argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
EU Settlement Scheme — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: International Affairs
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): The East Timor issue has been drawn to my attention, and we will continue to encourage those who are eligible to apply as soon as possible. The noble Viscount will, I hope, know that we have granted £22 million-worth of funding until September of this year, and, as I just said to the noble Baroness, we will be scoping whether that support needs to continue. We have an organisation in Oxfordshire working specifically with the East Timor community.
EU Settlement Scheme — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: Agriculture
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): I am very happy to meet the noble Baroness to discuss both the horticultural and fishing industries. She will know that a pilot is currently under way for seasonal agricultural workers, but I am very happy to listen to her thoughts on it.
UK Foreign Aid Programme — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: International Affairs
Elizabeth Sugg (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, for securing this debate and I am delighted that he will be fighting so strongly for this cause, now he has left the Speaker’s chair. Of course, two minutes is not sufficient to do justice to the incredible impact of UK aid, so I will just give one example—on sexual and reproductive health and rights In 2018-19 alone, the UK provided 23.5 million women and girls with modern methods of family planning. That means 23.5 million women and girls have more control over their bodies, lives and futures. However, sexual and reproductive health and rights have suffered disproportionately in the cuts to UK aid, and those cuts are bringing real-life consequences: midwives will have to leave areas where they are caring for pregnant women; women travelling to healthcare clinics to have their contraceptive implant changed will find the clinics closed; and girls will not complete their education because of adolescent pregnancy. This is just one example of the real-world impact these cuts are having, and enough of a reason to return to spending 0.7% immediately, but it is not the only reason. Cutting our aid programme in the midst of a global pandemic is simply the wrong thing to do. We are the only country in the G7 to do so. The amount we spend on aid is already falling because of the contraction in our economy. The amount saved is less than 1% of what we are rightly spending on our domestic response to the pandemic. We are undermining our global Britain ambitions and our efforts to resolve some of the world’s biggest challenges The noble Lord, Lord Fowler, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, have set out clearly the issues for Parliament. The Government may well soon be challenged in the courts over acting unlawfully, and, in the court of public opinion, since January we have seen a 9% increase in support from the British public for UK aid, bringing the total to 53% support. I strongly encourage the Government to announce an immediate return to spending 0.7% of GNI on aid. If not, they surely most allow a democratic vote in Parliament.
UK Foreign Aid Programme — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: International Affairs
Michael Bates (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, it is true that the UK was the first major economy to meet its 0.7% aid commitment. It did so in 2013 and sustained it for seven years. That is a record of which British taxpayers can be proud, and it added immeasurably to our reputation around the world. It is true that the scale of the economic catastrophe hitting the UK public finances is the worst we have seen in 300 years and requires action. Meeting 0.7% would require an additional £4 billion, but this is out of total government expenditure of £908 billion. It is also true that the Charities Aid Foundation reported that British charitable giving had risen by 20% during the pandemic crisis, so I would be cautious about claiming that there is public support for this move It is also true that many of our closest friends and allies do not meet the 0.5% target, never mind the 0.7% target, for overseas development assistance. The United States gives 0.17% of GNI, Japan, Canada and Ireland 0.31%, New Zealand 0.27% and Australia 0.19%. Could others be encouraged to do more to fill the gap at this time It is also true that the number of people living in extreme poverty is estimated to have risen by 150 million over the past year due to the pandemic. At the same time, the world’s richest have seen their fortunes increase by 27%—around £8 trillion—so there is a need, but there are also the resources to meet that need Finally, it is true that the British aid budget has saved millions of lives. It follows that a cut in the aid budget of around one-third will cost many lives. We do not know how many; I think we should. Will my noble friend consider preparing an impact statement illustrating how many lives will be lost as a result of the decision to reduce the aid budget—or, even better, will he just restore it?
