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Baroness Miller of Hendon: I think that in an enabling Bill it is more appropriate to have positive rather than negative resolutions. Therefore, clearly I am disappointed by what the noble Lord has said. I was interested in his views that everything is probably technical and that many noble Lords would not want to spend time debating such matters. That is
absolutely true. But then of course they would not have to. It would be left to those noble Lords who are interested in scrutinising them carefully to do so. I do not think that that is a reason against having the provision. However, at this stage in the evening, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 69 to 70A not moved.]
[Amendment No. 71 had been withdrawn from the Marshalled List.]
Schedule [Purposes for making control orders]:
Lord Sainsbury of Turville moved Amendment No. 72:
- Page 9, leave out lines 3 to 10.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
[Amendment No. 73 had been withdrawn from the Marshalled List.]
Lord Sainsbury of Turville moved Amendment No. 74:
- Page 9, line 10, at end insert—
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Sainsbury of Turville moved Amendment No. 75:
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Turner): The Question is that Amendment No. 75 shall be agreed to. I have to say that if this is agreed I cannot call Amendment No. 76 on the grounds of pre-emption.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Sainsbury of Turville moved Amendment No. 77:
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Baroness Miller of Hendon moved Amendment No. 78:
The noble Baroness said: Scattered through the schedule to the Bill are the recommendations of the Scott report as to the purposes,
The police around the world are often in the forefront of the fight against terrorism, insurrection and public disorder. One often sees rioting, orchestrated by masked organisers standing well back from the police lines.
In Northern Ireland, the police have long been the target of IRA assassins; likewise, the Spanish police have been the target of ETA. These terrorist groups exchange intelligence and advice on how to carry out their murderous purposes and supply each other with material support in the form of arms and explosives.
Members of the United Kingdom police service, as well as members of overseas police services, deserve no less protection under the Bill than their colleagues in the Armed Forces. I hope that the Government agree and will accept the amendment. I beg to move.
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: The amendment seeks to include a reference to the police services under paragraph 7(2)(A)(b) of the schedule to the Bill. I shall not use the word "unnecessary". I shall say that it is "not required" or "does not add anything of value to the Bill", because I know that the noble Baroness does not like that word.
I am grateful to the noble Baroness for raising the issue as it gives me the opportunity to explain how, under the Bill, we would have the necessary powers to impose controls where this was judged necessary for the protection of members of our police forces both at home and abroad.
First, of course, the schedule, as amended, makes clear that the Government can impose controls in relation to any military equipment and technology. That will therefore ensure that all weapons and related equipment, which arguably are likely to pose the greatest threat to the police, can be controlled. There are also a number of other reasons for which controls could be imposed that would be relevant to protecting the safety of our police forces at home and abroad.
Paragraph E of the table to the schedule refers to the risk of acts of terrorism or serious crime being carried out anywhere in the world. That allows us, for example, to impose controls in relation to items which might be used for such purposes either abroad, or indeed where there was a risk of their being diverted from the intended end user and smuggled into the UK for use in terrorism or serious crime.
In addition, paragraph A of the table in the schedule provides that controls can be imposed where there is a risk of an adverse effect on national security. That allows controls to be imposed in relation to types of equipment or technology that poses a significant threat to the police forces in this country or those of other member states or friendly states.
Finally, under paragraph B of the table in the schedule we can impose controls to avoid risks of an adverse effect on peace, security or stability in any region of the world or within any country. Under paragraph D we can impose controls in relation to equipment or technology where there is a risk that it might be used for internal repression or breaches of human rights. These powers allow us to impose controls that would be relevant to the protection of any police officers of the UK, other member states or friendly countries working abroad.
So we believe that the Bill would allow us to impose controls on goods or technologies posing a specific threat to our police forces and those of other EU member states and other friendly countries, whether in the UK or abroad. But I remind Members of the Committee that even if we found that we needed to impose controls on particular items that posed a threat only to our police forces abroad and which we could not bring in under the schedule as drafted, we would have the power to introduce temporary controls—with Parliament's express approval—on goods and technologies that fall outside the categories permitted in Clause 5 and the schedule. In the longer term, we could add to the table in the schedule. We therefore
Baroness Miller of Hendon: I am comforted by what the noble Lord has said. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Redesdale moved Amendment No. 79:
"1 (1) Export controls and trade controls may be imposed in relation to—
(a) military equipment;
(b) goods on which military technology is recorded or from which it can be derived;
(c) equipment intended, designed or adapted for use in the development or production of military equipment.
