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Tag: Speeches

  • David Trimble – 2001 Speech to Conservative Party Conference

    David Trimble – 2001 Speech to Conservative Party Conference

    The speech made by David Trimble, the then Leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, to Conservative Party Conference on 10 October 2001.

    May I thank you for the invitation to speak here today. I have always wanted to see Ulster Unionism closer to the heart of British politics. Today will mark a further step in that direction. I am also glad to see this invitation has been noticed elsewhere. I happened to be in Downing Street last week and someone said to me, “I see you’re addressing the Tory Conference.” I said that it was nothing odd, after all he had a guest at his. Indeed I remarked that his guest Gerhard Schroeder said he had come to the Labour conference as part of his quest to unite Europe. My object today, however, is much more modest.

    Obviously we meet at a very special time. May I say how proud I am at the contribution Britain is making at the moment. The attack on the World Trade Center was the greatest terrorist attack on the British people since the defeat of Hitler. It affected people from all parts of the British Isles – at least three of the dead came from Northern Ireland. We all know there may be greater challenges ahead for our armed forces and indeed for society here in Britain and our thoughts and prayers are with our servicemen and all those who protect us at home or abroad.

    But the Government today is doing precisely what we would want and expect a British government to do and it will be supported.

    In a situation like this we know the need to act and act decisively even though, inescapably, one must act on imperfect information producing results that may fall short of the ideal.

    But if I can digress, Britain and America find it easier to act because they have governments capable of taking decisions. The hesitant and sometimes uncertain responses of our European partners are because in most cases they are governed by coalitions. Inevitably they are less capable of quick and resolute decision. And, of course, coalitions are the inevitable consequence of proportional representation. I have had experience of more than one form of proportional representation. But I must resist the temptation of telling you of the drawbacks of PR.

    But if the response to Bin laden and the Taleban is clear-cut, unfortunately at home in Northern Ireland, the position is not so clear. The problem is uncertainty and the Government’s reluctance to grasp the nettle.

    I still think John Major was right when he began the process. Whatever one might think of the character of those involved in terrorism, if they were saying that they were prepared to turn their back on terrorism and embrace peace and democracy, then, if only for the sake of the people who identified with them politically, it was right to explore the chance of peaceful evolution.

    The problem is that the terrorists have tried to have it both ways – the ballot box and the armalite. They have delayed a clear and unequivocal commitment to peace.

    We can all go back over the last few years and say we would have done this or that differently. But the point today is that I and my party are now bringing matters to a head in order to force Sinn Fein and the IRA to decide. We are not doing this cynically to exploit the mood after 11 September. We have been steadily, patiently, building the pressure since last October. On Monday we took the final steps, which will result, by about today week, in the resignation of the Unionist Ministers from the Northern Ireland Executive. This will be shortly followed by the removal therefrom of the Sinn Fein Ministers until they prove by decommissioning that they have left violence behind.

    We have waited a long time – three and a half years since the Agreement – seventeen months since the IRA itself promised to put their weapons beyond use. If they are ever going to do it, it must be now. If they do, fine. Then the new institutions will bed down. If they do not it will be clear that we must change the institutions so they can survive Sinn Fein’s failure. There may be reluctance to make those changes, but the need will be inescapable.

    Either way I look forward to greater certainty and stability in Northern Ireland. But Northern Ireland does not exist in isolation. It is part of the United Kingdom. There is a wider context, which we should consider.

    So it is natural to consider our relationship with national politics. Because I am here, some have speculated that I am going to talk about future links between Conservatives and Ulster Unionists. And of course there was for a long time a structural relationship between our parties and there is a strong continuing friendship. But this is too big an issue to be approached simply in a sectional way. I would prefer to reflect first more broadly.

    There is a communal aspect to party structures in Ulster. This has some unfortunate consequences. Some who do not want a united Ireland will vote nationalist out of a perceived need for communal solidarity. On the other hand some opt out of politics completely because they dislike the communal background of most parties. Most Ulster Unionists would think of themselves as small “c” conservatives. But some would identify more with labour and are Unionist for communal reasons.

    Once it was different. In the nineteenth century, both the Liberal and Conservative parties organized throughout Ireland. In the early twentieth Labour too organized there. But in response to Irish nationalism those involved in those parties coalesced to form Ulster Unionism. It was understandable and for decades it gave us stability. But it has this disadvantage – politics in Northern Ireland are based on a nationalist framework of reference. Parties are based on the fundamental issue of whether they are for or against a united Ireland.

    Compare Scotland. Parties there are based on a British framework of reference. The major British parties are there providing to the Scottish people the full range of British politics and then, alongside them there is a Scottish nationalist party. To a British person who wants to see and take part in British politics, the Scottish model is preferable to that we have in Northern Ireland.

    To its credit the Conservative Party has recognized this. Moreover it is important that the decision in the late 80s to organize in Northern Ireland was taken in response to pressure from the grassroots of the party. They felt, rightly, that some of the party’s policies on Northern Ireland were wrong, and they wanted to send a message of sympathy to the British people of Ulster.

    But a move by Conservatives alone could not break the mold. If things are to change, if we are to move from a Irish nationalist to a British pluralist basis of politics, then we need two things.

    First all the national parties must move. I am sure that this party will do its bit. The problem is Labour. It too must be prepared to move. There is an element in Labour sympathetic to Irish nationalism who have resisted this. But they must realise that, with the acceptance by the Irish government and by all the Irish nationalist parties of the consent principle, their attitudes must change.

    If Tony Blair was right when, on his first visit to Ulster as Prime Minister in May 1997, he said to some primary school children, that there would not be a United Ireland in their lifetime, then Labour has a duty to provide political opportunities for those children throughout their lives. And Labour members with Irish nationalist sympathies should remember the considerable contribution to the positive development of community relations in Scotland that resulted from Wheatley’s decision to take the Irish nationalist organization in Scotland into the Labour party there.

    The second thing concerns the party politics in Northern Ireland. Clearly it will be radically affected. I know there will be many in all parties, my own included who will be cautious. And we will not want to give up our capacity to exercise our own judgment on local issues. Moreover it is not until there is a sense of stability, a sense that Ulster’s place within the Union is secure, that the Assembly and the new arrangements have bedded – not until all that is settled will folk focus fully on these wider issues.

    But I am sure that they will want to address these wider issues. I am sure that the basic concepts of the Agreement are sound – the consent principle to settle the constitutional issue – a regional assembly to give democratic accountability on local issues – an Irish dimension to acknowledge the identity of nationalists.

    But more is needed. The Assembly is limited. It has to operate within the context of the overall economic and social policy of the national government. If the Assembly is all there is the people will not fell that they are properly involved in politics. Taxation, expenditure, defence, foreign policy, are still determined in London. Unless there is a sense of involvement and accountability on those issues, the electorate in Northern Ireland will not be satisfied.

    This problem does not exist with regard to Scotland and Wales. There the people can vote for the national parties who decide these matters. I do not think we will have a healthy political system until the people of Northern Ireland have a similar opportunity to “turn the rascals out”. And it is in the interests of the people of Great Britain, and in the interests of the people of the Republic of Ireland to encourage the development of healthier politics in Northern Ireland.

    There is another aspect too. The present structures prevent a person in Northern Ireland participating in British national politics. The last two governments contained Ministers from Northern Ireland. But Sir Brian Mawhinney and Kate Hoey had to leave Northern Ireland in order to be able to participate.

    It reminds me of the comparison between Belfast and Bangkok. The question is what can you do in Bangkok that you cannot do in Belfast? The answer of course is join the Labour party. Northern Ireland is the only place on the globe where you cannot join Labour. It is a civil rights issue.

    This is not something that is going to change overnight. It is not on the agenda today. But it is something we should think about. It will probably be on tomorrow’s agenda. It is right that it should for in a sense it is just filling in the British dimension to the Agreement. When the time comes I believe this party will be ready. I hope mine will be. Together I think we can meet the need. The real challenge, however, is for New Labour and Tony Blair.

    Mr. Blair made a good beginning on Northern Ireland. That May 1997 speech was sound on the basic principles. Without him there would not have been an Agreement in April 1998.

    But then came the implementation. Understandably he left much of that to others. To an extent he took his eye off the ball. Expediency slithered into appeasement. Confidence in the Agreement ebbed as people felt that the concessions were all one way.

    But there is the chance now to recover – indeed to fulfill the original promise. The paramilitaries can be faced down – the Assembly stabilized.

    And by moving forward with this party he could offer a range of political alternatives to the people of Ulster.

    It is often said that we are the prisoners of history.

    But the key on outside.

    Mr. Blair it is time to turn it.

    Time to treat the people of Northern Ireland as fully part of the United Kingdom.

  • Theresa May – 2001 Speech on “Culture of Spin Within Government” [Jo Moore]

    Theresa May – 2001 Speech on “Culture of Spin Within Government” [Jo Moore]

    The speech made by Theresa May, the then Conservative Party chair, in the House of Commons on 23 October 2001.

    Thank you Mr Speaker and I would like to move the motion standing in my name and that of my Right Honourable and Honourable friends.

    Mr Speaker I am sure we will all remember the events of September 11th for the rest of our lives.

    Just as past generations have defined themselves by what they were doing when President Kennedy was assassinated so a whole generation of people will define themselves by what they were doing when they saw the events of September 11th.