UK Foreign Aid Programme — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: International Affairs
Edward Garnier (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, for opening this debate, and I agree with every word he said. The 2015 Act to which he refers places the Foreign Secretary under a statutory duty to ensure that the United Kingdom hits the target of 0.7% of gross national income for official development assistance every year. By law, he must make an annual statement to Parliament reporting on the previous year’s performance. If the 0.7% target has been undershot, he must explain why. Until Parliament changes that law, the Government must aim to hit the target of 0.7% of GNI. They cannot deliberately aim off, fire blanks or dissemble. They can say that they intend to amend the law or substitute another target, but, until the statute is amended or repealed, Ministers are subject to that law As I told the House of Commons International Development Select Committee earlier this year, Ministers cannot legitimise a failure to hit the target by announcing in advance their intention to fail. The Government of course know this. As the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, pointed out, Ministers in your Lordships’ House and the other place have admitted that they know this. Do the Government not understand that the expenditure defined by 0.7% figure is dependent on the size of the economy? If, as now, the economy shrinks, the absolute number shrinks with it. A politically and intellectually self-confident Government would comply with the law and permit Parliament to vote on any repeal or amendment, rather than ignore the law and Parliament I asked the House of Lords Library to provide me with a list of occasions when this Government may have broken either domestic or international law or have been accused of being indifferent to whether they were breaking the law or of being negligent in that regard, or have been accused of being untruthful to Parliament or the wider public. Time does not permit me to read out the lengthy list sent to me, but it is expressly described as "non-exhaustive". The Conservative Party used to stand for the rule of law. In my view it still should. It is time that this Conservative Government either complied with at least one of the laws the Conversative Party recently voted for and enacted, or placed their policy before Parliament for a vote.
UK Foreign Aid Programme — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: International Affairs
Richard Balfe (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I first thank the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, for initiating this important debate. I am the 28th speaker, and not a single speaker has supported the Government so far, and I do not see many on the list who are likely to. I cannot do better than to echo the statement of my noble friend Lady Sugg, who is a good friend, who said that it is "fundamentally wrong" to do this. You cannot better that I draw attention to the biblical story of the widow’s mite. We do not seem to get across that these cuts impact far more heavily on the people they are imposed on than the donors in the UK, who are giving a tiny proportion of their tax income to overseas aid. What we are doing is truly appalling. I ask the Government, who are very fond of making things up as they go along: what would you be saying if the Labour Party was in government and saying, "We will not obey the law and we won’t let Parliament vote on it". We would be appalled. My noble and learned friend Lord Garnier is quite right: if a country believes in the rule of law, the first place that it should be tested is in the Parliament of that country. That is the base position, I am afraid We have said many times that overseas aid is about soft power. It is not about giving money away but about sensible investment in the future of humanity. I ask the Government to remember that and get this aid reinstated. It is a tiny proportion of government expenditure—almost irrelevant but relevant to the people who are suffering.
UK Foreign Aid Programme — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: International Affairs
Arminka Helic (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I declare my interests as per the register. I shall focus on preventing violence against women, an area where the UK has done important work but where I fear we are now falling short The aid cuts are compounding an already difficult situation in this area. I shall point to just three examples: in Malawi, a violence against women and girls prevention programme has been cancelled; in Sierra Leone, a programme working to empower adolescent girls has had its funding slashed; and in Rwanda, Action Aid has been forced to close seven shelters that gave safety to girls fleeing abuse. Seven shelters—seven lifelines—have closed because of our actions I recognise that we find ourselves in difficult circumstances but the manner in which these cuts have been handled has not been to our credit. More than six months after the reduction was announced, many providers are still hamstrung by uncertainty. Tearing up multiyear funding plans leaves the beneficiaries entirely in the lurch. It will undermine trust in aid providers on the ground and in the British Government Even if the aid cuts were reversed today, much damage would already have been done. I hope, though, that the Government will commit to returning to 0.7% next year at the very latest, that they will ensure that multiyear funding arrangements are honoured, and that they will not reduce their political and diplomatic focus on combating violence against women Sexual violence has not gone away. Horrific stories of sexual assault have come out of Tigray, with men, women and children as young as eight raped. The UN has warned repeatedly of a "shadow pandemic" of violence against women and girls. This is not a time to reduce our programming, allowing our knowledge and experience to wither away even as the need increases —it is a time to double down.
UK Foreign Aid Programme — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: International Affairs
Andrew Lansley (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I was a member of the Government who achieved 0.7% of GNI for our aid budget in 2013. I do not remember, as a member of that Government and as Health Secretary at that time, our being awash with money. I do not remember us thinking that we could cut the aid budget and it would enable me, for example, to avoid the smallest increase in NHS budgets since the mid-1970s. We took the view that we had both moral imperatives and global ambitions that could be achieved only by reaching 0.7% of GNI. What has changed since then? It is not that humanitarian or other needs across the globe have diminished. On the contrary, what has changed is that we are now facing two crises: the pandemic and the climate crisis. We know, as the noble Lord, Lord McDonald of Salford, said, that none of us is safe from the pandemic until all of us are safe. With the climate crisis, avoiding carbon emissions in developing countries is equally as valuable as reducing carbon emissions in the United Kingdom. On both crises, we are supposed to be in a leadership position, as the noble Lord, Lord McDonald, rightly said: by making vaccines available for the pandemic, and by doubling our support for climate adaptations in developing countries in the next five years The only other thing that has changed is that we have left the European Union and we are supposed to forge our own path as global Britain. To reduce our overseas development aid budget is completely contrary to that. We should reverse the cuts and restore the 0.7%.
