Tuesday 23 February 2016
Oral evidence, 23 February 2016.
Witness
Kate Allen, Director of Amnesty International UK, gave evidence.
Chair
Thank you very much indeed for joining us. Would you like to formally identify yourself for the record?
Kate Allen
Thank you. My name is Kate Allen and I am Director of Amnesty International in the UK.
Chair
Thank you very much for your written evidence. I think that you had the opportunity to hear David Mepham. What is your view on whether or not the Government have deprioritised human rights?
Kate Allen
I think that when we hear Sir Simon McDonald actually saying that, there are real concerns. Over the past year or so, our concerns about the priority of human rights have become more marked. One of the things I would want to add to the areas that David talked about is that if you look back at some of the areas that we have worked on together in my time at Amnesty—civil society, human rights organisations and the FCO—you see that over several years we have had some brilliant co-operation around issues and campaigns such as the arms trade treaty, the preventing sexual violence initiative and support for human rights defenders in Afghanistan. I pick out those three as key areas where in the last three years, civil society, human rights organisations and Amnesty International’s 600,000 members, supporters and activists have worked together, either by getting behind a Government initiative, such as preventing sexual violence, or by persuading Government to get behind one of our campaigns, and we have seen the kind of impact that we can have in this country when we make those connections. I do not see where the next connection is at the moment in terms of what we could jointly pursue for good in terms of human rights in the world. That would be my worry about where things are going: I cannot see where the progress is and where we could work together to make things happen. I would also say that in some areas—for example, the arms trade treaty, which is something that Amnesty fought for over a 20-year period, so it is enormously close to our hearts to see how it is implemented—previous Governments have championed it. The last Government, with William Hague and Alistair Burt, were one of the first Governments to bring that treaty into operation, but at the moment, we are seeing our Government not implementing it—in fact, worse than not implementing it, they are breaking that treaty. I refer to arms sales to Saudi Arabia, which is involved in Yemen. We have a legal opinion, which we have shared with the Government, which says that they are breaking domestic and EU law and the arms trade treaty, and we have not yet had a response on that. I feel like some of those key issues on which we have made really significant moves forward together are going backwards.
Chair
What is your view on the shift to three key themes of work? Is the impact likely to be adverse? I think the Foreign Office’s case is that it will make the business of human rights everybody’s business.
Kate Allen
A bit like David, I think that whether it is 6+2 or 3, the key thing is that we are absolutely clear what sits under each of those headings. One advantage of the previous 6+2 is that the name said it all: the death penalty, freedom of expression, women’s human rights and so on. What we have now is three headings, and I am not sure what sits under those. It is not clear to me that that is clear across the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and that there are clear communications about torture and the death penalty—those are the issues I would highlight. Very significant work was undertaken by the FCO on the torture strategy. We would like to see that happen, and I am not sure where it is happening, or what resources are going into that; likewise with the death penalty. We have seen the external panels abandoned that brought together expertise and the FCO to take those issues forward, so there are concerns, at the least. What human rights objectives are the Government pursuing under each of those three headings? Can you find the issue that you are passionate about under those three headings or not? Maybe it is a question of time, but at the moment I would say it is quite difficult to see.
Chair
You have recommended that all UK missions should have a dedicated human rights adviser. How do you envisage that working? Who would they be? Where would they be drawn from? Would Foreign Office staff take up that role, or would someone external come in to undertake that role, and who would pay for them?
Kate Allen
No, we see them very much as Foreign Office staff, an integral part of that mission—not an add-on, but absolutely a part of that team, which has the remit of taking the Government’s human rights priorities and applying them to that country, making relationship and contacts with human rights defenders in that country, observing trials, being out there seeing exactly what is happening, looking for opportunities to bring British Government influence to bear and bringing that back to the rest of the mission. It is not that that is the only place that human rights resides, but it is a focal point within a mission to provide the expertise and support to do more and do better.
Chair
Doesn’t that already exist? Doesn’t someone in each mission have the responsibility for human rights? Obviously, it depends on the size of the mission as to how much bandwidth that issue takes up. If there are only three Foreign Office diplomats in a mission, it is quite difficult to have one of them entirely devoted to human rights.
