton will remind me about it later in the year if we have not had a final publication. We will be as transparent as we can be, but Members will appreciate that parts of the toolkit involve sensitive discussion, and it would not be wise to publish the rules and regulations in their entirety.

I will be facing the hon. Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) again tomorrow, at the debate secured by my hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Robert Courts) about West Papua. I know the subject is close to the hon. Gentleman’s heart, and I would not wish to belittle it; he has been passionate about it since his pre-parliamentary days, as he has made clear. I hope that debate will give us the opportunity to cover the situation in depth. He made some powerful points about particular female human rights defenders in West Papua.

I must confess that I have nothing specific to say in response to the hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss). I think she recognised that her concerns were more of an issue for the Home Office, so I will pass them on to my right hon. Friend the Minister for Immigration and try to get that sorted out. On a personal note, the hon. Lady may be aware that one of my great British political heroes is Andrew Bonar Law, who was the Member for Glasgow Central in the days when it was a safe Conservative seat—I think the business folk had something to do with that. Ironically, during his time in the House, just over 100 years ago, the great debate was about women’s rights to vote. He was quite a liberal on that matter, although he went on to be a Conservative Prime Minister. I think he would have been proud that the hon. Lady is the first female Member of Parliament—the first of many, I am sure—for that historic seat in the centre of that great Scottish city.

I promised the hon. Members for Hornsey and Wood Green and for North Ayrshire and Arran that I would mention Saudi Arabia, and I will write to them if there are more specific points I can address. They asked what actions the Government are taking in regard to the continued detention of women human rights defenders. We are concerned about that situation in Saudi Arabia, and we are monitoring it closely. Concerns are consistently raised by the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary when they deal with the Saudi authorities at the highest level. I will make similar representations. As the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green may be aware, I am also interim Minister for the Middle East and North Africa, so I will endeavour to raise these issues in future conversations with the Saudi ambassador to London.

Concerns have also been raised through the UN. The UK was a signatory to the joint statement published at the UN Human Rights Council on 7 March, which expressed significant concerns about the situation. We are deeply concerned about the allegations of torture and have raised that directly with the Saudi authorities. Saudi Arabia remains a Foreign and Commonwealth Office human rights priority country, particularly because of the death penalty, its restrictions and clampdowns on women’s rights, and broader issues about freedom of expression, of assembly and of religion and belief.

The hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton asked about business and human rights, and what we are doing to better human rights practices. We are committed to focusing on business and human rights through the promotion of the UN guiding principles. She is quite right to identify the importance that we rightly attach to issues around sustainable development goals 5 and 16. We also wish to utilise as many diplomatic skills as we can in relation to legislative and non-legislative measures to protect against, and provide remedies for, human rights abuses by business. The UK was proud to be the first country in the world to produce a national action plan responding to the UN guiding principles on this matter. We have since encouraged other states to draft their own national action plans. We were also the first country to produce an update to that plan, in 2016. We regard those guiding principles as the authoritative global standard for preventing and addressing the risks of adverse human rights impacts on business. We will continue to promote those principles.

Thank you for giving me a little leeway on time, Mr Evans. We have had a little time on our hands, and it is fair to say that, while the debate will not fully take up its 90 minutes, there is no lack of passion from those who are here. As the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton pointed out, the debate is on the first day back after a break, when people are making their way back to London, and that has affected the quantity of debate, if not its quality.

We have heard practical examples of the ways in which women human rights defenders can and do transform lives. That is why we should all be proud that the UK remains committed to helping women all over the world to feel safe and protected in the work they do, so that they can speak freely and be part of the change we all want. I speak for not just the Foreign and Commonwealth Office but, I hope, everyone in Parliament when I say that we want a world in which all people are treated with fairness and dignity, and in which those fighting to improve human rights can do so without fear of discrimination, violence or retaliation. Let us take all our inspiration from women such as Sara Landeros. If she is determined to keep fighting on for that better world, we must do the same. The Government and, I am sure, Parliament are committed to doing that.

