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G8: 2007 Summit

My Lords, we on these Benches also welcome the Statement. There is a vast collection of documents from the presidency andwe could spend three days raising questions, but I promise the Minister that I will not do so. We welcome the now clear establishment of the fact that we are talking about G8 plus five—in particular, the engagement of China as an increasingly important actor in the international economy; it is also becoming an important actor in the world political system. My heart sank when I saw the sheer width of the section on growth and responsibility on the world economy. Some of it is remarkably thin despite the words in it. Since the origin of the G8 was very much to do with managing global financial flows and retaining stability in the international economy, can the Minister tell us what is happening with the Financial Stability Forum and its concerns with the sheer scale of financial flows that carry trade, the role of hedge funds, and so on, which is one of the biggest sources of instability in the global economy that we now have? We on these Benches particularly welcome the progress on climate change, although we now recognise that the President of the United States is clearly behind opinion in the United States in his resistance to moving forward rapidly to deal withthis immense problem. We are very happy that the European Union countries continue to provide alead in this sector, and we trust that under the next Prime Minister, as well as under our present one,that collective lead will be sustained. We were disappointed that there was not more outcome on Doha and more pressure to make progress towards a successful completion of the Doha development round, but there was a great deal else on Africa, some of which is clearly a good step forward, but trade is a very important issue as well as aid. I will leave Darfur and other questions for others on my Benches, who I hope will be able to add their comments. I want to ask in more detail about the robust exchanges with Russia, which we welcome. The Russians in the Kremlin are now particularly fondof talking robustly and sharply to their neighbours around the world, and it is quite correct that we should reply in the same terms. On Kosovo, we need to move towards a resolution of the situation that is not going to be its remaining part of Serbia. There seems to be some merit in President Sarkozy’s suggestion that we should delay this for a further six months—although it would have been helpful if he had informed his co-participants in advance, in accordance with France’s deep commitment to common foreign policy within the European Union. The British Government have clearly been engaged in conversation with the Americans on missile defence for a considerable period. I was asking Questions in this House about the updating of Fylingdales radarin 2000 and 2001, so the British Government mustbe extremely well informed about what is behind American policy. Does the Minister think that the proposals by the Russians on this slightly artificial issue—the missiles are not yet ready or tested—represent some way forward without having an unnecessary confrontation on yet another issue between Russia and the West?