Annual Report 2008- 9

We are now working on four strands in the ministry for peace campaign, two in the UK and two internationally.   Within the UK our busiest strand continues to be the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Conflict Issues. (See separate report below.)  At the beginning of the year we tried a new format for two of our regular meetings in parliament, the Conversation Café.    These start with speakers talking on the theme and then small groups discuss the issues at length from a number of perspectives.  The evening ends with the groups coming together again and sharing any insights or ideas they have developed to take the issue forward   The first café  in May looked at: ‘How Do We Transform Political Violence Into Constructive Cooperation?  We had two young speakers who had formerly been members of the extreme Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir.   It was fascinating to hear their journey into that group and why they eventually left it.  

The second café in July asked: What Is The Role Of Young People In Building Peace?

We had young people from Peace Child and from a north London school who were excited to be invited to speak in Parliament and to have their voices heard. mfp  also organised two training courses in May with Kai Brand Jacobsen from PATRIR: the three-day Systemic Peacebuilding:  Enhancing Coherence and Effectiveness in Policy and on-the-ground Peacebuilding and the two-day Transformative Mediation:  Tools for Peacemaking and Sustainable Peacebuilding.   Both courses attracted participants from the UK and abroad – the US, Holland, Sri Lanka, Cameroon, Germany, Canada, France, Romania and Italy.

Global Alliance

The second mfp strand is working with colleagues in other national campaigns via the Global Alliance for Ministries and departments of Peace. We work via conference calls and this last year we have been developing ideas for a structure for the organisation, currently a simple network of national campaigns, and preparing in great detail for the Summit that will take place in Costa Rica this September.  For more information please go to: www.mfp-dop.org 

AGM meeting

 Our final public meeting was the AGM itself when we had a number of speakers looking at the very topical issue of monetary reform.  Canon Peter Challen, the Co-author of ‘Seven Steps to Justice’ with Rodney Shakespeare spoke on How commercially created money leads to war and Tarek El Diwany, author of ‘The Problem with Interest’ spoke on “Promoting peace through economic justice?’  John Mcdonnell, MP, the meeting host and the Co-Founder of ministry for peace gave us some parliamentary and personal insights on the current economic situation.      Finance report The news was somewhat gloomy here.    Although we made a small profit on the training courses our expenses once again exceeded our income, only managed because of loans by  members of the mfp National Coordinating Committee.      We urged those present, and urge readers of this on the website to join our campaign – only £15 a year for the membership, or simply make a donation.  We are being effective in our work; imagine how much more effective would could be and how many more people could be made aware of this work if we only had more funds.  Election of National Coordinating Committee The Committee was reelected for the coming year and consists of: 

Ahlam Akram
Diana Basterfield
Trish Dickenson
Eddy Canfor-Dumas
Elizabeth Dowse
Vince Dowse
Eirwen Harbottle
John Hunt
Ruth Ludgate
Jim McCluskey
Irving Rappaport

The second and third strands of mfp’s work are described below.   

Report on the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Conflict Issues – AGM of mfp – 29 April 2009 

 The past year has been an encouraging one for the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Conflict Issues.  I’ll give some background, then report on what’s been happening and our plans for the next year or so. 

Aims

The ultimate purpose is to influence HMG to employ non-violent conflict transformation tools and methods increasingly in its approach to all types of conflict; and, by extension, to influence other governments in the same direction too.

To our knowledge, we are the only All-Party Group approaching conflict in this generic and systematic fashion. 

Structure

 The APPGCI was formally entered in the Parliamentary Register of All-Party Groups on 21 December 2006.  It held its inaugural meeting on 7 February 2007. The APPGCI has three ‘Officers’ – an MP from each of the three main parties, who are all Co-Chairs.  They are Simon Hughes (Lib Dem), John McDonnell (Lab) and Gary Streeter (Con).  As the group grows and secures more funding it could elect more officers e.g. a Treasurer and/or a Secretary.  A Secretariat of four is provided by members of ministry for peace. Twenty Parliamentarians are ‘named members’ of the APPGCI – ten Labour, six Conservative and four others, from both Houses of Parliament.  Approximately 35 others have expressed support in varying degrees but are not ‘named members’.   The three Officers and the Secretariat meet at least once every Parliamentary term – i.e. three times a year minimum – and are in regular contact by phone and email.  Our progress is monitored and evaluated at these meetings.  Parliamentary rules dictate that we hold an AGM each year that must be open to all Parliamentarians and where the officers must be (re-)elected.  The annual report and income/expenditure account are presented at that AGM.  In 2007 the APPGCI also formed an advisory group that includes Scilla Elworthy, Douglas Hurd, Sir Rupert Smith (former Deputy Supreme Commander Allied Powers Europe), Jane Corbin (Panorama, BBC), Jango Sarosh (Chair, Religions for Peace, Europe), Moazzam Malik (Head of CHASE, DFID), Alison Blake (Head of Conflict Group, FCO) and Dr Steward Wood (Senior Policy Adviser to the PM).  We consult the advisory group members regularly and invite them to all our meetings. 