    Up and down the country people watched their televisions in disbelief and wondered if what they saw could actually be happening.

    Let me refresh the memory of Honourable Members on those events.

    At 1:45 in the afternoon British time a plane travelling from Boston to Los Angeles, carrying 92 people, crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Centre.

    Fifteen minutes later, at 2:00 British time a second plane, carrying 64 people, hit the south tower.

    At 2:30 British time a third plane, carrying 65 people, crashed into the Pentagon in Washington – and workers at companies such as Cantor Fitzgerald based in the World Trade Centre phoned their loved ones and left messages telling them they were about to die.

    Between 2:30 and 3:00 British time, major Government buildings in Washington were evacuated in anticipation of a further strike.

    Eyewitnesses and those watching on television saw bodies falling from the upper floors of the World Trade Centre.

    Between 3 and 3.30pm British time both towers of the World Trade Centre collapsed.

    At 3.30p.m the Prime Minister abandoned his speech to the TUC in Brighton.

    I’m sure that Members on all sides of the House shared with me the sense of utter disbelief as we watched those horrifying scenes.

    The world stood transfixed, unable to comprehend the horror that was unfolding before our very eyes.

    And yet in the midst of all of this, at 2:55, Ms Jo Moore, special adviser to the Secretary of State, his appointee, sent an e-mail to her departmental colleagues saying, ‘It is now a very good day to get out anything we want to bury. Councillors expenses?’

    To think that someone’s immediate reaction was to see what was happening in New York and Washington, not as a human tragedy but as a political PR opportunity, which Ministers should make the most of, is almost beyond understanding.

    The events of that day marked a change in the way we viewed our own position in the world.

    But they also marked the day when the culture of this Government’s news management stepped beyond the acceptable and became the disreputable.

    This motion today is not one that we have moved lightly.

    But it is a sad commentary on the attitudes and approach of this Government and on the culture of spin nurtured by this Government that Ministers’ actions have brought us to this debate today.

    And I am not alone in feeling this way:

    – Speaking of the email sent by Jo Moore, the Chairman of the Public Administration Committee, the Hon Member for Cannock Chase said ‘The question is whether what happened is consistent with any notion of public service that I or anybody else has. I thought at the time it wasn’t and I haven’t changed my mind now’. Her actions were ‘incompatible with public service’.

    – The Hon Member for Hornchurch said ‘the behaviour she’s displayed, it flies in the face of any public service ethos that I have ever heard of and it flies in the face of everything the Labour Party ever stood for.’

    – The Prime Minister said in this House on 17 October Hansard column 1165 ‘I do not defend in any shape or form what Jo Moore said, which was horrible, wrong and stupid’.

    Given those comments and the sense of outrage that has been felt across this House and outside Parliament I find it incomprehensible that Ms Moore is still in her post.

    It reflects not only a lack of understanding on her part, but also a sorry lack of judgement on the part of the Secretary of State.

    But in relation to the Secretary of State’s position there are a number of questions that still need to be answered.

    My hon friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale wrote to the Secretary of State on 12 October asking him to state publicly whether Jo Moore still had his firm support, give an assurance that no-one acted on the advice in the e-mail, and say whether or not he had spoken to Ms Moore before she sent the e-mail.

    So far he has not replied.

    So I invite the Secretary of State not just for his own sake but to restore some faith in government to take this opportunity to respond to the following questions:

    – Where was the Secretary of State on the 11th September?

    – Did the Secretary of State speak to Jo Moore on the 11th September; and, if so, at what time?

    – Did the Secretary of State speak to any one else in his office about the e-mail from Jo Moore on 11th September?

    – How did the Secretary of State learn of the existence and the content of the e-mail and who told him?

    Now of course it has been pointed out that the member of staff in question was disciplined, but again on this there are a number of outstanding questions surrounding the procedure that was followed.

    The Secretary of State needs to answer these in order to allay concerns in this House and elsewhere.

    It would appear that having initially not taken any action, when the story of the email broke on 8 October, the Secretary of State disciplined Ms Moore personally.

    The normal procedure is for the Permanent Secretary to discipline civil servants and special advisers, yet in this case the rebuke by the Permanent Secretary seems only to have been made after some delay, and only then because journalists were claiming that the Secretary of State had broken the rules on disciplinary action.

    This is a case in which the Secretary of State said that she had done wrong. The PM said that her action was horrible. But one in which ministers were determined from the outset that she should not lose her job.

    Just what does it take for a spin doctor to lose their job in this Government?

    – Why did the Secretary of State take it upon himself to protect her job before the Permanent Secretary had any chance to investigate?

    – Doesn’t all this show that the Secretary of State has indulged in grubby politics even as he sought to respond to Jo Moore’s disgraceful email?

    – And is it not the case that he clings to Jo Moore because he knows that if she goes, he is next in line?

    Later still of course we had Ms Moore’s apology.

    It took a week, it contained no direct apology to the families of those involved in the horrific events of September 11th, rather she seemed most concerned to apologise to the Government and Ministers.

    And then there was the manner of her apology.

    Any interview with a special adviser should be authorized – we do not know who did that nor do we know why Sky News was chosen initially as the sole recipient of the apology.

    And for many of us the most telling aspect was not the apology but the look on her face when she turned away from the cameras.

    She spun her way in and she has tried to spin her way out.

    But of course the email sent by Jo Moore on 11 September is not the only example we have of this culture of spin in Government – this canker of this culture of spin that lies at the heart of government.

    There are other examples from the DTLR.

    Ms Moore herself was involved in trying to persuade a junior civil servant to leak information to journalists aimed at discrediting Bob Kiley the London Transport Commissioner while he and the Secretary of State were involved in a dispute over the future of London Underground.

    That she did so was confirmed yesterday in a written answer at Hansard, col 94. Surely this is contrary to the code of conduct for special advisers yet no action was taken against her.

    Action was taken but instead of reprimanding his special adviser, the Secretary of State’s involvement was aimed at the Department’s Director of Information Alun Evans who had protested on behalf of his member of staff.

    5 days later the Director of Information was moved to another post.

    The question is did he leave the Department voluntarily. Perhaps the Secretary of State would like to answer that today.

    I understand that the posts of Director of Information and Head of News in the Department are vacant and appointments are due to be made in the next few weeks.

    It would help to restore a degree of confidence among staff in the Department if the Secretary of State would today state categorically that Ms Moore will have no role whatsoever, will not be consulted or invited to comment, on those appointments.

    The Secretary of State must answer these questions if he is to clear up some of the confusion that surrounds these events.

    Because the Secretary of State has something of a record when it comes to press officers.

    While he was a minister at the then Department for Education and Employment, in 1997, Jonathan Haslam resigned, reportedly after a row with the Right Honourable gentleman who had asked him to issue a press release criticising the record of the previous government.

    The charge against the Secretary of State is that he has perpetuated the culture of spin at the heart of government by his connivance in the politicisation of press officers.

    He must also, however, answer the accusation that, whilst the Government outwardly professed to be as disgusted as the rest of us, they appear internally to have followed Ms Moore’s advice.

    Because in the immediate aftermath of the events of the 11th September a number of ‘bad news’ stories were indeed released.

    We all know that the, now infamous, councillor’s expenses story was indeed released the following day.

    According to press reports the Rt Hon Member for Greenwich and Woolwich insists that that the announcement in question was cleared for publication on September 10th.

    Yet, press reports also suggest that the release was, unusually, sent to the Local Government chronicle only an hour before their press deadline.

    Chris Mahony, News Editor of the Local Government chronicle puts it very well when he says “To be thinking of such things at such a time shows that these people’s minds are even weirder than we thought.”

    But September 12th also saw a release on pensions for councillors and the release of new planning guidance for the West Country, which will force the construction of 200,000 more buildings on green fields, irrespective of local wishes.

    On the 14th September the Government published exam results, which showed that standards in Maths amongst 11 year olds were actually getting worse.

    The 4th October saw the announcement of the cancellation of the proposed Picketts Lock athletics stadium, jeopardising the chances of our hosting the 2005 world athletics championships.

    And of course we have seen over the past few days yet more examples of the problem of spin.

    The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs had to come to the House yesterday to defend herself against allegations of spin after issuing a significant press release on errors made in tests on sheep brains for evidence of BSE had been released to the press late one night with no press conference.

    But perhaps even more significant was the personal apology given yesterday in another place by the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald who had to apologise to the House.

    Not only for the fact that he had given an unclear answer to the House leading their lordships to believe that the number of special advisers had only gone up under Labour from 78 to 81 when in fact the number has increased from 38 under the last Conservative Government to 81, but he also had to apologise for the fact that his officials tried to persuade Hansard to change the written record.

    And now of course following the notorious email, the Government has had to appoint a city PR firm to do its spinning rather than Ms Moore – more taxpayers money being spent on the government’s image.

    […]

    But it is not only Opposition and Government MPs who have expressed their disgust at the attitude of Ms Moore and of Ministers in defending her – as any perusal of the letters pages of the newspapers since the event will confirm.

    … This issue goes beyond the actions of one government spin doctor.

    It is not just about what Ministers have referred to as a single mistake.

    It goes to the very heart of the approach this Government takes to the electorate and to Parliamentary democracy.

