Contribution
My Lords, as my noble friend Lady Noakes said at Second Reading, this Bill is right up there in contention for the title of “worst Bill of this Session”. It is a surrender Bill and the Government should be ashamed of having brought it before your Lordships’ House. The sparsely populated Labour Benches—congratulations to the three Members who have turned up—illustrate how unpopular it is on all sides. We now begin the detailed scrutiny to seek to improve the Bill and to see just how far the Government are willing to move, if at all, to deliver a better deal for the British people and, crucially, for the Chagossians.
My Amendment 1 would put a clear statement of the Bill’s purposes on the face of the Bill. In essence, it is a clear and faithful description of the effects of the provisions of the Bill. It delivers clarity. The Bill does cede sovereignty over the islands, seek to dissolve the British Indian Ocean Territory after 200 years, provide for the continued British administration of Diego Garcia and limit the citizenship rights of the Chagossians.
Strangely, the Bill is completely silent on who shall have sovereignty over the Chagos Archipelago in the future, which is against the precedent set in previous Bills where territory has been conceded. By bringing this Bill, the Government are saying that presumably all these changes are good things that they are justly proud of. I therefore see no reason why the Government should resist this amendment on the grounds of fact. The Minister always seeks to be constructive in her work in your Lordships’ House, so I am sure she would not resist an amendment that delivers essential legislative clarity simply for the sake of delivering an unamended Bill at the end of the scrutiny process.
Against this context, should the Government oppose my amendment we will be led to assume that the Government are in fact embarrassed by the reality of their legislation being set out in simple terms. If they are indeed proud of the Bill, they will have no cause to be embarrassed and should accept the amendment.
Amendments 8 and 9 in the name of my noble friend Lord Lilley put the Government’s fundamental motivations under scrutiny. I certainly will not presume to make my noble friend’s argument for him before he has spoken to his amendments himself, but the question of whether a court exists that could deliver a binding and enforceable judgment on the sovereignty of the Chagos Archipelago is essential to the fundamental purpose of the Bill. I am not aware of such a court, and without such a court the Government’s argument for the necessity of the Bill falls apart.
As we all know, this Bill is not necessary or essential. It may have been framed as such by the international lawyer friends of the Prime Minister and the Attorney-General. It may be the deep conviction of the Foreign Office officials who seem determined to act against Britain’s interests on this issue. It may even be the view of the Attorney-General. But ultimately it is a political decision of this Government. Ministers should not hide behind legal advice. They should come to the House with a positive message of whatever benefits they think the Bill provides to the British people and the Chagossians. That is what normally happens with any other Bill before this House.
While we are debating the subject of international law, as I am sure we will be, I would like to ask the Minister a question. I draw her attention to a 1967 international agreement concerning the availability for defence purposes of the British Indian Ocean Territory. This is an agreement between the United Kingdom and the United States in which we agreed that the British Indian Ocean Territory
“shall remain under United Kingdom sovereignty”.
Do the Government accept that their proposals to cede sovereignty over the territory to Mauritius would involve a breach of their obligations in this treaty? They are always lecturing us on the importance of abiding by international agreements and treaties, so I assume they would not wish to be in breach of an international treaty. I would be grateful if the Minister could tell me what they are proposing to do about that international agreement.
Amendment 21 is designed to improve parliamentary scrutiny of the Government’s actions on Chagos by requiring a ministerial Statement to Parliament when the treaty comes into effect. We know that the Commons were, in fact, denied a substantive debate on ratification, despite long precedent under CRaG requiring that debates should indeed be granted. We know the Government are likely to press ahead with the treaty irrespective of any opposition from these Benches, but their conviction to deliver a deal that is good for no one but Mauritian taxpayers should not mean that we have less parliamentary scrutiny. In fact, as I have said before, if they are so proud of their record, I am sure they would be delighted to come to Parliament to talk about exactly how they are pressing this issue.
Finally, I have indicated my intention to oppose the Motion that Clause 1 stand part of the Bill. In my view, this is a bad Bill that should rightly be consigned to the pile of other uncommenced legislation. If it lacked a commencement clause, I think that would be a very sensible outcome.
Before I give way to the noble Lord, I give Ministers advance notice that I intend to degroup Amendments 14, 64 and 84, and I believe my noble friend Lord Lilley will add Amendment 25 to that, on the subject of a referendum. We will take them out of the next group and talk about them when we get to them. I give way to the noble Lord.