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Debt Relief (Developing Countries) Bill

My Lords, I am very grateful to be able to speak briefly in the gap and to follow the noble Baroness, who, along with her colleagues in the other place, has performed a valuable service to developing countries. She introduced this apparently uncontentious but important Bill, which has had a remarkable passage through another place and has somehow survived to find an after-life in this House. I certainly did not expect to see it here today. As someone who has supported the Government’s heavily indebted poor countries initiative in the past, I congratulate the Jubilee Debt Campaign, as the noble Baroness did, on its perseverance over many years on vulture funds. It is nothing less than immoral extortion to deal in debts that are held by countries such Liberia, which she mentioned, which have suffered more than we can imagine from civil war and other situations. It is the people there, not the elites, who have suffered, and the elites are the ones who may have incurred the debt in the first place. I well remember the role played by the churches and aid agencies such as Christian Aid in the original HIPC campaigns. It is not often that a voluntary organisation conducts street protests against City firms in one month and is rewarded by a Bill virtually to abolish these funds in the next. It is very rare indeed that a Private Member's Bill survives the wash-up, and we shall no doubt hear from the Conservatives how they, after having been vilified by Labour campaigners for scuppering the Bill, ultimately saw the light. Finally, perhaps I may commend the latest report of the All-Party Group on Debt, Aid and Trade on aid effectiveness. The quality of aid, with this continual commitment of 0.7 per cent of GNP, I believe deserves more urgent attention in both Houses from politicians of all parties after the election.