    It typifies a culture of spin that says whatever the issue spin matters more than substance.

    Little wonder that there is an attitude of cynicism to politics and politicians among the general public when they hear of actions such as this which tell them that the Government is more interested in losing a few announcements than it is in the feelings of people whose loved ones had died in the horrific tragedies of September 11th.

    And it strikes at the heart of a relationship that has underpinned and strengthened our governments over the centuries that essential relationship between the non-political civil servants, working hard with dedication whoever is in government and the politicians they serve.

    I wonder what decent hard-working civil servants think when they see Jo Moore keeping her job.

    This culture of spin brings government and politicians into disrepute. It tarnishes Parliament.

    These are indeed bad news stories.

    But in this whole sorry saga we have a bigger one.

    It is a bad news story that at a time when all thoughts should have been focused on support for our friends in the US, people will read in their newspapers that politicians were intent on pulling the wool over their eyes.

    It is a bad news story because, at a time when people needed clear leadership, straightforward talk and honesty from all in government – they had the sense that they were being deceived.

    It is a bad news story because at time that brought out the best in so many people, they heard that, in some of their politicians, it had brought out the worst.

    When our armed forces are risking their lives half way around the world, when we are seeking to rally public opinion during the difficult times that may lie ahead, the Government has a particular responsibility to place its conduct beyond reproach.

    In the matter of Jo Moore it has failed in that duty.

    Despite all of the available evidence, against the advice of senior members opposite and contrary to the better judgement of some members of its own Cabinet, the Government has decided to retain its confidence in her.

    In the process it has inflicted unnecessary damage on our national life.

    By her actions, Ms Moore has demeaned the whole notion of public service. By its failure to act against her, this Government has debased both politics and itself.

    I beg to move the motion.

  • Iain Duncan Smith – 2001 Speech on “No Place for Racism in the Conservative Party” at Asian of the Year Dinner

    Iain Duncan Smith – 2001 Speech on “No Place for Racism in the Conservative Party” at Asian of the Year Dinner

    The speech made by Iain Duncan Smith, the then Leader of the Opposition, at the Asian of the Year dinner, on 25 October 2001.

    “It is a great pleasure for me to be here tonight to present the Asian of the year award for 2001. I would like to add once again my congratulations to Mr Gujral on winning that award. You typify so many of the values that I associate with British Asians, of hard work, enterprise and through your extensive charitable work, a strong commitment to helping the wider community. They are values that we all hold in common. This award is a tremendous achievement and I know I speak for all of us here when I say it is richly deserved.

    At the outset I would like to thank Jasbir Sachar, Managing Director of the Asian Who’s Who International for organising this event, that is firmly established as one of the high points of the British Asian calendar. Your annual publication serves as an essential work of reference about the British Asian community and, just as important, charts your success. So I am delighted to have been able to contribute the foreword to this year’s publication, as I am to receive a copy tonight.

    It is also a great honour for me to follow His Excellency Nareshwar Dayal, the High Commissioner of India, not least because of my own family links with India. In fact my father was born there – in Madras. It is a constant reminder to me of the closeness of the ties that bind so many of us with the sub-continent – ties that continue to grow stronger. That is something that I very much welcome and, as leader of the Conservative Party, wish to encourage and develop further. Of course, tonight’s event takes place against the backdrop of the military conflict that is raging in Afghanistan, a conflict in which our country is a fully committed coalition partner with the United States. Some two and a half weeks after the first bombing raids began it is worth reminding ourselves of our purpose and why it is so important that having started, we see it through.

    In our own country, in Northern Ireland, we have experienced thirty years of sustained terrorist violence and acts of cowardly evil. Hopefully, with the encouraging events of this week, we might now be able to look forward at last to a permanent end to violence there and a future for Northern Ireland based exclusively on democracy and consent.

    Yet nothing that we have been through here in any way prepared us for the scale of the atrocities that were carried out on 11th September in New York and Washington.

    Those attacks left over 7,000 people dead from over sixty countries. They included people of all religions– including Christians, Jews, Sikhs, Hindus, Muslims – and of none. They were the worst terrorist attacks ever perpetrated against our own country with hundreds of our fellow British citizens murdered. It must also rank as one of the worst terrorist outrages against countries such as Pakistan and India.
    They were attacks on us all and on the civilised values – democracy, freedom and the rule of law – that underpin our society.

    They could not go unpunished.

    Bin Laden and his Al Qu’ida network that planned and carried them out must be brought to justice, along with the Taleban regime that has harboured and sustained them.

    Let us be clear about one thing. This is not a war against Islam or the people of Afghanistan. It is a war against international terrorism, nothing more, nothing less. We must never allow Bin Laden to succeed in driving a wedge between Muslim countries and the west.

    Bin Laden and his supporters know no limits. There is no compromising with such fanatics. They simply have to be defeated.

    Some people argue that, yes, we must respond, but that the bombing has gone on for long enough and there should now be a pause – if only to allow essential humanitarian aid to get through to the Afghan people. I understand that view, but I cannot agree with it.

    Ending the humanitarian crisis is directly linked with military success. The biggest obstacle to delivering aid is the continued control of large parts of Afghanistan by the Taleban, who have intercepted aid, taxed it and sent some of it to market. For an effective aid programme to work the Taleban must fall. In its place there needs to be a broadly based government that is representative of the Afghan people and which will co-operate with the aid agencies. The window for that to happen is narrow, with most of the key passes into the country closed by the early New Year. So we must see the present action through.

    It is vital that this conflict is not allowed to sour relations between different communities here in Britain. All of us in public life have a responsibility to ensure that this does not happen.

    At the Conservative Conference a fortnight ago I said that, as Party Leader, I will be intolerant of those who are intolerant of others. I’ve demonstrated that already by the actions I have taken.

    I have also appointed Shailesh Vara as one of the Vice-Chairmen of the Conservative Party, Mohammed Riaz as my personal adviser on various race related issues, and Nirj Diva as my adviser on Asian issues in the European Parliament. Shailesh and Riaz were Conservative candidates at the last Election and Nirj is a Conservative MEP. All of them are first rate.

    I believe in a United Kingdom which is genuinely open and inclusive of all its citizens and in which racism and bigotry – of whatever kind – can have no place.

    Britain today is a diverse society, made up of many different groups, communities and cultural traditions. I believe that this is as a source of strength, providing our country with a richness of which we should all be proud.

    I want the United Kingdom to provide everybody with the same rights, the same obligations and the same levels of opportunity – a country where people are judged solely on their merits, whoever they are and wherever they come from.

    That is my view. It is also the clear and unequivocal position of the Conservative Party.

    It is a United Kingdom that respects differences, which enables us to hold on to the things that makes us distinctive but always allows us to come together as British. It is possible to be proud of your Asian roots, at the same time as being proud of your British heritage too. That is because whether we are Hindu or Sikh, Muslim or Christian, black, white or brown we are all as British as each other. It underpins our sense of being One Nation and the fact that the United Kingdom belongs to us all.

    And let us never forget that during the two world wars some five million soldiers from the sub-continent and the Afro-Caribbean countries fought side by side with British soldiers in the struggle for freedom. Many of them died. No – let us never forget.

    Tonight we are doing more than launching the latest edition of the Asian Who’s Who International. We are celebrating the fact that the story of British Asians is also one of the great British success stories of recent years. That is all the more impressive given the fact that so many British Asians came here with next to nothing. Many of those who were thrown out of Uganda in the 1972 – and I know some those present here tonight are in that category – had to leave literally with only the clothes they were wearing.

    Yet despite the handicaps and the obstacles businesses owned by the Asian community have prospered and employ many thousands of people.

    There is no doubt that you make an outstanding contribution to the strength, prosperity and success of the United Kingdom. And in so many aspects of our national life – business, the arts, the media and the professions – you play an increasingly prominent role.

    But I want your contribution to go much further. The blunt truth is we still have far too few British Asians, members of other ethnic communities, and for that matter, women actively involved in politics in our country. I want to encourage more of them into the mainstream of British political life.

    I appreciate the difficulties that there have been in the past. Political parties of all persuasions, not just the Conservative Party, have not always appeared attractive to the different ethnic groups in our society. That has begun to change. We have British Asians – Nirj Deva and Bashir Khanbhai as Conservative Members of the European Parliament. People like Narinda Saroop have done outstanding work for the Party over many years.

    We have come a long way. But I readily accept that we still have a long way to go. My aim is clear. It is to broaden the appeal of the Conservative Party for British Asians, and for members of all the different ethnic groups in Britain.

    There is no place, and never has been, in the Conservative Party for those who extol the virtues of a creed that demeans people on the basis of their ethnicity. There is no place for racism in the Conservative Party.

    I want the Conservative Party to reflect and represent the diversity of our national life. I want us to be a Party for all the people.

    That means attracting more Asians into the Conservative Party at all levels. I want British Asians to contribute to the major policy review that I launched earlier this week, to become involved in the constituencies, to get elected to Parliament, to serve in Conservative Governments and Cabinets and, yes, to lead our Party in the future.

    The Conservative Party has much to learn from the values that have underpinned your success – a belief in freedom, enterprise, tradition, education, individual responsibility, fulfilling our obligations to others and in public service. They are your values. They are Conservative values too.

