---

Cluster Munitions (Prohibitions) Bill [HL]

My Lords, before I welcome the Bill, I should like to embark on the pleasant and, under the present circumstances, reassuring task of telling the Minister how very welcome she is at the Dispatch Box. If she manages to sponsor only Bills that have as many good intentions and prospective effects as this one, she will be unique in the annals of politics. The Bill is enormously welcome here. In our own community, it is not really necessary to say why, but, as this debate will be read elsewhere, it might be worth spending just one moment refreshing your Lordships’ memory for the benefit of others about what it is intended to deal with. On my way here, I picked up the preliminary report of Handicap International. Meticulously prepared, it is dated November 2006. Things have moved on from then, but that does not make it any the less telling. It shows, first of all, the scale of the problem. During the Vietnam War, the Americans bombed the Ho Chi Minh trail in Laos next door, which was not actually in the war. The grand total of casualties in that area—not in Vietnam—by 2006 was 4,813. None of them was a military person; they were all civilians. Those figures built up after the conflict was over. From 1964 to 1973, the United States used a wide range of submunitions, resulting in estimated contamination of 20.9 million to 60.6 million submunitions. At the other end of the scale in terms of area and population, in the Lebanon, at least 4 million submunitions were delivered in July and August 2006. The average pre-conflict casualty rate, from weapons from earlier conflicts, was two per year, but the average post-2006 conflict rate at the time the report was written was two and a half per day. I have met a number of victims of these weapons: people minus a hand, minus both arms, minus both legs or sometimes without sight. It is an appalling tragedy. None of them was a combatant. The highest number of combatants I have seen is something like 15 per cent of the total post-conflict injury. Quite a lot of them are civilian deminers, enormously brave people who defuse these horrible devices. There is no doubt that the Bill is needed. The Minister was kind enough to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, and me on our persistence in helping. However, she should realise that we have been helping an enormous international movement. I should like to recognise the work of the Cluster Munition Coalition, which was mentioned by the Minister. It consists of 350 civilian organisations in over 80 countries under the charismatic leadership of Thomas Nash, who, like the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, was at every conference that I went to over several years. He is enormously effective. There is also our own local Landmine Action, led very well by Simon Conway. Those names ought to go in the record. The result of all this is the Bill, which has been well described by the Minister. I believe that it is well fitted for the task for which it is intended. I do not want to leave the subject of what has been done for the Bill without thanking the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, for his part, which was much more vigorous than mine. In particular, he was much better at socialising in the later hours of the night than I was. In this sort of campaign, that is a valuable asset, and I do not possess it. My noble friend Lord Astor of Hever expressed reservations about the effectiveness of the Bill. The Minister dealt with them very quickly. The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, will deal with this in more detail. I anticipate that he will give examples of land being sterilised for our troops by the high failure level of these munitions, which turn into landmines where they fall. That was why the American forces on the right flank in the first Gulf War arrived late on target. They had constantly to rely on, and wait for, helicopter transport in order to get over the ground in which they had just harassed the enemy with these weapons. Although this is a great Bill, this is not an occasion for great long speeches from people who are in favour of it. I take great pleasure in welcoming it. I congratulate the Government on the extent to which they are already assisting in clearing up the vast number of these weapons scattered around the globe. It is an expensive and dangerous job. I thank the Minister for her efforts at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting and subsequently to get further signatories to this treaty. The one thing nagging at the back of the minds of people who are aware of what we are doing is that the major manufacturers and, hitherto, the major users of these weapons—among them the United States, Russia, Brazil, I think, and Pakistan—have not signed up to the treaty. The effect of the treaty banning the use of landmines, which is also lacking signatures of that sort, has been to render landmines a pariah weapon. Those weapons are now used only by Burma; civilised countries, if I can use that term, do not use them. I fully expect that the cluster munitions treaty will have the same effect and that in due course all countries will sign up and embark on the essential job of clearing up the lethal mess left behind. As agricultural land becomes more and more precious, so removal will become more and more urgent. What has been started today is an important and exceedingly welcome humanitarian step, which I, for one, will support throughout. Small areas may need to be tested by amendments, although these will not necessarily be carried or even pressed. For example, I should like to discover the effectiveness of the term, ""under its jurisdiction and control"," when used in Article 3 of the convention and applied to stockpiles by other countries on our territory. This is an area that we need to look at closely. However, I am well seized of the Government’s good and honourable intentions in this area and am very happy to welcome the Bill.