HL Deb 14 April 1988 vol 495 cc1197-201

7.9 p.m.

Lord Glenarthur rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 28th March be approved [21st Report from the Joint Committee].

The noble Lord said: My Lords, this order is made under Section 1(2) of the Arms Control and Disarmament (Privileges and Immunities) Act 1988, which received its Royal Assent on 9th February. The Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments has considered the order and has made no comment, other than to draw the attention of Parliament to the Explanatory Note prepared for the committee by my department.

As your Lordships will recall, the Arms Control and Disarmament (Privileges and Immunities) Act is principally concerned with the granting of diplomatic privileges and immunities to observers and inspectors carrying out functions in the United Kingdom under the terms of the Stockholm Agreement. But it also provides for the extension, by means of an Order in Council, of such privileges and immunities to inspection personnel involved in other future arms control agreements. The Government made clear at the time that the INF treaty was one such agreement for which recourse to this provision of the Act was envisaged.

The aim of the order is to enable the British Government to fulfil the particular obligations which we have undertaken in respect of the verification of the INF treaty. The nature of these obligations, and the reason why they take the form they do, has been the subject of previous debates in your Lordships' House, and I shall not rehearse the background again this evening.

Needless to say the privileges and immunities to be conferred on Soviet inspectors and aircrew for the protection of their official functions when conducting INF inspections will cover only activities carried out in the United Kingdom. This is for the period from their arrival at the point of entry until their departure from the UK. The Order in Council also confers certain privileges and immunities on the equipment and aircraft used by the INF inspectors and aircrew. Naturally these privileges and immunities are no more extensive than those required under the Basing Country Agreement. They correspond directly to the privileges and immunities annex to the Basing Country Agreement, which in turn reproduces verbatim the relevant parts of the protocol between the USA and the Soviet Union. Nor do the privileges and immunities exceed those conferred by the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.

The United States Senate will vote on the ratification of the INF treaty within the next few weeks. It seems likely that the vote will be overwhelmingly in favour. We expect the United States and Soviet instruments of ratification to be exchanged during President Reagan's visit to Moscow from 29th May to 2nd June. The treaty will enter into force immediately thereafter. It is essential that the United Kingdom is able to fulfil its obligations in respect of the treaty as soon as it enters into force. This draft Order in Council will enable us to do so. I commend it to your Lordships, and beg to move.

Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 28th March be approved [21st Report from the Joint Committee].—(Lord Glenarthur.)

Lord Irving of Dartford

My Lords, as the Minister has said, the order arises from the Arms Control and Disarmament (Privileges and Immunities) Act which we dealt with earlier this year. It is related to the INF treaty. It is a necessary and inevitable consequence, as without verification we would not have had the treaty. The order provides the nuts and bolts for that verification, and we therefore support it.

Lord Mayhew

My Lords, the Minister's statement was understandably low key. The content is extremely encouraging. A remarkable advance in East-West relations is reflected in what he said. My noble friends and I are worried about the possibility of circumventing the INF treaty under the guise of modernisation. We have made that point before. But we find the Order in Council a very cheering matter, particularly for elderly people who remember the state of East-West relations many years ago.

The task of verifying the INF treaty is a comparatively easy one. One is verifying the absence of weapons. Indeed, the inspections to which the order refers will be a formality. Once the United States has declared that it has removed its missiles in accordance with the treaty, it would be extremely suprising if the Soviet inspection team were to discover a missile that had been left behind. That would be a source of considerable amazement to all concerned. Indeed, the inspection will be somewhat farcical—an enjoyable ceremony. However, we welcome it.

We are on the nursery slopes as far as verification is concerned. When we compare the difficulties of verifying the hoped for treaty on strategic weapons, we see that the problem is of an altogether different dimension. There is the matter of verifying how many strategic missiles should be allowed. There is the difficulty of agreeing the method of checking that number, of agreeing the number of warheads on each strategic missile and of checking that number.

I read with amazement—perhaps the Minister can confirm it—that agreement has been reached between the superpowers on those points. That is to say, they have actually reached agreement on establishing how many strategic missiles each side now has; on confirming, partly by on-site inspection, that the requisite number are being eliminated; on the continuous on-site monitoring of production facilities; and on short-notice inspections where cheating is suspected. All those matters are in a different dimension of difficulty when we come to the verification of a strategic arms agreement. It is a remarkable step forward if it is true, as reported, that the superpowers have reached agreement on those matters.

In the meantime, as regards the much easier and simpler verification proposals embodied in the treaty and to be validated by the Order in Council, my noble friends and I give the warmest support.