Forced Live Organ Extraction

Patricia Gibson Excerpts

Tuesday 26th March 2019 Westminster Hall

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

I am pleased to participate in this important debate, and I extend my warm thanks to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) for securing it. He set out a comprehensive and convincing case, as did other hon. Members, concerning forced live organ donation in China. We have heard from several hon. Members about the allegations of forced live organ extraction from prisoners in China. We have heard, for at least the past decade, about the alleged victims being members of religious and ethnic minorities.

Forced organ removal is when people are killed so that an organ can be removed—with the recipients being, apparently, wealthy Chinese people or transplant tourists who travel to China and pay substantial sums to receive transplants. The waiting times for such transplants are short, and it seems that vital organs can even be booked in advance. As the hon. Member for Strangford pointed out, the China tribunal, which has investigated this, has issued an interim judgment stating that it is

“sure beyond reasonable doubt—that in China forced organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience has been practised for a substantial period of time involving a very substantial number of victims.”

We also heard that from the hon. Members for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) and for Manchester, Gorton (Afzal Khan). That is absolutely horrific and an affront to all that is decent. Quite frankly, it is the sort of thing that one would expect to read about in a science-fiction novel.

Around 2006, a report was published giving credence to the claims that the Chinese authorities were indeed removing organs from executed members of the Falun Gong. At that time, the Chinese authorities acknowledged that organs had been taken from executed prisoners, but only with their consent. However, the European Parliament disputed China’s official version of events and passed a motion condemning the state sanctioning of organ removal from non-consenting prisoners of conscience, including from large numbers of Falun Gong practitioners who were imprisoned for their religious beliefs. The figure for transplants—we will probably never know the true figure—is somewhere between 40,000 and 90,000, as the hon. Member for Strangford set out.

[Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)]

Given that that first report was published in 2006, does my hon. Friend agree that the UK is 13 years overdue in calling for an inter-governmental investigation into Chinese practices?

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[Patricia Gibson]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. She tempts me to skip to that point in my remarks, but I will get there in due course. Her point is well made, and it has been made several times around the Chamber.

This barbaric, inhumane practice must end. As my hon. Friend said, the international community, including the UK—I hope that the UK will lead the international community on this, but I will settle for the UK being included—must leave China in no doubt about how repugnant this practice is to any country that has any sense of decency or places any value on the dignity of human life. There can be no equivocation, no excuses and no turning of blind eyes.

As the hon. Member for Strangford has pointed out, people are being treated like cattle. He gave us a comprehensive account of how utterly unspeakable the practice is. We find ourselves in a bizarre situation in which the World Health Organisation has declared organ transplants in China to be ethical, claiming that there is no cause for suspicion. I urge the Minister, as other hon. Members have done, to query and pursue that as a matter of urgency, since it seems to fly in the face of a considerable amount of evidence from the China tribunal, Geoffrey Nice QC and others. A number of hon. Members have expressed alarm at the World Health Organisation’s assessment, and I think that such a ruling undermines the organisation.

As we heard from the hon. Member for Congleton, Italy, Spain, Israel and Taiwan have introduced laws banning their citizens from participating in organ tourism, with Canada working towards adopting similar legislation. Perhaps the Minister can tell us what plans are in place to introduce similar legislation in the UK. Given that the UK has signed the Council of Europe convention against trafficking in human organs, forbidding the intentional removal of human organs from living or deceased donors, it is quite a small leap for the UK to forbid its citizens from engaging in organ tourism. Perhaps the Minister can explain what the Government are doing to take that small but extremely important leap. As the hon. Member for Congleton informed us, the UK Government and the UN must do more about the vast industrial scale of this horror and what can only be categorised as crimes against humanity.