UK Foreign Aid Programme — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: International Affairs
James Wharton (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I had the good fortune to serve as a Minister in DfID in a previous incarnation of my political life. I saw at first hand the impact and value of much of the work that is done and funded by our foreign aid programmes. I have listened carefully to a number of the contributions today and many noble Lords have spoken of their experience and knowledge of individual programmes and their impacts on some of the world’s poorest communities. They are to be commended for the breadth of examples and experiences that they have brought to this debate I want to focus a little more on why we should be concerned about the impact of this cut on the UK. I do not just mean thinking about our children and grandchildren, who we want to be able to see elephants and rhinos for real and not just in the pages of history books; of course, our international wildlife funding goes through our ODA budget. I also mean thinking about terrorism, which can be effectively countered by investing at the source and stopping those push factors For those concerned by the levels of immigration, the best way to tackle those concerns is by addressing the push factors and the problems driving people to take great risks to come here. For those concerned about drugs on our streets, one of the best ways to stop them getting here is at source, before they ever reach the ports and borders of this country. For those concerned about Britain’s place in the world as a trading nation and global leader, teaching English, our values and good practice strengthens our position just as it strengthens those communities we support. For those who may be concerned—particularly in the current climate —about the spread of global disease, Ebola gives an example of a disease where our overseas aid spending successfully combated it where it was prevalent and stopped it from ever reaching these shores I commend the work of my right honourable friend Andrew Mitchell and his campaign on 0.7%. I hope the Government will listen. It is not the right time to cut from 0.7% to 0.5% and the way we are doing it, given the particularly disproportionate impact on bilateral programmes, is not the right way.
UK Foreign Aid Programme — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: International Affairs
Mohamed Sheikh (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I was born and raised in east Africa, and over the years I have travelled to a number of countries in Africa and Asia on business and in the course of my parliamentary duties. Whenever I have been abroad, I have endeavoured, if possible, to see the high commissioner or the ambassador and to meet representatives of DfID, the British Council and the DIT. I have been pleased to note that we have played a vital role in providing help in many ways, which include acting on diseases, eliminating poverty and providing humanitarian assistance and support towards the achievement of the UN sustainable development goals. On my visits overseas, I have found that we are held in high esteem because of our activities and our balanced foreign policy. Furthermore, with some countries we have important historical connections I am actively involved in promoting world trade between UK and overseas countries and I have spoken at numerous trade conferences. During the pandemic, we held virtual trade conferences and, when the situation returns to normality, I hope to take part in organising trade delegations overseas. In providing foreign aid, we help to build better trade links; it is imperative that we use those links to provide adequate training to help people to undertake business ventures. The foreign aid programme gives us the means to support our friends and partners—more so as they emerge from the awful consequences of the coronavirus The OECD forecasts that the UK’s growth will be at 7.2% this year and not the 5.1% predicted in March. It is therefore imperative that we restore our aid to 0.7% of GNI as a matter of urgency, particularly in view of the pandemic.
UK Government Union Capability — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: International Affairs
David Arthur Russell Howell (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, in the miserably short time allotted for debate on this Motion that the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, has so wisely brought before us, I will make just two points. First, the Dunlop review is an excellent piece of work and an excellent contribution to the reformed machinery of government for a better union that we must build and must be on offer if the United Kingdom is to remain intact. Unfortunately, the Scottish independence movement is about a lot more than machinery and governance. It has to be realised that that is primarily an emotional cause, driven by a proud people in an ancient and exceptionally talented kingdom. That means that the movement is ready to sweep aside all rational, economic and administrative argument as scaremongering and project fear. It is emotions that have to be responded to. The separatist arguments can be met only by asking and answering the question as to why we need and how we gain consent for a good and friendly union in these islands, where we are all mixed together, in this utterly transformed age of new conditions. On that, frankly, we have hardly started Secondly, the key to the whole Scottish independence trajectory lies not in the hands of the hard-line one-third of Scottish republicans, who always wanted breakaway at any costs, but with the broad swathe across the middle—the moderate unionists who are now extremely inclined to independence of some kind, especially after Brexit. Given the emotional content, most practical proposals for more devolution will make little impact. This is about sovereignty, not just devolution—a different, although overlapping, concept So the question boils down to what can be done via tone, respect, language of partnership and a proper say in national and world policies for Scotland which is short of severing the link of sovereignty, yet gives Scotland a real feeling of place in the scheme of things and the comity of nations, large and small. It is time —well past time—to pin down the loudest voices in Edinburgh about what they really want and what independence actually means to them. Once that is done, we can start the steps towards a better kind of union and the full value of the Dunlop reforms can come into play. Let us hope that it is not too late.
