The following Statement was made in the House of Commons on Wednesday 16 June.
“With permission, Mr Speaker, I will make a Statement on the G7 summit I chaired in Carbis Bay and the NATO summit in Brussels.
Let me first thank the people of Cornwall, Carbis Bay and St Ives for welcoming the representatives of the world’s most powerful democracies to their home, an enchanting setting for the first gathering of G7 leaders in two years, the first since the pandemic began, and President Biden’s first overseas visit since taking office. Our aim was to demonstrate how the world’s democracies are ready and able to address the world’s toughest problems, offering solutions and backing them up with concrete action.
The G7 will combine our strengths and expertise to defeat Covid, minimise the risk of another pandemic, and build back better, fairer and greener for the benefit of all. Alongside our partners, the G7 is now engaged in the biggest and fastest vaccination programme in history, which is designed to protect the whole world by the end of next year. My fellow leaders agreed to supply developing countries with another billion doses—either directly or through other channels—of which 100 million will come from the UK.
The world’s most popular vaccine was developed here, and the express purpose of the deal between the British Government, Oxford University and AstraZeneca was to create an inoculation that would be easy to store, quick to distribute and available at cost price, or zero profit, in order to protect as many people as possible. The results are becoming clearer every day: over 500 million Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccines have been administered in 168 countries so far, accounting for 96% of the doses distributed to developing nations by COVAX, the global alliance that the UK helped to establish. With every passing hour, people are being protected across the world, and lives saved, by the formidable expertise that the UK was able to assemble.
But all the efforts of this country and many others, no matter how generous and far-sighted, would be futile in the face of another lethal virus that might escape our efforts, so the G7 has agreed to support a Global Pandemic Radar to spot new pathogens before they begin to spread, allowing immediate containment. In case a new virus gets through anyway, our scientists will embark on a mission to develop the ability to create new vaccines, treatments and tests in just 100 days, compared with the 300 required for Covid.
Even as we persevere against this virus, my fellow leaders share my determination to look beyond today’s crisis and build back better, greener and fairer. If we can learn anything from this tragedy, we have at least been given a chance to break with the past, do things better and do them differently. This time, as our economies rebound, we must avoid the mistakes we made after the financial crash of 2008 and ensure that everyone benefits from the recovery. The surest way to our future prosperity is to design fair and open rules and standards for the new frontiers of the global economy, so the G7 will devise a fairer tax system for global corporations, reversing the race to the bottom, and will strive to ensure that new technology serves as a force for prosperity and hope, strengthening freedom and openness.
My fellow leaders will act as one against an increasing injustice—the denial of an education to millions of girls across the world—by working to get another 40 million girls into school by 2025. I am happy to say that the G7 agreed to provide more than half of the $5 billion sought by the Global Partnership for Education to transform the prospects of millions of children in developing countries, and £430 million will come from the UK.
Our duty to future generations compels us to protect our planet from catastrophic climate change. Every country in the G7 has promised to achieve net zero by 2050, wiping out our contribution to global warming from that date onwards. To achieve that target, we will halve our carbon emissions by 2030 compared with 2010 levels. The G7 resolved to end any government support for unabated coal-fired power generation overseas, and to increase and improve climate finance between now and 2025. We will consecrate 30% of our land and sea to nature, protecting vast areas in all their abundance and diversity of life, giving millions of species the chance to recover from the ravages of recent decades.
It is precisely because safeguarding our planet requires global action that the G7 will offer developing countries a new partnership, the Build Back Better World, to help to construct new, clean and green infrastructure in a way that is transparent and environmentally responsible. There is no contradiction between averting climate change and creating highly skilled and well-paid jobs, both in our country and around the world; we can and will achieve both by means of a green industrial revolution at home and green infrastructure abroad.