Kate Allen
I think the bandwidth is the key issue, isn’t it? If you look across missions that have more than a staff of three—where the UK has substantial resources placed—where do human rights reside and where is that bandwidth? From our point of view, having a dedicated resource would mean that you had it at the forefront—pushing, looking for opportunities, being proactive and making sure that British Government influence was being used as creatively and as well as possible.
Chair
What advice do you have for the Committee on how we should hold the Government to account on human rights? I realise that it is difficult to say before they produce their new human rights report, but assuming it is a much more slimmed down version of the former accountability document, what would your advice to us be about how to hold the Government to account on human rights for the rest of this Parliament?
Kate Allen
As you say, we will see the new report before too long and I think it will be good to have that conversation then, seeing exactly what it looks like. For us at Amnesty, the report is a crucial moment in the year and in the calendar. It is not just the report; it is the fact that attention is paid to it, that this Committee scrutinises it, that you ask Amnesty and others what we think of it, and that there is a debate and a conversation about it. So I look forward to being able—I hope—to talk to you about that report once we have seen it. The clarity of the objectives is the key. We go back to the three new objectives and what the Government’s intention is under each of those in terms of the human rights progress that they wish to see. I would also say, as David from Human Rights Watch said, that the pressure where trade and human rights come into conflict is a point that is key for us. I would say that with the UK selling arms to Saudi Arabia at the moment and when we see what the UN panel is saying about the situation in Yemen—the targeting of civilians and the human rights abuses that are taking place—those issues absolutely need to be debated. I think that sometimes with countries like Saudi Arabia, there is a different standard in terms of human rights application from the British Government, and that is something we would like to see the end of.
Yasmin Qureshi
I asked David about whether the Foreign Office is sufficiently resourced to have a meaningful impact in the three areas it has identified as the ones it wants to look at, also bearing in mind that there have generally been cuts to Foreign Office funding. What do you think, Kate?
Kate Allen
We are very much aware that the cuts to the Foreign Office this time round were not as deep as had been expected, but we must remember that there were cuts in 2010 and 2013. That there are not dedicated resources within the human rights and democracy department for some of the key issues that we are concerned about worries us—whether enough resources are being placed there to achieve that impact. There are extraordinarily dedicated civil servants in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office who are taking up these issues and who want to pursue them, so it is not about anything other than the level of resources. We would like to see that extended—we would always want to see that extended.
Yasmin Qureshi
Obviously, as you said, resources are perhaps not necessarily the priority issue. Do you think it is more linked with what we have heard, namely that the political will—that is, at ministerial level—to deal with human rights issues, or deprioritise them, is what affects whether they can even look at these three issues that they themselves have identified as important? Do you agree that there seems to be less of that political will now than there used to be?
Kate Allen
I agree. It was disappointing on Human Rights Day to have the Foreign Secretary talk about megaphone diplomacy and quiet diplomacy. We at Amnesty are well aware of the different uses of both of those. Human Rights Day is an occasion where we could have hoped for something that set out a vision and an opportunity for human rights to be lauded and described in different ways. We felt we were being a bit hit over the head and told, “Stop shouting at us.” Of course, one of the things that happens in this country is that we disagree at times, but we also agree, and we try to be sensible about that and are not always using a megaphone. It feels like some of these key opportunities in the year to really champion human rights are being squandered. As I said earlier, the fact that we have been used to having some really ambitious joint areas that we work on—we have PSVI, which is still being implemented, but we do not have its successor on the horizon. That means there may well be a deprioritisation of this as an issue.
Yasmin Qureshi
Some people are cynical and say that this depends on the country in question and whether we want to have a good trade deal with it. Trade deals and investment seem to be the priority, and we do not really pay attention to human rights issues in countries that we want on our side strategically or want to work with, and we are more concerned about human rights in countries that we do not have financial or other strategic interests in.
