You are here: Parliament home page > Parliamentary business > Publications and Records > Lords Publications > Lords Hansard > Daily Hansard
Previous Section Back to Table of Contents Lords Hansard Home Page

Lord Chidgey: My Lords, rising to speak to your Lordships for the first time in this House cannot but fill one with a sense of humility. I look around, in the shadow of the bronze statues of 16 barons and two archbishops who, in 1215, forced King John to sign the Magna Carta—that great charter that laid down for the first time the statutes that protected our citizens from the excesses of the state. For 700 years, it was the point of reference for the constitutional rights of our citizens, until, in the 19th century, the growth of more utilitarian laws consigned it more to the backwaters of our legal process.

Speaking to your Lordships in the shadow of the Magna Carta barons, as a newly-created baron, I find it a hard act to follow. Nevertheless, I should like to place on record the fact that, since joining your Lordships' House, I have been overwhelmed by the courtesy, kindness and assistance of the staff of this House, and overwhelmed equally by the welcome offered by Members of this House from all political persuasions.

Your Lordships who were previously Members of another place may recall that I entered politics rather late in life—as an aunt of mine once said, "At an age when you ought to have known better". In total, I fought six elections—two in Europe, one of which was
 
29 Jun 2005 : Column 298
 
a by-election, and four for Westminster, one of which was a by-election. In fact, I suspect that fighting a by-election for both Parliaments might be almost unique. It might be a good Trivial Pursuit question if not practice. Nevertheless, having found my score standing at three losses and three wins, it seemed a good time to quit—if not quite ahead, at least even.

I should like to turn specifically to the debate before us today, on the progress of the G8 and the EU in the cause of defeating global terrorism, instigated by the noble Lord, Lord Judd, with whom I have had the pleasure to serve on the Joint Committee on Human Rights. We were united as lay men, often in awe of the eminence of the lawyers who grace that committee. Often was the cry heard, "But we are not lawyers", until it was taken from our lips and thrown to one side as unworthy of the committee.

I shall concentrate on the progress made in Afghanistan—the old north-west frontier, home of the Taliban and the breeding ground of al-Qaeda. I am particularly concerned about the progress in addressing the military and economic issues in that region, as they bear so directly on terrorism.

Your Lordships will be aware that nearly all the heroin that enters the European Union and the United Kingdom starts from Afghanistan. To their credit, the Government have recognised the problem and committed resources to try to address it. I understand that their target is a 75 per cent reduction in poppy cultivation by 2008 and complete eradication by 2013. I understand also that the United Kingdom's counter-narcotics budget has risen from £30,000 in 2001 to £16 million in 2004. It is forecast to rise to £20 million in 2005. However, I also understand that poppy cultivation has also increased, from 8,000 hectares in 2001 to more than 130,000 hectares in 2004.

Clearly, the pressures are enormous. Afghanistan is one of the poorest countries in the world. The proceeds from one hectare of cultivated wheat is about £120; the proceeds from one hectare of poppies is £7,000. It is no wonder that the warlords are happy to pay farmers in advance for their crops. It is estimated that, last year, the income gained by each of the warlords in Pakistan from heroin and retained border taxes exceeded £150 million per year. That somewhat dwarfs the United Kingdom's counter-narcotics budget.

It is also clear that the United Kingdom's effort, despite these problems, is greatly appreciated and admired—but I suggest that we need to see similar support from our European Union colleagues to address what is after all a European Union problem. We have to tackle heroin production if we are fully to tackle terrorism.

Military intervention is only one part of the solution. Nevertheless, it is right to say that the United Kingdom's record on military intervention in Afghanistan has been second to none. Both NATO generals and Afghan Ministers have confirmed that the behaviour and efforts of our forces have been peerless at all levels. They have set standards, including standards for human rights, to which others can only aspire. I understand that the Government plan that there should
 
29 Jun 2005 : Column 299
 
be 1,000 British Armed Forces personnel committed to Afghanistan at the end of 2005. It seems very likely that more than that will be needed in the short term and the near future. In that regard, I press the Minister to tell us, if he can, how he intends that we should cope with those demands, given the demands that we face in Iraq, Kosovo and elsewhere, and given the concerns expressed in all quarters of over-stretch in our Armed Forces.