(2) Transfer controls may be imposed in relation to military technology.
(3) Technical assistance controls may be imposed in relation to any services connected with the development, production or use of—
(a) military equipment;
(b) military technology; or
(c) equipment falling within sub-paragraph (1)(c).
(4) In this paragraph (without prejudice to the generality of the terms)—
"military equipment" includes—
(a) firearms and other weapons (whether or not intended, designed or adapted for military use or in military use);
(b) goods intended, designed or adapted for military use (whether or not in military use); and
"military technology" includes technology intended, designed or adapted—
(a) for military use; or
(b) for use in connection with the development, production or use of military equipment or equipment falling within sub-paragraph (1)(c).
(5) For the purposes of sub-paragraph (4) the reference to firearms and other weapons includes a reference to—
(a) component parts of firearms or other weapons;
(b) accessories for use with firearms or other weapons; and
(c) ammunition, missiles or projectiles of any kind which are intended, designed or adapted for use with firearms or other weapons."
Page 9, leave out lines 11 to 27 and insert—
"2 (1) Export controls may be imposed in relation to any goods the exportation or use of which is capable of having a relevant consequence.
(2) Transfer controls may be imposed in relation to any technology the transfer or use of which is capable of having such a consequence.
(3) Technical assistance controls may be imposed in relation to any technical assistance the provision or use of which is capable of having such a consequence.
(4) Trade controls may be imposed in relation to any goods the acquisition, disposal, movement or use of which is capable of having such a consequence."
Page 9, line 28, leave out "this Schedule" and insert "paragraph 2"
Page 9, line 36, at end insert "or the police services"
"for which export controls may, subject to Parliamentary approbation, be imposed and used".
I believe that those purposes will be strengthened by adding the police service to its colleagues in the Armed Forces whose security deserves protection.
Page 10, line 16, at end insert—
F An adverse effect on—
(a) the economic capacity; or
(b) the sustainable development of the country to which the goods were exported, or the technology was transferred."
The noble Lord said: I speak to Amendment No. 79 standing in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Razzall. The Government have made a series of complicated amendments to address the concerns raised regarding the status of sustainable development. However, this simple amendment to include the reference to "sustainable development" in the schedule would have been sufficient.
The Government have never answered the straightforward questions as to why a reference to "sustainable development" was included in the draft Bill but removed when the Bill was presented to Parliament. The Government have presented a number of arguments stating that the role of the schedule now relates solely to defining equipment to be controlled. The Government have argued that that has always been the case but as mentioned during discussion of earlier government amendments that was certainly not the impression given by Ministers in oral evidence to the Quadripartite Committee, or in briefing material on the Bill.
One issue remains to be addressed. An export or transfer order can be made only for a purpose elaborated in the schedule, therefore excluding sustainable development from the schedule means that an order could not be made for that purpose. Our advice states:
"However much other matters have to be taken into account, they cannot justify making an order for a purpose which is not listed on the Schedule".
That means that it would not be possible to introduce specific secondary legislation under the Bill in order more tightly to control exports that could hamper sustainable development, whereas the Government could introduce orders laying out a more detailed definition of what constitutes internal repression, for example. It is important not to restrict the powers of future secretaries of state in that way. For example, secondary legislation could be useful to provide a more detailed definition of sustainable development. We believe that there is no legal reason why the provision could not be added to the schedule and we hope that the government will accept that. I beg to move.
8 p.m.
The Lord Bishop of Manchester: It is late, and fortunately some of the things that I was going to say have already been said. I still want to add a voice of thanks to the Government for taking sustainable development seriously as a principle, but we remain concerned about the weight to be given to sustainable development and whether it will be mandatory.
Accepting the amendment and making sustainable development one of the relevant consequences in the table schedule would, as the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, said, send a clear signal. It would be an obvious way to set out the facts if we were to include it in the table. The simple amendment is unambiguous and transparent and would be sufficient to satisfy many of our concerns.
Sustainable development is such a significant criterion because of the quantitative dimension that comes into play when we think about export sales. In the case of large weapons platforms, whether aircraft carriers or fighter planes, the intrinsic expense can prove problematic, as we have seen in the case of Tanzania. Alternatively, a similar situation can arise with lower cost items when purchases are on a large scale.