Kate Allen
I would agree with you, but I would also say that this is not new. It has gone on for a long time. Amnesty would say that if you are talking about China, Egypt or Saudi Arabia, where there are strong security and prosperity trade issues, to completely leave human rights off the agenda is to do a disservice to both prosperity and security. For us, human rights is an essential part of that. For example, we saw the Chancellor in China not talking about human rights at a time when over 200 lawyers had been arrested; when he was in Xinjiang province and when Amnesty were campaigning for an economist who had been imprisoned—as far as we are aware, there was no conversation about that. It feels to us that human rights is not at the centre of that. That is why we would say there should not only be a human rights adviser in each UK mission but a human rights adviser on these big trade delegations, so that human rights can be part of that conversation and not something that is swept to one side.
Andrew Rosindell
What is your view of the shift in language away from “Countries of Concern” to “Human Rights Priority Countries”?
Kate Allen
Personally, I like “Countries of Concern”, as it shows that there is a concern and worry about what is happening there. But again, let’s see what the new human rights report that the Government produces looks like and see how that definition works out.
Chair
What is your assessment of the Magna Carta Fund as a means of influencing human rights overseas? It appears to have doubled, if one is measuring the Office’s commitment to human rights in financial terms.
Kate Allen
We very much welcome the increase in the size of the fund. Amnesty has not made any applications for the fund, but in the past colleagues of mine have been advisers to the fund in terms of the uses to which its predecessor was put. We are very supportive of that fund. We think it is a really good opportunity to support some creative and very important work around the world. The only thing we would highlight is that smaller, community-based organisations, particularly those outside capital cities, which do not have much experience of applying for funds, will need additional support to be able to apply effectively. There are Governments with funds that do this well, such as the Dutch, and there may be things that can be learned from them. The only thing we would pull out is making sure that it isn’t just the big NGOs based in capital cities that have access.
Chair
How do we deal with, say, Russian human rights NGOs, for whom taking foreign money is likely to be seen as treasonable?
Kate Allen
Yes, it is very difficult. Amnesty has an office in Moscow, and I understand all too well what the difficulties are. Some of the ways in which the embassy in Moscow has reached out to NGOs have been very good. There is a sense of interest in what is happening to NGOs, which is very good, and the embassy is raising these issues with the Russian authorities. There are now well over 100 NGOs on the foreign agents list. We have seen that happen to NGOs working on the way in which elections are conducted. LGBTI organisations have been absolutely targeted, as have other human rights organisations. Work from the embassy and the Government to raise this with the Russian authorities is the way to take it forward.
Chair
On the willingness of missions overseas to engage with human rights NGOs locally, have you seen any change in the behaviour and policy of our overseas missions that would support to any extent your point about a reduction in ministerial priority around these issues? What is actually happening on the ground? Are our missions just as committed as they were before? Is the actuality of what is happening on the ground pretty much the same as it has been in previous years?
Kate Allen
That is a very wide question. I would need to think about whether the change of priority is having any effect. I think that if those at the top of the Foreign Office are not championing human rights, it will be of concern.
Chair
That is why I am asking whether you have identified any change in, for example, the willingness of our mission in Moscow to engage with human rights NGOs in Russia, or indeed anywhere else in the world where there has been a change; or is there in fact a commitment to promote human rights throughout the Foreign Office? I think the Minister’s point is that this is actually about outputs, not about how it is recorded in an annual compendium; it is actually about what happens on the ground, and that on the ground missions are still committed to supporting NGOs, particularly where it is difficult.
Kate Allen
I am sure that great work is happening.
Chair
I’m really asking whether you have seen any change.
Kate Allen
No, I can’t say that I have.
Mr Hendrick
Clearly, as a lobbying organisation lobbying for huge improvements on human rights, it is your job to highlight where you think the Government should be doing more and where you think it is not doing a particularly good job. I totally agree with you on Russia. When I visited Russia, I met some of the human rights groups that are doing very good work under extreme pressure, given the changes to the law—the Russian authorities are doing their best to outlaw the activities of many lobbying organisations. Put yourself in the position of, say, one of our Foreign Ministers. If the Government took a view like yours, and put human rights at the top of the agenda—admittedly, I do not think it is high enough up the agenda—to the detriment of everything else, do you not think that to some extent the Government’s other priorities would take a beating? That could put our relations with many of those countries, which may be improving their human rights even though they are not reaching the standards that we would like, in danger of becoming more aggressive instead of becoming more positive.