The fact that Falun Gong practitioners are targeted in this way in China goes to the heart of the matter, as the hon. Member for Strangford has articulated, because an attack on freedom of religion is an attack on all freedoms. The right of all people to worship their God in peace, however they perceive their God, is a fundamental right. The threatening of that right endangers the very basis of freedom, in the widest sense, as the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton pointed out.

In June last year, the all-party parliamentary group for international freedom of religion or belief produced a report, which found a signal lack of understanding and misperception of religion and belief among decision makers working within the UK asylum system. We need to understand religious persecution better and deal with it in an appropriately sensitive way. Decision makers in the UK asylum system need to have the appropriate training to ensure that they make the correct decisions, which are literally a matter of life and death to applicants seeking asylum.

There is no doubt that China exerts absolute and cruel control over its citizens, and that is something about which the international community is, and ought to be, exercised. The targeting of multiple faiths and ethnic groups has been characterised by some as the hallmark of genocidal intent, as the hon. Member for Burton (Andrew Griffiths), who is no longer in his place, indicated. There are loud echoes of the evils of history.

The UK Government need to step up to their international and moral responsibilities, as does the international community. No one could fail to be moved and horrified by the evidence and the stories of forced live organ extraction. It is an outrage, and we must not be afraid to say so. International institutions and Governments around the globe must bring to bear as much pressure as possible on China. That is our duty, and it is what decency demands of us.

If any nation treats any of its people in such a cruel and despicable way, we need to stand with other free and democratic states and condemn it using the harshest and most unequivocal language that we can articulate. I look forward to the Minister telling us what influence and pressure his Government have exerted, and will continue to exert, on China in the light of this debate. I also ask the Minister what the UK Government will do to encourage greater action from the international community on this barbarism.

There is no doubt that China is an important and influential international player, but no state should be allowed to engage in such horrific human rights abuses simply because it is influential. We have an international duty to uphold human rights and values however we can. We can do more to effect change. It is time for the international community to do so, and the UK must play its part.

[Mrs Madeleine Moon (in the Chair)]

Before I call the Minister, I should acknowledge that I had prior advice from the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman), who has just arrived, of a domestic emergency that prevented her attendance earlier. She has had a member of staff making notes throughout and I am sure that if she has notes for the Minister or for those who have called the debate she will deal with that afterwards. I call the Minister.

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[Mark Field]

There is evidence for deep concern, as has been demonstrated in the debate, but we believe that we are some way away from the notion of it being evidence that it is state sanctioned. However, I am well aware that the issue is now being looked at by a number of interested parties, to which I and the hon. Gentleman have referred. As I have said, we will work within the international community on the issue, which I think will raise the attention of many countries that have deep concerns about such matters.

The hon. Members for Glasgow North West (Carol Monaghan) and for North Ayrshire and Arran raised the separate but related issue of British citizens travelling to China for medical treatment—so-called organ tourism. We do not collect data on that and are not really able to do so, but we believe that relatively few people in the UK choose to travel to China for that purpose. As it stands, the British Government cannot prevent those individuals from travelling—I am sure hon. Members recognise that it would be difficult to police that and understand whether people had gone for that purpose—but it is important that we make them aware that other countries may have poorer medical and ethical safeguards than the UK, and that travelling abroad for treatments, including organ transplants, carries fundamental risks.

There is a broader issue about the sheer ethics of what we might call a free market in transplanted organs. This debate is an important staging post, although we have had debates in Parliament before. Health is one of the few attributes that some of the poorest people in the world have, and we find the notion that the rich world can take advantage of that an even bigger ethical concern. Travelling abroad, whether to China or elsewhere, is something that we want to work on with other countries. Where manageable legislation is in place that seems to be operating effectively, we should take it seriously.

I will come back to hon. Members with some thoughts about whether we feel legislation is practicable and can be introduced. I recognise hon. Members’ deep concerns, which reflect deeper ethical concerns about the notion of there being a free market for organs, and about the large-scale travel of British citizens to take advantage of that terrible harvest, although I do not think there is any evidence.

