Global Britain — House of Commons, 2021-01-11
Topic: Foreign Trade
Questions: 2021 is a pivotal year for the UK on the global stage: we will host the COP26 climate change summit; assume presidency of the G7; co-lead the action coalition on gender-based violence; and undertake a new chapter, having exited the EU. Against that backdrop, I await the findings of the Government’s integrated review of international policy, which provides an opportunity to clarify what the UK stands for internationally, and how we will hope to lead and achieve on the global stage not just through trade First and foremost, our development policy should be underpinned by a core commitment to tackling poverty among the poorest communities. The pandemic has meant that that commitment is needed now much more than ever. The World Bank estimates that covid-19 will push about another 100 million people into poverty, reversing hard-won gains. I am therefore concerned by the absence of an explicit commitment to tackling poverty in the Government’s new strategic framework Our aid policy should enable communities in developing countries to lead and shape their own development, using their own knowledge of what works best at local level to create long-lasting change. For example, local women’s rights organisations are grounded in their communities, with long-standing and trusted relationships. Their work is strategic, lasting and cost-effective. The United Nations Population Fund estimates that the pandemic will lead to an additional 2 million female genital mutilation cases and 13 million child marriages, so their work is needed more now than ever. To ensure that the Government meet their own commitments on girls’ education, global Britain must mean leadership on addressing violence against women and girls, which is a key barrier to girls globally accessing education in the first place. I was saddened when Baroness Sugg stepped down, but I admire her reasons for doing so. Can the Government confirm when her important role on gender equality will be filled In 2018, just 0.3% of UK aid was spent on ending violence against women and girls globally. We can and must do more. Alongside greater funding, there needs to be a robust framework to guide the Government’s work on gender equality. I urge the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office to adopt and use the Department for International Development’s strategic vision for gender equality The UK needs to advocate for a world that respects internationally agreed rules and practices, including respecting human rights and the rule of law. We must call out the actions of those who break these rules, whether the Ugandan Government’s treatment of opposition politician Bobi Wine, or threats to human rights defenders in Colombia. Perhaps one of the greatest tests of this is our relationship with China. In Hong Kong, the rights and freedoms of citizens continue to be eroded following the introduction of the national security law. We need to work with like-minded international partners to stand up to these abuses and support pro-democracy campaigners.
Alexander Morrison Carmichael (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): Three minutes is not a great deal of time to talk about a subject as big as Britain’s place in the world as global Britain, so this evening I want to challenge the House to think a little about the signals we are sending. I mean it as absolutely no disrespect to the Secretary of State for International Trade, but I rather wish somebody else had opened the debate. I wish the Secretary of State for international development had come to the Dispatch Box to boast that Britain was one of the handful of countries that had a commitment to spend 0.7% of its GNI on overseas aid. Of course, we could not have had that, because the Government have abolished the Department for International Development and now seek to walk away from the commitment to spend 0.7% of our GNI on aid. As others have said in this debate, that commitment put us at the top of the world’s nations, rather than in the rather backward and downward-looking position we are now left in If the Government want the focus of today’s debate to be on trade, let us take them at their word. As the hon. Member for Glasgow East (David Linden) said, let us focus on the tariffs currently being imposed on Scotch whisky, which have cost us something in the region of £450 million in lost exports already. It is a pretty open secret that we were close to having a bilateral deal with the US last week but we did not get it over the line. That is because it was just too difficult for Government Departments within Whitehall to agree on a common position that would have delivered that deal. Rather than having Ministers come and crow at the Dispatch Box about the great achievements of cut-and-paste trade deals, they would do better to focus on the real challenges that face us as we now try to create these trade deals across the world, because that one issue of tariffs in one sector shows just how challenging this is going to be The challenge to the House tonight is what the narrative is going to be as we create this global Britain. Is it going to be one that is merely transactional—all about trade? Are we going to create a global Britain that is actually rooted in values—rooted in support for human rights, wherever they are found, and the rule of law—or are we going to be looking at this just as a question of pounds, shillings and pence?