argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
UK–Commonwealth Trading Relationship — House of Lords, 2021-07-08
Topic: International Affairs
Richard John Grenville Spring (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I warmly applaud my noble friend Lord Howell for initiating this debate and for so constantly bringing our attention to the Commonwealth over many years. I think it would not be unreasonable to say that much of the energy and focus of our Foreign and Commonwealth Office in the past perhaps arose out of our membership of the European Union. While we of course want to have excellent relationships with our European neighbours, the long-standing and prescient call by my noble friend to embrace the Commonwealth clearly needs to be answered now, without hesitation. I also applaud the work of my noble friend Lord Marland, who chairs the Commonwealth Enterprise and Investment Council, the mandate of which is to promote trade and investment across the Commonwealth We should capitalise on the Commonwealth advantage. It is a gateway to trading with nations with whom we share legislative practices based on the rule of law, with whom we overwhelmingly share common ideals and values through the commercial charter, and which is strengthened by commercial links and the Commonwealth legal framework Each morning, I look at newspapers from across the channel. There is considerable debate, not always harmonious, about links between Francophone countries. Quite simply, our Commonwealth structure has no remote equal and is widely admired In the extensive list of countries with whom we have signed trade deals, digital connectivity and stimulating digital trade is at the heart of a number of these agreements. Thus, the Commonwealth is an area for this country to develop and share targeted digital commercial activity Young people abroad remain very attracted by our technological and cultural offer and our forms of soft power, often through the English language. I greatly welcome the changed visa regime, with students from the Commonwealth now able to study and work here much more freely There is one structural component of the Commonwealth architecture which begs for modernisation. I happen to be the Prime Minister’s trade envoy to Algeria—the biggest country in Africa and, for over 50 years, a reliable supplier to us of liquified natural gas. As I have heard from their president’s lips, they would like to have associate or formal observer status with the Commonwealth. But there is no such status: it is either full membership or nothing. Does my noble friend agree with more flexible linkages to the organisation, which would undoubtedly enhance the Commonwealth’s reach and credibility? If he does, will he strongly take the message to our Government to work assiduously to achieve this? After all, our Prime Minister is currently chair-in-office. Surely the time to put real focus and energy into the Commonwealth has now arisen.
UK–Commonwealth Trading Relationship — House of Lords, 2021-07-08
Topic: Foreign Trade
Gloria Dorothy Hooper (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I join all those who have thanked and congratulated my noble friend Lord Howell for giving us the opportunity to debate this important topic. Since the first hint of Brexit, my noble friend has been consistent in advocating the opportunities and advantages we have in building on our special relationship with our Commonwealth cousins. I agree with everything he said, especially on the importance of educational links. It is certainly hardly surprising that the first non-rollover FTA we have entered into has been completed with Australia As many of your Lordships will know, I have a long-standing interest and involvement in Latin America as a region, and now my voluntary duties as a trade envoy also lie there. But Guyana in South America and Belize in central America are both Commonwealth members, and I hope and trust they will not be overlooked in any new trade deal. I should perhaps say, in this context, that my honourable friend Darren Henry, who is the trade envoy to the English-speaking Caribbean, also includes Guyana in his sphere of influence and is certainly working on this. We have already heard from my noble friend Lord Risby, and his observations from his long experience as a trade envoy were very interesting In my few minutes, I will raise a few issues and to ask the Minister for some points of clarification. The role of the British group of the CPA, the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, cannot be overestimated, especially in terms of the important work it does. As a former member of the executive council, I am well aware of the work it does in relation to the values and principles set out in the Commonwealth charter. As the excellent Library briefing puts it: "These range from respect for democracy, human rights and the rule of law, through to promoting good governance, pursuing sustainable development and acknowledging the role civil society can play in communities"— all very important values to be acknowledged in future trade deals On a second point, if we intend to move the centre of our trade efforts to the Commonwealth, what will be the role of the Commonwealth Secretariat based here in London? Will it be part of any consultation process? Will it or could it have a monitoring or regulatory role? Can my noble friend the Minister enlighten us on that Finally, perhaps I may be reassured that the overseas territories will not be forgotten and will be included as much as possible in any trade deals and dialogue on trade opportunities. I look forward to the rest of the debate.
