Baroness Featherstone (LD)

I am very grateful. I thank everyone for such brilliant speeches—there is such knowledge in this House; it makes me so proud of everybody here. To the noble Baroness, Lady Hyde, I say that I was a designer before I came here, and my studio was at 7 Caledonian Road. I just wanted her to know that. I have an anecdote for the noble Lord, Lord Barber, about our ability to send potentates’ and dictators’ children to private school, but I will tell him that privately. Lastly, I want to thank the noble Lord, Lord Browne, who has been so kind and so wonderful to everyone. There was not a little “V” by his name on the speakers’ list—he is even too modest to tell us it was his valedictory speech. I just want to say to the Government that this debate asks that “this House takes note”, but I sometimes feel that in such debates, we, the contributors, get it, but I want the Government to get it. We have been forced to look at our defence spending by our friend in the White House; let us look at our spending on soft power too. Let us not wait for catastrophic world events and wars; let us move now and let us lead on prevention and peacebuilding. I thank all noble Lords for such brilliant contributions.