Human Wrongs

British Social Policy And The Universal Declaration Of Human Rights

John Hunt Publishing Ltd.

Contents

Diego Garcia: free and equal?

Article 1

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Britain's national status is Constitutional Monarchy and Parliamentary Democracy. Consequently, one may assume that British citizens are actually subjects of the crown, not 'free and equal' citizens. Part 1(1) of the British Nationality Act 1948, adopted in the year of the UDHR, states: 'Every person who under this Act is a citizen of the British United Kingdom and Colonies or ... (has) the status of a British subject' for persons living in the Commonwealth. In other words, English, Welsh and Scots as former subjects were granted formal citizenship, but Irish and Commonwealth subjects remained subjects (until 1983, more below).

All of this is irrelevant in a Constitutional Monarchy by virtue of an obscure veto the reigning monarch holds over legislation, known as the Royal Prerogative (also known as Crown Prerogative).

Subsection 2 of the British Nationality Act 1948 states: 'the expression "British subject" and the expression "Commonwealth citizen" shall have the same meaning'. This is important for the people of Diego Garcia, which makes for a tragic test-case examined in this chapter, because future Acts granted them citizenship, yet the Royal Prerogative reduced them to the status of subjects. Her Majesty's Government website states that if one of numerous criteria were met, 'You became a British overseas territories citizen on 1 January 1983 if both of these apply (1)you were a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies on 31 December 1982 (2) you had connections with a British overseas territory because you, your parents or your grandparents were born, registered or naturalised in that British overseas territory'. This should apply to the people of Diego Garcia.

A HISTORY OF THE ISLANDS

Diego Garcians were known as Ilois, French Creole for 'islanders', now as Chagossians. They inhabited the island from the late-eighteenth century to the early-1970s, when they were expelled by the British military. The Chagossians came from slaves, plantation workers and managers. During the nineteenth century, they developed a unique democratic culture. 'No one was involuntarily unemployed. Most of the Chagossians were illiterate and their skills were confined to those needed for the activities on the islands. But they had a rich community life', the House of Lords concedes. '(T)he Roman Catholic religion and their own distinctive dialect derived (like those of Mauritius and the Seychelles) from the French. Into this innocent world there intruded, in the 1960s, the brutal realities of global politics'.

The Chagos Archipelago lies south of the equator in the Indian Ocean. Its largest island, Diego Garcia, was ceded to Britain by France with the Treaty of Paris 1814, after the Napoleonic Wars. Its formal status was a Dependency of Mauritius, the latter being a British crown colony, also taken from France. Diego Garcia's unique position protects islanders from floods, hurricanes and earthquakes, making it an ideal site for military operations, hence the establishment of a Royal Air Force base on the island in the Second World War.

In 1965, Britain created the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT), Diego Garcia being the main island in the territory. The purpose was to regain control of Diego Garcia after Mauritius was decolonized so that the United States, under a 50-year lease, renewable in 20-year periods, could use it as a military base. The excision of Diego Garcia from Mauritius through the Lancaster House Agreement, a violation of UN laws on decolonization and an issue still disputed with Mauritius, was formalized by an Order in Council; a monarchic legal ritual in which government appointees read legislation to the monarch, who approves or rejects the given order. The Lords confirm that 'by an exception in the Mauritius Independence Act 1968, (the Chagossians) did not lose their UK citizenship'.

Legal specialist Maureen Tong writes: 'The UN General Assembly Resolution 2066 (XX) of 16 December 1965 prohibited the dismemberment of Mauritius to establish the US military base in Diego Garcia'. She continues: 'The excision of the Chagos archipelago to establish the BIOT in 1965 contravened Resolution 1514 (XV)'. The original Order in Council establishing Diego Garcia as British Indian Ocean Territory was arguably the first royal act that sought to deprive the Chagossians of their rights. It demonstrates that in a monarchy, citizens are indeed subjects. It is also worth noting that as part of the 1966 agreement with the US, Britain received a £14 million reduction in its sea-based Polaris nuclear system, which it purchased from America.

From 1968 to 1973, the islanders were forcibly removed by the British military and deported to the slums of the Seychelles, Mauritius and London, where they have remained ever since. Depopulation was necessitated by UN regulations regarding decolonization. It would have been contrary to international law for the US to take over a populated territory (colonialism), so the solution was to depopulate Diego Garcia. Britain's act of forcible exile prevented the US from being scrutinized by the UN Special Committee on the Situation with Regard to the Implementation of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples.

