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10.26 amDr. John Cunningham (Copeland) : I thank the Secretary for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs for his kind remarks about my appointment. I hope that he does not find himself this afternoon appointed as Secretary of State for National Heritage.
There is an old adage about diplomats, in which they are described as honest men who are sent abroad to lie for their countries. That description cannot be applied to the Secretary of State--though I might apply the first half of it to him, if not the second. I would describe the right hon. Gentleman as a man who can effectively and comprehensively tell one to go to hell and make one look forward to the journey. That was reflected in the right hon. Gentleman's speech to the House today.
It is a privilege for me to hold my present responsibilities and to speak for Labour on foreign and commonwealth affairs. My present role takes me back to where I began in the early 1970s, when I worked in a modest capacity for James Callaghan--first in opposition and then in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. When he became Prime Minister in 1976, I was fortunate to work for him at 10 Downing street, before joining my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) at the Department of Energy, which also involved many European and wider international issues.
I value all that experience. Although much has changed since those days, I was surprised that many of the younger people around at that time are now in senior positions in Britain and in other countries. I was surprised also to receive many letters containing good wishes from them, following my appointment to the shadow Cabinet by my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the Opposition. It is clearly somewhat easier to make progress to the top in the diplomatic world than it is in the world of politics.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) also gave me some advice in a tour d'horizon, courtesy of The Independent, for which I thank him. I realise that my appointment is a great challenge and that I have much to learn. In my work during the 1970s with the United Nations on Cyprus and in central and southern Africa--Zimbabwe and Namibia- -I found that there are no easy solutions to complex and endemic international difficulties of the kind that the Secretary of State described this morning. There are no easy ends to conflicts or brutal civil wars. I believe profoundly--I know my view is shared by my right hon. and hon. Friends--that we live in an ever more interdependent world in which not just continental but intercontinental, indeed global, co-operation is essential for peace, security and more effective and more equitable relations between north and south.
Events being debated in the House today illustrate graphically the need for improved policies and arrangements, particularly, as the Foreign Secretary said, in respect of the United Nations. The Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary has had some interesting and rather surprising things to say about the UN recently. I shall return to them later. Like the right hon. Gentleman, I shall deal first with events in the territories of the former Yugoslavia. I understand that, for good reasons, the Prime Minister is anxious to leave the Chamber. He was kind enough to write to me to tell me that he would have to leave and I take no offence at his departure.
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The appalling series of human conflicts, human degradation, deceit--there has been much deceit--and racial and religious hatred in the republics of the former Yugoslavia continue to shock Europe and the rest of the world. I acknowledge that there are difficulties, but I have to observe that events have not always been handled well by the EC or, indeed, by the Foreign Secretary in his role as president during the past few months.We support the aims and conclusions of the London peace conference, although the appointment of Lord Owen was regarded as somewhat eccentric by my right hon. and hon. Friends and myself--he is known for many qualities, but not as a mediator. Indeed, he has balkanised a few political parties himself, but of course we wish him well. We realise that, in his work with Cyrus Vance, he has an important role to play.
We support the deployment of British troops under UN auspices. They have our good wishes in the difficult and dangerous tasks before them and our good wishes for a safe eventual return home.
We support the excellent work of Mrs. Sadako Ogata, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, in tackling the largest refugee crisis in Europe for decades. We support wholeheartedly the mandatory United Nations sanctions against Serbia. Those commitments do not mean, however, that we endorse the Government's record or that we are uncritical of the Government.
The EC has not been evenhanded in its response to requests for recognition by the republics. The premature recognition of Croatia, in which Britain acquiesced following pressure from Germany, was and remains in marked contrast to the refusal to recognise Macedonia. That was despite the fact that the Badinter commission found that, while Macedonia and Slovenia met the requirements for recognition, Croatia did not. The repercussions of these confused decisions also led to uncertainty about the security of Bosnia, of which the Serbs and Croatians took ruthless advantage. They continue to do so. We have learnt from the press today that President Tudjman's forces have consolidated their hold over parts of independent Bosnia. We condemn that without reservation. We condemn the continuing violence in Bosnia and the appalling practice of ethnic cleansing.
