Westminster Hall
Wednesday 13 January 2010
[Christopher Fraser in the Chair]
China
Motion made and Question proposed, That the sitting be now adjourned.-[Helen Jones.]
9.30 am
Tony Baldry (Banbury) (Con): Somewhere in my scrapbook is a photo of my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Norfolk (Mr. Simpson), who is responding to this debate on behalf of the Official Opposition, me and a number of other members of the great and good, including Andrew Neil, outside NATO headquarters in the early 1970s on a student study tour. My hair was somewhat longer and my hon. Friend's moustache was somewhat fuller, but otherwise we are fully recognisable. That demonstrates that we, and indeed all hon. Members in this Chamber, grew up in a world of two superpowers-the United States and the Soviet Union-although throughout the cold war the United States economy was far more advanced than and twice as large as that of the Soviet Union.
The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 greatly enhanced the pre-eminent position of the United States and, by implication, the west. Terms such as unipolarity and phrases like "the end of history" sought to describe what appeared to be a unique situation. Those of us living in the United Kingdom and Europe, whose nation states had been the pre-eminent powers from the start of the industrial revolution until the mid-20th century, accepted as a given the west's ability to shape global history. Well, all of us are now going to have to adapt to a new reality, as are our children and succeeding generations. We are witnessing a significant change, which, although it is still in its early days, will transform the world: the rise of China.
Global Insight, a US economics consultancy, expects China to overtake the United States as the world's largest manufacturer by 2020. An article demonstrating that in the Financial Times in May 2007 was entitled, "US to lose role as world's top manufacturer by 2020." Goldman Sachs estimates that by 2025 the United States and China will have similar-sized economies, but by 2050 China will be the largest economy, followed some way behind by America and India. Incidentally, only two European countries are predicted to be in the top 10 by 2050: this country and Germany, in ninth and 10th positions respectively.
China is a country where gross domestic product grew 30 per cent. from 2004 to 2006, investment since 2000 has tripled and exports have quadrupled. China has getting on for a quarter of the world's population. Last week it was announced that China has overtaken the US to become the biggest car market in the world-more than 13.5 million vehicles were sold in China last year-and, interestingly, for four out of every five Chinese customers that car is the first they have driven.
Mr. Nigel Evans (Ribble Valley) (Con): My hon. Friend is painting a full picture of what China is today. Of course, it was not always so. At times China was clearly a closed society, and British businesses did not trade there as they do now. Will he pay tribute to the British businessmen who, with entrepreneurial wit and wisdom-some in the 48 Group and those known as the icebreakers-went into China and started trading with it in the early days when it was not fashionable to do so?
Tony Baldry: Those in the 48 Group are much to be commended, as are those in the China-Britain Business Council, who continue to work hard to promote trade between the UK and China.
This week it was announced that China is now the world's largest exporter, with an economy on track to grow by 9.5 per cent. in 2010. If our economy were likely to grow anything like that we would all collectively be singing the hallelujah chorus. But China's growth is in large part a testament to the fusing of foreign capital and Chinese hard work in that country.
During the next four decades the world will become a different place. The future will be different from the past and anything other than a policy of fully engaging and seeking the best possible mutual understanding with China is simply not an option. A part of the challenge for all of us in the UK will involve visualising a world that will look different in 10, 20 or 30 years, particularly our relationship with China. Western dependency on Chinese products will grow, especially as we need to keep interest rates down.
An element of the challenge of our relationship with China is that, as a country, China is somewhat sui generis, as one of our colleagues, George Walden, observed in his book, "China: A Wolf in the World?" I quote from certain books, Mr. Fraser, because I do not want to give the impression that the only person in the Conservative party who reads books is my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Norfolk. I want it to be understood that some of the rest of us read books as well. [Interruption.] I should say to the Minister that that is an in-joke.
The Minister for Europe (Chris Bryant): Not a very good one.
Christopher Fraser (in the Chair): Order.
Tony Baldry: In his excellent book, "China: A Wolf in the World?", George Walden, who was a young diplomat in Beijing for many years, wrote:
"Which other country with a billion plus population-a five thousand year old civilisation who from its own perspective has always seen itself as the centre of the world-which has been catapulted from extreme left-wing totalitarianism to a headlong rush to consumerism and the outward signs of capitalism in just three decades-whilst at the same time maintaining a Communist political structure".
That quote demonstrates that China is a unique country. Understanding China will be one of the great challenges of the 21st century.
China sees itself as a civilisation state of understandable antiquity. We all see ourselves from our own perspective. Emperor Qianlong's comments to George III's petition are probably almost as relevant today:
"I have perused your memorial. The earnest terms in which it is couched reveal a respectful humility on your part, which is highly
praiseworthy...My capital is the hub and centre about which all quarters of the globe revolve...I do not forget the lonely remoteness of your island, cut off from the world by intervening wastes of sea...Our dynasty, swaying the myriad races of the globe, extends the same benevolence towards all."
I suspect that quite a number in Beijing, in slightly different terms, still perceive us slightly in that way today.