GETTING THE PEOPLE OFF

The British Colonial Office made this perfectly clear in secret, internal records. For the colonial officials:

to recognise that there are any permanent inhabitants will imply that there is a population whose democratic rights will have to be safeguarded and which will therefore be deemed by the UN to come within its purlieu. The solution proposed is to issue them with documents making it clear that they are 'belongers' of Mauritius and the Seychelles and only temporary residents of BIOT. This device, although rather transparent, would at least give us a defensible position to take up (at the UN).

Denis (later Lord) Greenhill, head of the Colonial Office, explained the UK's position in a memorandum to the British Delegation at the UN: 'The object of the exercise is to get some rocks which will remain ours; there will be no indigenous population except seagulls who have not yet got a committee. Unfortunately, along with the seagulls go some few (sic) Tarzans and Men Fridays that are hopefully being wished on Mauritius'.

When Members of Parliament began asking questions, the Foreign Office strategy was to administer briefing papers to MPs concerning Diego Garcia. Eleanor Emery, head of the Foreign Office's Indian Ocean department, outlined the strategy in a secret paper: 'We would not wish it to become general knowledge that some of the inhabitants have lived on Diego Garcia for several generations and could, therefore, be regarded as "belongers"'. She went on to say that: 'We shall advise ministers in handling supplementary questions to say that there is only a small number of contract workers from the Seychelles and Mauritius, engaged to work on the copra plantations'.

In 1967, the British Commissioner declared an Acquisition of Land for Public Purposes (Private Treaty) Ordinance, preventing the Chagos Agalega Company from operating on the islands. This meant that temporary workers had to leave, draining the economy with the possible intended effect of impelling the indigenous islanders to leave. This was phase two of the expulsion preparations. Phase three was the issuance of an Immigration Ordinance to clear the island of its inhabitants. In another secret memo, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office explained: 'The purpose of the Immigration Ordinance is to maintain the fiction that the inhabitants of the Chagos (sic) are not a permanent or semi-permanent population'. These were secret admissions that the population had a right to stay.

Phase one of the physical expulsion of approximately 1,700 Chagossians began in 1969, when the working contracts were terminated. This left those working in Mauritius stranded. When relatives travelled to Mauritius to assist their families, they too became stranded. As for phase two, 'British officials began restricting supplies to the islands and more Chagossians left as food and medicines dwindled ... UK officials forced the remaining islanders to board overcrowded cargo ships and left them on the docks in Mauritius and the Seychelles'. David Vine's Princeton University-published study continues: 'Just before the last deportations, British agents and US troops on Diego Garcia herded the Chagossians' pet dogs into sealed sheds and gassed and burned them in front of their traumatized owners awaiting deportation'. Survivor and exile Rita Bancoult, who has suffered further personal tragedies in the slums of Mauritius, says: 'It's as if I was pulled from my paradise to put me in hell. Everything here you need to buy. I don't have the means to buy them. My children go without eating. How am I supposed to bear this life?'.

Rita's son, Olivier, formed the Chagos Refugees Group. Olivier and others continued to struggle for repatriation, becoming official citizens in 1981. In 2000, Olivier brought a case against the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Robin Cook) to the High Court.

THE RIGHT OF RETURN?

The High Court granted the islanders the right to return to Diego Garcia. They had not the means to return and legislated for compensation in 2004. In June of that year, Elizabeth II overruled the High Court decision with two Orders in Council, banning the islanders from their home in perpetuity. One of the Orders was the British Indian Ocean Territory (Constitution) Order 2004, which states: 'no person has the right of abode in the Territory'.

In May 2006, the High Court declared the government's decision unlawful, stating: 'The suggestion that a minister can, through the means of an order in council, exile a whole population from a British overseas territory and claim that he is doing so for the 'peace, order and good government' of the territory is, to us, repugnant'.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the government's 2007 action against the High Court. In 2008, the Government brought the matter to the Appellate Committee House of Lords, which overturned the High Court's ruling by a judgement of three to two: Lords Carwell, Hoffman and Rodger voting in the government's favour, that the Royal Prerogative was appropriate. This tells us much about the nature of British democracy, particularly that the Lords can overrule High Court decisions and that the monarch has 'full power to establish such executive, legislative, and judicial arrangements as this Crown thinks fit', particularly in relation to colonies, to quote Halsbury's Laws of England. It also tells us that citizens have official status, but are in reality subjects.

