I rise to speak to new clause 1. The year was 1985. After a campaign lasting decades, 123 councils answered the call for solidarity with the South African anti-apartheid movement and adopted policies opposing that injustice, including 39 councils that had divested from companies operating in South Africa and Namibia. While the Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, was calling the African National Congress and Nelson Mandela terrorists and Young Conservatives were proudly wearing badges calling for him to be hanged, local authorities were on the right side of history, standing up to the horror of apartheid. Of course, the Conservative Government could not tolerate that, so, a few years later, to weaken the anti-apartheid movement, they brought in laws making it illegal for local councils to boycott South African and Namibian goods. Looking back, it is crystal clear who was on the right side of history and who was on the wrong side.
The new clause, in the name of the right hon. Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick), would ban local councils from taking such a stand. Had it been in place back in 1985, because the Conservative Government supported apartheid South Africa—let us not forget that—local councils, no matter the strength of local feeling or the righteousness of the cause, would have been prevented from divesting pension funds from apartheid South Africa. They would have been compelled to be complicit in injustice.
Government Members may argue that that is history and things are different now. I contest that the facts say otherwise. The House knows that British-made weapons
and diplomatic support are integral to the Saudi war in Yemen. Even as that war has claimed the lives of more than a quarter of a million people, pushed more than 20 million into absolute destitution and resulted in grave violations of international law, British complicity has continued. The new clause could deny councils the right to divest from arms companies whose bombs rain down on the people of Yemen. Similarly, if a local authority wanted to align its pension fund with international law and divest from companies operating in illegally occupied Palestinian lands, the new clause risks denying it that right, too.