The joint United Nations and EC London peace conference in August agreed a framework for a negotiated peaceful settlement, which is more urgent now than ever. We support the objectives of that agreement. The Foreign Secretary rightly ruled out military solutions to these complex problems, at least for the moment, but he and his European colleagues have got us into the worst of all possible worlds. The only realistic alternative to military intervention is effective implementation of the United Nations mandatory sanctions, particularly against Serbia and, perhaps, in the developing circumstances, against Croatia. We all know that the Community has been lax when giving effect to United Nations decisions about sanctions. It is weeks since the Romanian ambassador told us on the BBC of the Danube being an open waterway to Serbia. We know that convoys cross the Greek frontier carrying supplies into Serbia. It was with sadness that we learnt recently--I do not know whether it is verifiable, but it was widely reported--that the Iranians, under the guise of humanitarian aid, are flying armaments into Bosnia. If we are to resolve such problems or to have some significant effect on them without resorting to military intervention, sanctions have to be made to work. We need
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much more effort from the Foreign Secretary in his role as president in the Community and from the Community as a whole to give effect to UN decisions. We support the call for a cessation of armed conflict in Bosnia, the immediate lifting of the sieges of towns and cities, the international supervision of heavy weapons, a ban on all military flights and the identification of all armed units. We want a massive increase in humanitarian aid and more effective delivery of it. We want all detention camps to be closed at the earliest practical opportunity.Mr. Keith Vaz (Leicester, East) : My hon. Friend will recall that, during the recess, he met my constituent Mr. Abdul Malida and a delegation of community representatives from the midlands who gave him a copy of a video recording Mr. Malida had taken of horrific scenes in Bosnia. My hon. Friend knows that Mr. Malida took £30, 000-worth of goods to Bosnia to distribute to people in real need. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government should put much greater emphasis on how humanitarian aid is being co-ordinated to save constituents such as Mr. Malida the risk to their lives of flying to the area to disperse aid themselves?
Dr. Cunningham : I accept my hon. Friend's point, but I am sure that humanitarian aid is welcome from wherever it comes. My hon. Friend's constituent has made an effective and practical contribution. I, too, was horrified by the scenes on the video tape made during his stay in Bosnia.
We want the mandatory sanctions against Serbia to be enforced rigorously by more effective monitoring of river traffic on the Danube and by more effective monitoring of the states bordering Serbia. The Government and the Community have failed properly to implement those decisions and they have just to work harder at it. It is clear that fighting has continued on all sides. The UN peace conference must assert its aims more strongly. An enduring and peaceful solution must ensure that internationally recognised borders are fully respected and that no gain can be achieved by force. Any solution must be based on human rights and ethnic and religious pluralism, not some division of Bosnia which is a state in its own right, recognised and a member of the UN. Its integrity must be upheld.
It is vital that peace be established before the belligerents extend their war into Kosovo and perhaps even into Macedonia which, as some of my hon. Friends have said, might happen. Europe again--the British presidency, the Foreign Secretary acting through the United Nations and with the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe and NATO--must do all in its power to end the potentially explosive circumstances that prevail in Kosovo and Macedonia. Macedonia is surely entitled to recognition by, and guarantees of its integrity from, the international community. I know that there is a dispute and that Greece is, apparently, blocking this in the European Community because of a dispute about the name, but we are surely not going to let an argument about the name of a territory lead to our allowing the situation to descend into conflict and war, which could spread throughout the Balkans. It would be outrageous if that were allowed to happen. Therefore, I urge the right hon. Gentleman to act in his role as president to resolve the problems about the recognition of Macedonia.
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I share the concern about the situation in Kosovo. The United Nations and the European Community should get monitors into Kosovo now. As the late John F. Kennedy once said :"Lofty words cannot construct alliances or maintain them. Only concrete deeds can do that."
If we are to resolve the dangerous circumstances that exist in Kosovo and Macedonia, we need action now. I urge that upon the Secretary of State. Mr. Panic should be committeed to guarantees for the ethnic Albanians in Kosovo now. The record shows, sadly, that President Milosevic is unlikely to give such guarantees. The majority Albanian population, for example, has not been able to attend schools and universities for more than a year. Autonomy for Kosovo has been severely eroded. The United Nations and the European Community should intervene now to prevent conflict, which would inevitably send refugees into Albania and Macedonia, countries which could not remotely cope with an influx of people. Further serious unrest could easily involve Greece.
In May, the United Nations voted for mandatory economic sanctions. I emphasise yet again, before I move on to other matters, that the Secretary of State and the British Government, in the role of presidency, have a major responsibility in the European context to see that that United Nations resolution is given real effect. I understand that some people are calling for a relaxation of sanctions against Serbia. I say that there should be no such relaxation until the Serbians use their undoubted influence in Bosnia to help to bring about a ceasefire.
Mr. Michael Stephen (Shoreham) : Does the hon. Gentleman accept that in all three of the tragic cases that we are discussing this morning, there are individuals--the so-called political and military leaders--who have committed grave crimes against humanity in the name of state policy? Is it not time that the United Nations conferred criminal jurisdiction on the International Court of Justice so that these individuals will know that if and when they are caught they will be brought to justice and personally punished for their crimes?
