Peter Frankental explains why the ‘anti-boycott bill’ must be stopped.

The Government’s bill to bar public bodies such as local authorities from acting on political or ethical factors in their procurement and investment decisions passed through the House of Commons on 10th January by 282 votes to 235.

Coming after a raft of anti-protest and anti-asylum laws, It’s another attack on human rights by this increasingly authoritarian Government.

Ministers have dressed up their Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill as a necessary measure to stop local authorities from pursuing “their own foreign policies”. In reality, it’s a sinister encroachment on the ability of public bodies to pursue ethical procurement and investment policies. And with its inclusion of a special provision solely on Israel and the Palestinian territories it occupies, it’s also a none-too-subtle attempt to prevent principled opposition to Israel’s systematic mistreatment of Palestinians, including the crime of apartheid and the war crimes we are seeing in Gaza.

The Government has framed the legislation in a way that maximises the chilling effect on public officials who make purchasing and investment decisions. It requires them to show that their decision-making process has not been influenced by political or moral disapproval of a foreign state’s conduct.

This is an impossibly high threshold to meet even with certain exclusions included in the bill. How can a public official prove that there were no moral factors in denying a contract to a company which – for example – does business with the Myanmar military? Or a firm which sources products from the Xinjiang province of China? Or one that provides spyware to Saudi Arabia or trades with Israel’s illegal settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories? Faced with the threat of a legal challenge, it’s inevitable that public officials will err on the side of caution to avoid the risk of committing an offence under the law.

Amnesty has documented many cases in which UK companies have been complicit in human rights violations. Often it’s a firm’s relationship with state officials and the security forces that gives rise to the abuses. It simply isn’t possible to assess a company’s environmental, social and governance impacts without taking account of the conduct of the foreign states in which the company does business.

If the proposed law is enacted, a public body would be in breach whenever it tries to do this. By tying the hands of public bodies making decisions about whom they buy goods and services from and where they invest, the Government is undermining the role of public purchasing in being a force for good.

At a time of mounting public concern about unethical business practices, it’s more important than ever that companies are held to account. Denying contracts to those that fall short of international standards is one such means. Otherwise the Government is creating a moral hazard where responsible companies may be denied business opportunities as rogue companies are able to undercut them.

Not only will the law shield companies with a poor track record on human rights and the environment, it will even give these operators a competitive edge. In short, if it becomes law the bill risks locking in the current situation where many multinational corporations already operate to unacceptably low standards.

There’s one final twist. The legislation has a clause allowing the Secretary of State to specify whether or not a country is to be exempted from the law’s basic provisions (and one imagines that ministers will positively encourage councils to think ethically about procurement from countries such as Russia and Myanmar). Tellingly enough, one country alone – Israel – is ringfenced from the powers in this clause. Such bizarre selectivity shows very clearly that this bill is partly designed to prevent Israel’s atrocious human rights record and its apartheid policies from coming under scrutiny.

In addition, the bill undermines the UK’s longstanding policy of differentiating between Israel’s internationally-recognised borders and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, which the UK – rightly – doesn’t recognise as part of Israel. Along with 13 other UN Security Council members, the UK has endorsed UN resolution 2334 which requires states to differentiate between their dealings with Israel in its recognised borders and the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

It is difficult to escape the conclusion that the real purpose of the legislation isn’t, as the Government claims, to counter antisemitism, but to delegitimise human rights advocates who want to draw attention to Israel’s human rights violations, including through boycott, divestment and sanctions campaigns. Tarring human rights advocates with the brush of racism is taking us down a very dangerous road and has wider implications. If it is antisemitic to call out human rights violations by Israel, then is it anti-Hindu to raise human rights concerns in relation to India, anti-Buddhist to do so with Myanmar, and anti-Islamic to do this with regard to various Gulf countries? Where are we headed?

The bill is utterly perverse. Not only does it uniquely privilege Israel at a time of flagrant human rights abuses in Gaza, but by prohibiting public bodies from expressing their concerns about foreign state misconduct, the Government is effectively shielding dodgy business practices from proper scrutiny.

These draconian measures to prevent the public sector making ethical decisions are incredibly ill-judged, ill-timed, deeply contrary to the public interest and they must be stopped. The focus is now on the House of Lords which will have the unenviable task of picking through this irredeemable legislation.

Peter Frankental is Programme Director, Economic Affairs at Amnesty International UK.

Image: c/o Labour Hub.