    And let me make it abundantly clear. Under my leadership the Conservative Party will be open to everyone who shares our values.

  • Iain Duncan Smith – 2001 Speech to the CBI

    Iain Duncan Smith – 2001 Speech to the CBI

    The speech made by Iain Duncan Smith, the then Leader of the Opposition, to the CBI on 6 November 2001.

    It is a great pleasure for me to be with you this morning at the 25th CBI National Conference, and I am grateful for you kind words of introduction.

    I am particularly pleased, at the beginning of my new role, as the leader of my party, to have this opportunity to speak to you. I hope that today is the beginning of a new dialogue between the Conservative Party and British business.

    Your Conference this year takes place against an increasingly difficult background for British business and the United Kingdom economy as a whole. The feeling of unease and uncertainty has, of course, been exacerbated by the events of 11 September.

    The Conservative Party is fully behind the Government in its total backing for the United States in the war against terrorism. It is their war and it is our war. We must see it through to the end.

    All of us has a role to play. Politicians in presenting a united front. And you, in business, by not allowing the terrorists to succeed in deflecting you from your normal, daily activities.

    Yet it is clear, as most commentators agree, that the global economy was weakening from well before the terrible atrocities committed on that day.

    As the most recent Economic Review by Deloitte and Touche states: ‘there is no doubt that a severe slowdown is in train’.

    As the report makes clear, to blame this on 11 September would be, in their words, ‘mistaken’.

    Without in any way being alarmist about our prospects this picture gives us all concern. It means that for many businesses there are going to be immense challenges ahead.

    In this context of growing economic difficulty, it is more important than ever that the Government’s policies support business and foster competitiveness.

    Throughout its first term, the current Government inherited an economy in which the fundamentals were strong. There was a favourable global economic environment. The world economy generally performed well.

    As a result the Government was able to increase taxes while their immediate effect for many people was blunted by rising incomes.

    The task of any responsible Government, however, is not to pursue an economic policy just for the times when things are going well and then assume that those circumstances will last forever. They need to ensure that the economy is also in a position to withstand unexpected shocks. Instead, Ministers seem to have believed their own rhetoric about boom and bust being abolished forever.

    At a time when many of our competitors have been cutting taxes, Gordon Brown has spent the last four years raising them. The tax burden has increased by a massive £28 billion, or 10p on the basic rate of income tax. The CBI itself puts the increased burden of business taxes at £5 billion a year.

    It is little surprise, therefore, that a recent Pricewaterhousecoopers study showed that Britain has now lost two-thirds of the tax advantages we enjoyed against our European neighbours in the mid 1990s.

    To make matters worse, instead of easing the burden of regulations on British business, the Government has spent the past four years increasing them. The Institute of Directors has put the added cost to business of regulations at a further £5 billion. According to research carried out by the independent House of Commons Library in the year 2000 alone, 3,864 new regulations were introduced– the highest figure on record.

    And in place of a truly responsible and prudent approach to spending, we have seen spending allowed to run ahead of growth. If that continues it can only mean one thing.

    As the IFS said in March: ‘If spending is to grow by more than GDP growth beyond 2003-4 then further increases in tax will be required’.

    Or as a senior Downing Street policy adviser was quoted as saying yesterday: “We have to get over, and the public have to understand, that all these changes that are being talked about come at a price. The only way that they can be paid for is tax increases”.

    All of this has contributed to a worrying picture for our competitiveness.

    Now there is the risk of adding further uncertainty to the economy. The Government have set a course to join the euro that would lock us forever into a one size fits all interest rate irrespective of whether it suited our economic circumstances of not.

    Of course on Sunday, the Chancellor sought to sound a more cautious note than the Prime Minister in Brighton last month. Yet this is just another episode in Labour’s now all too familiar good cop, bad cop routine whose purpose is to make a decision to bounce Britain into the euro look objective.

    It is all part of a game. Whenever they want to appear warm about the euro, we see the Prime Minister, or Peter Mandelson or Peter Hain. When they want to appear sceptical we see Gordon Brown or Jack Straw. They urge those of you who are pro-euro to run ahead of them in advocating membership. At the same time they try to assure those of you who are against, that membership is a far off prospect when the truth is that they are committed to join.

    The result of this game is to produce the worst of all worlds. It is destabilising to industry that wants to plan ahead with a degree of certainty. And it clearly exposes the so-called five economic tests as totally bogus. We all know that they have nothing to do with economics and everything to do with politics.

    A strong, dynamic economy relies on fundamental economic stability and the flexibility to respond to different circumstances. That is why in the referendum Conservatives will campaign to keep the pound.

    I know that some of you will agree with this, while others won’t. Yet our position has the virtue of being offering stability – you at least have a clear sense of where you are with the Conservatives. And it is sustainable because, as the fourth largest economy in the world we can make a success of our own currency, if that is what we choose.

    It stands in stark contrast to the now you see it, now you don’t peekaboo politics being played by the Government on the euro.

    Building a strong, dynamic and competitive economy is vital. It underpins so many of our aspirations. Without it, the improvements that all of us seek in our public services simply are not deliverable. And building world-class public services has to be our overriding priority as a nation.

    Britain is the fourth largest economy in the world. Yet ask anyone who uses the public services, and they will tell you that in so many areas they would disgrace the third world.

    Of course I don’t pretend that the problems with our public services began 1 May 1997. Yet it is undoubtedly the case that since then things either haven’t improved, or they have simply got worse.

    Our hospitals have been operating throughout the summer at winter levels of crisis so that a Health Minister is now forced to admit the winter crisis now lasts for the whole year. Our schools are such that up to forty per cent of all teachers with three years experience are leaving the profession. Our police are so demoralised that, according to the Chairman of the Police Federation, morale is at an all time low with resignations having increased by over 80 per cent in the past four years.

    We live in the age of the communications revolution, where vast amounts of information are transmitted across the globe every second. Yet we have patients lying on trolleys in crowded hospital wards for hours before they are seen by a consultant.

    We live in the age of the global economy where more money is traded in the City of London’s foreign exchange markets in two hours than the British Government spends in a year. Yet too many of our children leave school ill-equipped to take advantage of the opportunities that are on offer.

    And we live in an age of where we can buy goods and services through the internet in minutes. Yet the state of our transport system means that travelling a few miles can take hours.

    What angers people more, is that this comes at a time when we are constantly told that record amounts of investment are going into these services. We are urged to be patient. All that is needed is time. The Government’s view seems to be that all it will take is one more heave.

    Yet we have had four and a half years already. For all the boasts of new investment, of record amounts of money and new initiatives, things the experience of real people is that things are not just failing to get any better, they are going from bad to worse.

    Take the Health Service. Only yesterday figures showed that despite an extra £8.4 billion in the past two years alone, there has been almost no rise in the numbers of patients treated. At the present rate there is no way that Labour will meet their Election pledge to cut the maximum waiting time for in patients to six months by 2005. No wonder Ministers are reportedly concerned that the cash “has disappeared into a black hole”.

    All of this is of enormous importance to all of you in business. Put simply, failing and unreformed public services cost you money. They cost you money in the extra taxes the Government imposes on you to pay for them. And they add to your costs when you have to pick up the bills for their failure. It is happening now.

    Your own annual absence survey for 2001 states that 192,000,000 working days were lost due to sickness. It estimates that this costs British business £10.7 billion a year. Coronary heart disease in men accounts for the loss of 47,000 working years every year. In France and Germany waiting times are virtually negligible. Here, it can take a year for a heart by-pass. A constituent of mine waiting for a by-pass started by working five days a week, gradually it went down until after a year he was working a half day, one day a week. Yet as he put it to me: “my employers still have to bear the cost of not having me around”.

    According to one survey transport problems are costing British business at least £5 billion a year in lost working time. Include productivity losses, the cost soars to £10 billion a year. As one who has used the Tube endlessly to get to work, my abiding memory of last summer is not just the endless delays that make people late, but the cramped and sweaty carriages that mean when you eventually arrive, it takes half an hour before you are in a fit state to think of work.

    Last year Tesco was so alarmed by poor literacy and numeracy standards that it was forced to spend £1 million to send hundreds of recruits on courses to bring them up to scratch on the 3Rs. As one Tesco manager said: ‘The people we are employing are not thick or stupid. They have just not been given the right education in the first place’.

    The conclusion is clear. Failing public services don’t just create human tragedies; they result in business tragedies too.

    For too long in this country we have been locked into a sterile debate. We have been told that there were only two choices. Either we have higher taxes and better public services, or we have lower taxes and worse public services. Yet what we have had for the past four years is higher taxes and worse services.

    It is a false choice, based on an argument that simply wouldn’t run anywhere else in those European countries that tax no more heavily than we do, yet spend more on their public services.

    The real choice before us is not, as the Prime Minister tells us, between short term tax cuts or increased investment. We can continue down the same road of taxing ever more heavily in order to plough ever more money to pay for unreformed services. Or we can combine a low tax, wealth-creating economy with genuine public service reform.

    The other danger with the current course is that not only will it not work, it will ultimately be self-defeating. As taxes continue to rise we will risk undoing those things on which business success – and the money to pay for public services – actually depends. We will never pay for public services pursuing a policy that taxes and regulates businesses out of existence.

    We will have a situation in which sclerosis in the unreformed public services will ultimately lead to sclerosis in the economy as a whole.