Dr. Cunningham : We certainly support moves through the United Nations to establish war crimes procedures so that people acting in the barbaric and inhman ways to which the hon. Gentleman refers are held to account when they are brought to book.
Will the Secretary of State persuade his right hon. Friend the Prime Minister in the coming round of inevitable cuts following the crisis in our economy not to cut our aid programme or to reduce support, in particular for the aid work that is going on not only in Bosnia but in Iraq, which I shall come to later, and certainly not in Somalia? Will he ensure that the programme that Mrs. Ogata is developing to deal with the huge refugee crisis will have the full support of Her Majesty's Government? And will the Government respond generously to any further requests for cash and material aid that Mrs. Ogata may make? I understand that she is likely to do just that. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will respond effectively and generously on behalf of Britain. Again I say that we have a particular responsibility in these matters during the term of our presidency of the European Community.
I believe that Parliament should have been recalled some weeks ago to discuss these issues. In particular we wanted to discuss the decision to deploy British troops. Some important questions need clarification. It is
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interesting that there have been, I believe, 17 occasions since 1939 when the House has been recalled to discuss emergencies or crises of one kind or another and that eight of those occasions have involved foreign affairs. It was remiss of the Government to postpone or, at first, to reject the request of my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the Opposition for the recall of Parliament before now.What are the objectives of the United Nations in the deployment of our troops? The right hon. Gentleman had something to say about that. I hope that his right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Defence does indeed keep to the commitment that he will expand upon it when he replies to the debate. Will the operation, in effect, be under NATO control? Who will be in command? Who will take overall charge? There certainly appears to have been considerable confusion so far about the current deployment, under United Nations auspices, in Bosnia. Are the rules of engagement absolutely clear to our commanders? My hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Dr. Clark) will wish to go into more detail about these matters before the Secretary of State for Defence replies to the debate. Nevertheless, I hope that we shall have very clear replies to these important questions.
Dr. Norman A. Godman (Greenock and Port Glasgow) : My hon. Friend mentioned the use of NATO forces. The Foreign Secretary also mentioned the use of certain NATO forces. Does my hon. Friend agree that the deployment of NATO forces outwith the territories defined in the North Atlantic treaty would be a grave violation of articles 4 and 5 of that treaty and that such a radically rearranged role would require the sanction, the support, of all the member state Parliaments?
Dr. Cunningham : It is for clarification of these questions that I am asking the Secretary of State to reply. I do not know the answer to my hon. Friend's question and I am not going to pretend that I do, but I know that it is an important question to ask. That is why I have asked it. I understand that although these forces will be from NATO, they will be under the command of the United Nations, but we need to have that question clearly answered in the course of this debate.
I emphasise again our absolute support for all British personnel involved, and our hopes and good wishes for peace and a safe return home, but the reality is--again I quote the late President John F. Kennedy--that
"Peace does not rest in charters or covenants. It lies in the hearts and minds of people."
Sadly, it does not yet lie in the hearts and minds of many people in war- torn Bosnia and elsewhere in Yugoslavia. Nor, indeed, does peace lie in the hearts and minds of the people of Somalia, as the right hon. Gentleman rightly said. We have historic links, particularly with the north of that country.
I support the intervention by my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, South and Penarth (Mr. Michael) in seeking an assurance, which I was pleased to see the Secretary of State give, that people in the north of Somalia will not be ignored as the humanitarian aid programme develops. My hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher) has just returned from Somalia. An earlier visit was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Clydebank and Milngavie (Mr. Worthington). Their graphic reports of a lawless, broken country make
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desperate reading. Their praise for the heroic work of the non-governmental organisations is unstinting and their condemnation of the failure of the international community to act much earlier in the case of Somalia is, frankly, damning.There is considerable feeling in Britain and beyond that the European Community and the United Nations have been far too slow to respond to the developing tragedy in Somalia. Even now, their efforts are insufficient to make a significant or early impact on the nature and scale of the problems. Hundreds of people die daily while food that is already in Mogadishu cannot be more effectively distributed because of armed clans and the complete absence of government at any level. The United Nations must deploy more troops in Somalia and more aid and support for non-governmental organisations, especially for the International Red Cross, should be urgently provided. In the Horn of Africa, including Somalia, 23 million people face severe food shortages and starvation. In southern Africa the worst drought in living memory has devastated crops, affecting a further 18 million people. Given the huge need, it is a matter of grave concern that the European Community, of which Britain holds the presidency, and the Government are threatening cuts in next year's aid budget. As Oxfam and others have said, while African nations continue to be drained to pay off their debts, the G7, the IMF and the World bank again recently failed to agree measures to help write off some or all of that debt. For years, Europe's leaders have been promising to do something to tackle the problems of the third world and poverty, but somehow there always seems to be something more important to do. There is a widespread fear that if action is not taken soon to relieve debt and increase aid many more lives will be at risk and Africa will face decades of instability.