UK–Commonwealth Trading Relationship — House of Lords, 2021-07-08
Topic: Foreign Trade
Andrew Lansley (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I join in thanking my noble friend Lord Howell for enabling this debate. It is most welcome. I am also pleased to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Liddell of Coatdyke. She and I serve together on the International Agreements Committee. In that context, we have had the privilege of examining the continuity trade agreements—the rollover agreements—that have enabled us to transition agreements that we had previously with the European Union In my tally of the 53 other Commonwealth states, two are member states of the European Union, and with 28 of them we have now in place transition rollover agreements—or, as my noble friend said, sufficient bridging agreements. Many of them are literally rollover agreements with no continuity-plus provisions. I should say first that it is important that we make rapid progress with, for example, Canada, Ghana, Kenya and others in turning those continuity agreements into continuity-plus agreements. In addition, 17 countries are within the generalised scheme of preferences in its various frame- works, which leaves, for those who are calculating, six other countries, with three of which we have negotiations in train—New Zealand, Australia and Singapore. We will have trade relationships with two of those countries—Brunei and Malaysia—by virtue of our accession to CPTPP. The other country is, I think, the Maldives. Therefore, by my calculation, we will have trade relationships with Commonwealth countries, but the point is that we need to make those relationships stronger and fuller I wish to make three quick points. First, let us try to make sure that we include the environment in this. New Zealand has taken an initiative on climate change, trade and sustainability to have tariff-free environmental goods, to remove subsidies on fossil fuels and to promote eco-labelling. We could use the Commonwealth, which would be a great place to bring that initiative forward on a more global basis. Secondly, many of our agreements focus on goods, but we have the capacity, as my noble friend Lord Risby said, to be strong in digital trade and, indeed, to be a services-sector superpower. We should extend many of those agreements into services on a major push to develop those relationships Thirdly and finally, I look forward to hearing from my noble friend Lord Marland. The Commonwealth should and can be a powerful instrument through which we promote enterprise and entrepreneurships and scale up businesses, particularly in developing countries. As a consequence, we will expand our trade to those countries dramatically, as well as their exports to us.
UK–Commonwealth Trading Relationship — House of Lords, 2021-07-08
Topic: Foreign Trade
Hugh Trenchard (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, it is a great pleasure to speak in this timely debate. I congratulate my noble friend Lord Howell, both on securing the debate today and on his inspirational and interesting speech. He has long been the strongest advocate of the Commonwealth and the huge potential benefits it can offer all its members. Our 47-year dalliance with the EU has meant we have not pursued the valuable opportunities open to this unique association of 54 member states to make a great contribution to free trade, security and stability across the world It is good news that we have reached agreement in principle on a free trade deal with Australia. The lord mayor’s virtual visit to New Zealand in May showed great enthusiasm in that country for the progress being made towards a free trade agreement, with ambitious digital provisions. India is another major Commonwealth country with which we are now moving to make up for lost time. The lord mayor’s virtual visit there in November 2020 provided a further boost to London’s fintech industry, which is now worth £6.6 billion to the UK economy and accounts for 76,000 jobs. UK-India collaboration is an important factor at the heart of the growth and continued success of the sector. Stephen Booth, head of the Britain in the World project at Policy Exchange, has also written about the positive results from the Prime Minister’s recent summit with Narendra Modi. Mr Modi coined the term "living bridge" to describe the deep connections between the two countries, in part deriving from the 1.6 million UK nationals of Indian descent The most exciting development in our new independent trade strategy is our application for accession to the CPTPP. It is notable that among the 11 member countries of partnership are six Commonwealth countries. Our application to the CPTPP provides hard evidence that we are serious about our tilt to the Indo-Pacific, as an important part of global Britain. I hope that other Commonwealth countries which share our commitment to free trade and the prosperity it generates may follow our example in joining the organisation. They may also consider that, against the background of the rise of China, membership offers geostrategic and security advantages The noble Lord, Lord Triesman, suggested that geographic distance acts as a barrier to trade in goods. I remind him that Ottawa is 16,000 kilometres from Canberra; both are members of the CPTPP. As my noble friend Lord Lansley said, our new trade agreements have strong digital provisions and global Britain is as much about services as goods, leveraging London’s position as clear global leader, in spite of a failed attempt to sabotage international equities markets. Does the Minister agree that the sooner the UK completes—
UK–Commonwealth Trading Relationship — House of Lords, 2021-07-08
Topic: International Affairs
Hugh Trenchard (Conservative, Centre-right): Yes, I will just finish —completes our accession negotiations, the better, both because Japan is providing strong support during its presidency, which lasts until the end of the year, and because the UK’s role in developing the modus operandi of the organisation will be maximised by our early involvement Ironically, particularly prior to the possible future return to the organisation of the US—
UK–Commonwealth Trading Relationship — House of Lords, 2021-07-08
Topic: International Affairs