UK Government Union Capability — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: International Affairs
Stephanie Fraser (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, during the debate on constitutional affairs in May, I asked for assurance that the future of intergovernmental relations would be a conversation of co-operation, and my noble friend the Minister gave me that assurance. Two months on, embedding positive working relationships must surely run broader and deeper than simply recovery from the pandemic, important though that is. There are too few post-devolution and post-referendum voices being heard in this debate. Energy is wasted and mistakes are made that are completely avoidable, such as the ridiculous attempt to encourage schoolchildren to sing a song for One Britain One Nation Day just as the Scottish schools had broken up for the summer holidays. Intergovernmental relations should be a partnership and not a popularity contest, but every flag-waving misstep allows the First Minister to use muscular unionism to her advantage Too often, consultation is too little, too late, or there is a lack of understanding that a Scottish-based approach, rather than a whole-UK solution, might work better. This mutual respect for the differences of our four nations is essential for improving and developing positive relations. This stance was supported by my noble friend Lord Dunlop in his excellent review, which also found that the prevailing attitude in Whitehall was to "devolve and forget". The recommendations proposed were "welcomed" by the Government, yet they remain unfulfilled. Why are we stuck with an intergovernmental structure that predates the Scottish referendum and the subsequent transfer of additional powers, with no concrete plans for progress? We must not "devolve and forget" This week, Her Majesty the Queen is at Holyrood. She has met both the First Minister and the new Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament as well as taking a tour of the Irn-Bru factory. In short, Her Majesty has respected Scottish institutions. As ever, she has set an ideal tone. May I encourage the Government of the United Kingdom to do the same?
UK Government Union Capability — House of Lords, 2021-07-01
Topic: International Affairs
Ian Bruce Lang (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I am grateful to be reconnected, albeit by telephone. It is notable that the word "referendum" has ceased to dominate the constitutional debate in Scotland in recent weeks. The reality has dawned that, although the country is divided—something that demands our attention—support for separation and a referendum has fallen and is now roughly where it was seven years ago The years since have been wasted. Apart from the increase in powers granted from the 2014 referendum, which, like all such initiatives, made matters worse, there has been a void. The excellent report by my noble friend Lord Dunlop gathered dust for two years, just like its two predecessors from your Lordships’ Constitution Committee, which it echoes. I thank the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, on behalf of that committee for his kind remarks Past neglect must not be allowed to continue, and today’s rather short debate is welcome; I hope it is the first of many. Sustained action of the sensitive and well-modulated kind is now urgently needed. The experience of Covid-19 has shown not just how much the devolved Administrations depend on the UK for help and support with vaccines, expertise, money and the Army, but how much we all have in common with our fellow British citizens. We share a common identity. Covid must not be an excuse for delay in implementing the diverse, broadly based action programme Time does not allow for detail today, but I stress that it is at the core of the nation—the union—that action is most needed. The report on intergovernmental relations is a welcome first step, but a host of other measures is necessary, and above all we need a change of tone. Reports and reviews do not in themselves win hearts and minds and that is the essence of the challenge Finally, I ask my noble friend the Minister to note that structural change to the constitution has a bad record in this field. I urge him to be very cautious over any such further proposals that may come to him.
Brexit Opportunities — House of Lords, 2021-09-16
Topic: Government Operations
Patrick Cormack (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, will my noble friend give me some comfort? I thought that "take back control" meant an elevation of parliamentary sovereignty. Why are we therefore seeing so many government Bills stuffed with Henry VIII clauses? We had one on Tuesday this week. What we want is the sovereignty of Parliament—Parliament in control—not the sovereignty of the Executive.