    Nor will the Government’s approach to public/private partnerships solve their tax and spend dilemma. Conservatives strongly believe in bringing the private sector in to help provide public services. But Labour’s approach won’t work because it is a one-sided partnership.

    Four things are needed when private capital is brought into public projects: clear information, on which customers and suppliers can make a choice; freedom for customers to choose; freedom for providers to manage their businesses; and sanctity of contracts.

    Labour is providing none of these. In the health service, for example, the information about cost and performance is not available. Customers are not free to choose their health provider. Private providers are not free to manage their businesses, but have to abide by NHS practices. The Government is insisting on total control.

    What they are offering is not a public private partnership, but off-balance sheet finance. It is public services on the never-never.

    What they fail to understand is the trade-off between risk and reward that the private sector makes. If private capital providers can’t rely on the Government to keep to the terms of the deal, if the Government don’t hold to the sanctity of contracts, then there will be a huge risk premium on providing capital for public projects. And who is going to trust the Government to keep to the deal after they have ripped off 250,000 shareholders of Railtrack? What is the risk premium on dealing with the Government now?

    After the Railtrack debacle how many of you would want to deal with a Government that expects you to take all the risks, but is prepared to dump on you the minute anything goes wrong? So I make no apology for saying that we need a fundamental re-assessment of our approach. Not just to the financing of our key services, but also to the way in which those services are run. Because, the truth is that however much money we pour into the system, so long as the system remains the same things will not change. And Britain will be condemned to public services that shame our country.

    Just as the incoming Conservative Government in 1979 came to power with a radical reform agenda to transform an ailing economy, Britain now needs a Government with the an equally radical reform agenda to transform the public services.

    We need to reject the dogma that insists on services always being delivered by a monopoly state provider. We need to run our services in the interests of those who use them instead of providing favours for the vested interests that pay the political bills. And we need, where appropriate, to include the best of British enterprise and innovation that is found in the private and voluntary sectors.

    That is what other countries do. Only an ideological attachment to existing structures prevents Britain from doing the same. Yet that is what we get with Labour. They are ideologically wedded to the system, which is why, whatever the rhetoric, they simply cannot deliver.

    So we will be listening to the people who work in our public services as well as those who use them. We will be working with the charities, the churches, the public and the private sector to help us shape the policies that will deliver the results that people demand. And we will be seeing what can be learned from other countries too. That is why I have asked members of my Shadow Cabinet to travel to other European countries and beyond to see why their public services are so much better than ours.

    There are those who say that we can only have European levels of healthcare, education standards or transport if we have European levels of tax. They are missing the point. It is European countries such as France and Germany that are reducing taxes, while Britain has been putting them up.

    Our European neighbours have been prepared to learn from Britain about the need for low taxes, flexible markets and privatisation. It is time, when it comes to running public services, Britain has the self-confidence to learn from Europe.

    So the choice for Britain over the coming years is a clear one. It is to continue taxing and regulating ourselves into yesterday, while at the same time presiding over the steady and certain decay of our essential public services. Or we can choose a different way – one that sets business free, that promotes enterprise and on the public services whose only dogma is delivery.

    It is the latter course that, under my leadership, Conservatives will be following over the next four years.

    I know from working in industry that the most important resource a business has is its people. Yet the failing public services has become a hidden tax on that resource.

    People are devalued, while business is left to pick up the cost.

    Instead of investing in people we spend more and more money investing in failure.

    And the failure to reform our public services is a failure to invest in people.

  • PRESS RELEASE : Essential role for Europe in managing constitutional change in Ireland – Declan Kearney [December 2022]

    PRESS RELEASE : Essential role for Europe in managing constitutional change in Ireland – Declan Kearney [December 2022]

    The press release issued by Sinn Fein on 10 December 2022.

    Sinn Féin National Chairperson Declan Kearney MLA has called for the support of European democratic and progressive parties in helping to secure Irish unity.

    Speaking at the 7th Congress of the European Left in Vienna today, Declan Kearney said:

    “Constitutional change in Ireland is being increasingly viewed as the means by which to deliver real economic and social change in the interests of all citizens.

    “That is to transform health and social care through an Irish national health service; to guarantee the rights of all citizens within a new constitutional settlement; and for a united Ireland to rejoin the Europe Union.

    “If Brexit teaches us anything, it is that constitutional change requires planning and foresight so that Ireland does not repeat the mistakes made during that referendum.

    “Sinn Féin and other significant voices within Irish society are campaigning for the Irish government to establish an all island Citizens’ Assembly on future constitutional change.

    “A Citizens’ Assembly will be an important stepping stone towards securing a unity referendum and shaping the future of Ireland.

    “It would provide a forum to initiate all-island planning on issues such as the economy, health and education, policing and justice, and the protection of identity and cultural rights.

    “The Irish government should start preparing and planning for the transition to a united Ireland now. It makes common sense.

    Emphasising the important role of European democrats in the past and for the future, the Sinn Féin National Chairperson said;

    “European democrats and progressives and from elsewhere, helped us develop the peace process in Ireland. Now we are appealing for the support of all progressive political and civic forces across Europe, and in the European Parliament to help advance the process of future constitutional change.

    “Brexit, and British government attempts to rip up the Protocol, and its repeated threats to break international law, have made the division of Ireland, and our island’s future, a European issue.

    “European democrats have an important role to play again in helping us navigate the transition towards a united Ireland, and to bring all of Ireland back into the heart of Europe.”

  • Mary Lou McDonald – 2022 Speech Welcoming the European Commission President von der Leyen in Oireachtas Address

    Mary Lou McDonald – 2022 Speech Welcoming the European Commission President von der Leyen in Oireachtas Address

    The speech made by Mary Lou McDonald, the President of Sinn Fein, in the Irish Parliament on 1 December 2022.

    Ireland is a proud European nation.

    In the New Year, we will mark fifty years since Ireland became a member of what was then the European Communities in 1973.

    Since then, it has been a journey.

    There have been many positive advances in areas like equality, workers’ rights and environmental standards and challenges in terms of growing militarisation, deregulation and privatisation.

    But on this journey solidarity, fairness and a conviction that we can be strongest when we work together – to make a real, positive difference to people’s lives- has guided our greatest successes.

    I warmly welcome European Commission President von der Leyen here today.

    Through your work on the Commission you have been a good friend to Ireland and demonstrated your desire to work with Ireland towards these common goals.

    This year, Europe has shown the power of its unity and its solidarity in standing squarely with the people of Ukraine.

    Vladimir Putin’s barbaric invasion has shocked the world.

    His illegal and unjust war must be stopped and the horror of the bloodshed end.

    In this time of crisis, Europe has come together in solidarity with the people of Ukraine as they endure and resist this grotesque war.

    This solidarity has sent a powerful message to Putin that Ukraine is not alone— that Europe will stand up for what is right.

    Recent years have also shown Ireland the importance of European solidarity as we weather the storm of Brexit.

    There is no such thing as a good Brexit for Ireland.

    The people of the north voted to Remain in the EU, but were dragged out against their will by Britain- spearheaded by the Tories at the DUP’s urging.

    Throughout those years of fractious negotiations, the EU stood steadfast with Ireland and our determination to protect the peace process and the Good Friday Agreement, a peace agreement which will be 25 years old next year and has transformed our island and showed that conflict can end and peace can triumph.

    Prior to the Good Friday Agreement, British army checkpoints marked the border.

    British military installations, built and reinforced from the 1970s onwards, were symbols of division and conflict.

    The invisible border on the island of Ireland has now become the greatest symbol of peace.

    There can never be any return to the hard border in Ireland and I welcome your forceful assertion of that reality here today, President.

    It’s important to acknowledge that the Good Friday Agreement is a diplomatic success not just for Ireland but also the European Union and for that we commend you and we thank you.

    The European Union has been a critical partner for peace, providing political and financial support leading to greater economic and social progress on an all-island basis.

    I think it is particularly important to thank Michel Barnier and Maroš Šefčovič and their teams for their determination to hold steady on these crucial issues and defending peace and progress in Ireland.

    The EU’s solidarity remains essential as we continue to address the fall out of Brexit.

    Currently, the institutions in the north of our country lie dormant as the DUP continue their shameful boycott.

    Workers and families in the north pay the price of not having an Executive to work hard for them to deliver for them in the current cost of living crisis.

    It bears repeating that the Protocol is working and is necessary to protect the north from the damages of Brexit. It is supported by democratically elected representatives in the north and indeed across Ireland.

    While issues around the implementation of the Protocol exist, they can be resolved through good faith engagement.

    We must see calm and clear leadership from those at the negotiating table.

    We listened to the words of the new British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak that he is committed to restoring the political institutions and resolving issues around the implementation of the Protocol.

    His words are welcome but they need to be matched by action and meaningful talks between the British government and the European Commission.

    I know it is your fervent desire to engage constructively.

    This is what’s needed, not sabre rattling and no more threats to breach international law.

    The reality is that Ireland is changing and Brexit is responsible for some of that change.

    It was a very significant decision by the EU to state from the start of Brexit  – to our then Taoiseach Enda Kenny – that in the event of Irish reunification the north will automatically rejoin the European Union and the north’s citizens can become EU citizens once again.

