§ 2.53 p.m.
§ Lord BOOTHBYMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
§ The Question was as follows:
§ To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they propose to take to deal with the serious allegations by the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, and Nikolai Tolstoy that, between 1944 and 1947, the British Government took actions which led to the murder of millions of innocent men, women and children.
§ The MINISTER of STATE, FOREIGN and COMMONWEALTH OFFICE (Lord Goronwy-Roberts)My Lords, it is not for the present Government to deal with allegations concerning the actions of previous Governments more than 30 years ago, other than to release for public scrutiny the official papers bearing on these events. This has been done for the period up to the end of 1947.
§ Lord BOOTHBYMy Lords, arising out of the Answer of my noble friend, may I ask him whether he is aware that good books—and both these books are good books—are apt to stick; and that if nothing at all is done about it they could leave a stain on the British name which might last for generations to come? May I ask him further whether he realises that this would be quite unjustified, because the British people had no idea of the terrible things that were being done in Europe 1042 during the years 1944 to 1947, nor indeed had the British Parliament, of which I myself was a Member at the time? Finally, I should like to ask him whether he does not think that a Statement on the part of Her Majesty's Government, who, after all, have no responsibility for any of this at all, would, even if it amounted only to an expression of regret for what happened during those years, do us, and indeed the world, a lot of good?
§ Lord GORONWY-ROBERTSMy Lords, I very much appreciate and respect what the noble Lord has said. I know that he speaks with complete sincerity and integrity, as indeed do those who had access to the papers and have written substantial books on these happenings—that is, Count Tolstoy and, certainly, the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, to whose integrity and sincerity in these matters I should like to pay testimony. However, there are of course other interpretations of the available documents. Already they are beginning to become available. I suggest that it might be helpful if we all reflected on the nature of the request being made to Governments officially to pronounce on happenings which took place some time ago, and to say that one interpretation is to be preferred to another. Not everybody would agree, and I do not think that, in a democratic country, it would be for the Government to lay down as a final statement what is to be regarded as historical truth.
§ Lord GLADWYNMy Lords, will not the noble Lord agree that at least part of the trouble was that the Government of the day, and naturally still more so Parliament and the nation, did not sufficiently appreciate the essentially barbarous nature of the then Soviet régime? Does the noble Lord think that, in the generation that has elapsed since these sad events took place, the nature of that régime has substantially altered for the better?
§ Lord GORONWY-ROBERTSMy Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, is of course putting forward his own interpretation of the extant evidence and asking me to adopt his interpretation, as others have asked me this afternoon to adopt theirs, as the official view of the Government. I may have my own personal 1043 views, but Government cannot. The duty of Government in a democratic country is to make available as fully as ever possible all the extant evidence, and that we have done.
Lord PAGET of NORTHAMPTONMy Lords, I think that the noble Lord is aware that the stain is there. I was concerned at the time with some of these unhappy Yugoslavs. It cannot be erased. But I think almost all of us—
§ Several noble Lords: Question!
Lord PAGET of NORTHAMPTONMy Lords, I will put it in the form of a question. Is the noble Lord not aware that, with few exceptions—and the noble Lord, Lord Home of the Hirsel, then a junior Member who had lost his seat, was one of those exceptions—we allowed our admiration for the heroism of the Russian people to gild our conception of the infamy of their régime? The things that we did were sincere and in the interests of peace, and the Russians had to be treated as a civilised power, which, plainly, they were not. Is any good served by trying to dig up these things from the past?
§ Lord GORONWY-ROBERTSMy Lords, I was almost in agreement with my noble friend until he reached his last sentence. Yes, I think good is done by an impartial, meticulous, responsible examination of the evidence, and it is the duty of Government in democratic countries to make that evidence available. This we have done. I think I agree with him that we must not be too selective about what we dig up and comment on. Some things may appeal more to some people for investigation than others. Equally, we must bear with one another's interpretations of the same facts. My noble friend has added his. We have had at least four this afternoon.
