Mr Bowen Wells: If the small Caribbean islands cannot export bananas, the islanders' only other way of earning a living is to grow drugs, which they are increasingly doing because of the dispute. Is that a desirable outcome?
Mr Bowen Wells: Does my hon. Friend know why the Netherlands and Denmark voted against the regime? The reason, if I may suggest it to him, is that the subsidiaries of Chiquita, which distribute central American bananas, have the entire Danish and Dutch markets to themselves.
Mr Bowen Wells: If the Government intended to implement the two-stage process that the right hon. Gentleman describes, why did they not appoint a consultative body—a Speaker's Conference or a royal commission—as soon as they came to office? That would have given opportunities for proper discussion, bringing in those on all sides of the argument, including the Official Opposition. I am not aware of any...
Mr Bowen Wells: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Could you clarify for me your ruling on the breadth of the debate? Are we allowed on Third Reading to debate the question of the transitional House, to which the abolition of hereditary peers will inevitably lead, or is that banned from our debate as well?
Mr Bowen Wells: Will the Minister of State and his G8 partners examine ethical foreign policy as regards the pursuit of peace in Sierra Leone? That state remains violent and conflict-riven, and our policy seems to be simply to support one aspect, one person and one president and not to encourage the pursuit of an ethical foreign policy to achieve peace in that country.
Mr Bowen Wells: We all owe it to the House, to our constituents and to the country to speak the truth as far as we can possibly know it. The truth is that the Budget is very good in many aspects and we should acknowledge that. Although we would have liked to have achieved an inflation rate of 2.5 per cent. much sooner than we have, it is a matter for congratulation that the Government have managed the...
Mr Bowen Wells: I admit that I have not had a chance to focus on the IFS analysis of the Budget, and if we start to talk about deciles of the population, we shall soon lose the attention of most of our constituents. I believe that our constituents must experience what happens in their schools, what happens to bus and train fares, what happens to food prices and, if they have a car or a motor cycle, what...
Mr Bowen Wells: Does the Secretary of State agree that trade must happen along with aid, so that people in third-world countries can help themselves? Will she join me in trying to persuade the Foreign Secretary and the Prime Minister that President Clinton should in turn be persuaded to call off the war against the small countries of the eastern Caribbean over the banana trade?
Mr Bowen Wells: Amendment No. 13 is a compromise. Unfortunately, it says: or shall in future be appointed a member of the House of Lords by the exercise of patronage". I would have preferred it to continue, "or shall be appointed by a member of the House of Lords by exercise of patronage"—in which case we would have left the House of Lords without hereditary peers or life peers, but with bishops and Law...
Mr Bowen Wells: Would the right hon. Gentleman like to reflect on those colonial constitutions?
Mr Bowen Wells: The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right—it is all factual stuff. However, he might like to recall the occasion on which that renunciation took place and the reason why it was so important: it was that Lord James Douglas-Hamilton represented the Government's majority in the House of Commons at the time.
Mr Bowen Wells: I am following the hon. Gentleman's argument closely. How many Government Bills has the House of Lords wrecked, and on what subjects?
Mr Bowen Wells: Will the Foreign Secretary confirm that he accepts the recommendation of the International Development Select Committee on Agenda 2000—that all development should be undertaken by one commissioner, so that the whole development budget can be combined in a managerially and administratively sensible way?
Mr Bowen Wells: I know that the hon. Lady has visited the Caribbean. She is of course right to say that, in the Caribbean, limbo dancing is done horizontally, under a flaming bar, to calypso music of the type that is performed so brilliantly in Trinidad and Tobago during carnival, which starts today and leads up to Lent. However, I believe that you would quickly pull me up to order if I followed that...
Mr Bowen Wells: I should be very interested to know what your Clerk would advise you, Mr. Martin.
Mr Bowen Wells: I assure you, Mr. Martin, that I have no doubt that you will always make very positive and proper decisions in the interests of all hon. Members. The Government are in a peculiar position. In a subsequent amendment, they will be supporting hereditary peers with voting rights, whereas, in amendment No. 1, they will not support peers without voting rights. That seems to be illogical.
Mr Bowen Wells: I believe that, if we pass amendment No. 1, we may not have to worry about the next group of amendments. If we pass the amendment, the Clerk may say to you, "The next amendment falls." We could therefore move on even more swiftly—which I know would very much please your heart, Mr. Martin, and the hearts of the Government Whips.
Mr Bowen Wells: That might be a very sensible course of action. If we passed the amendment, we would have a new House of Lords in which we retained all the peers and would not have to choose from among them. They would not have to elect from among themselves, and we would not have to have the peculiarly distorted electoral process described in the next group of amendments, which we shall debate at length....
Mr Bowen Wells: I wonder whether my hon. Friend will reflect on the reasons why that Bill was not passed? It was, after all, Mr. Foot and Enoch Powell who opposed it.
Mr Bowen Wells: There is a great deal in what the hon. Lady says. I believe that the Cross Benchers fora: the largest single group in the House of Lords—they cannot be called a party—and add enormously to what goes on there. They include life peers, but also many hereditary peers—200, I believe—who participate in the elements of House of Lords activity that the hon. Lady admires. I want to talk about...