I was honoured to welcome our friends the leaders of India, South Korea, Australia and South Africa as guests in Carbis Bay—virtually, of course, in the case of the Prime Minister of India. On Monday, Scott Morrison and I were delighted to reach a free trade agreement between the UK and Australia, creating fantastic opportunities for both our countries, eliminating tariffs on all British exports—whether Scotch whisky or cars from the Midlands—and making it easier for young British people to live and work in Australia. We have also included protections for British farmers over the next 15 years and unprecedented protections and provisions for animal welfare. This House will, of course, be able to scrutinise the agreement once the texts are finalised.
This is exactly how global Britain will help to generate jobs and opportunities at home and level up our whole United Kingdom. Our agreement with Australia is a vital step towards the even greater prize of the UK joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a $9 trillion free trade area embracing the fastest growing economies of the world.
Together with the G7, the countries represented at Carbis Bay comprise a “Democratic XI”—free nations living on five continents, spanning different faiths and cultures, but united by a shared belief in liberty, democracy and human rights. Those ideals were encapsulated in the Atlantic charter agreed by Winston Churchill and President Roosevelt in 1941, when Britain was the only surviving democracy in Europe and the very existence of our freedom was in peril. The courage and valour of millions of people ensured that our ideals survived and flourished, and 80 years on, President Biden and I met within sight of HMS “Prince of Wales”, the Royal Navy’s newest aircraft carrier and the linear successor of the battleship on which the original charter was devised; and we agreed a new Atlantic charter, encompassing the full breadth of British and American co-operation in science and technology, trade and global security.
The surest guarantee of our security is NATO, which protects a billion people in 30 countries, and the summit in Brussels on Monday agreed the wholesale modernisation of the alliance to meet new dangers, including in space and cyberspace, reflecting the priorities of our own integrated review of foreign and defence policy.
Britain has the biggest defence budget in Europe, comfortably exceeding the NATO target of 2% of national income. We have committed our nuclear deterrent and our cyber capabilities to the alliance, and we contribute more troops than any other country to NATO’s deployment to protect Poland and the Baltic states. We do more for the security of our continent than any other European power, showing that we mean it when we say that an attack on any NATO ally shall be considered an attack on all—a pledge that has kept the peace for over 70 years, and which President Biden reaffirmed on behalf of the United States.
Together, these two summits showed the enduring strength of the Atlantic alliance and the bonds we treasure with kindred democracies across the globe. They have provided the best possible foundation for COP 26 in Glasgow in November, when the UK will bring the whole world together in a common cause. They demonstrated how global Britain creates jobs at home, while striving in unison with our friends for a greener, safer and fairer world. I commend this Statement to the House.”
My Lords, had we heard the Prime Minister make his Statement in the other place, we would have heard the great joy with which he did so and how wonderful he thought the summit was, but we need to reflect on this. The Prime Minister hosted his first summit as the country basked in some much-needed sunshine and the England team delighted us all with their first group-stage win. The BBC reported that the US President raised Northern Ireland in a side meeting, and finance Ministers discussed global tax arrangements. That is not about 2021; the same issues were raised back at the G8, as it was then, in 1998, but the similarities end there. The differences between the Carbis Bay and Birmingham summits are stark, not just because it is now the G7 meeting.
The hope that we would see agreement on meaningful, concrete plans to tackle the biggest global challenges disappeared as the Prime Minister’s strained relationships with world leaders took centre stage. Not for the first time, the Government overpromised and underdelivered. There is no global vaccination plan and no action agreed on the climate crisis. At every step, Boris Johnson’s broken promises have cost us friends—but they also cost us our influence.
Bringing the pandemic to an end must be the priority. That means an effective, worldwide vaccination programme. While the virus circulates anywhere it is a threat to us all everywhere, so we welcomed and were optimistic about the Prime Minister’s promise to vaccinate the entire world, as he said, by the end of 2022—only to yet again be disappointed as that turned out to be unsubstantiated rhetoric, with no clear plan to deliver it. There is no funding formula, no operational strategy and no information on where the 11 billion doses of the vaccine would come from. We should have seen an immediate increase in global support for health services in developing countries for any plans to be truly effective.
