Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and Defence

I congratulate the hon. Member for Blaydon (Mr. Anderson) on being an authentic voice of old, red-flag socialism. It was good to hear him speaking out so robustly. Needless to say, I disagree with almost everything he said, but I do agree with his last point. He has been gravely let down by his own Government on the issue of pleural plaques. I want to talk about a number of issues, beginning with Afghanistan. I want to follow up on the quote from the Gracious Speech that the hon. Member for Islington, North (Jeremy Corbyn) used. It is extraordinary that Afghanistan does not even get a sentence of its own in the speech. The quote is:""My Government will work for security, stability and prosperity in Afghanistan and Pakistan and for peace in the Middle East."" On analysing that sentence, it does not appear that the Government are working for peace in Afghanistan, although they are working for prosperity there. My constituents, like those in many other communities, have faced the loss of loved ones in this war. I think that four families in my constituency have been directly affected by the loss of loved ones who have sacrificed everything for the service of their country in Afghanistan. The woolly words in the Gracious Speech do not answer the question that I and many others have been asked during the recent Remembrance day services. People asked us whether their son, their relative or their friend had died in vain. The answer that I gave is no, they did not, but I look to the Government to be more forthcoming in explaining why those young men did not die in vain. The woolly language on Afghanistan in the Gracious Speech, which was picked up by the hon. Member for Islington, North, shows that the Government are trying to embrace all opinions, but we are left with no clarity at all. Instead, we have a spin doctor's fudge, using words that can be interpreted by different people in different ways, to ensure that the hon. Gentleman can support them. I am dissatisfied by the Government's lack of clarity on the objectives. They have not yet succeeded in persuading the people of this country that our young friends and family members are not dying in vain. I have been in the Chamber for some four and a half hours today, listening to what has been a good quality debate. A persistent theme throughout has been the collective political impotence that our country, our Government and our constituents are experiencing in the face of global anarchy and terrorism and the abuse of human rights. That sense of impotence is apparent in many of the actions of NATO, the EU and the United Nations. Looking at different parts of the world, one can see that their best efforts are not delivering much of a return. We have heard about what is happening in Zimbabwe, Iran, the Balkans, the middle east and Somalia—not to mention Afghanistan. The Foreign Secretary took it upon himself to say that it was important to have as the EU spokesman on big international issues someone who could stop the traffic in Beijing. I fear, however, that the Foreign Office and the Government now lack any clout in international affairs, although they still talk as though they were running the show. Extending that theme, I believe that our constituents feel a similar sense of impotence, not just about what is happening abroad but about what is happening in the United Kingdom. For example, the population of the UK is rapidly accelerating to reach 70 million within the next 20 years. It is difficult to find any constituents who think that that is a good idea, but is there any mention of that in the Gracious Speech? Do we ever have a proper, constructive debate about it? No, we do not. People feel that they are being left in the dark, unable to do anything about it. What about the vast numbers of immigrants who have come to this country in the past 10 or 12 years, most recently estimated by the Oxford economics report to be in the order of 3 million? According to the report's estimates, that would lead to a total of 6.6 million immigrants in this country, with another million expected in the next five years. Again, has there been any public debate about that? My constituents do not feel that there has. Moreover, the figures that I have just cited do not include those figures for illegal immigrants. Only last weekend, at my Saturday surgery, I had a couple of relevant cases. One involved a person from Iran. I will not identify him by name, but he was picked up in this country in April 2000. He applied for asylum, but his application was turned down. In January 2002, he appealed. His appeal was dismissed in December 2002. He is still here, although there is a restriction on his being able to work and he is not allowed to depend on public funds. He is, however, alive and well and living in Christchurch. He is now one of the legacy cases, which means that he might finally be dealt with by 2011. In the meantime, this man is in a complete state of limbo. People will ask why he still reports monthly to the local police station, and why his case has not been dealt with if his appeal was turned down as long ago as 2002. Why is he still in this country, the best part of 10 years after he was first discovered to be here? I do not know the answers to those questions, but I do know that the people of this country feel that this is not right. They feel that someone who has been refused asylum should either be returned to the country from which they came, or, if that is not possible, be allowed to participate in the life of this country. They cannot be expected not to be allowed to earn anything and just to drift along. On the same day, two people from the People's Republic of China came to my surgery. They had been in this country since 2004, and they, too, were in this limbo of not knowing what is going to happen to them. Again, they are not allowed to work or to have recourse to public funds, but they have now produced a couple of children, so I do not know how they are managing to support them. If there are this number of people in Christchurch who have been refused permission to stay in this country after having gone through due process but are still here, one can only imagine how many there must be in other parts of the country. The biggest sense of frustration and impotence at the moment, however, is that felt by people in the face of what has been happening in the European Union in the past week or so. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Ms Stuart) said that she thought what had happened in recent weeks or days was not particularly satisfactory, but I would go so far as to say that it has been a grotesque spectacle of wheeling and dealing and backroom deals, ending up in lowest common denominator appointments, which cannot be in anybody's best interests. Over the last two Sessions, I have consistently sought to bring before the House a Bill to evaluate the costs and benefits of our continuing membership of the European Union—a Bill that is supported by my Front Benchers and by the Liberal Democrat Front Benchers, but not, interestingly, by the Government. Bearing in mind the fact that my own party accepts that political integration has gone too far and that the costs of our membership—with a gross contribution exceeding £14.2 billion—are far too high, I hope that the Government will introduce proposals to enable us to have a rational discussion and evaluation of the political and economic costs of continuing membership of the European Union, balancing against that what the benefits might be. If we did that, we would be prepared at the beginning of the next Parliament to debate this issue with the people—leading, I hope, to a proper referendum, because the people feel impotent, having been promised a referendum that has never been delivered. Nobody under the age of 52 has ever had the chance to express their views in a specific ballot on whether they believe our relationship with the EU is satisfactory or not, and whether they wish to have a changed relationship. All those sources of frustration give rise to a feeling among our constituents that they are impotent and powerless, with an enormous democratic deficit. Having a lame duck Government continuing to try to hang on to power instead of calling a general election to have a fresh start in this economic crisis simply adds fuel to the fire. I hope that the Government will in fact abandon their proposals in the Queen's Speech and call an immediate general election so that we can clear the air and people can have their say.