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Zimbabwe: Public Servants

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, has been dogged in his pursuit of the interests of those who served in various colonies throughout the time of the empire, and now particularly in the case of former public servants who served in the then Rhodesia. I share with him the fact that I am vice president of the Overseas Service Pensioners’ Association, and I can attest to the fact that he does valiant work in that direction. I could make the whole of my speech declaring an interest, which I will not do; rather I will focus on one area. In 1979, I was the Minister responsible for African affairs, and under the leadership of Lord Carrington, we had three months of negotiating day by day at Lancaster House. It was during those negotiations that all the parties agreed that the new constitution for an independent Zimbabwe would contain provisions entitling former civil servants and public service employees to pensions paid by the Zimbabwean Government. It is perfectly true, as the noble Lord has said, that Her Majesty’s Government had no direct responsibility for public administration and the recruitment of staff in the then Rhodesia. The then Secretary of State for the colonies had that responsibility in most of the colonies, but not in Rhodesia. Equally, therefore, Her Majesty’s Government can claim that they have no legal obligation. That was fine so long as Zimbabwe’s economy was growing and expanding, but due to gross mismanagement and incompetence, we now see the condition of a failed state in Zimbabwe. There is rampant inflation, no foreign exchange, and a disastrous collapse in the value of the Zimbabwean dollar. The result is no payments whatever to the Crown servants who live in this country. I therefore join the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, in asking Her Majesty’s Government to look at this afresh in the light of totally changed circumstances and on their merits. We have moral, not legal, obligations to do something about this. I make three factual points to support this. First, we are a pragmatic nation. We have been pragmatic throughout our history, and it has always been disastrous when we have tried not to be. We must be pragmatic in this case. The empire evolved in different ways and in different forms. We can always argue that we are creating a precedent that we cannot afford, but I recall when, in my very early days as a new Member of the other place, a small number of us campaigned very strongly for a change in the position for former Crown servants in Aden and the former British Somaliland. After some campaigning, we managed, because there was no public officer’s agreement, to get the agreement of the Government that some locally recruited people and some expatriates from both those former colonies should in future receive pensions along the lines of those of other colonies. That was, if you like, a pragmatic solution to a problem that, on its merits, deserves support. Secondly, we are talking about people who have served the Crown. It is very interesting that when independence was unilaterally declared on 11 November 1965, Harold Wilson, the then Prime Minister of this country, said that it was the duty of public servants in Rhodesia to remain at their posts, to maintain order and essential services, and to take no oath of loyalty to the illegal Government. They were to continue to serve the Crown, and those of us who have a memory of those days will remember that Sir Humphrey Gibbs stayed there as the representative of the Queen. In the later 1970s, I visited Zimbabwe, then Rhodesia, to see how the scene was changing. However much I disagreed with the policies of Mr. Smith’s Government, I can say without hesitation that I was always very impressed by the quality of the civil servants and the administrators in that country, and by the level of service that they gave the then Government. They handed over to Mugabe a solid, competent Administration and Civil Service. As the noble Lord said, we must remember that, in 1923, Her Majesty’s Government decided that Rhodesia should become a responsible self-governing colony, with ultimate responsibility to the Crown through the governor. The third, and last, factor that I would like the Minister to consider is the humanitarian aspect. We are now, in this disastrous situation in Zimbabwe, giving whatever humanitarian support we can through Her Majesty’s Government. But the people who have served the former Government and people of Rhodesia and who are living in this country without any pension are also suffering very badly. As the noble Lord said, the numbers are rapidly diminishing, so the cost itself is diminishing. I appeal to the Minister and the Government to take an imaginative and humanitarian approach in view of the special circumstances that exist in that country today, and give support to these people for as long as Mugabe stays in his job or a replacement regime is unable or unwilling to fulfil the obligations that were provided for in the constitution. Against the background of the Commonwealth conference, which is about to take place in Uganda, I hope that the Government are in consultation with the Commonwealth, drawing up a contingency plan to offer help and assistance to the people of Zimbabwe to rehabilitate themselves. In those circumstances, it would also be sensible to give assistance in some form to those valiant former public servants in recognition of the fact that the 1979 agreement is now not being fulfilled. I should have said earlier that I congratulate the Minister on taking up his responsibilities and I hope that he will now be able to go away and consider seriously taking action on this important matter.