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Visiting parliamentarians pledge support for Falklands

That the challenge to the Falkland Islands from Argentina has to be met head on, was one of the messages delivered on Wednesday by a group of British parliamentarians who have been visiting the Islands this week..

Meeting with local media representatives, on the day before their departure, the group, comprising three Labour members of the Westminster parliament and one Conservative member of the Welsh Assembly, were keen to show their enthusiasm for what they had seen and to pledge their support for the Falklands on their return to the UK .

Asked for her impressions, Vera Baird, MP for Redcar in the North East of England, said that the visit had given them all an idea of the advantages and disadvantage of living in such a place and that she felt that they now had some understanding of the way the country worked.

Like her colleagues, Mrs. Baird expressed amazement at the wildlife they had seen during a visit to Pebble Island and expressed her gratitude for the warmth of the reception they had received, wherever they had been. Dari Taylor, MP for Stockton South, also said that she had been "taken aback" by the sheer beauty of the Islands and unprepared for how large they are.

Alun Cairns, the only Conservative and the only parliamentarian of the group not representing a constituency in the North East of England, said that he had been impressed by the high standard of living enjoyed by people in the Islands and by the fact that young Islanders who had received education and training elsewhere appeared keen to come back to the Islands. He contrasted this situation with that of Wales, which suffers a constant drain of its young people

Alan Campbell, MP for Tynemouth, an area which has had much to do with the construction of rigs and other infrastructure for the British North Sea oil industry, said that he had been impressed by the strong sense of community evident in the Falklands as well as the great sense of personal security. Clearly there was respect for tradition, but the community appeared very forward?looking and independent-minded. The challenge for the future, he thought, would be to retain what is best of the present, while at the same time taking advantage of opportunities that the future might offer.

Asked for their reaction to the recent claim made by the President of the Falkland Islands Chamber of Commerce that the Falklands were being subjected to "deliberate and calculated attempts at economic warfare" on the part of the Argentine Government, Mrs. Taylor replied that in her opinion the important thing was to keep talking.

She continued: "we will be persuading the Foreign Office to keep talking to them and quite frankly I don't hear that they are doing more than talking, I don't think there is an aggressive threat, albeit there is a serious determination to undermine your economic development and that challenge has to be met, head on." Asked whether British Foreign Office Minister Bill Rammell was continuing to urge the Argentine Government to allow a second flight a week to the Islands by LAN, Mrs Taylor replied:

"We spoke to Bill Rammell before we came out, very keen to hear how he had spoken with you, how he had spoken with them and I think he has (made) a very clear, clear, statement to the Argentinians that all they are doing is actually damaging international relationships, because whilst they think they've got you pinned down or can pin you down, they've got to acknowledge there are other and bigger forces that would equally respond to them. There is no relationship that is specifically Argentinian /Falkland Islands; we are now an international global community and that interdependence is going to be more the case, not less the case and that is the approach that the British Government is very robustly taking."

In response to a question about whether the Falkland Island Government should defy the Argentine Government's attempts to ignore its existence and communicate more directly with Argentina, Alan Campbell replied,

"It's not for us to tell your Councillors or your government what they should be saying to the Argentinians. A lot of my constituents' views on the Falkland Islands, certainly mine and, perhaps, my colleagues, were conditioned by what we saw twenty-two years ago in 1982 and that's a series of events that are very fresh in the minds of many Falkland Islanders; there clearly is a lack of trust with regard to your Argentinan neighbours; if you are not under a situation of military siege, then there's certainly a feeling of being under one of economic siege."

"It's for the Argentinians to try to build on that trust. Unfortunately it seems subject to the hopefully short-term, but very unreasonable attitude of the Argentinian government at present. In my view, its about parking those issues that are not open to negotiation such as sovereignty, while keeping the door open on those issues that will be of mutual importance like, for example, environmental matters, like, for example, issues around tourism and issues around fisheries, but for Councillors and the Falkland Islands Government to make a re-evaluation of their view of these issues depends very much on it being a two-way street and the Argentinians being reasonable. It seems to me at present that's not what they are being."

Mrs. Baird, who has been described as subscribing to traditional Labour views and therefore might, in the past, have been viewed with suspicion by some Falkland Islanders, added,

"We were always clear, I think, that from the UK point of view sovereignty simply isn't negotiable; we couldn't be clearer now we've been here for the better part of a week that Falkland Islanders are absolutely straight and absolutely up-front about their determination to remain British, so there is absolutely no room to negotiate anything connected with sovereignty, but I have a strong feeling that the majority of people, certainly that we've met, are anxious to be good neighbours to Argentina and are anxious that Argentina should be good neighbours back . It is key, therefore, to keep open every channel of communication that's available, but I think we'll have to touch base with reality as well and say that, as historically has proven the case, the Argentine government will use the issue of the Falklands, whenever it needs a distraction from its central concerns.

An enterprising community such as this has shown itself to be to us, in the very short time we've been here, has got to look at other options and not simply accept the difficulties of being dependent on Argentinian goodwill for much of its future trade".

John Fowler (MP) Stanley

Categories: Falkland Islands.

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