Kate Allen
I am not sure that pursuing human rights is ever to the detriment of progress in a country. Take Saudi Arabia—a country where recently 47 people were executed in one day, where is no freedom of speech and where we are campaigning for individuals such as Raif Badawi, who was given a 10-year prison sentence and has been lashed 50 times simply for a very reasonable blog that he wrote. Some women in Saudi Arabia have a vote in local elections, but there is no equality for women in the workplace and in family life; in everything else, they are discriminated against hugely. I do not see where it could be to the detriment of those human rights—
Mr Hendrick
In Saudi Arabia, I totally agree with you, so list as many examples and instances as you like, but not every country is the same, and my question is whether it might be more sensible for Ministers to calibrate their response to the specific concerns about a specific country. The example of Saudi Arabia is clear. With Egypt, it is scandalous that the actions of the Egyptian Government are overlooked by the Foreign Office in terms of producing a human rights report. One example you mentioned is China. I regularly visit China and, as Peter mentioned previously, President Xi Jinping is called a reformist. China’s move away from the one-child policy is a step forward. The reform that is talked about a great deal relates in particular to corruption, which is a huge problem and leads to many human rights abuses. We know what is happening in Xinjiang, and to many people in the outside world Xinjiang looks like a problem of human rights, but to many Chinese people living in Xinjiang, it is a terrorist problem. Obviously a country the size of China, which is probably the size of two continents, has serious internal security problems, and unlike modern western democracies like us, they would not necessarily have the same development and sophistication to be able to deal with it in the way that we would want. All I am asking is whether there is a case for calibrating our attitudes to human rights, depending on the country we are dealing with.
Kate Allen
I am not sure that I would use the word “calibrating”. The diplomats in the FCO have huge experience of how to raise these issues.
Mr Hendrick
I am talking about the Ministers. The criticism from Mr Mepham and probably for the most part from you is that civil servants are excellent and our Foreign Office people are great. I am talking about the job that Ministers have to do when they go out to these countries.
Kate Allen
And my view and the view of Amnesty International is that in the right way in each of those places that Ministers go to, human rights should be firmly on the agenda. Sometimes that might be a private conversation and sometimes it might be in public; sometimes it might be quite critical and sometimes it might be encouraging, but it should take place. We would say that in such countries as China, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, either we are not seeing it take place or we are not seeing any results from private diplomacy. You can only be told that the private diplomacy is taking place and having an effect for so long before the demand to show what some of that effect is comes into operation.
Mr Hendrick
I would make a distinction there, and that is what I meant by calibration. Attacking a country on its human rights record is not the same as being a critical friend, and that differentiation should be made.
Kate Allen
I agree, but I do not think that being a critical friend when the abuses are so extreme is the appropriate approach.
Mr Hendrick
On Saudi Arabia, I would agree with you.
Yasmin Qureshi
There are other countries as well. You always concentrate on Saudi Arabia.
Chair
Let’s ask the questions, rather than conduct a debate.
Ann Clwyd
The FCO’s annual report contained three paragraphs—in a 192-page report—on its monitoring and evaluation work. Is it not just a joke when the term “monitoring” is used? Does it really happen in practice? When we ask about the use of arms, for example, in countries that we are exporting to and we ask for a monitoring report on whether those arms have been used in certain circumstances, we very rarely get what I would call comprehensive replies. I would suggest the monitoring and evaluation is a bit of a joke.
Kate Allen
If you go back to the conversation that we were having about the three new priorities, for me, it is essential that the human rights objectives under each of those are articulated and communicated really clearly, so that we know exactly what the Government are setting out to do. In that way, the monitoring and evaluation is applied towards an objective rather than simply sitting in a vacuum, and it would then have more meaning. If an objective was to implement the arms trade treaty, we would absolutely be having a conversation at the publication of the next annual report about whether that objective was met or not, and I would be sat here telling you that our view as Amnesty, given what is happening in Yemen, would be that it is being completely flouted. But it seems to me that what is lacking at the moment are clear objectives under those three priorities.