§ Lord SHINWELLMy Lords, is my noble friend aware that, speaking as a member of the Cabinet between 1945 and 1947 when some of these events occurred, I had no knowledge of the matter at all? I noted my noble friend's remark about some of the papers beginning to be made available. Is he aware that, while this is being done, serious allegations have 1044 been made against the late Lord Avon, formerly Anthony Eden? Why do we not get all the facts so that blame is not imputed to the late Lord Avon, because other Members associated with the Foreign Office were responsible? Let us get the facts right. In order to do that, let all the publications be made available.
§ Lord GORONWY-ROBERTSCertainly, my Lords, and that is what I have been endeavouring to say. The documents have been made available. If any Member of your Lordships' House or another place or in any other quarter can bring to my notice or that of the Secretary of State an omission which is inexplicable, then by all means attention will be paid to it. I looked into this before coming to the House this afternoon; the documents are available and indeed have been made available for some little time. That I think is the right inquiry, that in a country like ours everybody can have access to the facts and everybody can publish his interpretation. No doubt there will be other interpretations. All I am saying is that Government should not pronounce on historical fact and select one interpretation as being the absolutely true one. The alternative is that everybody should be entitled to his interpretation and publish it.
§ Lord BETHELLMy Lords, is the Minister now able to reply to the letter I wrote to his right honourable friend Dr. David Owen about three weeks ago, in which I made a 'number of positive and I hope constructive suggestions? First, I asked whether the Government would now consider asking, through the proper local authority, for a memorial to be erected at Newlands Corner near Guildford where a number of Russians were detained, some of them illegally, men and women, before being, some illegally, returned by force to the Soviet Union to execution or Stalin's camps. Secondly, I asked whether the Government would consider setting up a fund, to which the dependants of these persons could apply for assistance, of recompense and to which those few individuals who were repatriated by British Forces—illegally, contrary to the Yalta Agreement—could apply and to which their dependants could apply. Thirdly, I asked whether the Government would, in announcing these measures, make it 1045 clear that they would be carried out as a symbolic gesture of the responsibility of Britain for what happened, and an indication of the uneasiness felt about it by many people in this country.
§ Lord GORONWY-ROBERTSThe noble Lord is almost writing another book, my Lords, but I recognise the seriousness and responsibility with which he put forward those suggestions. The Secretary of State has expressed to me—indeed, I think we have conveyed this to the noble Lord—his regret that, because of his many movements in the past week or so, he has not so far been able to reply to the letter which the noble Lord sent him. However, I can assure the noble Lord that a full reply is now on its way to him, and no doubt most if not all the questions he has put this afternoon will be satisfactorily answered in that reply.
Lord CAMPBELL of CROYMy Lords, may I ask the Minister to give some clarification of the numbers involved? There were the Soviet citizens who had fought on the German side and who were returned to the Soviet Union, until that was stopped, and we had a debate about them in this House some months ago and that is a matter of concern. However, does not the word "millions" which appears in the Question have to include all the Soviet prisoners of war and forced labour who were released by the Western Allies when they overran Germany and the rest of Europe?
§ Lord GORONWY-ROBERTSMy Lords, I understand perfectly well the import of the noble Lord's question. I would not wish to go into a full categorisation of the unfortunate people involved; they varied very much in their circumstances, background and the motivation for what they did. I think the term "millions" may be very much exaggerated. Nevertheless, there certainly were some thousands or more, and that is far too many to deal with with any equanimity. If the noble Lord would wish me to give a categorisation by numbers of the various types of person involved, I will see what I can do. I have no great confidence that my categorisation, any more than that of others, would finally be found to be the right one. One comes back to the same point, that really 1046 the duty of Government is to make available all the facts and figures for everybody to interpret with responsibility and punctiliousness, as I am bound to say those who have already commented have done—that is, the inquiry—and then to leave it to the democratic conclusion. Otherwise, if we have formal inquiries leading to a formal official Statement of what is the truth by Government, we shall I think be untrue to our own democractic tradition. Moreover, where does one stop and how far back does one go; about whom, when and for what reason?