As Martin Jacques observes in his recent book, "When China Rules the World", China
"still has almost the same borders that it acquired at the maximum extent of the Qing empire in the late eighteenth century. The state remains as pivotal in society and as sacrosanct as it was in imperial times. Confucius, its great architect, is in the process of experiencing a revival and his precepts still, in important measure, inform the way China thinks and behaves."
He went on to say, perhaps more contentiously:
"The legitimacy of the Chinese state, profound and deeply rooted, does not depend on an electoral mandate; indeed, even if universal suffrage was to be introduced, the taproots of the state's legitimacy would still lie in the country's millennial foundations. The Chinese state remains a highly competent institution, probably superior to any other state-tradition in the world and likely to exercise a powerful influence on the rest of the world in the future."
My concern, and the reason why I sought this debate, is that during the end of last year and the start of this year three things happened, which, in different ways, show that China and this country need to make much greater efforts to understand each other. None of us wants a situation in which we kowtow to China's increasing economic influence, and China will not listen if we give the impression of hectoring. Engagement must be on the basis of mutual respect, and we should endeavour to understand each other.
In the case of the Copenhagen conference on climate change, the bottom line was that China did not want a bottom line. As one Danish official observed, "China doesn't do numbers". China was not even willing for developed countries to set out their own CO2 reduction targets. One can understand that China-the largest CO2 emitter in the world-still sees itself as a developing nation, and would be wary of any target that might be set. However, one is inclined to ask: where were the sherpas? Why had China not communicated its misgivings much earlier, and how was it that others, such as ourselves and our colleagues in the United States, had not picked up on those concerns? Why was it left until the last two days of the conference?
I was not at Copenhagen-I do not think that any hon. Members present were-but Mark Lynas, a writer for The Guardian, was attached to one of the delegations. In an article written immediately after the events, when matters were fresh in his mind, he observed:
"The truth is this: China wrecked the talks, intentionally humiliated Barack Obama, and insisted on an awful 'deal' so western leaders would walk away carrying the blame. How do I know this? Because I was in the room and saw it happen. China's strategy was simple: block the open negotiations for two weeks, and then ensure that the closed-door deal made it look as if the west had failed the world's poor once again. And sure enough, the aid agencies, civil society movements and environmental groups all took the bait... All very predictable, but the complete opposite of the truth...China gutted the deal behind the scenes, and then
left its proxies to savage it in public...it was China's representative who insisted that industrialised country targets, previously agreed as an 80 per cent. cut by 2050, be taken out of the deal."
The suggestion is that the whole Copenhagen conference and the accord were effectively undermined and sabotaged by Chinese mendacity-that is how Lynas puts it.
I believe that it is unlikely that China deliberately intended to ruin the Copenhagen conference, or that it wanted to be accused of systematically wrecking the accord. It is interesting that almost immediately after the conference, a senior member of the Chinese negotiating team at Copenhagen was shifted. The media have been speculating that that was punishment for the debacle of the climate change talks. He Yafei, who was at the forefront of the negotiations, was removed as Vice-Foreign Minister, and it is suggested that he was removed for failing to ensure smooth relations between China, the US and Europe.
In advance of what was clearly a major world conference, why did China and the rest of the world not have better established negotiating positions and work out where the red lines were going to be? There was the bizarre situation of Barack Obama having to burst into the room on practically the last day of the conference, find a seat, and help to guide the negotiations to the Copenhagen accord. I hope that the UK, those in the embassy in Beijing and representatives of the European Union mission, are talking to their counterparts in Beijing to seek to better understand whether China meant to wreck the talks, or whether there was a tragic failure of understanding. If China did mean to wreck the talks, that is a serious matter. China takes on the rotating presidency of the UN Security Council this month, and it cannot afford misunderstandings any more than we can.
Mr. Evans: I attended the Copenhagen conference for one of the days, although I was not privy to that particular meeting. Like my hon. Friend, I would be amazed if China had gone wilfully to try to sabotage the talks. Does my hon. Friend agree that in the past, Hu Jintao has said supportive things about wanting to tackle climate change, and that we must work closely with other countries to ensure that China has nothing to fear from coming to an agreement about what action needs to be taken? Vast tracts of China are developing but are impoverished. China must have no fear of working with the west, so that we can reach an agreement that will not prevent the developing parts of China from progressing into the 21st century.
Tony Baldry: My hon. Friend uses an extremely good phrase-we must convince China that it has nothing to fear. It must have nothing to fear from being part of the international community, from moving towards more democratic processes or from opening up society. Today, we have the bizarre situation that Google is threatening to pull out of China altogether. However, it is difficult to see how the world's largest exporter, and a country whose economy is growing exponentially, will manage if internet providers start shutting down services. There could be a collision between the concerns of the Chinese Communist party and Government, who on the one hand want to maintain party control, but on the other hand want economic expansion. We must help China to recognise that it has nothing to fear.
Something else that happened while the House was in recess was the conviction of Liu Xiaobo for supposedly subverting state power. His trial lasted just two hours, and resulted in an 11-year sentence of imprisonment for doing no more than seeking to promote democracy. He simply said that China should have a more democratic system-something that many people have said.
