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Zimbabwe: Public Servants

My Lords, this is the first time I have looked at this subject and, with a little hindsight, one may look back and ask how on earth we ever got here. Going through the history of this and the history of Zimbabwe, it is odd to find ourselves discussing a matter concerning so few people and very small sums of money. Then we have to wonder why the Government will not deal with this. The noble Lord, Lord Waddington, gave us a master class on how to pull the absurdities from legal structures in order to look at how they function. Surely, Parliament should do that. I should like to ask, and to have clearly placed on the record, why the Government do not feel that it is their position to intervene. What great principle would be threatened? What is the great danger? Exactly what is the status of these people if they are not receiving their pensions? I am not an expert on how these matters work or on the decline of the Zimbabwean dollar. In legal terms, what would those pensions be worth now? I suspect they may be worth almost nothing. Would these people be any better off with this pension than they would be if supported by our benefits system? We need clarification on that. If we do not address the real problem, rather than the legal problem, we will get nowhere. If the legal problem is that the Government fear that they would set a precedent involving costs running through the structure, we must look at the structure and how it is set up. Unless we have a knowledgeable discussion—the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, deserves considerable credit for opening up the subject—we cannot go forward. It is unlikely that we will ever have a situation exactly like this again. UDI was 42 years ago and, as the noble Lord savagely pointed out, anno Domini is removing this problem virtually by the day. This will set precedents for other servants overseas or those who have positions in other places that our Government administer. How will this fit in? What are the Government actually worried about in legal terms? If we know, we can make some progress or at least give a coherent answer. I have a nagging suspicion that the treasury departments of all the political parties are a little nervous when a discussion such as this takes place. Let us be brutally honest and say what the problem is. Unless we have some clarification of what the Government think cannot be done and why, we can go no further. I am interested in hearing the answer. I hope that we can at least get a clear answer tonight even if we cannot get a solution.