Words should be followed by action, and products manufactured through Uyghur slave labor should no longer be imported, Lords said.
by Ruth Ingram
A campaign to force the UK government to stand up to China over human rights abuses in Xinjiang was pushed to the next level by Lords this week, unanimous in their condemnation over millions of pounds of PPE procurement during the COVID pandemic made by Uyghur forced labour in China. The debate will continue and proposals will then go to the Commons, where a sizable number of MPs have already expressed their support.
There were no dissenting voices to the motion brought by Lord Blencathra, designed to halt the purchase of tainted medical goods and services from states where genocide is suspected. His Genocide Amendment to the Health and Care Bill is the second piece of legislation brought by campaigners who are determined to take the UK government to task on its stance over trade with China, the first being a fraught ping pong between MPs and Lords last year over an eventual narrowly defeated amendment to the Trade Bill which, had it succeeded, would have blocked trade between Britain and genocidal states.
Campaigners say they will not stop using every legal opportunity to back ministers into a corner until they harden their relationship with Beijing.
Speaking to Politics Home, an in-house UK government publication, Luke de Pulford, co-ordinator of the Inter Parliamentary Alliance on China, said, “There are a few things [regarding China] that need to be done in the Foreign Office and if they don’t want to do them they’re going to be forced to do them,” adding, “Every single bill that [government] brings forward, will be a China bill until they reform their policy. Every single one. If they’re doing something on education, we’re going to amend it around China and education, if they bring something about health, we’ll amend it around health. We will keep going until the government reforms its policy.”
Cutting across the much vaunted UK government position from Minister Earl Howe, that genocide can only be determined by a competent international court, Lord Blencathra urged an immediate assessment over whether there might be a risk of genocide taking place in Xinjiang. He reminded ministers that the requirement of the Genocide Convention was to act “the moment they suspected a genocide might be taking place” and “not after it was all over.”
“We boast that we are leading the world in the fight against modern slavery and yet here we are pouring hundreds of millions into a region that our closest ally, the United States, has identified as the site of an ongoing genocide,” he said, citing a UK Government of Health and Social Care report confirming that in 2021, the UK procured 708, COVID contracts, a significant number of which had been given to China.
One billion Lateral Flow Tests had been ordered from China, he said, despite the existence of local procurement capacity. “It is beyond me that we should eschew Britain, in favor of China,” he said.
Baroness Brinton pointed out that a New York Times exposé had discovered 25 percent of the workforce in the Medwell Medical Products factory in Jiangxi province were found in 2020 to be Uyghurs, working there under a Chinese government labour program.
Lord James Bethell, junior health minister, had admitted in April 2020, that equipment had been purchased by the company, a large manufacturer of masks. “Investigation of stocks of PPE received from suppliers at the central distribution warehouse for PPE in Daventry shows a record of receiving PPE masks produced by Medwell Medical Products,” Lord Bethell had told the Byline Times.
Whilst Lord Blencathra could forgive the initial mad scramble for PPE in the early days of the pandemic, he said it was time to look elsewhere. “We now know there is a genocide going on in Xinjiang, and we are not in a rush to buy from any dodgy source in the world.” “UK tax payers don’t want to be complicit in genocide,” he stressed. “Life saving must not be dependent on life taking.”
Lords from every political spectrum entered pleas for the UK to honor its obligations under the Genocide Convention and turn its back on deals involving slave labour. Calling for greater transparency, robust checks on supply chains and due diligence, David Alton called for a halt in complicity with the “odious and reprehensible crimes” that were being committed in Xinjiang.
Millions of pounds worth of UK medical supply procurement contracts with Chinese firms were called out and ministers urged to commit to investing in technology to trace the origin of products. “If America can use forensic technology,” asked Lord Rooker, “then why can’t we?”
Lord Collins reminded the House that “Kristallnacht” had been described as “unfortunate” and Hitler “not that bad.” He regretted the inertia and complacency shown by the government in allowing the situation to continue in Xinjiang while the suffering of hundreds and thousands of Uyghurs was prolonged.
Rahima Mahmut, director of the World Uyghur Congress in London, urged ministers to accept the Amendment. “The hypocrisy on display here is symptomatic of an important truth—tough statements are not a substitute for meaningful action. It is beyond reprehensible that products made from the slave labour of my people are being used to clothe and equip this country’s healthcare workers. I am certain that if those workers were aware of the brutal conditions in which their kit was made, they too would be disgusted.”
Speaking to Politics Home she said, “Despite all the ‘Never Again’ and pledges from politicians to learn the lessons of history, the world continues to be scarred by atrocity crimes. Atrocities continue to happen. As I put pen to paper, a genocide is raging in my homeland—the Uyghur region in northwest China.”
