SECOND REPORT
DEPENDENT TERRITORIES
REVIEW:
INTERIM REPORT
The Foreign Affairs
Committee has agreed to the following Report:
INTRODUCTION
1. On 27 August 1997, the
Foreign Secretary announced a fresh look at policy towards the
United Kingdom's remaining Dependent Territories, which are listed
in Table 1. The Review will consider whether changes in policy
or practical arrangements are desirable. It will address generic
issues relevant to all Dependent Territories and specific issues
relating to individual Dependent Territories.[1]
2. As the Review is unusual
in that it has no formal terms of reference,[2]
we decided to seek further information from the Government. In
the light of this[3]
we resolved to take oral evidence from a range of interests, including
the Dependent Territories Association and Baroness Symons of Vernham
Dean, the Foreign Office Minister with overall responsibility
for Dependent Territories matters.[4]
We also took the rare opportunity of their official visit to
London to take oral evidence from elected representatives from
St.Helena.[5]
We have also received a substantial amount of written evidence,
including submissions from elected representatives in many of
the inhabited Dependent Territories. We are most grateful to
all who have submitted evidence to us.
3. The Foreign Secretary
originally intended to announce the outcome of the Review at the
Dependent Territories Association conference on 4 February, Baroness
Symons indicated, however, that it was important "not to
have predetermined timetables by which everything must be decided."[6]
We understand that the Secretary of State's address to the Conference
will be in the nature of an interim conclusion.
4. We have therefore
decided to produce an interim report on some of the issues that
have been raised in our evidence, as a contribution to the wider
debate on the future of these territories. We propose to return
to the matter of the Dependent Territories at a later date, when
the full outcome of the Review is available. We therefore welcome
further contributions, from representatives of the Dependent Territories
and others, both in response to this report and to any announcements
the Secretary of State may make.
Table 1
The United Kingdom's Dependent Territories
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Inhabited Dependent Territories
*Anguilla
Bermuda
*British Virgin Islands
Cayman Islands
Falkland Islands
Gibraltar
*Montserrat
*Pitcairn Islands
*St. Helena (with sub-dependencies Tristan da Cunha and Ascension Island†)
*Turks and Caicos Islands
Dependent Territories with no permanent indigenous resident population
British Antarctic Territory
British Indian Ocean Territory
South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands
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*Dependent
Territories receiving substantial United Kingdom development assistance.
See Cm. 3789, panel 16. See also HC Deb, 28 January 1998, Vol.
305, Col. 331.
†The
Governor of St Helena is also the Governor of Tristan da Cunha
and of Ascension Island. The Legislative Council of St Helena
has no responsibilities towards the subdependencies.
The Dependent
Territories
5. The United Kingdom's
remaining Dependent Territories are distributed worldwide and
are highly diverse in character. Indeed, it is this very diversity
which is at first sight the key feature. Baroness Symons commented
that they were "very different", even within the Caribbean.[7]
Three have no permanent indigenous population. Others are isolated
islands with subsistence economies, while others have high GDP
per capita,[8]
often as a result of their development of tourism and as off-shore
financial centres. What they all have in common, though, is that
they constitute the residue of the British Empire and that they
willingly owe allegiance to the Crown. All the inhabited Dependent
Territories have some form of internal self-government, the extent
and character of which varies from territory to territory. The
Governor, appointed by the Secretary of State, is usually responsible
for external affairs, defence, law and order and the public service.
6. The Foreign and Commonwealth
Office is responsible for the good government of the Dependent
Territories, including their proper financial management. It
aims also to improve the standards of government in the Dependent
Territories. The Government's general policy on independence
for Dependent Territories is to assist moves in this direction
if and when it is the clearly and constitutionally expressed wish
of the local people. This general policy does not apply in the
case of Gibraltar, because of the provisions of the Treaty of
Utrecht.[9]
7. It should be remembered
that considerable benefits accrue to the United Kingdom in return
for the responsibilities of administering the territories: for
example, Ascension Island is a key element in the Falklands air-bridge
and the British Indian Ocean Territory provides an important military
facility for the United Kingdom and its allies.
8. Some of the territories
are rich in natural resources: for example, the Falkland Islands
have substantial fisheries and may have rich deposits of oil in
their territorial waters and minerals on-shore. At the parliamentary
level, those with legislative assemblies are active participants
in the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association.[10]
9. It is nonetheless true
that the responsibilities exercised by the United Kingdom in respect
of these territories do expose it to potential liabilities resulting
from their actions. The Comptroller and Auditor General reported
to Parliament in May 1997 on the United Kingdom's contingent liabilities
in the Dependent Territories.[11]
More recently, the Public Accounts Committee took evidence on
this subject from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.[12]
This evidence covered a wide range of issues, including the difficult
question of the balance between internal autonomy and protecting
the legitimate interests - including the financial interests -
of the United Kingdom. We also received evidence of a specific
example of this from St Helena witnesses, who were critical of
the Government's refusal to sanction a lottery via the
Internet and based on St Helena.[13]
10. In view of the fact
that the Public Accounts Committee is expected to report on the
subject of contingent liabilities in the Dependent Territories,
we do not propose to address these important issues in this interim
report. We may well return to aspects of this matter in our final
report. We nonetheless take the view that there should be
a presumption in favour of the maximum degree of internal self-government
in these territories.
1 Because of the particular circumstances of Gibraltar and the Falkland Islands, policy towards these two territories will continue to be handled separately (see paragraph 13, Ev. p. 26 and Q169). Back
2 HC Deb, 29 October 1997, Vol.299, Col.824w. Back
3 Ev. p. 26. Back
4 Q131. Back
5 See Ev. pp. 17-21 and Q65-104. Back
6 Q108. Back
7 Q113. See also Q1. Back
8 Contingent Liabilities in the Dependent Territories: Report by the Comptroller and Auditor General, HC 13 (1997-98), Figure 1. Back
9 See HC 13 (1997-98), paras. 1.1 to 1.4. Back
10 Q6. Back
11 HC 13, Session 1997-98. Back
12 Minutes of Evidence taken before the Public Accounts Committee on 15 December 1997, HC 435-i (1997-98). Back
13 Q93-95. See also Appendix 2, p. 46, concerning a proposed banking operation which did not proceed. Back
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