We should have a quite separate debate in Government time as soon as possible after the House resumes to discuss more fully aid and development, poverty, drought and famine, especially in Africa but elsewhere in the world. While the world must continue to bend its efforts to end the local wars which cause mass starvation in Somalia and elsewhere in Africa, we must look to South Africa's progress because that will eventually provide the key to progress and development throughout that continent. While the undoubted energy and resources of South Africa's people and its land remain locked in internal political struggle, they cannot be unleashed to thrust the economy forward. In that comparatively rich region of the continent, economic prospects are plummeting as the welcome political developments of two years ago regress into ever-greater violence. The Government of South Africa were internationally applauded, too quickly by this Government, for their modest early conciliation, but they now simply demand too much from the still disenfranchised majority of black Africans. There is good news today about talks between the state president and Nelson Mandela. Those welcome talks are crucial to the multi-party Convention for a Democratic South Africa. For the ANC, Nelson Mandela is asking for movement on three key points. They are the release of people who are still in prison for alleged political offences, the fencing and securing of the hostels from which single migrant workers from the cities emerged to wreak violence on their neighbours, and the early banning of the carrying of dangerous weapons. He seeks that
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movement, and especially on the latter two matters, to prevent any repetition of what happened in Boipatong and Ciskei.Mr. Hurd : The hon. Gentleman has strayed on to South Africa. I do not criticise him for that, but I did not do it because I thought that it would be out of order. However, as he is in that territory I can tell him that I share his pleasure about today's news. Yesterday, I spoke on the telephone to Nelson Mandela and the South African Foreign Minister. Each explained the narrow difference between them at that stage on the issue of political prisoners. I am delighted that it has been resolved. We are backing the peace accords and the work of Mr. Goldstone, with whom I had a long talk in South Africa a few weeks ago, by sending people from this country and other European countries as monitors to support the peace accords and the new peace structures on the ground in the townships.
Dr. Cunningham : I am grateful for that intervention. It is clear that the right hon. Gentleman is actively involved and we appreciate that and applaud it. The Government have many channels through which to urge President de Klerk to move more swiftly on these crucial matters and I am pleased to learn that the channels are being used. I shall now deal with the situation in the Gulf. I thank the Foreign Secretary for his letter about Paul Ride and Michael Wainwright and for his quick response to the representations by my hon. Friends the Members for Walthamstow (Mr. Gerrard) and for Halifax (Mrs. Mahon) about those two unfortunate gentlemen. I urge the Foreign Secretary to continue to do all in his power to seek their early release.
When I wrote to the Foreign Secretary in August, I expressed Labour's support for an air exclusion zone over southern Iraq with the object of giving some protection to the Shia Muslim communities of the marshes. I reiterate that support. The air exclusion zone introduced last year to protect the Kurds in northern Iraq was justified and successful. It had the authority of UN Security Council resolution 688 as well as the justification of general humanitarian protection. The zone was rightly given wide all-party support and, as the United Nations Human Rights Commissioner recently stated in his report that a major further series of threats to the Shias was imminent, the same action is clearly in order.
I also make clear our position about any proposed military attacks on ground targets in Iraq. Such attacks cannot be justified and should not be made unless and until
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the United Nations Security Council has considered and approved them in advance--if they are necessary at all. We certainly make it clear to the House and to the United States of America that we will not support any adventurism in Iraq by President Bush in aid of his re-election.Finally, I shall deal briefly with what the Foreign Secretary said about the United Nations. It is clear that the UN is overloaded and that Britain is nowhere near meeting the United Nations target for aid programmes. It is also clear that the Conservative Government's contributions to many multilateral agencies of the United Nations are lower in real terms now than they were in 1979. Hopes of a new world order have not been fulfilled and many people, including the Opposition, place more and more demands on the United Nations. The Foreign Secretary said that the UN should have an imperial role. No phrase could be more calculated to offend the non-aligned countries of the third world. He quickly changed the phrase and spoke instead about good old-fashioned diplomacy when he spoke at the UN. He should have used such diplomacy much earlier this summer in his relations with Dr. Boutros-Ghali, and if he had perhaps an unseemly and unhelpful row could have been avoided. The United Nations needs restructuring, but, above all, it needs more finance and more personnel. Many millions of dollars are outstanding in contributions, principally, I regret to say, from the United States. If the Foreign Secretary wants the UN to work more effectively, as we do, he should ensure that it has adequate resources and should give it more support and help so that it can more effectively tackle the important tasks that we are discussing.