    This is a very important statement recognising that the Good Friday Agreement set out the next step on Ireland’s journey – the ending of partition and the holding of referenda on reunification.

    The responsible thing for all of us to do now is to prepare for democratically, orderly, planned constitutional change.

    Just as the Commission played a key role in the peace process, I believe that the EU can play a positive role in the last length of the journey to Irish reunification, and a United Ireland within the European Union.

    We want to see the bridging of the gap on the democratic deficit.

    We want to see advances on workers’ rights, environmental protections, social justice, ethical trade, sustainable trade, research and developments, all areas in which we can make progress.

    That will challenge the European Union but we must rise to that challenge.

    The climate emergency is one of the biggest challenges facing our planet.

    As we in Ireland work to secure a better, greener future for younger generations, we know that this solidarity is crucial in delivering the major changes that area needed to secure truly meaningful impact.

    Through working together on these issues, we can deliver tangible and lasting change to our citizens’ lives.

    That is our vision for Europe.

    We are an island nation, at once on the periphery of Europe and at its heart.

    Our vision also recognises Ireland as a proudly neutral state.  To be Irish is to be from a small island, but it is also to be part of a powerful global family.

    We are somewhat of an outlier as an EU state in that we were the colonised and not the coloniser.

    We have seen conflict, we have seen partition and we have seen occupation.

    Speaking in this Chamber 35 years ago Australian former Prime Minister, Bob Hawke described this well when he said:

    “Ireland is the head of a huge empire in which Australia and the United States are the principal provinces. It is an empire acquired not by force of Irish arms but by force of Irish character, an empire not of political coercion but of spiritual affiliation, created by the thousands upon thousands of Irish men and women who chose to leave their shores, or who were banished from them, to help in the building of new societies over the years.”

    In an increasingly complex world in which our multilateral institutions must work, the presence of military neutrals and non-aligns can be a critical interlocutor in the work for peace, disarmament and social justice.

    I would go further.

    The next step is the recognition and acknowledgement of military neutrals and non-aligns within EU treaties, and of course here in Ireland.

    This would be a hugely positive step forward and would add to the diplomatic repertoire and scope of Europe.

    No doubt that there are many challenges facing Europe, but our shared commitments and values show what can be achieved through solidarity and a resolve to improve our citizens’ lives.

    We remain committed to working with our European friends on these issues as we work for a better life for all our people.

    We stand at a crossroads.

    The future of Europe can be one of retreat or one of hopeful progress. We must choose progress.

    A future in which citizens are disillusioned or empowered.

    A future of opportunities for the few at the top or a future of opportunity and prosperity for all.

    Now is the time, to look forward to the future, with ambition and hope.

    By working together, we can build a new Ireland and re-invigorate the vision of Europe as a beacon of fairness, solidarity, and equality.

    We believe we can make Ireland better, we believe we can make Europe better and by working together we can make the world better too.

  • Quentin Davies – 2001 Speech to the Ulster Unionist Party Conference

    Quentin Davies – 2001 Speech to the Ulster Unionist Party Conference

    The speech made by Quentin Davies, the then Shadow Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, in Belfast on 17 November 2001. This is the edited version released to the media.

    If one thing above all has struck me in the two months I have been doing this job it is the anxiety, the pessimism – I do not think it too much to say the despondency – of much of the Unionist community.

    So many people have said to me that they feel that things have moved inexorably against them, that the Peace Process has been a one-way street and that even a single IRA act of decommissioning does not change that.

    There is a very widespread impulse to discount any good news and – most painful of all for anyone who comes from England – a sense of betrayal – a feeling that their fellow citizens in the rest of the United Kingdom do not even regard them as such, and want nothing so much as to get shot of them as soon as possible.

    I am well aware that it is not the first time that such sentiments have been expressed in Ulster. I was struck by a passage in Thomas Hennessy’s excellent ‘History of Northern Ireland’, which I was reading the other day, in which Sir Richard Dawson Bates, then Minister for Home Affairs in Northern Ireland, said in 1938:

    ‘So long as we live, there will always be the danger of Home Rule or merging into the Free State. We will never get rid of it. One has only to go to England to see the extraordinary apathy towards us by people who should be our friends. We do not understand this apathy in England towards us …’

    If these sentiments have existed before, they have now returned with a vengeance. The thing that has caused me more pain than, I think, any other political comment that has ever been addressed to me, has been to be told several times that of course I care fundamentally much more about bombs in London or Birmingham, about blood being shed in England than about blood shed here.

    Well let me use this opportunity today to say with all the sincerity and conviction of which I am capable, that in my eyes Northern Ireland is in every sense just as much as part of our country as London or Lincolnshire where I come from, its inhabitants are every bit as precious to me and my colleagues and our responsibility for them is exactly and precisely the same.

    I know very well that it is not verbal analysis that will reassure people, it is only our deeds.

    So let me give you this commitment.

    Everything we do or say as the major Opposition party will be designed, whether directly or indirectly by exerting influence on the Government, to ensure that Northern Ireland can be, can continue to be, and can feel, a respected, a valued, and an equal part of the United Kingdom, and I hope increasingly a normalised and a prosperous part of our Kingdom.

  • Damian Green – 2001 Comments on the Education Bill

    Damian Green – 2001 Comments on the Education Bill

    The comments made by Damian Green, the then Shadow Education Secretary, on 22 November 2001.

    The Government will claim this Bill is deregulatory. This is flatly the opposite of the truth.

    It amounts to the biggest move yet towards the centralisation of decision-making in education.

    The Government is about to snuff out even more areas of independent activity in education. Under the guise of encouraging innovation in schools, the Bill will take power away from local government, from school governors and from headteachers, and keep that power back in Whitehall.

    I think this approach is exactly the opposite of what we need in our schools today. You cannot create a world-class education system if all power lies with the Secretary of State.

    If the Archangel Gabriel was available to be Secretary of State for Education and Skills, we still should not give him the powers that the current Secretary of State wants for herself in this Bill.

    What we need are motivated teachers, schools that can think for themselves, local authorities that can take their own decisions. We will get none of that from this Bill.

  • Michael Ancram – 2001 Speech to Conservative Women’s Conference

    Michael Ancram – 2001 Speech to Conservative Women’s Conference

    The speech made by Michael Ancram on 29 November 2001.

    May I start by saying what a pleasant surprise and a pleasure it is to be speaking to you this afternoon. I had thought that for the first time in four years I would not have the privilege of addressing you this year and the withdrawal symptoms were severe.

    But then fortune smiled on me, if not on you, and here I am.

    Of course my pleasure is somewhat tempered by your disappointment that I am not Iain. I know that Iain shares that disappointment – not that I am not him, but that he can’t be with you today. But we live in strange times when plans cannot be made very far in advance and when opportunities have to be grasped.

    In today’s frenetic scenario it is hard to catch a passing senior member of the administration in Washington. They are on the move all the time. Today and tomorrow that chance presented itself for the first time in months and I know you will agree that Ian had to grasp it.

    He has asked me to pass on his apologies and best wishes.

    It does however give me a chance to do something which I have been anxious to do. That is to thank you for the unstinting help and support you gave me throughout my three years as Party Chairman.

    They were not easy times, but your loyalty and your hard work and unfailing good humour were a tremendous strength. I say thank you to you from the bottom of my heart.

    As you know I set great store by you. I have always seen and acknowledged the women in our party as the bedrock of our organisation.

    You are the people who quite literally in many areas keep our party going, not just in raising funds but by being the face of the conservative party in the streets and the market places, on the doorsteps and increasingly on the telephones.

    You are the real workers, the lifeblood of our party, creating the momentum and the dynamism and the drive. I have no time for those who seek to detract from your efforts or who belittle your organisation.

    I know your value and your commitment and in me you will continue to find a champion and a friend.

    One of my greatest disappointments as Chairman was my failure to see more conservative women elected to Parliament.

    I know that if we are to present an acceptable face to the electorate it must be a representative face, representative of the world we live in where women outnumber men. We had so many able women on the candidates list, many of them in seats of which I had hopes, hopes which were sadly dashed. And there were many more equally able women who did not come forward because they did not feel that the party wanted them.

    I believe that this is one of the most important challenges facing us in the next year. There are no simple solutions but we must turn this around, and quickly. I am delighted with the appointments announced today.

    I must refer briefly to the election.

    I am deeply sorry that we could not deliver the comeback of which so many of us had dreamed and for which we had all worked so hard.

    We proved the opinion polls wrong by a factor of 50%. We achieved a slight swing to us from the previous election. A little more of both and we would have achieved the critical mass which would have seen us making serious inroads into our target seats. We fought under William Hague’s brave leadership a campaign of which we should never be ashamed.

    It was however sadly not to be.

    The truth was that we ran into the sands of apathy and the shoals of disinterest and disengagement. Too many of our own people were not motivated to come out to vote.

    The reasons were many and must be addressed. The effect was the lowest election turnout of my political life. 59% voted. The three main parties between them couldn’t muster 50% between them. We have a government elected by just 25% of the electorate.

    The result was bad for politics and bad for democracy. But above all it was bad for us. And that is what we now have to start to put right.

    We have to begin to re-engage the interest of the electorate – in politics, in the democratic process, but above all in us. The last two months have not been easy in this respect.