Zhao Ziyang was the general secretary of the Chinese Communist party at the time of the Tiananmen square massacre. As hon. Members will recall, he intervened with the students and tried to get the demonstration called off. For his pains, he was sacked as general secretary, and spent the rest of his life under house arrest. He managed to record his memoirs on a children's tape recorder, and after he died, what was in effect his autobiography was discovered and published.
Zhao Ziyang quotes his predecessor, Hu Yaobang, general secretary until 1987, who stated:
"In the history of mankind, in the struggle of the newly emerged bourgeoisie and the working class against feudal dictatorship, the formation of the ideas of democracy, freedom, equality, and fraternity greatly liberated the human spirit. The most important lessons learned during the development of socialism were: first, neglecting development of the economy, and second, failing to build real democratic politics."
Therefore, two successive general secretaries of the Chinese Communist party recognised that it will be difficult to build China without having some regard to enhancing democracy. It is tragic that someone who did no more than promote Charter 08, which calls for a constitution guaranteeing human rights, should be serving 11 years of imprisonment.
That is not an isolated case. Last July, the Chinese Government suddenly detained the famous lawyer Dr. Xu Zhiyong, who is an activist renowned for his work on behalf of China's most disadvantaged, and for his commitment to advancing the rule of law in China. He is not an extremist; he is a mainstream lawyer. He had a clear record of support for incremental reform in his litigation, which was aimed at the enforcement of guarantees already enumerated in the Chinese constitution, and he had won a seat on his local people's congress in a district of Beijing. However, he was detained on what clearly, as I think everyone recognised, were somewhat trumped-up charges in respect of "suspicion of evading taxes".
Last year's Amnesty International report on China makes dismal reading. It states:
"Individuals who peacefully exercised their rights to freedom of expression, assembly and association remained at high risk of harassment, house arrest, arbitrary detention, and torture and other ill-treatment. Family members of human rights activists, including children, were increasingly targeted by the authorities, including being subjected to long-term house arrest and harassment by security forces. Lawyers who took on sensitive cases were also at risk; several had their licences suspended, and others lost their jobs. Some lawyers were specifically warned by the authorities not to take on sensitive cases".
The reality is that the conviction and extremely harsh sentencing of Liu Xiaobo mark a further severe restriction on the scope of freedom of expression in China. It is a system that still massively restricts freedom of opinion and is very suspicious of anyone who organises, but just as we must seek to understand China and the Chinese position, so too must they understand that, for us, human rights are universal. That is the whole point about the universal declaration of human rights. If we
as individuals and parliamentarians in this country regularly raise issues about human rights, it is not because we wish to be antagonistic or hostile or to appear hectoring, but because we believe that we have an innate duty as world citizens to seek to defend human rights irrespective of borders.
Lastly, there was the case of Akmal Shaikh, which resulted in the Prime Minister saying that he was "appalled" and a spokesperson for the Chinese Government retorting:
"We urge the British side to mend its errors and avoid damaging China-British relations."
I cannot recall when the Prime Minister and Ministers were exhorted by an official spokesperson of the Chinese Government to "mend their errors". That is going back almost to the days of the cultural revolution.
Clearly, the case of Akmal Shaikh was very sad. It is difficult to know whether Akmal Shaikh was so mentally ill as to be unfit to plead, but it was very sad that the Chinese authorities did not feel able to spend sufficient time making those inquiries. It is fair to say that the House is now collectively opposed to the death penalty anywhere in the world.
There seems to have been a breakdown of communication between us and the Chinese Government. There must have been, because the fact that the Prime Minister used a word such as "appalled" about the action of the Chinese Government and that the Chinese Government responded with a phrase such as "mend our errors" suggests that there had clearly been an expectation on the part of our embassy in Beijing and the Government and the Foreign Office that pleas of mitigation on behalf of Akmal Shaikh would succeed. On the part of the Chinese Government, there was clearly frustration that they were being misunderstood and it looked as though we were trying to interfere publicly in their administration of justice. The point I am making is that we both need to make far better attempts to understand each other and what we are really saying to each other, so that we do not end up with a public spat of that kind. It was hardly a good way to end one decade of Anglo-Chinese relationships and start another.
Of course, there is an enormous amount for us to celebrate with China. As my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans) said, we increasingly see trade expanding between the UK and China, which is very good news. This year, we shall have the Shanghai expo. I understand that the UK national day at the Shanghai expo is 8 September 2010-that is 8.9.10, which must be extremely good feng shui. We are about to start the year of the tiger. We are delighted to see ever increasing numbers of Chinese students coming to the United Kingdom, which is testament to China's belief in education and the belief that students will receive a good education in the United Kingdom. That is also to be celebrated. Considerable numbers of Chinese tourists come to the UK. Indeed, the largest single destination for Chinese tourists in the UK is Bicester Village in my constituency-I exhort any officials in the Foreign Office who have not yet been to Bicester Village to ensure that the Minister visits it.
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