Richard Balfe (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Howell for initiating this debate and welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Chapman, to her new role. She will probably find this place a bit more peaceful than where she came from, but I hope she enjoys it My connection with the Commonwealth goes back to the beginning of my working life, across the road with the Crown Agents for Oversea Governments and Administrations, a body sponsored by the British Government. During the time I was working for it, its main aim was to enable the colonies to emerge into the Commonwealth. It did a pretty good job. We are dealing with probably the largest international voluntary organisation in the world. As with many voluntary organisations, it is a very disparate group of nations—some would say too disparate We just heard from the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, who made many points about why the Australian deal is not a good one. I tend to think it probably is quite a good one, because at heart I am a free trader. If you reduce tariffs, you generally improve people’s welfare. The argument about free trade has been a feature of British politics for at least 100 years I counsel us against romanticising about the Commonwealth. There is a tendency—particularly among those who were not, let us say, 100% in favour of the EU—to try to look back to a time that was quite different, when there was a Commonwealth but Australia and New Zealand basically fed Britain. That time has long gone and will not come back. The sheep miles referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, are exactly what will stop it, because the market for Australian and New Zealand produce is now in the Far East and the Middle East. It is not in the United Kingdom and it is not going to be I see the future of the Commonwealth as a centre of soft power, an organisation that can give good advice, set standards, encourage good behaviour and, on occasions, assist other countries with limited amounts of money. It is not going to be a substitute for our aid budget or the international financial institutions we all subscribe to. Where it does have a future is as a centre of soft power, working with the British Council, the BBC and those other institutions that do so much to promote a good image of Britain and the Commonwealth in the world.
UK–Commonwealth Trading Relationship — House of Lords, 2021-07-08
Topic: Foreign Trade
Aamer Sarfraz (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I too thank my noble friend Lord Howell for securing this debate. If we are to realise our ambition of achieving $2 trillion-worth of trade within the Commonwealth by 2030, we must build and strengthen the institutions that will facilitate that trade. Today, the Commonwealth does not have a trade finance bank, a development finance institution or an investment guarantee agency. It should probably have all those things and much more, but what we have is the immediate opportunity to ensure that digital co-operation is a fundamental part of our trade deals with Commonwealth countries. We wrote an excellent digital trade chapter into the Japan deal that is a model to draw inspiration from Most of the Commonwealth is still offline. Only 27.8% of the population of Commonwealth countries have internet access. The opportunity to grow connectivity in digital trade is massive, but the disparity is significant: six Commonwealth countries make up 98.8% of the Commonwealth’s exports in high-technology goods. Tech workers across member states are keen to do business. On the freelance job website Upwork, there is an oversupply of tech workers from the Commonwealth, and on average only 6% find work It is not just about bilateral trade. The big prize is for member states to sell more digital products and services to each other. There are existing initiatives within the Commonwealth that we can build on. One of these is an organisation called COMSATS, a 26-country network, accredited by the Commonwealth and headquartered in Islamabad, which operates universities, engages in science diplomacy and runs innovation labs. It has built a powerful brand and demonstrates the impact that technology co-operation has in building good will Some 60% of the population of the Commonwealth are under the age of 29. We aim to be a world super- power in science and technology. The opportunity here is absolutely clear.
UK–Commonwealth Trading Relationship — House of Lords, 2021-07-08
Topic: Foreign Trade
Daniel Hannan (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, we should guard against sentimentality. It is a particular temptation when discussing this association of nations to which we are bound by language, law, culture, kinship, history and habit. It is almost impossible if you are in this country not to be slightly misty-eyed when we think of the two great global conflagrations of the 20th century and of the millions of young men who rushed from every corner of the Commonwealth and Empire to take up arms, in many cases for a country on which they had never set eyes, because they believed in our shared values Yet, as my noble friend Lord Howell says—correctly and wisely quoting Her Majesty the Queen—the Commonwealth is the face of the future. The case for it is not nostalgic or sentimental. At some point in this decade, the Commonwealth’s GDP will overtake that of the European Union. We live in an age when geographical proximity has never mattered less. In the 1950s, it may have made sense to form regional trade blocs, but many of those arguments were broken down by advances in containerisation, travel and the internet, and have been accelerated by our experience in the past 15 months in lockdown. We are now all much more accustomed to having sensitive commercial conversations over Zoom and Teams, so the case for cultural proximity rather than accident of geography has never been more eloquent There is one other form of nostalgia that I have heard in this debate. Perhaps I am wrong, but I cannot help feeling that, as with all our global trade deals, some noble Lords are still a little bit resentful about our withdrawal from the European Union and are looking for pegs on which to hang their opposition. We heard a little bit of it from the Front Bench—perhaps we will hear some more from the Front Bench spokesmen who will close this debate—when noble Lords talked about the importance of not trading with countries that do not meet our food production standards. There has been one major divergence post Brexit between British and EU food production standards: the decision recently announced by the EU to allow some animals to be fed on bits of other animals. We can argue about whether that was a good thing but clearly those noble Lords who have been arguing—and perhaps are planning to argue again today—that we should not trade with countries that have lower food production standards than ours must therefore be prepared to argue that we should not have a trade deal with the European Union. I hope that they will not erect barriers vis-à-vis the rest of the world that they would not erect against Brussels. Let me close by saying that the Commonwealth is not just a voluntary association. By virtue of being voluntary, it brings out the best in all its members. It encourages us all to live our best lives and any strengthening of the Commonwealth must therefore be reckoned a net augmentation of human happiness.
