Written evidence from the UK Overseas
Territories Conservation Forum (UKOTCF)
SUMMARY
An important part of the FCO's role is to ensure
that the distinctive interests of the overseas territories are
taken into account right across government. As lead department
for the UK overseas territories, the FCO needs to act as their
guardians and ensure that all government departments play their
role in safeguarding those interests. Parliament needs to be able
to rely on the FCO to support the effectiveness of appropriate
institutions of good governance in the territories (eg freedom
of information acts, an Ombudsman or equivalent, provision for
independent review of major planning and fiscal decisions). Where
non-governmental organisations in the territories and in the UK
have relevant experience—as is the case on many environmental
issues—the FCO (and other government departments) should
make sure that their contributions are welcomed, and early, towards
policy development and implementation.
DETAIL
1. The UK Overseas Territories Conservation Forum
(UKOTCF or the Forum) promotes the conservation of biodiversity,
ecosystem services, and their contribution, together with other
aspects of natural and human heritage, to the well-being and sustainability
of the UK Overseas Territories (UKOTs). Member organisations include
leading environmental bodies in the UK, the UKOTs, and the Crown
Dependencies (CDs). The last (the Channel Islands and the Isle
of Man) share many conservation challenges and aspects of governance
with the UKOTs, including reliance on HMG to represent their interests
internationally, under international conventions, including Multilateral
Environmental Agreements (MEAs), and in related negotiations.
UKOTCF and associated organisations have given evidence to earlier
inquiries by the FAC and other select committees in relation to
the fulfilment of the UK's responsibilities in respect of the
UKOTs.
2. This submission relates primarily to the UK's
overseas territories for two reasons. First, that is in line with
our priorities. Secondly, the FCO leads within government on policy
concerning the overseas territories. The forthcoming White Paper
on the overseas territories will be drafted by FCO officials and
approved by FCO ministers, as was the 1999 White Paper—with,
of course, contributions from and agreement by other government
departments. We would hope that the Committee would accept that
there should be no dilution of policy within the 1999 White Paper,
nor from the specific commitments on the UKOTs made in the 2006
White Paper on the UK's foreign policy. A case can perhaps be
made for a different institutional structure. The overseas territories
are not foreign and—as with other sub-national jurisdictions
(the devolved administrations and the Crown Dependencies)—voters
at these sub-national levels of government remain British citizens.
However, this inquiry concerns the current responsibilities of
the FCO. Precisely because they are not foreign countries, the
overseas territories are sometimes not given the attention they
deserve. That said, we are greatly encouraged by the importance
which current FCO ministers attach to the territories—evident
in that two territories have already been visited by Mr Bellingham;
through recent speeches; and by the fact that the territories
are listed as one of the FAC's priority issues. We hope this will
be reflected in your report.
What is the FCO's role in UK Government?
3. The FCO has three inter-related roles. The
first is making policy in areas where it has the lead role. The
second is its coordinating role, where other departments often
have the primary input on policy, but where there are overseas
bilateral, regional or international dimensions that need to be
taken into account. Third, the FCO has a managerial role in staffing
and managing our network of overseas posts (including in the UKOTs)
and in using them to communicate with other governments and overseas
or international governments and other organisations.
4. Under present arrangements, the FCO is the
lead department in Whitehall for the UKOTs. That means that, in
relation to the UK Parliament and to the international community,
the FCO is responsible for the good governance of the territories.
However, most territories have their own locally elected governments,
so a delicate balance has to be struck between respecting the
autonomy of the territories and making sure that appropriate standards
are observed in such areas as public security, the integrity of
public administration and justice. The responsibilities of governors
of overseas territories are not easy because they need to communicate
to the people and government of the territory the policies and
concerns of UK ministers and officials where these affect the
territory; but they also have to make sure that ministers and
officials in Whitehall are aware of local concerns.