[Patricia Gibson]

I understand the Minister’s point about the difficulty of preventing people from travelling. I ask him—in his remarks a moment ago, he hinted at this—to consider that we pass a law preventing people from travelling for this reason and from being organ tourists. That would put our moral position on the map and set a marker, which is very important.

As the Minister says, we can look at what countries such as Italy, Taiwan, Israel and others have done and what measures they have in place to prevent their citizens from becoming organ tourists. Ethically, it is very important that we introduce such measures and it cannot be beyond the wit of any UK Government to put them in place.

[Mark Field]

I do not want to make any great commitment on this—I recognise that another Government Department may well have responsibility. We do not just want to put laws in place. We want to ensure they are effective. The worst of all worlds is to have legislation that is essentially bypassed in a straightforward way. Rather than making a commitment now that I end up having to backtrack on, I hope the hon. Lady will forgive me if I say that, given the depth of concern reflected by all Members, we will go back and try to look at things, particularly international comparators, to see how we can craft legislation that will be effective in the way that all of us would desire.

I conclude by taking this opportunity to reassure all hon. Members that, contrary to suggestions, our trading and economic relationship with China does not prevent us from having very frank discussions with the Chinese authorities, and nor does it affect our judgment on this increasingly important issue. We shall continue to engage with China on a full range of issues, including human rights. I outlined earlier the UK’s recent actions in the UN Human Rights Council and our vocal condemnation of the abuses perpetrated in Xinjiang. We shall continue to promote universal freedoms and human rights, and to raise serious and well-founded concerns with China at the highest levels.

I thank all hon. Members for their contributions. I know that so much else that is going on crowds out interest elsewhere. It is great to see so many people in the Public Gallery, obviously recognising that these issues are close to the hearts of many representatives. Although it is perhaps understandable that much of the press coverage focuses on Brexit-related issues, a terrific amount of other work goes on. Many hon. Members—Back-Benchers and Front-Benchers alike—focus on that work.

As a Foreign Office Minister, I try to do my level best to keep working hard. I am afraid that a few conversations abroad obviously have a Brexit flavour to them, but there is also a sense that there is other important work to be done. Last week, I had two days away at the OECD in Paris, doing some very good work to stand up for the rules-based international order, and to work in relation to anti-corruption and integrity matters together with a number of other countries from across the world.

It is rather important that all of us utilise our energies in any way we can to address the important issues raised today, which I know we will come back to. I hope Members will work closely with the Government—with the Foreign Office and other Departments—to try to ensure that the terrible scourge of involuntary organ harvesting is, before too long, firmly in the past.

Oral Answers to Questions

Patricia Gibson Excerpts

Tuesday 26th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I think the Foreign Secretary knows that the right hon. Lady has had her two questions, and therefore that it would not be legitimate to put a third on this occasion. There may be other occasions. We come now to Question 2 and we need to speed up.

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

2. What recent discussions he has had with Cabinet colleagues on the extent of freedom of worship in Commonwealth countries.

[The Minister for Africa (Harriett Baldwin)]

The Foreign Secretary chaired regular meetings with Cabinet colleagues on the April Commonwealth meetings objectives. The Commonwealth leaders’ communiqué emphasised that full social, economic and political participation for all irrespective of religion is essential for democracy and sustainable development.

[Patricia Gibson]

Will the Minister tell the House what further practical steps are being taken to ensure the protection of human rights in the Commonwealth, including freedom of religion or belief? That is at the heart of UK foreign policy. Does she share the concerns of Open Doors that the persecution of religious minorities must remain high on the international agenda?

[Harriett Baldwin]

Yes, I can confirm that. Further to the very widely attended Westminster Hall debate last month, I can assure the hon. Lady that at all parts of our diplomatic network we raise these issues at the highest level.

Protecting Children in Conflict Areas

Patricia Gibson Excerpts

Wednesday 25th April 2018 Westminster Hall

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

I am delighted to contribute to the debate, although, like probably every Member here, I wish it was not necessary. I am also delighted that my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee West (Chris Law) secured the debate. It is timely, as we have heard, given international events and the February 2018 Save the Children report, “The War on Children”.