Lord Kennet

My Lords, I agree with everything that has been said in approval of the order and of the treaty which it is designed to support. But it would be wrong of me to fail to mention once again the difficulty that I see in the future for this Government or another government in provision for national inspection only with no provision for British or alliance inspection.

The verification of the treaty is to be carried out on a national basis by the United States and the Soviet Union alone. We remember that the Government rightly maintain an independent nuclear strategic deterrent against a certain Soviet armoury. That armoury is changed by the treaty. The removal of SS.20s will reduce the size of the Soviet nuclear armoury in deterrence of which we maintain the Trident force and so on. It is therefore in our supreme national interest to know whether or not the SS.20s are being removed and destroyed in accordance with the treaty.

The same argument which has caused us to have an independent nuclear deterrent for the last 40 years now requires us to have independent verification possibilities of the reduction of the Soviet armoury. The Government have ignored that and they propose to leave the matter in the hands of the United States alone. We shall have to be content with what it choses to tell us. To say that is not to say that I think it is likely that the United States will lie to us. But sovereignty is at stake and the sovereignty of the United Kingdom and of other nations is infringed by the treaty.

I think that it is certain that in the long run the Government will have to face up to that problem. As my noble friend Lord Mayhew rightly pointed out, we are on the nursery slopes. We hope that treaty after treaty will come forward. Each will have its own verification machinery. If we allow bilateral national verification by the superpowers to go unquestioned in the present treaty, we shall make it that much harder to achieve alliance verification or even separate British verification in treaties further down the line where it may be more important.

This is the third time that I have made the point to the House and I shall be brief. On the last two occasions the noble Lord, Lord Mayhew, took me to task for saying something which would make ratification in the American Senate less likely. This time, since I am speaking after him, he did not say it, but perhaps I may answer the argument by saying that I do not believe that the action which the Government ought to take should be taken in the next few weeks. The noble Lord, Lord Glenarthur, told us that there are only a few weeks to the ratification debate. Action ought to be taken some time in the next year or two, preferably before the 50 per cent. strategic reductions come to occupy the centre of the stage. It is something which has to be faced. In saying that I do not intend to make ratification harder in Washington, nor do I believe that I am doing so.

Lord Glenarthur

My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate and especially to the noble Lord, Lord Irving of Dartford, for his unqualified welcome of this order. As regards the other points, essentially they go rather wider than the very narrow issue with which the order is concerned.

The noble Lord, Lord Mayhew, is right. The INF agreement is a good agreement. It is a triumph for alliance solidarity and the strategy of negotiating from strength. One is bound to wonder whether we would be in such an encouraging position had one or two other ideas prevailed.

So far as START is concerned—and I hesitate to get involved too deeply in that question this evening—all I can say in reply to the noble Lord on what is, after all, a different issue and a complex one is that I confirm that we understand that the United States and the Soviet Union have reached agreement on warhead counting rules for strategic ballistic missiles. There are, however, many other problems still to be resolved. It is important that those problems and the question of verification be resolved if we are to see satisfactory progress.

I should like to make perfectly plain that there is no question of NATO circumventing the United States' obligations under the INF treaty. I do not believe that the noble Lord really thought that would be the case, although he indicates he thinks it is possible. I qualify that remark by saying that the treaty was intended by both the Soviet Union and the United States to bite on ground-based missiles with a range of 500 to 5,500 kilometres only and both NATO and the Warsaw Pact have the right to adjust or modernise other systems. I do not think that the noble Lord is right in making his suggestion.

Although the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, has raised this particular point before, I simply say that the INF treaty is a bilateral treaty. I have given him this answer on more than one occasion, but once more will not do any harm. This treaty is a bilateral one between the United States and the Soviet Union. The missiles with which it deals belong to those states and to them alone. It would be wholly inappropriate for other states to be involved in the inspection and verification procedures. It would add nothing to our benefit and it would unnecessarily complicate the arrangements if inspectors from seven basing countries—East and West—were to join the inspections. Of course we are involved, and rightly so, in the arrangements for inspections in the United Kingdom.

I believe that that answers the main points that have been raised. I commend the order to your Lordships.

Lord Kennet

My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down I cannot let the Aunt Sally pass unanswered. I have not asked for seven basing country inspectors to go into the Soviet Union to inspect. I have been asking throughout for a NATO inspection, which could be done by one person designated by NATO for the alliance alongside the American person.

On Question, Motion agreed to.

House adjourned at twenty-five minutes past seven o'clock.