Mr. Tam Dalyell (Linlithgow) : On a point of order, Madam Speaker. Long after the circumstances that give rise to the personal statement that is to be made are forgotten, people will surely ask how, on Monday, Pitchford hall, an almost unique 16th century timber-framed house, was allowed to come under Christies' hammer. During this personal statement, may we have a personal explanation of why--
Madam Speaker : Order. The hon. Gentleman should wait until we have heard the statement. I have taken his point.
It being 11 o'clock, Madam Speaker-- interrupted the proceedings, pursuant to Standing Order No. 11 (Friday sittings).
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Personal Statement
Mr. Dalyell : Further to that point of order, Madam Speaker. I have attended many personal statements ; explanations are in order. Why was the advice of Lord Rothschild and of the National Trust--
Madam Speaker : Order. I respect the hon. Gentleman as a longstanding Member of the House, but he must respect the views of the House, too. He is not putting a point of order to me ; he is simply making a statement, and I cannot hear it. The House and I are ready to hear the personal statement.
Mr. Dalyell rose--
Madam Speaker : Order. I am asking the hon. Gentleman to let the House proceed and to hear the personal statement.
Mr. Dalyell rose--
Madam Speaker : Order. I am on my feet. I ask the hon. Gentleman to respect the Chair and the views of the House.
11.1 am
Mr. David Mellor (Putney) : I should like to thank you very much, Madam Speaker, for your courtesy in permitting me to make a personal statement. I apologise to those who are engaged in a serious debate on real tragedies in the world for interposing my altogether rather smaller matter, but I thought it right, having resigned, to give an account of myself to the House, rather than doing a round of press conferences.
I want to make it clear to my colleagues and Members of the House that, while I have my regrets, this is not a sad moment for me. After what my family and I have been through over the past two months, it is with almost a sense of relief that I make this statement. There were times during that period when one wondered whether one was living in Ceausescu's Romania rather than John Major's Britain, with bugged telephone calls and the other things that came out. I want to make it clear to the House that I resigned for what I hope the House will agree was the best of reasons. I could not expect my colleagues in government or Parliament to put up with more of the ceaseless flow of stories about me in the tabloid press. Having grown heartily sick of my private life myself, I could hardly expect others to take a more charitable view.
When the first of this stuff started to appear in July, I made it clear that I was willing to resign from the Government. The Prime Minister, who has been a constant friend and has shown his personal qualities to the full throughout, decided not to accept my resignation, and that was the view of my colleagues. That offered me the opportunity to do two further months in my Department--an opportunity which I shall never regret having--in which we were able to do some important work on the Green Paper on the BBC, preparation for the national lottery Bill and so on. From then on, I regarded myself as, in effect, the servant of the Government and of the party and believed that if the time came when my presence was an embarrassment, that was the time to go, and the time to go was yesterday.
To those who think that I could have resigned sooner, I say that it was legitimate for the Prime Minister and
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other senior colleagues to take the view that in this day and age--sorry and distressed though I was at the revelations of this affair, and despite how cheap and sordid it must have looked--this was not a reason for a Cabinet Minister to resign.Inevitably, there were other stories as it became clear that this matter would not be allowed to rest. I am glad to be able to leave office with its having been made clear that there has been no breach of ministerial rules. That is not to say that people are not entitled to challenge my judgment on the other issues that have been raised. I have to accept that, in the jobs that we do, one has to take a view and I do not resent the fact that some say that they would have taken a different view, just as others, in the same situation, would have done the same as me. It is clear that there is no question of impropriety, and I hope that I can leave office with that fact clearly established.
It will be for others to decide the rights and wrongs of this business. I certainly was the author of my own misfortune, which permits me to make this statement today. Perhaps of all the many good, bad and indifferent things that have been said to me, the one comment that I prefer was from the friend who said to me, "There is no self-pity". We make our decisions and must accept responsibility for what we do, and I can assure colleagues that there is no more heavy responsibility than laying down a burden of office that one enjoys in order to take responsibility for one's actions. It will be for others to decide the role of the media. I have always been very relaxed about the media and have never taken the view that statutory interventions would be the answer. To be fair, most journalists and newspapers have behaved in the professional manner that one would expect in the circumstances in which they found themselves. Some hon. Members have been through the experiences that I and my family--who have been a tower of strength throughout all this, particularly my wife--have been through, but it has been an illuminating episode for me. Endless hordes of people appeared not only outside my home but outside the homes of relatives, friends and acquaintances. Extraordinarily offensive things were said in the context of those visits, and a lack of respect was shown for age and infirmity when pressing the point home. Legions of cameramen took 10 or 12 pictures knowing that none would appear and rushed around as if they were in a Rambo film, banging against the side of the car, and even stayed outside our house last night until the wee small hours, long after it was obvious that all we were trying to do was get a good night's sleep.