We have heard throughout the debate that the sad fact is that children pay the heaviest price for war, but they bear no responsibility for causing it. They may survive conflict, but their innocence is murdered. War robs them of their sense of themselves, their homes and, too often, their parents. It is an indictment of mankind as a species that the number of children living in conflict zones has increased by more than 75% from the early 1990s, when it was around 200 million. It is now more than 357 million—around one in six of the world’s child population. Some 165 million of those children are engulfed in high-intensity conflicts, where there is often no access to schools or health facilities, and where they are much more exposed to violence.

The middle east is where children are most likely to live in a conflict zone. In 2016, about two in five children in the region lived within 50 km of a conflict event in their own country. Africa, where one in five children are affected by conflict, is second in this grotesque league table. Children are more at risk of conflict now than at any other time in the last 20 years. Research shows that the trends are very clear: there has been an escalation in the number of UN-verified cases of killing and maiming children, with an increase of nearly 300% since 2010. Incidents involving denial of humanitarian access have risen fifteenfold in the same period, and there has been a growing trend of abductions, because war opens the door to, and invites in, the chaos in which such licence thrives.

We also have to accept that increasingly brutal tactics are used: the use of children as mere weapons of war—as suicide bombers—and the targeting of, or the launching of weapons from, schools and hospitals. We in this Chamber are extremely lucky that we can only speculate; we cannot even really begin to imagine what effect living in such conditions has on children. A culture of violence often breeds a culture of violence in the next generation, and peaceful societies become harder to build and rebuild as a result.

We need real and concrete international action to ensure that children’s lives and safety are protected. Save the Children has called on the United Kingdom Government to use all the influence at their disposal to improve measures that protect children and to ensure that there is a greater focus on explosive weapons in populated areas. It also calls on them to bring in measures to address the challenges surrounding that; those measures include the provision of training and support to the forces of other states, the establishment of a cross-Government framework to track civilian harm and ensure the comprehensive recording of civilian casualties, and the consistent championing of independent accountability mechanisms at the UN and other forums, including investigations into potential grave violations of children’s rights.

The UK Government should seek to show leadership in delivering humanitarian assistance, working with allies to prevent the long-term damage of armed conflict. Responding to the psychosocial challenges of childhood trauma in conflict and toxic stress is extremely important. There is an opportunity here, and there ought to be the political will, to drive forward global action and investment in children’s mental and psychosocial health, thus helping to reverse the long-term damage that will be done to a generation of children.

The earlier point from the hon. Member for Coventry South (Mr Cunningham) about the UK Government’s absolute duty to fulfil, in full, the terms of the Dubs agreement was well made. The UK’s endorsement of the safe schools declaration is, of course, to be welcomed. As the lead in the global partnership to end violence against children initiative, the UK must use and prioritise aid to protect and champion children, to protect them against violence and recruitment into the worst forms of child labour.

Children do not create wars; they, more than any other group, are victims of war. The UK Government and the international community must take note and act. It is time to do all that can be done to end this murdering of innocence.

Suspicious Deaths Abroad

Patricia Gibson Excerpts

Wednesday 28th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

I thank my hon. Friend very much for bringing this important debate forward. One of the issues that she has raised, in common with Members on both sides of the Chamber, is the series of unanswered questions that families have to experience. Does she agree that another concern is the lack of pastoral care and support for families who go abroad? Two of my constituents lost their son abroad. When they went out to the EU member country where he died, they were given no police contact and no pastoral support; they were completely abandoned in their grief and isolated in a country where they did not speak the language. This really is not good enough. People do not just need help with the legal process; they also need support in their time of grief.

[Hannah Bardell]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention, and I absolutely agree. This is often about taking a lead, but some of the language in the Foreign Office guidance is very conditional, and I will come on to that.