    The events of 11 September changed the currency of the political debate just at the moment when Iain was elected our leader. Normal politics would have been inappropriate. The national interest demanded bipartisanship in our response to the international terrorist threat.

    Iain’s measured, knowledgeable and responsible approach was absolutely right for the moment and I believe he gained great respect for it.

    But time is now going on, and while we will continue our support for the government on the international and defence fronts just so long as they remain resolute in their fight against terrorism, we will now return to the domestic political scene and the deteriorating situation over which they are so ineffectually presiding.

    Tony Blair may have been jetting the world offering our services. Here at home the services which matter, the public services have been going down the chute. While he preaches a new world order the order here is old. The tune and the words never change.

    On Tuesday, in his pre-Budget report, the Chancellor of the Exchequer repeated his promise to deliver improvements in our public services. He promised to throw more of our hard earned cash at them.

    The problem is that he has been making the same promise for the past four and a half years since Labour were elected. And every year he has broken that promise. We are told the money goes in, but nothing ever seems to come out.

    He is like some crazed gambling addict who believes that with just one more visit to the tables, just one more stake down, all will come good. Every year we are told that more of our money has been pumped in. Every year we are told that next year will be the year of delivery. Every year Gordon Brown is hailed by his admirers as a cross between a prophet and a miracle worker; and every year he gets it wrong.

    If it wasn’t serious it would be farcical. Year after year more and more of your money is thrown at the public services only to see them deteriorate. If this lot were running a public company in this way, there would be some pretty rigorous auditing going on.

    The truth is that across the board, in schools, in hospitals, in transport, the story of this Labour Government has been one of the steady decline in the quality of Britain’s public services.

    They claimed that things could only get better. The reality is that despite all the tax increases, even the Daily Mirror was forced to admit that “things have got considerably worse”.

    And under this Government they will only continue to get worse.

    Who can forget Tony Blair’s 1997 scare mongering plea to the voters that there were twenty-four hours to save the NHS? Try telling that to the demoralised Doctor, the overworked nurse or the patients lying on trolleys sometimes for more hours than that before they are even seen by a consultant.

    Remember Labour’s pledge to cut hospital waiting lists, attract more doctors and nurses into the health service and harness the best of the private sector to drive up standards of care.

    Four and a half years on the waiting list for the waiting list are still over 150,000 higher than it was in 1997. Cancer survival rates are still lower in Britain than they are in countries like France and Germany. Labour’s plans to involve the private sector are bogged down in confusion and union opposition.

    We face a 57,000 shortfall in the number of nurses by 2004. The number of Doctor vacancies has doubled in the past year alone. More GPs are leaving the profession than joining it.

    No wonder the Chairman of the BMA says “our morale has been driven to distressingly new depths”.

    The Government talks about recruitment. But it’s no good recruiting Doctors and Nurses if you can’t retain them. And they can’t.

    The other week Alan Milburn even went to Spain to try and recruit Doctors from among their surplus.

    Actually, come to think of it, that’s not a bad deal. We’ll have their Doctors and Spain can have Alan Milburn.

    Even the Labour Party Chairman was forced to admit this week that parts of the NHS are in a worse state now than they were in 1997.

    Twenty-four hours to save the NHS. Four and a half years of Labour to run the NHS into the ground. And they are now telling us that it will take 24 years to get it right. For heavens sake, we cant wait that long!

    Remember Tony Blair’s other proud boast. “It’s education, education, education”.

    Try telling that to the teachers who spend so much time dealing with Whitehall directives that they are unable to concentrate on teaching. Try telling that to the inner city parents who are forced to send their children to schools where discipline is so poor that classrooms are like war zones.

    And try telling that to the Tesco Store Manager who recently had to spend over £1 million on new recruits to bring them up to the numeracy standards needed to work the checkouts.

    Labour promised to cut class sizes, to recruit more teachers and raise standards. Yet secondary class sizes are now higher than at any time since 1978. Standards in maths for 11 year olds are falling.

    Nearly 60 per cent of trainee teachers either never make it into the classroom or leave within three years, while 80 per cent of teachers say that discipline has got worse in recent years.

    They make boasts about teacher recruitment. But it’s no good recruiting teachers if you can’t retain them. And they can’t.

    And Labour’s new big idea? More classroom assistants.

    Make no mistake. Classroom assistants can do a good job. But this has to be the first time ever that they are being recruited so that teachers can spend less time in the classroom and more time filling in forms.

    Education, education, education. Under Labour it’s falling standards, worse discipline and a teacher crisis.

    And remember the other boast two years ago – an integrated transport policy: “delivered”. Try telling that to the car drivers stuck on some of the most congested roads in Europe. And try telling that to the rail passengers last month whose forty- minute journey lasted six hours – longer than it actually takes to fly to the Middle East.

    Labour’s transport policy is in tatters. And which private sector company is now going to risk its own money to provide investment in transport when they look at the treatment of Railtrack? And which private investors – often pensioners and workers – will ever again put their money into public services when they now know that the Stephen Byers’s of this world will without warning not only whip the rug from under the value of their hard earned shares but will sneer at them for having invested in the first place.

    Stephen Byers deserves the Karl Marx award for services to outdated dogma. For the damage he has done to public services he deserves the sack.

    Britain is the fourth largest economy in the world, yet we have public services that would shame the third world. Our people are unable to receive the hospital treatment they need. Our children are failing to receive the education that will give them a proper chance in life. Our disintegrating transport system means that simply getting to work is a daily story of misery for millions of people.

    For the past four year and a half years Labour have tried to blame everybody else for their own failure to deliver. First it was us, then the doctors, the nurses the teachers – all of us at some stage dismissed as the “forces of conservatism”. Under this Government it is always somebody else’s fault.

    Yet four and a half years on Labour Ministers have nobody left to blame but themselves. This is Labour’s health service crisis. It is Labour’s education crisis. And it is Labour’s transport crisis. And who is now being forced to pick up the bill for Labour’s record of failure. You: the taxpayer. Because on Tuesday Gordon Brown signalled his clear intention to increase taxes yet again.

    The last times he did so over and over again by stealth. He pretended that it hadn’t happened; and it still hurt. This time he’s positively boasting about it. The hard-pressed taxpayer has been well and truly warned.

    So much for that other famous pledge: “we have no plans to increase tax at all”.

    Tuesday was the day when the veneer of New Labour was finally stripped away.

    And it was the day when Labour finally abandoned any pretence that it was serious about the reform of our public services.

    Everybody wants to see investment going into our public services. But it should be investment that delivers results and doesn’t simply disappear down a black hole. Without genuine reform we will never bring about the improvements that people and expect and they will continue to have to put up with public services that shame our country.

    Tony Blair tries to tell us that there is only one choice – between tax cuts or increased investment.

    There is indeed a choice before us – but it is not that one. It is this.

    We can continue down the same road of taxing ever more heavily in order to plough ever more money to pay for unreformed services. Or we can combine a low tax, wealth-creating economy with genuine public service reform.

    Labour refuse to engage in reform because they remain dogmatically wedded to systems that were created in different circumstances to suit different needs. They remain the servants of the vested interests that pay their political bills.

    Conservatives must become the champions of world-class public services.

    We must be open to new thinking and new ideas that bring practical and pragmatic solutions to the challenges we face.

    We need to bring, where appropriate, the best of British enterprise and innovation that is found in the private and voluntary sectors into the running of our public services.

    We must listen to those who run our public services as well as those who use them.

    We need to learn from other countries, such as in Europe, where public services are run so much better. Liam Fox has already begun his rounds on health and his findings are significant.

    We need to offer people genuine diversity and choice.

    And we need to offer the British people the choice of a party that not only promises to deliver better public services but one that actually delivers better public services. That will be the number one priority for the Conservative Party over the next four years.

    Labour came to power promising to restore people’s faith in politics. Yet four and a half years on people’s faith in politics is so low that as I have pointed out at the General Election the number of voters staying at home was greater than the number who turned out to vote for the winning party.

    We have seen how the Government has increasingly sidelined and marginalized Parliament with Ministers taking every opportunity to make announcements anywhere but the House of Commons.

    We have seen a Prime Minister demonstrate such a low regard for Parliament that one of his first acts was to cut down the number of times he could be questioned there.

    We have seen how every reform that the Government has introduced has been designed with one objective – to increase the power of the Executive and weaken effective scrutiny of its decisions.

    And we have seen the culture of spin with Stephen Byers’s Special Adviser sending an e-mail round her Department, as the planes were crashing into the twin towers, suggesting that it might be a very good day “for burying bad news” and keeping her job.

    The worst thing is that none of us is the least bit surprised by it and even less so when on Tuesday Stephen Byers and Moore tried exactly the same tactic and sought to bury the minutes of his meeting with Railtrack by releasing them four minutes into the Chancellor’s pre-Budget Statement.

    I’ve now got to the stage that every time a big story breaks I find myself looking for the bad news which Stephen Byers will inevitably be trying to bury behind it. In terms of work rate he puts most undertakers to shame.

    What utter contempt they show for Parliament and the British people who put them there.

    These are the realities facing us and facing the British people as a whole. We need to turn them round and we need to turn them round fast. And we will only do that by showing that we ourselves have changed.