In 2009, the British government sought to make the BIOT a 'marine nature reserve', with exceptions for US military purposes. A leaked memo written by Political Counsel Richard Mills states: 'the BIOT's former inhabitants would find it difficult, if not impossible, to pursue their claim for resettlement on the islands if the entire Chagos Archipelago were a marine reserve'. Mills quotes and paraphrases Colin Roberts, the FCO's Commission of the BIOT: '"there are proposals (for a marine park) that could provide the Chagossians warden jobs" within the BIOT. However, Roberts stated that, according to the HGM's current thinking on a reserve, there would be "no human footprints" or "Man Fridays" on the BIOT's uninhabited islands', note the same language and attitude 50 years on. 'He asserted that establishing a marine park would, in effect, put paid to resettlement claims of the archipelago's former residents ... (Roberts said) "We do not regret the removal of the population"'.

In 2015, Mauritius took Britain to the International Court of Justice over its obligation, agreed in 1965, to decolonize the Chagos archipelago, including Diego Garcia. Mauritius's specific complaint was that the UK had illegally drawn a Marine Protection Area (MPA) in 2010, restricting operations (including fishing) around the British Indian Ocean Territory. The Permanent Council for Arbitration ruled 'that the creation of the MPA violated international law'. The UK has ignored the ruling and the islanders are left to wonder where the decision puts them, legally speaking.

The Chagossians continue their struggle and can be assisted in Britain via the UK Chagos Support Association. Let us now turn to the British mainland.

... without distinction

Article 2

Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.

Most of this book concerns poor people because they are the ones disproportionately affected by government policy. In addition to poor people, middle-class women, ethnic minorities and people with so-called disabilities face institutional and socioeconomic discrimination, in violation of Article 2 of the UDHR.

ETHNIC INEQUALITIES

Many factors coincide to put British ethnic minorities at the bottom of the scale when it comes to socioeconomic indicators, in most cases. In times of economic downturn, ethnic minorities are often more at risk than whites.

The recession in the 1990s resulted in a 10% rise in unemployment among blacks compared to 6% among whites. Most of us are familiar with Brexit-related attacks on minorities after the Referendum result in June 2016, but this is nothing new. At the dawn of the millennium, a United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination criticized the high level of racially-motivated attacks in the UK, institutional racism in the police and 'high unemployment and school exclusion rates among ethnic minorities'.

The financial crisis 2008 and its aftermath made things worse. The crisis and the government's handling of it left 50% of black people aged 16-25 unemployed, compared with 20% of whites. The Department for Work and Pensions puts the figure of Asian unemployment for 16-24-year-olds at 46%. According to the House of Commons Library, by 2015, there were 41,000 16-to-24-year-old black, Asian and other ethnic minorities 'long-term unemployed – a 49% rise from 2010'.

Dr Laurence Brown of Manchester University's Centre on Dynamics of Ethnicity says that 'ethnic minorities in Britain are, in many cases, outperforming their white peers in both secondary and higher education. However, very few of these gains in education have translated into employment outcomes'. One third of ethnic Bangladeshis and Pakistanis in England and a fifth of Arabs, Black Africans and Black Caribbeans, live in the most deprived areas, compared to one tenth of white Britons. Black African and Caribbean women experienced a 15-20% decline in full-time employment between 2004 and 2014, compared to relative stability for white women. Among Bangladeshi women, 39% have experienced a doubling of part-time work over the last 20 years.

Around the time of Brexit, with pro-'nationalist' spokespeople like Nigel Farage given airtime and press coverage, many racists and xenophobes who would not have otherwise acted on their prejudices felt vindicated by the 'Leave' result and started attacking both migrants and Britons from ethnic minorities. The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination stated: 'Many politicians and prominent political figures not only failed to condemn it but also created and entrenched prejudices, thereby emboldening individuals to carry out acts of intimidation and hate towards ethnic or ethno-religious minority communities and people who are visibly different'.

The government's Casey Report (2012) reviewed a decade of community cohesion and race relations. It concluded that successive governments had failed to implement advice from communities:

But the awareness of many of these issues and subsequent failures to address them arguably makes the situation worse, not better. The problem has not been a lack of knowledge but a failure of collective, consistent and persistent will to do something about it or give it the priority it deserves at both a national and local level. The work that has been done has often been piecemeal and lacked a clear evidence base or programme of evaluation.

GENDER INEQUALITY

In 2008, towards the end of the New Labour government, a committee of the UN's Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women found that 'British women are under-represented in Parliament, paid less than men at work and increasingly being sent to prison for committing minor offences'. It concluded that women's pay was on average 17% lower than men's.