In Kirsty Maxwell’s case, it took me from first writing to the FCO in October 2017 to February 2018 to get a contact name, which is not the sort of compassion I find acceptable. To date, I am still unclear about the remit and power of the murder and manslaughter unit, and I also do not know why it cannot become involved when a criminal investigation is ongoing. Perhaps that is something the Minister can shed some light on.

Similarly, we have been chasing the whereabouts of the clothes that were on Kirsty’s body when she died. We found out only very recently that these key pieces of evidence have been destroyed by the Spanish authorities—a matter I believe the FCO should be raising at the highest possible level. I appreciate that, at times, these are diplomatic issues—matters that have to be raised and pushed by the Government or by a Minister—but it is vital that the flow of communication is as clear and defined as possible.

The report I referred to goes on to highlight the use of language and the fact that support is discretionary. It quotes the FCO:

“We will consider making appropriate representations to the local authorities if there are concerns that the investigation is not being carried out in line with local procedures…Where possible, if you visit the country during the early stages of the investigation and initial court hearings related to the death, our staff there may be able to meet you…Where legal systems differ significantly from the UK, or proceedings are conducted in a language you do not understand, we may help to arrange, or attend, an initial round of meetings with the authorities.”

The language is too discretionary—it is way too conditional—and it needs to be more robust and more definite.

Persecution of Christians: Role of UK Embassies

Patricia Gibson Excerpts

Tuesday 4th July 2017 Westminster Hall

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

I extend my thanks to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) for bringing forward this important debate. Freedom of religion—the freedom for people to worship their God, however they perceive him or her to be—should be an absolute right. If any society exercises censorship over which God its members may worship, prohibits a particular religion or compromises on freedom of religion, that is a threat to all that society’s freedoms.

The 300,000 Christians in North Korea are deemed to be enemies of the state, in a country where worship must be reserved exclusively for the nation’s leader. Christians face being tortured and executed. It is a society that looks like something straight out of a George Orwell novel. In Somalia, the state religion is Islam, and converting to Christianity or any other religion is illegal. Indeed, the Islamist group al-Shabaab has stated that it wants to rid Somalia of all Christians. Those suspected of following Christianity are killed on the spot. In Iraq there are 300,000 Christians, and there have been public execution-style killings of them by ISIS—some of which have been recorded for propaganda purposes. Saudi Arabia, with its 1.25 million Christians, punishes conversion to Christianity with death.

India also has a poor record on freedom of worship for its 59 million Christians, and so does Qatar, which has 900,000—not to mention Pakistan, whose 5.3 million Christians are often treated as second-class citizens. Christian women and children there are often the targets of sexual abuse, and blasphemy laws are abused to attack Christian churches; those churches are monitored and often attacked. Even in the Maldives converting to Christianity means forfeiting citizenship, and owning a Bible is punishable by death. I could go on with my examples, of course, but there is not time. The list is unfortunately far too long. What a world we live in.

I want to add my voice to the praise that has been directed today to the work of Open Doors. It has often visited Parliament to reveal its World Watch List of countries in which Christians face awful persecution. Sadly, it seems that the western media frequently under-report such persecution. The suspicion that I have heard expressed is that that is because of a fear of offending cultural sensibilities. I do not know whether that is true, but I certainly hope not, because there is no room for cultural sensitivities when it comes to basic human freedoms. Persecution and violence are wrong and unacceptable, and we must all have the courage to say so.

While democratic countries celebrate their freedoms we cannot turn away as minority groups abroad are bathed in violence and blood. The UK Government and specifically the Foreign and Commonwealth Office need to support the efforts of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and the special rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief. We need to ensure that there is proper support for the work of Open Doors and other non-governmental organisations that work on the frontline to help Christians who are persecuted. We cannot afford to stand by. An attack on religious freedom is an attack on all freedoms and we in the west, particularly, who believe in those values and take them for granted must stand up for them wherever they are attacked.