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8.46 pm
Mrs. Ann Clwyd (Cynon Valley): I remind the hon. Member for Salisbury (Mr. Key) that, when arms sales to Iraq took place, there was no inhibition at all and Members of Parliament were not given straightforward answers to straightforward questions. While Ministers continue to shelter behind phrases like "disproportionate costs", I hope that the rules are tightly adhered to.
I spent much of September following closely events in northern Iraq. After 12 days in the United States talking to people in the White House and the State Department and members of Congress, I am convinced that they are embarrassed by the United States' response to events in northern Iraq. Although at the beginning we thought that the response was necessary, it turned out to be the wrong response. As I said to the Secretary of State earlier, the result is that Saddam Hussein has consolidated his position in northern Iraq. In 1991 we promised the Kurds and the Iraqi Opposition that we would protect them against invasion by Saddam Hussein, but that has proved to be a very hollow promise. We have no short, medium or long-term policy regarding Iraq.
I put one question to the Minister. When I visited northern Iraq in January in an attempt to arrange the release of prisoners taken by both sides during that country's unfortunate civil war, I discovered that both Kurdish leaders were ready to travel to Washington to sign the peace agreement. The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan released 44 prisoners and both sides were anxious to travel to Washington to sign the peace agreement which was the culmination of discussions that had taken place in Ireland and elsewhere.
Upon my return from Iraq in January, I met a Minister from the Foreign Office and told him what the two Kurdish leaders had said. I also asked him to get Britain involved in the peace talks rather than allowing us to sit on the sidelines as the Turks had insisted. I thought that the Minister would take up my suggestion as both Kurdish leaders were in agreement: they said that the Americans were relatively inexperienced at dealing with the Kurds and that Britain had far more expertise in that area. They wanted Britain to be actively involved in the continuation of the peace process.
However, nothing was done: Britain was content to sit on the sidelines because the Turks objected to our involvement in the negotiations. What kind of country is prepared to allow the Turks to push it on to the sidelines rather than play an active role in the peace process and thereby avoid loss of life and heavy expenditure? The Americans told me that the peace agreement was held up
because Clinton was having trouble with his budget--the Republicans had pulled the rug from under him and the budget was frozen. What happened between February and August when the budget was unfrozen? In February, it would have cost $3 million to install peace monitors in northern Iraq, but in September it cost $200 million to send 44 cruise missiles et cetera to southern Iraq as part of an exercise that proved absolutely useless. It did not fulfil its stated objective: to protect the Kurds in northern Iraq. What sort of value for money is that--$3 million in February compared with $200 million in August?
What did the British Government spend on that exercise and what is the British Government's attitude to the American response to the events? I suspect that Britain supported the US in a show of solidarity. At the time, I must admit that I was glad of some response from the British Government, but I was waiting for a further response and a commitment to fulfil our promise of 1991: to provide a safe haven and to protect the Kurds and the Iraqi Opposition from further incursion by Saddam Hussein.
That policy clearly failed and has been changed. When I asked the Americans at all levels what had caused the delay, they looked embarrassed. When I posed that question at one meeting, a former American ambassador approached me and said, "I can answer your question: it was incompetence and ignorance." In that case, were we also incompetent and ignorant? We allowed the space of time between January and August to elapse and failed to seize the opportunity to bring about peace in northern Iraq.
One of those who chaired the negotiations said, "It may not have worked anyway." We do not know whether it would have worked; it may have, but we did not give peace a chance. That is a big failing on the part of those involved.
I turn now to arms sales. It is estimated that at least 100 wars have occurred since 1945, resulting in the deaths of more than 20 million people. As usual, civilians are the major casualties of those kinds of wars--women and children are killed in disproportionate numbers. There are at least 27 million refugees world wide and probably the same number of displaced people within their own countries. The former Yugoslavia, Rwanda, northern Iraq and Afghanistan provide recent stark reminders of civil war.
More than 1 billion people throughout the world--more than one fifth of humanity--live in abject poverty. In a world of plenty, lack of proper food and easily preventable diseases kill a quarter of a million children every week. The Brundtland report, which was hailed at the time, pointed out that major progress could be made in tackling four of the world's major problems--the lack of clean water, the destruction of tropical rain forests, the spread of deserts, and uncontrolled population growth--for the expenditure of less than one month's global arms spending.
Of course, wars will not end nor the world's problems be solved simply by industrialised countries adopting more responsible arms export policies. However, in many countries--including our own--if only a quarter of military spending were allocated to health, housing and education, we would be much better off.
Today the United Kingdom seems to be particularly proud of its record as one of the world's largest arms exporters. The United Kingdom actually promotes the export of arms at the taxpayers' expense through the Defence Export Services Organisation and export credit guarantees. DESO, which is a branch of the MOD, exists to promote and support British arms sales throughout the world. Its running costs amount to at least £16 million per year. In 1994, more than £3 billion worth of military equipment left the United Kingdom destined for other countries. In 1994, almost £543 million was provided in export credit guarantees for those exports. Scott illustrated only too well how export credit guarantees supporting the sale of arms can go wrong--for example, the £652 million that was paid in export credit guarantees to promote arms sales to Iraq. If we were to provide that level of support to civilian industries in the future, it would be better for the British economy and British jobs. The construction industry, for example, employs about 1.3 million people and that is about three times as many as the defence industry. Construction exports amount to about £4 billion a year, which is more than the total of defence exports.
Some people argue that if the United Kingdom will not sell arms to nasty dictators, someone else will. That may be true, but it cannot be ethical. We would not use that argument to support the state selling cocaine or child pornography. This country, which at least has some world reputation as a decent democracy, should not measure itself against such low standards.
Those who argue that jobs must be the main consideration must also look at the facts. In the 12 years up to 1994, jobs directly or indirectly dependent on the military industry fell by more than half, from 740,000 to 360,000. Of those jobs, 40,000 are directly dependent on exports and 40,000 are indirectly dependent. The Government underwrite arms exports by £1 billion a year. That is a subsidy of £12,500 a job each year and I am sure that many non-defence industries are rightly jealous of such support.
Even with the shrinkage in the number of jobs, the British economy is still more reliant on military production than any other in Europe, a specialisation which has proved something of a liability over the past few years as defence budgets have fallen. Given that the world market is set to decline by 20 per cent. by 2000, I think--and other people have made the same point--that the Government should develop a diversification strategy to avoid future job losses. That, of course, is the policy of the Labour party. The difficulty of shifting from making weapons to other products has been overcome in the past. Western countries adapted after the second world war and people went back to peacetime jobs.
For a start, we could stop the sale of arms to some of the worst regimes. Surely the United Kingdom could lead the world, as a major arms-selling country, if we just stopped encouraging and subsidising the arms trade in countries with the worst human rights abuses. Unless the main exporters of arms take a responsible attitude, there is every likelihood that major weapons systems will become the properties of countries which give barely a thought to human rights. One of the many lessons taught by the Gulf war is that international arms sales should never be governed only by commercial considerations.
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