Perhaps that is the way in which an alternative criminal justice system, run by the media, should work, but when the criminal justice system, which we have all played our part in creating, was established, it had checks and balances and principles of fairness. Some will want to reflect on chequebooks being waved for stories, however lurid, on people being offered at the beginning of a conversation, "We would like to talk to you ; we will make it worth your while", and on bugged telephone calls, which we now have to accept. That does not apply only to me. I should not play any part in that because I would be parti pris. I was determined on leaving office, just as when I held it, never to allow my own experiences to interpose themselves, but I think that they are relevant and interesting.
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It is a paradox that, as the BBC said today, some tabloids--and it is only some--have expressed unrestrained glee at what has happened because of the sense that they have exercised power, but the issue is whether they exercise power with responsibility. The paradox is that the only basis on which this could be justified is that a greater public good is thereby being served. But can anyone explain the paradox that in serving a greater public good one is entitled to bug and buy and abuse and use methods that are, therefore, themselves amoral or at best morally neutral? At some point the House will have to consider that issue.I do not want to detain the House much longer, but I have two or three further points. The first is that I have had 11 years as a Minister. I have thoroughly enjoyed them. I have been fortunate in that I have served in many interesting Departments, some of them in the cockpit of party- political debate and some of the more interesting ones giving me the opportunity to work with colleagues in all parts of the House on legislation that was important, relevant and non-partisan. I think of the Broadcasting Act 1990, the Children Act 1989 and the work on the misuse of drugs. I shall treasure these 11 years. My great sadness is that having had the opportunity to establish the Department of National Heritage, I will not now have the chance to carry on with that task, but I blame no one but myself for that.
Amidst the welter of charge and counter-charge, the one thing this morning that is of great comfort to me is the extraordinarily nice things that have been said by the people who have worked with me in my Department and by the interest groups that I have tried to serve. There is no doubt that I have had a genuine passion for what we have been trying to do in the Department, and, although it is entirely my own fault, I deeply regret that I shall not be able to carry on that work. In one of his last songs John Lennon wrote the following line which is always relevant to all of us :
"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans".
As to the future, I hope and intend to be an active Member of the House. I intend to continue to serve the interests of my constituents. The people of Putney have been kind enough to increase my majority at each of the past four elections. They have stuck by me through this sorry mess, and I owe it to them at least to redouble my efforts on their behalf. That is what I shall endeavour to do as I try to fit in with the life and work of the House as best I can. I should like to tell colleagues and friends here that last night, coming into the Division Lobbies to vote, I was offered tremendous acts of friendship by Members on both sides of the House. The House is at its best on these occasions, and that certainly made me feel a lot better about myself after what has happened.
Finally, as I leave the warmth of Government for the icy wastes of the Back Benches I want everyone to know that there is precedent for this : Captain Oates was born and raised in my constituency.
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United Nations Operations
11.11 am
(Question again proposed, That this House do now adjourn.
Madam Speaker : I call Mr. King-- [Interruption.] Order. I ask hon. Members who are leaving to be kind enough to do so more quietly so that we can hear the next speaker.
11.12 am
Mr. Tom King (Bridgwater) : I rise to speak for the first time in 17 years from the Back Benches in these rather extraordinary circumstances. It is traditional not to intervene in personal statements, but I should like to add, as a former colleague of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Putney (Mr. Mellor), that it was with the greatest sadness that I heard the news of the past 24 hours. I entirely endorse his comments on the exceptional tributes that have been paid to him by many in the arts world for the work he was seeking to do. These may be icy wastes, but there are some friendly faces here on the Back Benches and I assure him that the journey that he is about to make is not an entirely disastrous one.