Methods

 So – how do we work? By promoting non-violent conflict transformation the APPGCI challenges traditional attitudes held in Parliament and HMG towards conflict.   We firmly believe that unless practical and clearly effective alternatives are offered to policy-makers they will always tend to favour ‘default’ methods for dealing with conflict – especially at times of crisis – with violence often an early option.  The approach we support seeks to transform the structural and cultural – i.e. root – causes of conflict, as well as its direct causes.  We believe that by introducing Parliamentarians and HMG officials to those who are putting theory into practice – namely, peace-workers of all types –they will eventually be convinced that the alternatives really can be effective. To achieve the aims of the APPGCI, therefore, we regularly bring together three main groups of people – Parliamentarians, HMG officials and members of conflict-related NGOs in both open meetings and private briefings.  We are also beginning to attract members of the media and intend to include this group increasingly in our open meetings. To date we have held nineteen open meetings in Parliament on a wide range of topics.  At our meetings in January and February, two prominent figures in the field of peace and conflict transformation – Scilla Elworthy of Peace Direct and Johan Galtung of Transcend – addressed the Group and various guests.   Additionally, in 2008-9 we arranged six private briefings for Parliamentarians and HMG officials.  Most recently, Johan Galtung briefed officials at DFID and the FCO, including the Foreign Secretary’s senior strategy advisor.  We anticipate that this aspect of our work is likely to grow. 

Our most recent event has been our most ambitious to date, when, last month, we hosted the launch in Westminster of the international Parliamentarians Network for Conflict Prevention and Human Security.  This is an initiative of the EastWest Institute, a large and renowned international NGO. We were approached by them last summer and supported the international launch of the Network in Brussels in October.   The Westminster launch took the form of a reception on the Terrace, where the Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, gave the keynote address.  We also received a message of support from the Foreign Secretary, David Milliband (an indirect result, perhaps, of Galtung’s briefing).  Over 100 guests attended, the majority of whom were Parliamentarians and ambassadors (or senior representatives) from various embassies.  And I’d like to thank everyone who helped to support this event in any way – your hard work was noted and much appreciated, and has helped turn up the positive light in which mfp is regarded. We see the launch of the Parliamentarians Network as evidence that awareness is growing around the world of the value of alternative, non-violent approaches to conflict.  We believe these alternatives will eventually become mainstream and accepted practice, and we intend to do all we can to help that process. APPGCI meetings are publicised by email, on our website and by flier – every Parliamentarian (all 1400 of them) receives one for each meeting, distributed internally.  Additionally, during 2008 we secured the services of an experienced media consultant, Wendy Bailey, who managed to get national media exposure (on PM, BSKYB News and the BBC World Service) for two of our speakers, and achieved good coverage for the launch of the Parliamentarians Network.  With the availability of more funds we intend to use her more in future. 

Progress

 What progress have we made over the past year, then? Clearly, the number and range of meetings we have held, and the speakers we have attracted, is in itself a measure of our success, as is the fact that the EWI chose us as their partner at Westminster.  We expect this relationship to develop in the future, which will give us, among other things, access to more senior people in the field (the EWI is very well-connected).  We have also made progress towards our aim of increasing ‘soft support’ in Parliament – so far, over 50 MPs and peers have expressed general agreement with or interest in the aims of the APPGCI.  We are also starting to attract the support of more senior Parliamentarians (e.g. former ministers). ‘Hard support’ is also now emerging, in the form of Parliamentary action initiated by APPGCI members.  For example, just before the Easter recess the Officers of the group tabled an Early Day Motion – a kind of Parliamentary petition – on Conflict Prevention (EDM 1248) and so far, 59 MPs have signed.  We are looking for at least 100 signatures so please see me afterwards to find out how to encourage your MP to support this measure.   The Officers of the APPGCI are also applying to hold an Adjournment Debate on Conflict Prevention in July, and to support this latter initiative, we are currently arranging a working dinner in June for senior representatives of the UK’s major conflict-related NGOs.  We will be seeking their input into preparations for the debate and will produce a briefing paper based on this for interested Parliamentarians and HMG.  We will also be exploring the idea of joint NGO action in the run-up to the General Election – for example, a coordinated campaign to get a manifesto pledge from all the main parties to increase funding for conflict prevention, conflict resolution and peace-building. Finally, we believe we are starting to influence HMG.  We see the message of support from the Foreign Secretary for the Parliamentarians Network as evidence that this topic is on firmly HMG’s radar at a senior level, and is viewed with some sympathy.  Additionally, our open meetings are always attended by officials from various departments of HMG; and the FCO and DFID have recently opened their doors to us (to hear from Johan Galtung).  The FCO also invited us to bring together Parliamentarians for a briefing by Ed Luck, the UN Secretary-General's Special Adviser working on the Responsibility to Protect.  So the relationship with HMG is developing.

The future