5. Policy areas where the FCO has the lead include
such fundamental issues as constitutional reform, and the appointment
of governors and their staff. However, many areas can impact on
overseas territories where the lead and the expertise lie elsewhere:
offshore finance, international transport, international trade,
climate change, defence, physical planning, education in the UK,
nationality. Here the crucial role of the FCO is a coordinating
one, to make sure that the interests of the UKOTs are taken into
account. That means making sure that other government departments
are aware, for example, that international agreements may affect
the UKOTs as well as the metropolitan UK. One area of direct interest
to UKOTCF is multilateral environmental agreements. Here the lead
department is usually Defra but, even here, there is not one single
division with responsibility as, for example, marine and fisheries
are dealt with by different officials than those that deal in
general with the MEAs. Because of the rich biodiversity of the
UKOTs (comparatively much richer than in metropolitan UK), there
is often much directly relevant experience in NGOs, both in the
territories and in the UK. However, there is also a crucial issue
of resources, both human and financial, for good environmental
governance in the territories. The territories are often small
in population and remote. Many of the areas richest in biodiversity
are islands that have no permanent resident population but where
the threats to biodiversity stem from historic damage to the environment,
often through invasive alien species: goats, rats, even reindeer
in South Georgia, and several plants species. Support from the
UK is essential, and the FCO thus has a dual role both in providing
support and in making sure that appropriate support is provided
by other government departments and by collaboration with NGOs.
6. A historic example of the complexity of the
FCO's role in respect of the overseas territories in working with
other government departments and with NGOs is provided by the
proposal made in 1998 by a US company, Beal Aerospace, to construct
a satellite launch station on Sombrero, an uninhabited island
in the Caribbean overseas territory of Anguilla.
7. First, the Governor needed to advise FCO of
the proposal, which had been made directly to the Government of
Anguilla (GOA); and to ask that the FCO make expert advice available.
Much of that went beyond the competence of FCO officials. Other
departments had to be consulted on international agreements on
space, on international transport, on trade, on biodiversity and
on planning. The government of Anguilla asked the FCO to arrange
for the UK Planning Inspectorate to help it organize a public
consultation on the proposal and on the Environmental Impact Assessment
prepared by consultants for Beal Aerospace. There was a major
NGO contribution involving several UKOTCF members, as independent
evidence was needed about the island's unique ecosystem. The FCO
also had to handle lobbying from the company and from the US government.
8. The main lesson from this example is that
the FCO can best support the overseas territories when it uses
its power of convocation to draw in outside expertise as early
as possible, including other departments and civil society.
How should the Foreign Secretary's claim to be
putting the FCO "back where it belongs at the centre of Government"
be assessed?
9. In relation to the Overseas Territories, the
FCO should be assessed in terms of its active engagement with
other government departments and with civil society. The existence
of the overseas territories and their distinctive contributions
to the extended British family is not well understood, either
by officials or by civil society throughout the UK. The FCO needs
to develop a more active role in explaining that part of Britain's
human and constitutional diversity lies in these territories beyond
our shores, but within the extended British family.
Could the FCO better organise and utilise its
financial and human resources so as to fulfil its role?
10. In relation to the Overseas Territories,
one way government as a whole could better organise resources,
with the FCO taking a leading role, would be by encouraging secondments
between departments and the governments of overseas territories
(especially, but not only, governors' offices). That would give
territories the benefit of wider Whitehall expertise than just
that developed in the FCO; and over time it might help to build
up a greater appreciation in other Whitehall departments of the
distinctive features of life for fellow British citizens in the
overseas territories.
11. The most important task, however, is for
the FCO and other departments to work with the overseas territories
to make sure that there are local structural checks and balances
to support good governance—and that these work effectively,
with adequate resources. Small territories are often like towns
or villages: all the political players know each other and many
are inter-related by family or business relationships. This can
mean undue personal influence in such areas of life as access
to information, planning permission and the operation of an independent
judicial system.
12. In part, the position of the Governor's whole
role is very different from that of an Ambassador by providing
a constitutional guarantee of the UK's ability to intervene when
that is necessary to ensure good governance. Nevertheless—as
has been seen in the current example of the Turks and Caicos Islands—needing
to invoke the constitutional authority of the governor to intervene
is likely to be a sign that things have gone badly wrong at much
earlier stages. It is not for the UKOTCF to offer views here on
any specific territory. But in such areas as freedom of information,
access to an Ombudsman (or comparable independent authorities
guards against maladministration) and provision for independent
review of major planning and financial decisions, it is far better
for the citizens of the overseas territories that there are appropriate
structures in place to enable them to hold elected and unelected
officials to account. To rely too far on governors, who are, after
all, generally "birds of passage", to guarantee good
governance of the overseas territories is unrealistic. Governors
should be seen primarily as helping the FCO to ensure that the
interests of the territories are appreciated throughout HMG and
civil society in the UK; and to protect the territories' interests
internationally. Good governance should generally be assured for
the citizens of the overseas territories through local democratic
institutions working within adequate local checks and balances,
with the FCO monitoring actively.