Ann Clwyd
Comparing what the Foreign Office does on evaluation with, for example, what is done by the Department for International Development, my view is that DFID has a much more comprehensive evaluation process in place than the Foreign Office does.
Kate Allen
I am not that closely aware of DFID. I have heard that it has very effective evaluation and I am sure that the Departments could learn from each other.
Ann Clwyd
I only know because I was once a member of that Committee. The evaluation reports on projects, for example, and whether policies were working were pretty thorough compared with, as I described, a few paragraphs in the annual report from the Foreign Office. We can also compare what happens in other countries, although I don’t know if you go with those comparisons. You are asking for monitoring. Suppose a country has sold arms somewhere and there is a suspicion that they are not being used as they were supposed to be used. There are other countries that take monitoring much more seriously.
Kate Allen
I agree.
Ann Clwyd
The other thing I would suggest is that in the countries that we have been very heavily involved in, such as Iraq and Afghanistan, our continuing policies there really are questionable, as is the effectiveness of those policies. I think just a few paragraphs in the annual report are not sufficient.
Kate Allen
If you look back to some of the progress that has been made, there was the adoption in Afghanistan of the EU guidelines on human rights defenders, with particular support for women human rights defenders. I think that that was agreed over a year ago. I would very much to like know how that has been implemented and what advantage human rights defenders now feel from those guidelines and the increased sense of security given by them for the work they are doing. By pulling out particular projects, making sure that they are followed through and understanding where the progress is, we can build future progress.
Chair
Some of the evidence we have taken, particularly from some LGBT human rights organisations, has been quite positive about the change that the Foreign Office is undertaking. They think it will give them and the Office more rather than less scope, and support moving away from the comprehensive annual report on human rights, the critique of which is that it has become rather formulaic, one year following the next. It has become a document that is perhaps of some use to Amnesty and Human Rights Watch, but in terms of highlighting current issues of concern and getting a new, annual focus on them, the rather less prescriptive and formulaic approach, which we are yet to see in action, might be an improvement. What are your thoughts on the people who see the change as positive?
Kate Allen
The only thing I would say about the human rights report is that I think it is much more than “of use to Amnesty and Human Rights Watch”. It really is a report that shows the accountability of the UK Government over this issue. We felt like we were hanging on to it with our fingernails at some points during the last year, so I am really glad that it is still there because of that moment and because of the conversation that I hope we will have in a few months’ time. I think it is really important. Shaking things up is good, too and in April we will see whether we think that shake-up is one that still shows accountability that we can all—not just human rights organisations—talk about. At the launches of some previous reports, the media and everyone else were really interested in what Government Ministers were saying and who was on the panel presenting the report; there was a real sense of occasion. Some of that has drifted, so what goes around the report is also important. The thing I would say about the 6+2 and the lack of LGBTI among them, the head of the human rights and democracy department said that that was a bit of a hierarchy of norms. It would not be a bad hierarchy if you added LGBTI to it. Then there would be a clear sense of what is being pursued. I am repeating myself, but again that is what is lacking at the moment in the current three priorities. It can be put right, but there needs to be a real sense of what the Government’s objectives are.
Chair
How important is public debate and public concern about being able to engage people, and therefore the media, whose attention span is always limited and spotlighted? Are we not likely to be a bit more effective with more of an issue by issue, country by country and perhaps individual by individual focus on progress, or the lack of it, around individuals, countries and causes’ rights, rather than a much more comprehensive response that then gets lost in the background? Producing highlights might have the capacity to achieve ministerial focus and public focus.
Kate Allen
Again, we will see when we get the new human rights report and see what the changes are, but I do think it has been a really important report and I think that the attention that it has had in previous years has been important. I think that important debates have come out of that: the UK’s approach to Saudi in terms of torture and I remember in the past some areas have been really highlighted and which the Government has taken to heart. That has been the role of human rights organisations, this Committee and the media, making clear and having a discussion. That is important, and I hope that we have that around the next report, however long or short it is, and that we can have a conversation about how effective we think it is once we see the thing.
Chair
Okay. If my colleagues have no further questions, Kate, thank you very much indeed. Oral evidence: Human rights, HC 860 17