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The shadow Secretary of State for International Trade, Emily Thornberry, has written to the Prime Minister on those issues. I hope that the noble Baroness the Leader of the House has had an opportunity to see that letter to the Prime Minister and that he has read it. The 10-point plan my right honourable friend outlined addresses the fundamental problems about how we can produce the volume of vaccines needed, alongside making preparations for the infrastructure to deliver it. It would ensure we were better prepared for any future pandemic. Yes, it is expensive, but the human, social and economic costs of not doing so are far greater.
Ahead of COP 26, the G7 could have set the groundwork for an ambitious green recovery, leading global support across the world to tackle the climate crisis and finding common ground on climate finance. Again, the Prime Minister fell short: nothing was agreed on national determined contributions and there was nothing to support mitigation and adaptation in the world’s poorest countries. The complete failure of the green homes grant here at home and the impact of aid cuts on climate projects undermine our climate credibility and leave us recklessly out of step with our allies in the G7.
The noble Baroness the Leader of the House will be aware that I have repeatedly asked when, or indeed if, there will be a vote in Parliament on aid cuts. I have had no success, even though this is about the Government breaking their own legislation. This time I will be more specific about the effects of those cuts, because the Prime Minister’s Statement, made yesterday, refers to girls’ education. He clearly recognises the importance of the issue. Given that, and following the cut in the aid budget, will the Government now publish the full details of the cuts expected for such girls’ education programmes? This is just in the interests of transparency, so we know the exact impact they will have.
While Northern Ireland may have been missing from the communiqué and the Prime Minister’s Statement to Parliament, it was not missing from the meetings. Let us be clear: the protocol was not imposed on us but negotiated by this Government. Mr Johnson’s claim to
“do whatever it takes to protect the … integrity of the UK”
is meaningless unless the Government step up to find serious solutions to protect the precious Good Friday agreement. In refusing to do that, the Government are not only shirking their responsibility but damaging our reputation with our strongest allies. We have repeatedly suggested that a veterinary agreement which recognises the unique circumstances of Northern Ireland would remove the need for almost all the checks. Ministers must now show some leadership.
President Biden’s proposal for the global minimum corporation tax is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to stop tax avoidance and the undercutting of UK businesses which pay their fair share. This could provide us with billions of pounds in extra tax revenue, yet the Government have spent the last few weeks watering down proposals which could have put an extra £131 million a week into our NHS and other services for the public’s benefit. Can the noble Baroness tell the House why the Government stood in the way of this proposal?
Although Northern Ireland was not mentioned, the Australian trade deal was. We obviously want to see good trade deals, but we also need to see the details and not just the Government patting themselves on the back. I seek two points of clarification on that trade deal. First, there seems to be no mention in the Government’s agreement in principle of environmental or animal welfare standards. The noble Baroness will understand why it is so important to the farming community to ensure that our high production standards are not undermined. Can she provide any assurances on this? Secondly, can she also guarantee that, prior to ratification, Parliament will have full ratification well in advance and a clear and accurate impact assessment?
On a more optimistic note, the NATO summit in Brussels took some welcome steps towards future security in Europe and the north Atlantic. This underlines exactly why the alliance is so important to us. A collective understanding of new security threats, a recommitment to Article 5 deterrence and an emphasis on climate are each integral to global security and stability. We are also pleased that the leaders recognise the challenges that Beijing poses to global security and stability, so can the noble Baroness now detail and provide more information on what strategic actions NATO will agree in relation to China?
In a world of democracy under pressure, and as the US leads allies in facing the challenges posed by China in the Indo-Pacific, the UK’s military leadership in Europe is more important than ever. Having cut the British Army by a further 10,000, however, we are left not only unable to provide regional leadership but out of step with our allies. Again, the UK Government were unable to provide the necessary leadership or direction that we should be in a position to do. With that in mind, does the noble Baroness regret that the Government have broken their election pledge and are now cutting our Armed Forces by 10,000?
In conclusion, it has been 23 years since the Birmingham G8. International co-operation remains our most effective tool for global progress but the Government have to be ambitious, and that is what was really lacking from this summit. We could have enormous influence on the world stage, but that is a choice. We can do that only if we have the leadership to turn our values into action.