How does the FCO work across Whitehall? Are the
FCO and its resources organised so as to facilitate cross-Government
cooperation?
13. How the FCO works across Whitehall is partly
for it to explain in ways which encourage clarity in how its ministers
and officials understand their own role. One way to do this (which
relates also to the first two headings) would be to identify areas
where effective cooperation with overseas countries, bilaterally,
regionally and within international organizations, is important
for securing HMG's policy objectives; and identifying the ways
in which ministers, senior officials and desk-officers (including
in overseas posts) coordinate their work. At the simplest level,
this may simply mean making sure that relevant officials in other
government departments are kept in the picture. However, the civil
service, and indeed coordination in general, needs leadership,
so effective joined-up government is only likely when there is
meaningful contact between ministers, not just officials, when
policy implications cross departmental boundaries. Any interdepartmental
working groups established, whether at ministerial or official
level, should actually meet and function on a regular basis.
What should be the role of the FCO's network of
overseas posts?
14. Their role should be to support and serve
all UK citizens, their governments, their civil institutions and
commercial companies. They should do this, of course, for those
who have good reason to call on their services. Governments is
plural because while it will often be the FCO and other central
government departments that inform posts of personal and institutional
interests that may need their support, these interests may often
best be defined by other levels of government, including those
in the overseas territories as well as the devolved administrations
and the Crown Dependencies.
What is the FCO's role in explaining UK foreign
policy to the British public?
15. The role is not just to explain foreign policy,
but to relate it to other policy areas and to show how they are
interrelated. Classic examples are defence, trade, international
development, global environmental issues, conflict prevention
and resolution. As far as environmental issues are concerned,
the FCO has sensibly retained a key role in climate change but
now takes a far less direct interest in the loss of global diversity
and environmental degradation, especially of the marine environment,
with the single exception of polar regions (because of the UK's
territorial stake in Antarctica and in the Antarctic treaty system).
While it is right that the lead on specific international issues
such as policy within the Convention on Biological Diversity should
lie with Defra, the FCO needs to retain an active interest and
engagement. The greatest stake that Britain has in both global
biodiversity and in the marine environment is one where the overall
lead lies with the FCO: the overseas territories.
What should be the FCO's role in relation to non-governmental
organisations?
16. The FCO has generally shown an awareness
of the importance of NGOs in public life in Britain. UKOTCF has
experienced a good spirit of cooperation in the past with the
FCO, which had waned a little in recent times, but is now building
once more, and we very much hope it continues to do so—and
certainly the Forum will play its part. What matters above all
is that consultation is part of a natural working pattern, rather
than just when governments feel the need to demonstrate that consultation
has taken place. There can be a tendency, when an issue has any
degree of sensitivity, for different government departments to
get together to decide what their position will be, before engaging
with NGOs. That is not the best way to benefit from the different
perspective which NGOs can often provide; and which can help governments
to avoid mistakes. A classic illustration of this has been the
derivation of the UK Government's rather deficient "UK Overseas
Territories' Biodiversity Strategy". This document was agreed
by Defra, DFID, FCO and JNCC, but received no input from NGOs,
private sector or scientific institutions—all of which are
listed, rather ironically, in the Minister's foreword as a prerequisite
for success.
Given the new Government's emphasis on using the
FCO to promote UK trade and economic recovery, how can the Department
best avoid potential conflicts between this task, support for
human rights, and the pursuit of other Government objectives?
17. This question has perhaps limited application
to environmental issues in the overseas territories. However,
respect for the human rights of those who are UK citizens by virtue
of their being associated with a UK overseas territory is
fundamental to the credibility of the FCO in promoting good governance
internationally and human rights, as well as good fiscal and environmental
governance.
3 December 2010
|