Will the Government seek a commitment of more European Union and NATO forces to Afghanistan as a priority during the UK's EU presidency? In that regard, the European Union's delivery on commitments to Afghanistan in the past has been shabby at best. Last year, in the NATO headquarters in Kabul, the commanding officer was close to despair for the want of a few thousand extra personnel from the European Union's 2 million Armed Forces personnel—close to despair for the want of approximately 10 more helicopters from the EU's total of more than 1,000 helicopters.

The subject is particularly relevant given the tragic news today of the loss of another United States Chinook helicopter, together with 17 lives, to what appears to be hostile fire in the Kunar province. Clearly, if we are to be successful in combating terrorism at its heart, we have to have the resources and the personnel to do that job.

Finally, I draw attention to the need—as I think was intimated by the noble Lord, Lord Judd—to consider not just the military aspects but also the civil and the hearts and minds aspects of combating terrorism. We can do that only with the support of the G8 and EU nations. If we consider a centre of terrorism to be the north-west province of Pakistan and northern Afghanistan, we are considering one of the most mountainous regions in the world with a desperate lack of infrastructure and development. In isolated areas the tribal lifestyle is virtually unchanged since the days of the Raj. There are appalling levels of illiteracy, particularly among women. I understand from the figures that have been quoted that in some areas the level of literacy among women is less than 1 per cent. That is almost unimaginable. There is almost no provision of state education, health services or public health. Ignorance has become embedded and has become fertile ground for a hostile society to transform itself into a terrorist society.

I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure us that during the United Kingdom's presidency of the EU and chairmanship of the G8 it will, in addressing the war against terror in the short and the longer term, and in addressing the military and civil aspects, make Afghanistan one of its priorities.

It is a great privilege to address your Lordships in this House. I hope that I shall play a part in your proceedings on a regular basis in the future.

6.21 pm

Lord Garden: My Lords, it is a real pleasure to follow my noble friend Lord Chidgey, who has made as informed and informative a maiden speech as I and
 
29 Jun 2005 : Column 300
 
those who know him would have expected. He brings an extraordinary breadth of experience to your Lordships' House. Trained as a mechanical and aeronautical engineer, his career spanned the Admiralty, highways and the engineering industry at home, in the Middle East and in Africa.

As we have heard, he has been the Member of Parliament for Eastleigh—when he was eventually elected to Parliament—since 1992, and has been our party's spokesman in the other place on employment, transport and trade and industry successively. He has a wealth of experience. In addition—this is relevant to today's debate—he has been a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee since 1999, which does so much good work in considering the causes of terrorism. He brings a wealth and breadth of experience that I know will be valued. We look forward to his future contributions.

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Judd, for giving us the opportunity to consider how the current approach to international terrorism is progressing. I believe that I agreed with everything he said, and mostly with the same passion that he expressed.

The cause of defeating global terrorism is unhappily likely to be a lost cause in this century. What we can best do is look at ways to reduce risks from existing terrorists, reduce their number and aim to eliminate the growth of recruits to extremist movements. This should shape our thinking in terms of where we put our effort nationally or through the G8, the EU or, indeed, the UN as between short-term defences against the threat and long-term cures to address the causes.

The Foreign Affairs Select Committee in the other place produced on 22 March 2005 a report entitled, Foreign Policy Aspects of the War against Terrorism. I commend it to your Lordships as an excellent piece of analysis. It concluded that al-Qaeda and associated groups continue to pose a serious threat to the UK and its interests. However, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Judd, that that is not the most serious security threat that we face. I refer to threats such as climate change, disease, poverty and so on. However, it is a serious threat. How do we best tackle this threat? Your Lordships will probably not have read a recent report by Professor Coolsaet of Ghent University. His analysis is relevant to the matters that we have discussed so far this afternoon. He states:

He sees the major global root cause as,

The Select Committee highlighted the role that Iraq is playing as a training ground, and the noble Lord, Lord Judd, spoke of that as well. It is a training ground for the new generation of terrorists, just as Afghanistan was in the past. Therefore, it is in those two countries
 
29 Jun 2005 : Column 301
 
that we need to examine our policies most carefully. My noble friend Lord Chidgey has dealt with Afghanistan in detail, and I agree with his analysis. In Iraq, we need to ensure that our actions do not stoke up further the fires of extremism. Heavy-handed peacekeeping may give short-term military successes, but the families of the dead will be the fertile grounds for new terrorist recruits.