    We need to show as we develop our policies that we understand the real problems which confront people in their own lives and that we really care about them. We need to show that we mind about the priorities, the failures of those services upon which people have come to depend for their quality of life, but which are now personally failing them. We need too to show that we care about our country and that we will stand up for her interests and those of her citizens.

    We will fight the covert sell-out of our fellow citizens in Gibraltar upon which the Government is engaged.

    We will fight the hand wringing and waffle which is the hallmark of the government’s response to the growing catastrophe in Zimbabwe and we will demand action.

    We will fight the government’s inaction over our plane-spotters stuck in Greek jails.

    We will fight the headlong rush into a European superstate which was the import of Blair’s speech last Friday and we will offer a genuine alternative.

    We are faced by a government which seems hell bent on giving our country and its interests away, which has no pride in our past and no confidence in our future and which prefers surrender to resistance and abdication to responsible action.

    We must change all that. There can be no denying that we have a long and hard haul ahead. We start from a basis of indifference and disinterest.

    There is not so much hostility out there, only disengagement. We need to rekindle the interest, become interesting ourselves, and get ourselves out onto the doorsteps.

    In Iain Duncan Smith we have a leader who has already shown us a steady and clear command and who will see us through this long haul. I am honoured to be his deputy.

    He is growing in public stature with every day that passes and he will be a strong, clear and powerful leader in the months and years ahead. He was an excellent choice and we must give him all the support we can muster.

    That way lies the road to victory at the next election. The going will not be easy. But we are more than ready for the task. Our greatest enemy will be our own lack of faith in ourselves, our own lack of confidence. With confidence we can create the environment within which we can and will win.

    There can be no room for fainthearts on this journey. They will only hold us back. But none of you are fainthearted. You are the foundations upon which our victory will be built.

    So go back from here to your constituencies. Tell them that the dog days are over. Tell them the fight is on again. Tell them that the enemy is in our sights again.

    And tell them that with them with us we can win.

  • Iain Duncan Smith – 2001 Speech to the American Enterprise Institute

    Iain Duncan Smith – 2001 Speech to the American Enterprise Institute

    The speech made by Iain Duncan Smith, the Conservative MP for Chingford and then Leader of the Conservative Party, in Washington DC, the United States, on 30 November 2001.

    Nothing, of course, will ever remove from our memories the horrific attacks – in this city and in New York – that took place on September 11. It is still almost impossible to comprehend what happened on that day, or to understand the hate that could motivate men to carry out such evil deeds. The grief felt throughout the United Kingdom on that day was real and heartfelt.

    They were attacks on Britain’s staunchest ally and Britain’s greatest friend. Yet they were attacks on us all and on the shared values that we hold dear. Over 4,000 people were brutally murdered from over 80 countries. In terms of loss of life, they were the worst terrorist outrages in British history too. So my message is simple – we are in this together.

    If one thing has stood out since September 11, however, it has been the indomitable spirit of the American people never to bend the knee to terrorism. The response of your nation, under fire, has demonstrated to the whole world why the spirit of freedom and democracy will always triumph over evil and terror. And the leadership given by President Bush and others, such as Rudolph Guiliani, has been quite outstanding.

    Such an atrocity could not go ignored or unpunished. The guilt of Bin Laden, and the Taliban regime that harboured him, was beyond any reasonable doubt. Having been shown some of the intelligence by the Prime Minister, I am quite clear that they are guilty as charged. That is why the British Government, with the backing of my Party, was right to give its full support to the President in taking whatever course of action he felt appropriate.

    Our aims in Afghanistan have been clear all along. The removal of the Taliban regime and its replacement by a more broadly-based government, bringing Bin Laden to justice and dismantling his Al-Qa’eda terrorist network.

    The first of these – the removal of the Taliban – is now virtually assured. UN sponsored talks are currently taking place about the formation of a new Government. Hopefully the shape of that Government will emerge quickly so that some stability can at last be brought to a people who have suffered so much from a succession of tyrannical regimes.

    And the net is closing in on Bin Laden. The professionalism of our Armed Forces – American and British – will ensure that either he is brought to justice or that justice is brought to him.

    The success that has been achieved in recent weeks is a vindication of the strategy pursued by the international coalition, with the United States at its head. We must see it through to the finish and not be distracted by those who, for whatever reason, call for an end to the bombing before our task is properly completed.

    Yet, while the war in Afghanistan might just be beginning to have an end in sight, the war against terrorism is emphatically not over. It must go on.

    You have called this particular part of the Conference “Confronting the Terrorists”. To me, that encapsulates neatly what I believe to be the overriding joint purpose of our two countries, not just in Afghanistan, but wherever terrorism rears its evil head or finds sanctuary.

    We in the United Kingdom have had to face terrorism for too long. Thousands of people have died as a result – enough is enough. If September 11 told us one thing, it is that terrorism today knows no limits. There is no weapon they will not use, and no life they are not prepared to take. We need to realise that these people are fanatics who will stop at nothing. That is why we have to stop them. If we fail to maintain the pressure on terrorism everywhere, then we are all at risk.

    Winning the war against terrorism requires us to fight it on all fronts. It means tackling the terrorist organisations direct. It means drying up their sources of finance. It means tackling the links between terrorism and organised crime. And it means dealing with those rogue states that for too long have been able to get away with harbouring terrorists and using them for their own twisted purposes.

    A clear lesson is that the days of the safe havens are over. We are no longer prepared to tolerate your activities. That goes for Afghanistan, just as it should for other countries we know, and can show, are involved in international terrorism. Where these states are unwilling to take effective action against terrorism they must be prepared to face a determined response from the wider international community – and I hope that the United Kingdom will continue to be at the forefront of that response.

    As Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, made absolutely clear just over a fortnight ago: ‘we are in this for the long haul’.

    And certainly I agree with President Bush when he says that there can be no further justification for the continuing Iraqi failing to abide by the Gulf War ceasefire obligations to allow UN inspectors back into the country to monitor its weapons of mass destruction. As Richard Butler has made clear, Iraq has used the three years since UNSCOM was kicked out to build up its arsenal.

    The events of September 11 also shattered one of the post-Cold War illusions that we no longer faced any direct threats. In fact the threats today are many and more varied than ever before – from the car bomber to the rogue state with ever more powerful weapons of mass destruction – nuclear, chemical or biological. Nobody can be in any doubt that if Bin Laden had been able to lay his hands on a nuclear device then he would not have used it.

    As I have said before, proving one threat does not disprove another. And against many of these threats we are currently literally defenceless. That is particularly the case when it comes to ballistic missiles. It makes them the weapon of choice for the terrorist or rogue state bent on blackmail or carnage.

    Traditional methods of arms control will not solve the problem. Those countries, like Iraq, are the least likely to observe treaties. Stemming the flow of military technology to these countries might delay their ability to develop weapons of mass destruction but we cannot guarantee that it will halt it. Preventative defence, seeking to bring these countries within the family of civilised nations, clearly has a part to play, though in a number of cases we are a long way from that.

    That is why it is essential for us to look collectively at new ways of strengthening our defences. In this context I reiterate my Party’s backing for President Bush’s plans for the development of an effective ballistic missile defence shield – for the United States and her allies – in which the United Kingdom plays a full role.

    Far from holding back on missile defence, I believe that the events of September 11 have made it all the more important to press ahead.

    Confronting the terrorists must mean all terrorists. As far as I, and the Conservative Party, is concerned terrorism is indivisible. What happened in the United States is the same as that which has been carried out in the United Kingdom, and in particular in Northern Ireland. The only difference is scale. Even then we should never forget that some 3,600 people have lost their lives in terrorist violence associated with Northern Ireland. As Northern Ireland’s First Minister, David Trimble, and I argued last week, there is no moral difference whatever between those who planned and carried out the attacks on the Pentagon and the Twin Towers or those who planned and carried out Enniskillen, Omagh, Greysteel and countless other atrocities over 30 years.

    Nor is there any difference between the illicit trade in drugs that helps to finance the terrorist operations of Al-Qa’eda and the illicit trade in drugs that sustains the activities of Republican and Loyalist Paramilitaries in Northern Ireland.

    Over the years the IRA has clearly established links with international terrorist organisations. Much of its weaponry was supplied courtesy of Colonel Gaddafi. In August, three suspected IRA members were apprehended in Colombia suspected of collaborating with the narco-terrorist group FARC. The IRA is in many respects the prototype for international terror groups and the organisation from which they draw inspiration.

    And even with the current ‘ceasefires’, and the IRA act of decommissioning, the terrorist threat from dissident groups remains high. So we need to continue to confront the domestic terrorist threat in the United Kingdom.

    When Gerry Adams said in New York recently, ‘those who support us know the difference between what’s been happening in Ireland and what happened in this city on September 11′ – he is wrong – there should be no equivocation about our response to terror.

    We agree that because a person has a violent past, it does not mean they cannot have a future if they renounce violence completely. We want the peace process to succeed. Yet we should never fall into the trap of those who would claim there are different categories of terrorist or, worse still, ‘good terrorists’ and ‘bad terrorists’. Do that and we are a short step from giving legitimacy to all terrorist violence. The dead of the United Kingdom are testament to that.

    This will not be an easy road – it will not be a quick journey – but the United States and Britain have been together for too long to weaken now. Together in defence of freedom.

    We must be strong in the face of tragedy – relentless in the pursuit of evil – resolute in the fight and just in victory.