UK–Commonwealth Trading Relationship — House of Lords, 2021-07-08
Topic: Foreign Trade
David Arthur Russell Howell (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I thank everyone in the Chamber and our electronically connected friends for all their excellent speeches. Indeed, I thank the Minister for his excellent survey of the Government’s position and his round up of the debate. All of the speeches have been reminders that there is much more to trade and commerce than just trade itself. Without the wider conditions, there is no trade, nothing occurs, and prosperity disappears There is the health and vaccine issue. The noble Baroness, Lady Chapman, was right to draw our attention to that, as did my noble friend Lady Hooper. The secretariat played a strong role in that, led by the secretary-general, Patricia Scotland, which I think has borne fruit, even with India’s colossal difficulties. There is also respect for human rights, which the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans reminded us about. There is the temptation or desire for others to join the Commonwealth, as my noble friend Lord Risby and the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, said. That point seemed to be more eloquent than any speech: if people want to join something, it must be good There is the climate threat, which my noble friend Lord Lansley referred to, and the need to help the smaller island nations, particularly by adaptation. I think we all understand totally the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, about fine Welsh lamb—how could we not? The basic point is that tastes, products and markets are changing. As my noble friend Lord Marland reminded us, there are completely new markets and new tastes, and new trade flows growing everywhere. My noble friend Lord Balfe reminded us that a lot of New Zealand and Australian products are going to the Middle East The message of all this is that we cannot stop where we are. We cannot go back; we have to go forward, and so does the Commonwealth, and so it is now going.
Licensing Act 2003 (2020 UEFA European Championship Licensing Hours) Order 2021 — House of Lords, 2021-07-08
Topic: Law and Crime
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank both noble Lords for the points that they have made. I join both of them in expressing concern for the effect that events like this have on domestic violence, and it is certainly something that the police will be alert to. It is not just this football game; any football game seems to be a time of escalation of domestic violence. I totally understand the points that the noble Lords are making and, yes, the police and support services are fully aware of the issue The noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, mentioned the appalling incident with a laser pen. I have already asked about this and I understand that the police are investigating it. He mentioned that he hopes that Cardiff and Edinburgh will be passing similar regulations. The order applies of course to Wales but I am sure that Edinburgh will be considering it as well The noble Lord, Lord Rosser, asked about 11.15 pm and if it was kicking-out time or last-sale time. It is the last-sale time—alcohol of any description cannot be served after that time. In terms of other consultees, I know that the British Beer and Pub Association alongside the British Institute of Innkeeping, UKHospitality, the NPCC, which he mentioned, and the Local Government Association were consulted I apologise for the late laying of the instrument, as I said at the beginning. The remarkable progress England has made throughout the tournament has surprised and delighted even Government Ministers. It has served to bring the question of a licensing extension into focus. We could not really have foreseen—of course we had every confidence in them—how the England team would progress or just how successful this tournament has been, not least for the well-being of this country. I am sure noble Lords agree The order changes nothing about the current Covid rules; they are still in place. Clearly, 19 July will see a change, but for the moment everything that was in place before Sunday will still be in place on Sunday. I thank noble Lords for their questions. Football’s coming home.
Covid-19: Education Settings — House of Lords, 2021-07-08
Topic: Education
Ralph Matthew Palmer (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, will the Government use the summer holidays to see whether they can revive the relationship with the head teachers’ unions, review the guidance with them and evolve a plan B for use in the event that it becomes necessary to bear down on transmission in schools, so that schools know what will be expected of them if that happens? Will the DfE also produce a template advice leaflet for schools, so that schools can give advice to parents when children return to school?