Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)

My Lords, I will try not to outlive the welcome that the Minister extended to me and the nice words expressed by so many colleagues from all sides of the House. I hope that she will forgive me if I press her further on the enhanced tier of the foreign influence registration scheme and the point about academics that was raised earlier. It comes as no surprise to those seven parliamentarians —of whom I am one—who have been sanctioned by the Chinese Communist Party to hear warnings about CCP operatives spying and laying the groundwork for subversive long-term relationships with parliamentarians. But those sanctions are nothing compared with the imprisonment of hundreds of pro-democracy advocates, such as Jimmy Lai in Hong Kong, or the atrocities committed against Uyghur Muslims. They are nothing compared with the evidence that the Joint Committee on Human Rights, which I have the privilege to chair, received during our inquiry into transnational repression and published in our report of 30 July. For instance, we cited the bounties of 1 million Hong Kong dollars on the heads of UK residents, including the courageous 20 year-old Chloe Cheung. I have raised the intimidation of academics, such as Professor Michelle Shipworth, who was referred to by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, as well as the case of Professor Laura Murphy, which was in the newspapers recently. Laura Murphy works at Sheffield Hallam University, and she gave evidence to our Joint Committee on Human Rights in our inquiry on supply chain transparency and modern-day slavery. Both of those academics have experienced intimidation as a consequence. When the Minister has her meeting with university vice-chancellors, I hope she will emphasise the dangers of becoming far too dependent on money pouring into our universities, which then starts to call the tune. During our hearings, we received a large amount of evidence recommending the designation of China under the enhanced tier of the foreign influence registration scheme. We found: “China conducts the most comprehensive TNR”— transnational repression— “campaign of any foreign state operating in the UK. Its omission from the enhanced tier risks undermining the credibility and coherence of FIRS”. We recommend that “the Government specify China under the enhanced tier of FIRS”. In the light of these most recent revelations, I hope that the Minister will go back and talk to the honourable Dan Jarvis, who gave evidence to the Joint Committee, to try to speed up that consideration. It is high time that we did so, and it is high time that we reduced our dependency and enhanced our resilience.