My Lords, it is a pleasure and an honour to be able to follow my noble friend Lord Forsyth of Drumlean and, of course, my noble friend—for he is a friend—Lord Alton.
I took part in the debate on the Floor of your Lordships’ House in December on Report. I spoke then in strong support of the noble Lord, Lord Alton. I have tabled this amendment today in my name—which alters a couple of quite important timings—not because I oppose in any way, shape or form the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Alton, but because I discovered last week that I could not take part in this debate unless I tabled an amendment. I thought things had changed a little since Christmas.
I spoke in your Lordships’ House quite often from September to December, and I came to realise that those of us present had a certain privilege when it came to ping-pong. Since Christmas, I have received almost countless messages, as your Lordships will have done, telling me, in effect, not to come. Some were because of my age—I am over 80—and others because I needed to be vaccinated, and I now have been. But being told not to come does not chime with the injunction that the occupant of the Woolsack recites every day: “Some Members will take part in the debate on the Floor of the House and others by remote means, but all will be treated equally.” This afternoon, all are not being treated equally.
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The House would have benefited from a speech by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, but he is not able to take part. I hope not only that the Government heed the lessons of today but that the authorities that regulate business in your Lordships’ House will do likewise. It is wrong not to treat Members equally if, at the same time, you are telling or urging certain Members not to come.
I turn to the substance of the amendment. I like and respect my noble friend the Minister, and he tried to make what my late father would have called “a good fist” of his argument today, but—I say to him gently but firmly—he failed, as he did with the letter from which my noble friend Lord Forsyth quoted a moment ago. The Government are on barren moral ground and I hope that they move to more stable ground, following the defeat that I trust will be inflicted upon them in an hour or so.
I grieve that a defeat has to be inflicted upon them, because I do not doubt the personal bona fides of my noble friend the Minister, the Prime Minister or the Foreign Secretary, but this is not the way to go about it. We live in the midst of many and great dangers, and perhaps the greatest of all was underlined only yesterday with the news from Burma. The greatest danger of all is the collapse of civilisation and civilised values. There is no more heinous crime than genocide, as the noble Lord, Lord Alton, said in his brilliant and moving
speech. We have to put down a marker today. The other place is clearly moving in this direction. The majority for the last amendment, which we all acknowledge was defective in certain particulars, was only 11. It would be failing in our duty not to send the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Alton, to the Commons today, so that they can truly reflect and think again.
What is going on in China is appalling. The Chinese Communist Party is as objectionable a regime as any as we have seen since the beginning of the last century—in which we fought two world wars to defend civilised freedoms. I commend to noble Lords, and in particular to the Minister, a report that I have had the privilege and honour to be asked to endorse, from the Conservative Party Human Rights Commission. It is entitled The Darkness Deepens: The Crackdown on Human Rights in China 2016-20. No one can read that report—meticulously researched and spelled out in detail—without feeling revulsion to the very pit of the stomach. It is endorsed by two former Conservative Foreign Secretaries in the noble Lord, Lord Hague, and Sir Malcolm Rifkind, by two former leaders of the Conservative Party in the noble Lord, Lord Hague, and Sir Iain Duncan Smith, and by many others. It is a party-political service, but it is not a party-political document. I doubt that any Member in your Lordships’ House or those who are observing this debate remotely could fail to be both moved and convinced by it.
Fundamentally, this is all about human values. Today, we had the very sad news of the death of Captain Sir Tom Moore, a man who stood for the values that it is our duty, as parliamentarians, to uphold. He fought for his country to uphold those values, when Europe was in danger of being plunged into the deepest darkness of all—citing the title of the report I just mentioned. It is less than a week since we commemorated Holocaust Memorial Day. Surely we do not need to be reminded that, if we are vigorously pursuing bilateral trade deals with the Communist Party of China, we are turning our backs in a way that does not do us credit. It is a very evil regime that can do what it is doing to the Uighur Muslims and others—think of Tibet—yet it has world ambitions and will be the dominant power as we move through the 21st century.
That country also has one of the greatest and oldest- surviving civilisations in the world. We must appeal to the people of China, who are the guardians of that civilisation, to say that we want them to realise that the regime that presently governs them is not honouring that great civilisation.
I will vote for the Motion in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Alton. I will not press my amendment to a Division—although it would marginally improve that of the noble Lord, Lord Alton, by putting in a couple of dates and concentrating the mind in that way—no more than my noble friend Lord Forsyth will move his. But I will vote with determination. I hope that the other place heeds the advice that we seek to give and that together, as a Parliament, we can be proud of what we are doing in creating global Britain.