The motion on the Adjournment concerns British support for the United Nations in Yugoslavia, Iraq and Somalia. I am surely not the only hon. Member who believes that that list is capable of significant extension in the months and years ahead. As my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary said in his important review, we have arrived at the end of the cold war, a period in which the super-powers imposed discipline on their client states using both acceptable and unacceptable means. Those client states made up a considerable sector of the world. All that has now gone. The Soviet Union has imploded into separate republics, and the whole system of client states that it supported has disappeared. It is no coincidence that we are debating some of its former client states today. All of them depended to some extent on Soviet support in the past. As this system of client states has collapsed, the United States has understandably imposed a limit on its willingness to become involved--it has no desire to become the world's policeman. That, in turn, has introduced a role for the United Nations--a role formerly inhibited by veto throughout our life times but now, since Iraq and due to subsequent developments, full of new responsibilities. What should the UN's role be in future? What should our contribution to it be? The United Nations can authorise and support internal intervention in the affairs of disorderly countries, but when it does so, how should it be done and who will carry it out? I was involved to some degree in discussions of the possible military intervention in Iraq and subsequently in Yugoslavia. Such military intervention, if contemplated, must always be seen as the last resort. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary is always the first to emphasise the essential and demanding role of diplomacy, since such conflicts must if possible be solved without military intervention. One of the less welcome by-products of the superb professionalism displayed by the military in the Gulf war was that the skill, speed and success of the liberation of Kuwait and the ending of Iraqi aggression encouraged in some minds too ready a feeling that we can
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always call on the military to solve our problems. The Ministry of Defence is just across Whitehall--it can deal with the problem. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary was always sympathetic to my warnings against such a view.Today we again face the difficult decision whether to put young men and women, to use President Bush's phrase from the Gulf war, in harm's way. About 30,000 of our fellow citizens, men and women, are in Northern Ireland helping to protect the community, to keep the peace and to prevent the success of terrorism.
Two years ago we sent 45,000 of our young men and women into Iraq as our contribution to the United Nations effort there. Subsequently I had the opportunity, with my hon. Friend the Member for Berkshire, East (Mr. MacKay), to see at first hand the remarkable humanitarian effort carried out by 1,000 Royal Marines, providing air cover and helicopter support in Operation Haven. I am proud that that effort saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of Kurds who would not be alive today had we not been prepared to take the difficult decision to do something against which many arguments could have been advanced. It stands to the eternal credit of our country that we played such a positive part in that operation.
We all take pride in the success of Operation Haven. It is a sombring and interesting thought that our Jaguar aircraft have now flown for more than a year from the Incirlik air base in Turkey. They are continuing to provide that air cover and to impose a no-fly zone in northern Iraq, as undoubtedly they should. Although the situation is far from perfect, we have, in a real sense, created, through the removal of Saddam Hussein's additional asset, a more level playing field in northern Iraq from which the Peshmerga can more readily defend their Kurdish countrymen. I welcome also what is, for obvious reasons, no longer called Operation Southern Comfort but Operation Jural--the sending of the Tornados to the south similar to Operation Provide Comfort in the north. This is helping with the problems of the Shias in the marshes and I welcome the Opposition's support for that.
Those have been welcome interventions. They continue and they have no fixed time limit. I could not advise the House with such knowledge as I have when those efforts may be withdrawn. The great difficulty in such peacekeeping activities is whether one can ever get out ; all peacekeeping activities involve such a warning.
By any military standards, the situation in the former Yugoslavia is a textbook example of what Britain should not become involved in. It is difficult to imagine a more appallingly difficult situation. There are no clear objectives. There is every prospect of getting sucked into an open- ended commitment, starting with humanitarian aid and the escorting of convoys and released prisoners from the detention camps--all the most worthy and desirable objectives. Yet there is the greatest risk of a spread of the conflict.
In 1964 we went into Cyprus and we are still there. The history of the United Nations peacekeeping forces in different corners of the world, whether still on the peaceline in Korea, whether the UN interim force in Lebanon or in Sinai and across its other activities, shows the great difficulty of withdrawal. An understandable
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intervention in this debate has been the warning that after Bosnia, what next? Reference was made to the predictable and the predicted Bosnian conflict and now Kosovo, then the real risk of an implosion in Macedonia involving Serbia, Albania, Greece and Bulgaria. We know that the potential risk is great.We also run the real risk, as we know sadly all too well, not just from Northern Ireland, of being accused of taking sides, of going in for one purpose and then finding that our purposes are disbelieved--
Mr. David Trimble (Upper Bann) : Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. King : I would rather not. I understand why the hon. Gentleman seeks to intervene, but I want to be brief and not to abuse my situation.
There is also the clearest possible risk of casualties. To use another analogy with Northern Ireland--the House has been horrified at the suffering and the real tragedy of Northern Ireland--it is a sobering thought that already in what was Yugoslavia within six months three times more people have died that in 25 years of trouble in Northern Ireland. The scale of the viciousness and fanatical hatred has been there on our television sets for all of us to see. The sad news today of four more injuries to the UNPROFOR is a clear warning of the dangers that are run. As the Opposition spokesman said, we see in United Nations activity the risk of potential confusion of command, the difficulty of establishing clear rules of engagement and, as casualties happen, as sadly I fear they will, the difficulty of presenting them to the country to explain what national interest there is in our involvement.