But there is more to such sales than those who arrange the finance, those who license such exports and the government of the country to which such goods are exported. Many Members of the Committee will be aware that in the debate about cancelling the debts of the poorest countries, attention is now given to poverty reduction strategy papers. Each country applying for debt relief must set out how it will organise its internal affairs, structure its economy and plan its spending so that the resources made available through loans and debt remittance can benefit the poorest.
At least three parties must be involved: the government of the country concerned; the external funders such as the World Bank and wealthy nations; and, thirdly, civil society represented by local non-governmental organisations, people in local organisations and voluntary groups right down to the grass roots. That is a very different scenario from the World Bank or similar bodies imposing policies on the grounds that they know best and very different from private and secret deals between external powers and the government of the day in a heavily indebted nation.
I return to the case of Tanzania. The Tanzania Association of NGOs has been shocked to learn that its government have committed the nation to an additional 40 million dollars of commercial debt in addition to their existing unsustainable debt, bearing in mind the work that still needs to be done to educate the poorest in that country. It seems to those in Tanzanian civil society who are aware of what is going on that that act is inconsistent with the United Kingdom Government's own international aid, debt relief and sustainable development policies. It is ironic that we in the United Kingdom may be giving vital budgetary support for debt relief with one hand and taking it back with the other.
I said on the Bill's first day in Committee, citing the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Lichfield in earlier debates, that there needs to be a moral presumption against arms sales unless the case for a particular transfer can be proven. Tonight, I go a stage further. There needs to be a moral presumption in favour of poverty reduction, sustainable development and the enabling of human flourishing—what is known in another place as joined-up thinking. There is a moral imperative to help to shape the world so that all can live in what is now a small globe in justice and peace.
The Secretary of State for International Development, citing recent figures—some of them familiar to us, but we need to continue to absorb them—said that one in five of the world's population, two-thirds of them women, live in extreme poverty on less than a dollar a day. About 150 million children are underweight, which is a severe risk to their physical and mental development. More than 36 million people worldwide are infected with HIV; 130 million children have never been to school.
If we call ourselves civilised, we will want to contribute significantly to world development by ensuring that not simply charitable, voluntary work but our economy, our legislation and our politics are conducted in such a way as to enable global human flourishing. I was not able to be present—perhaps some Members of the Committee were—but I am aware that a few days ago, on 26th February, I think, here in Westminster, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Secretary of State for International Development convened a meeting at which the United Nations Millennium Development Goals were endorsed by representatives of the governments of Africa, Latin America, Europe, the Pacific Rim and North America, together with leaders of the United Nations bodies, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and development agencies.
I say all that because I want clearly to lay down not only the need for sustainable development but the huge international pressure that we might work together for debt relief, the reduction of poverty and, indeed, sustainable development. The amendment offers a way to ensure unambiguously that it is a mandatory element of the Bill—not simply on the face of the Bill but a mandatory element of its table—to ensure that the economic capacity and sustainable development of the country to which goods are to be exported or technology transferred are taken into account in the process of deciding the illegitimacy or otherwise of such exports. We have already heard from the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, about the proposed sale of Hawk aircraft to India. I shall not repeat the figures, but simply say that alongside the obvious security concerns of allowing that sale to proceed are, as the noble Earl reminded us, serious developmental concerns.
The question raised by the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, stands. If there is no reference in the table in the schedule to the whole question of sustainable development, does that exclusion mean that it will be possible to argue that an order cannot be made for that purpose? I have also consulted lawyers and I am
advised that there is no justification at law, however much other matters have to be taken into account, for making an order for a purpose not listed in the schedule. A lawyer could argue that it could not be taken into account. I need to be assured by the Government that if sustainable development is not listed in the schedule, it will—not can but will—be taken into account as a mandatory requirement.I take some interest in urban areas in England, and I find it strange that a Government that could in May 1999 produce a sensible and coherent strategy for a better quality of life and sustainable development for the United Kingdom are now so shy and coy about doing so on a global scale. The reason that I cited the case of Tanzania and the involvement of civil society is that that removes from us the sense that we cannot make decisions that involve other people—that when we are talking to other governments it must be their decision on their own. It will seem strange to many people, not only in the United Kingdom but internationally, if we are so coy about the matter.
We must make sustainable development a mandatory requirement for consideration, which is why I support the amendment to include it in the table.
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