In that respect, I am sorry to see the United Kingdom is providing aircraft to operate with American aircraft in Fallujah-style offensive operations near the Syrian border. Will the Minister comment on that? Even if the intelligence were reliable, which one might doubt, there will be innocent deaths and growing resentment. That is not the way to reduce the long-term threat from terrorism.

If Iraq is now at the centre of our problems, we must look for a grand strategy and not just continue to operate at the military tactical level. That means a realistic approach to the political process, which is the key to stabilising the country. The drift and the worsening insurgency since the elections of 30 January must be reversed. That means that we must bring together the United Nations, the G8, the EU, the neighbours and the Iraqis in forming a coherent plan. It is not good enough just to say, "We are going to stay there as long as the Iraqi Government want us to"—that is not a plan. We need a co-ordinated approach, or we may eventually have to leave and we will have a nest of terrorism to strike at all our interests for decades to come. As the Select Committee concluded when it looked at Iraq:

There are, of course, other regional priorities as well as Afghanistan and Iraq for the political action that we need to reduce the long-term threat from terrorism. I know that noble Lords agree that the Middle East peace process is key. Pakistan, with its nuclear weapons and long-term stability problems, is a particular worry. Syria and Iran need careful engagement rather than isolation if we are not to generate new sources of extremism.

The Select Committee looked closely at problems of the Maghreb, and the significance particularly of Algeria, Morocco and Libya to countering terrorism. I agree strongly with the conclusion that this emphasises the need for reform in the EU's policy towards the region, an overhaul of the Barcelona process, and full engagement. Perhaps the Minister will comment on how the UK presidency will take that forward.

Three other aspects of the Select Committee report were just as important: the multilateral framework, the importance of human rights, and the role of non-proliferation. The Motion rightly speaks of the G8 and EU, but the importance of the United Nations to the multilateral framework must not be forgotten. The lack of a secretariat for the UN Counter-Terrorism Committee has been a poor indication of commitment. Similarly, in the EU we have an action
 
29 Jun 2005 : Column 302
 
plan on terrorism under Mr de Vries, but progress has been remarkably slow. EU members agreed in December last year,

The analysis is right; the strategy is right; and we must use our presidency to put some urgency into that area.

Promotion of human rights is a key factor in preventing support for terrorism increasing. Injustice, lack of dignity, abuse, and torture by repressive regimes have always led to extremes of violence. In promoting democracy, the members of the G8 and EU must never sink to the moral norms of their terrorist enemy. I agree totally with the remarks made by the noble Lord, Lord Judd, about Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, and Bagram, and the many other interrogation centres of which we know nothing. They are not just a moral outrage, they are against our interests in combating terrorism. Information gained by undue pressure and outright torture is always unreliable and recruits many more to the terror banner. We must stop it and bring back due process for all suspects.

Non-proliferation approaches have also assumed much greater importance in the age of the suicide bomber. It is now more likely that a non-state actor will use chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear weapons—CBRNs—to achieve their aim. The Cold War left us with unwanted mountains of fissile material, and also biological and chemical weapons expertise. All the responsible nations of the world should be working together to deny access to those materials and manufacturing processes. In that respect, the failure of the NPT Review Conference was also a failure of counter- terrorist strategy. I trust that the Government will make that an important aspect of their G8 work.

I shall draw my remarks to an end by questioning whether we nationally have the balance of our efforts correctly drawn. The Ministry of Defence sees its role as tackling the threats at a distance. We and our allies seem to think that we can take a robust military approach when the action is thousands of miles away. I do not recall us contemplating the use of aircraft-launched missiles on the Irish border for the terrorist problems closer to home. Yet if we generate five new radical recruits for every mis-targeted bomb, we will be storing up more trouble for the future. The need for engagement and respect for all peoples is in our interests as well as theirs.

If that is true in Iraq and Afghanistan, it is also true in Bradford and Bethnal. Each EU member nation needs to work hard to prevent its own minorities becoming isolated and radicalised. Fallujah and Guantanamo Bay radicalise young people in Iraq and Afghanistan. To an extent they do so here as well, but discrimination and racism can do the same at home. We must take care that, in legislating to protect against terrorism, we do not spawn more recruits to the cause by alienating and isolating our citizens.
 
29 Jun 2005 : Column 303
 

6.32 pm

Next Section Back to Table of Contents Lords Hansard Home Page