Queen’s Speech — House of Lords, 2020-01-07
Topic: Environment
Thomas Jeremy King (Conservative, Centre-right): I join the noble Lord, Lord Jay, in welcoming the maiden speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie. How welcome it is to hear the voice of the SDLP after those of John Hume and Seamus Mallon, balancing out unionist voices. Those voices are important, but the constitutional nationalist voice has for too long been silent I also welcome the parade of Bishops that we have had in this debate so far. I hope that they will listen carefully to what I am going to talk about, because I think they have a particular contribution to make. The noble Lord, Lord Jay, talked about the United Kingdom continuing to play an important role in the world, and that is what the Queen’s Speech says: "My Government will work to promote and expand the United Kingdom’s influence in the world." One issue on which the world must work together and which has suddenly had far greater attention—this came out clearly in my noble friend the Minister’s speech, in which he devoted an exceptional amount of time to it—is climate change. We recognise that, and a number of other noble Lords have talked about it. However, there is another issue which is every bit as important but about which too little is said—I may be the only person talking about it in this debate—and that is population When Queen Victoria delivered her Queen’s Speeches later in her reign, the population of this world was barely 1 billion—noble Lords know these figures very well. When I first came to Parliament in 1970, it had gone up to 3.5 billion. As I stand here today raising this issue, it is now 7.75 billion, and the forecast is that another 1 billion will be added in the next 10 years, with a further 1 billion in the subsequent 10 years, and that, by 2040, we will be up to 10 billion—trebled in our lifetime. As population grows, the challenge of preventing climate change becomes ever more difficult. There is one new coal-fired power station every week among eight Asian countries seeking to raise living standards for their growing populations. The high birth rate in less developed countries traps more and more people in poverty and devastates the local environment. The consequences are ever more obvious: more failed states; increased competition for food, and even more for water, with the tensions that that brings; and mass migration of people. These are not temporary phenomena. They will grow ever larger unless the world works together to agree positive remedies before it is too late I am helped in this by a very interesting article written 12 years ago by a promising journalist called Boris Johnson, headed "Global over-population is the real issue"; we should forget global warming. In it, he expresses his dismay that, "no world statesmen have the guts to treat the issue with the seriousness it deserves." Some 12 years later, with his pledge to work closely with international partners, he should ensure that they do now all have the guts to put population high on the agenda. Then, his proposed remedies included greater literacy, female emancipation and access to birth control. The last line in the gracious Speech proposes sanctions against human rights abuses and ensuring that, "all girls have access to twelve years of quality education." We need to make it possible for individuals to make informed choices for smaller families There is an opportunity here which is not always good in connection with our present problems over Iran. Social media can be a huge asset in getting to places that were previously impossible to reach. We see some countries with effective family planning programmes, but all must be encouraged to have them. Our aid programme should be increasingly directed to supporting this. In his article, Boris Johnson complained that certain words had become taboo and that, "the very discussion of overall human fertility—global motherhood—has become more or less banned." More recently, David Attenborough has discussed what he calls the "bizarre taboo" among world leaders against discussing population. He has warned that the demands of mass humanity will destroy not only the natural world but humanity itself. We must break this taboo and I urge our new Prime Minister to read his great article again and give the lead that the world desperately needs.