My Lords, I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Boycott, Lady Whitaker, and Lady Ritchie of Downpatrick, for offering their support to Amendment 126, on ecocide. A number of other Members of your Lordships’ House would have brought extra cross-party support to this amendment if there had been space.
I have been asked by the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, one of your Lordships’ House’s foremost advocates of human rights, to share, with your Lordships’ permission, a few words from her. She wished to say: “Criminal offences are not to be created lightly, and I have resisted so many, but the repercussions of ecocide go way beyond those of most criminal acts. The emergency demands this measure, as should our grandchildren.”
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Returning to the discussion in Committee, noble Lords will remember that I moved two amendments, one of which called on the Government explicitly to
back the creation of ecocide as an offence under the Rome statute, to join other crimes against humanity. The other called for the creation of a domestic offence of ecocide. Noble Lords will have noted that what has come before us on Report is a very much softer amendment. Proposed new subsection (2) of the amendment calls on the relevant Minister of the Crown to
“promote discussion of such an amendment, either independently or jointly with other sovereign states, within the Working Group on Amendments of the International Criminal Court within 12 months of this Act being passed.”
This is a call for the Government to make it a commitment to promote debate—a very moderate step forward into something where many other nations are already leading. If the UK wishes to be world leading, as it so often claims to be, it surely should be in this debate, particularly given the UK’s long-term heritage of involvement in leading on human rights issues through many decades.
I hope the Minister will agree that international law has a key role to play in transforming our relationship with the natural world by shifting it from one of harm to harmony. Despite significant progress, the clear inadequacies of environmental governance at a global scale are widely acknowledged. There are laws that are supposed to protect our natural systems, but they are clearly inadequate and failing.
I referred to the international discussion already ongoing. Thirteen member states of the ICC are having discussions at a parliamentary or government level. Two states, Vanuatu and the Maldives, have officially called on member states of the ICC to consider amending the Rome statute. As we discussed in Committee, a consensus on the definition of ecocide was reached in June. This is the definition referred to in proposed subsection (3) of the amendment.
It really is a great pity that the nature of the arrangements in your Lordships’ House make it impossible for me to test the opinion of the House tonight. I formally give notice that I am not planning to do that. I also think it is a great pity that that is clearly restricting our debate tonight, and I have restricted what I was planning to say in the interests of the hour. I hope we will hear from the Minister the strongest possible words acknowledging that this is a crucial issue. This is absolutely foundational for the future of our world. It should be a fundamental part of the Bill. With those words, I beg to move.