There is also the difficulty in explaining why there are so many abstainers from the initiative. Germany's situation is understood. The problem of its constitution and its past involvement in the territories make this a particularly difficult matter. The United States, we know, does not feel that this is an area in which to make a contribution of the same significance at this time.
Those were my views, which I sought to ensure were represented clear in government. I was clear, on the advice that I received, of the great dangers that we faced. Yet I always said that there could come a time when we could no longer walk by on the other side. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary used precisely that phrase in his speech.
The scale of man's inhumanity to man that we have witnessed in the appalling incidents introduces an element in which it is no longer acceptable for us as a leading member of the European Community, holding the presidency at the present time, as a permanent member of the Security Council and with our role in the United Nations to say that we shall simply stand back and do nothing.
It can be argued, perhaps some of my right hon. and hon. Friends will do so, that all the disadvantages that I have clearly rehearsed, of which I am not unaware--I know that my right hon. Friends are acutely aware of them-- should not be overlooked. But government is about taking difficult decisions and taking responsibility, no matter how difficult and awkward that may be.
I believe that there is a national interest. Obviously there is a clear national interest by virtue of the role of the United Nations and the importance of the United Nations making a contribution and our being a willing and strong supporter of the United Nations in its work. But there
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must come a time when the conflicts spread, when we see the risk of the brush fire that has spread already from the initial problems of Serbia and Croatia, then involving Bosnia, Kosovo and Macedonia, and the problems in the ex-Soviet republics, when we see the risks of this involving Slav and Muslim, Turk and Greek, when our past history shows that we will inevitably at some stage be sucked in, that we still have a national interest in trying to intervene in any way that we can, first, because there is a moral case for humanitarian aid, but, above all, to do everything that we can to try to prevent further conflict.Mr. Trimble rose--
Mr. King : Will the hon. Gentleman excuse me ? I want to make progress.
If we ask our young men and women to stand in harm's way, we must insist on certain conditions. The first is that it must be right that we work under United Nations auspices and authority. We have a duty to see that we have the clearest possible rules of engagement that are fair to our forces. They must have the authority and the opportunity, without qualification, for self-defence, and self-defence interpreted not in the most immediate and narrow way of whether a weapon is being fired at them, but a sensible and flexible approach to the problem. We must ensure that they have the right scope. My right hon. Friend's decision, put to Cabinet, was to send a self- contained unit of some 1,800 men, with the Cheshires, the Warrior armoured personnel carriers and their own logistics. They would be self-contained with the very real intention that if the worst came to the worst they could look after themselves and would not be dependent on other, perhaps less adequate, elements of what may be a United Nations force.
There must be in that force the maximum contribution from the maximum number of nations. I have already referred to the abstainers--the no-shows in this situation. I note that we are proposing to send 1,800 men and I support the reasons for deciding on that figure. I note that the Canadians form the next largest force with 1,200, then the French with 1,100. The Benelux countries are sending smaller contributions. There must be maximum contributions from the maximum number of countries. There must also be some rules about, or some opportunity to set, a time limit on the contributions of individual countries, and certainly of individual units. I welcome the announcement in today's newspapers of the proposal to use, wherever possible, NATO structures and logistic systems that are already in place and operational. We owe it to our forces to ensure that they have the best possible support that we can give them. Above all, we owe it to them to accept that in no sense can we pretend that this is the solution. In asking them to undertake such a very dangerous task, we owe it to them to ensure that they go there in the knowledge that every possible effort is being made in the political and diplomatic areas to find a solution. I warmly support what the hon. Member for Copeland (Dr. Cunningham) said about sanctions. We must make those levers that are not military work in support of our forces.
It is as difficult a decision as Ministers could ever be asked to make. It is a sombre position. I do not think that any hon. Member is under any illusion about the dangers and the difficulties. We have all seen television pictures of the terrible horrors. In my judgment that we cannot simply
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stand by, I am also influenced by the fact that no one could fail to have been impressed by the fortitude of the people of Sarajevo and the many suffering such appalling hardships. This debate is taking place at the end of September and we know that, in the months ahead, those people face the prospect of falling temperatures, no water, probably no power and no heat. The risks to life, the possibility of death, the casualties and the suffering could be enormous. Against that background, and within Europe, we have a responsibility to play our part. We must do what we can, but we must do it with the world. As we take this decision we pray for our forces as they undertake a challenging and vital task.Several Hon. Members rose --
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