28/06/2019 | 11:40:51 Thank you, Madam President. This report makes a number of requirements on countries which are hosting refugees or where refugees are presenting themselves, and it points to the way in which some countries are, quite openly, violating the rights of refugees. It points to inhuman and degrading treatment of refugees, the stealing of their belongings, depriving them of food and depriving them of basic services. In the name of humanity, I ask, are we able to stand here and say that we are going to... 28/06/2019 | 10:31:17 Thank you Mr President. It is difficult to know how to improve on Lord Donald ANDERSON's speech. But let me have a go at this. This is a conflict that has been going on for nine years and it's important to remember that. My starting point in any discussion about Syria is the expression of enormous sympathy for those countries that are taking refugees and particularly to Jordan. Jordan is the tenth driest country in the world and if you look at camps like Zaatari, and other camps in Jordan... 27/06/2019 | 10:40:07 Thank you Madam President. I'd like to start by quoting a sentence from the report. That sentence says the following: These fora are not just talking shops with no results. And neither are the Council of Europe standards and strategies, or the Parliamentary Assembly resolutions and recommendations insignificant. Now that may be an English understatement but I think that it is worthwhile remembering that because it stresses the importance of both of these reports. And why are these reports... 26/06/2019 | 11:26:36 Thank you, Mr President. I would start by saying that I have a tremendous amount of sympathy for this report. I congratulate the Rapporteur on having produced a balanced assessment of the problem. But she and I will be aware, of course, that arguments are put that patients - either risk of harming themselves or of harming others - are incarcerated for their own good. What you may not be aware of - and I think she may have just referred to that - that in my experience of prisons in the UK and... 25/06/2019 | 16:07:44 First, I'd like to start by congratulating the rapporteur. This is an excellent report. She has raised a very important issue and I do pay tribute to the excellence of her report. The report talks in terms of lifting "the shroud of violence that surrounds violence against women and girls" and I think that that is an excellent use of English, if I may say so, to describe what the report contains. The Istanbul Convention has made an excellent contribution to this. But the question that I would... 25/06/2019 | 12:05:45 Thank you, Madam President. I would like to start by criticising, if I may, gently, the first sentence on the summary of this report. It says "As it celebrates its 70th Anniversary, the Council of Europe is facing budgetary pressure from the Russian Federation". I don't believe that what we're talking about today is the budgetary pressure from the Russian Federation but it is our reaction to the Russian Federation and our reaction to that budgetary pressure. Now, of course, Russia is crucial... 24/06/2019 | 18:27:08 Thank you, Madam President. In this, the 70th anniversary of our creation, I want to ensure, as I said this morning, that we are fit for another 70 years, and to do that we need to be true to our common values that are summed up in the three expressions: human rights, democracy and the rule of law. But these values do not include holding this Council to ransom. They do not include invading another Member's territory or falsely arresting and imprisoning sailors from a neighbouring country... 12/04/2019 | 10:36:37 I start by saying how much I appreciated this report. I congratulate Ms Petra De SUTTER on the sensitive way in which she approached a very complex subject and on the careful handling she has given it. I began by looking at this subject from a human rights point of view. There is a conflict between the human rights of the donor and of those who are being born from these processes. The report judges those different human rights and assesses them, coming to a perfectly reasonable conclusion... 10/04/2019 | 11:29:22 With the permission of this Chamber, I would like to provide some personal context to my remarks because I am the person Lord David BLENCATHRA mentioned in his speech who has been targeted with death in a hate crime. It came about because I have spoken out in support of Israel. I do not agree with everything Israel does, but it is an issue on which I simply cannot be silent and should not be silent, and an issue I am fully prepared to debate in a democratic way. The whole substance of the... 09/04/2019 | 18:51:15 I agree with the comments that have been made about this issue affecting men as well as women, and I am sickened by the violence that many of my female parliamentary colleagues are facing. It is particularly offensive to us all that these attacks are aimed at women. We have all come into politics to serve our constituents to our best abilities. We may disagree on the best way to achieve that and on policy, but we have all come in to serve our constituents. However, these attacks on women make...