Speech at opening ceremony of 32nd Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference

Queen Elizabeth IIYour Majesty, Your Royal Highness, My Lord HailshamLord Chancellor, Bernard WeatherillMr. Speaker, Your Excellencies, Distinguished Commonwealth Parliamentarians, Ladies and Gentlemen.

INTRODUCTION

As Chairman of the United Kingdom branch of our Association, I thank Your Majesty for your gracious speech opening this 32nd Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference. [end p1]

We are honoured and grateful that Your Majesty, as Head of the Commonwealth, is with us today.

Throughout your reign, Your Majesty has taken a deep, personal interest in the Commonwealth.

You have a matchless knowledge of the member countries and your dedication and [end p2] interest inspires admiration everywhere.

It also falls to me, as Chairman of the host Branch, to greet all of you who have travelled to London for this Conference.

One hundred and three separate legislatures, both national and local, are represented.

Many of you will know London well: others are here for the first time. [end p3]

We welcome you all most warmly to this our capital city.

THE PARLIAMENTARY TRADITION

As Mr. Speaker has observed, there could be no better setting for this opening ceremony than the Great Hall of Westminster, built more than nine hundred years ago: before Magna Carta: before the first Parliament. [end p4]

As the Lord HailshamLord Chancellor put it on another great occasion: Westminster Hall is one of the eternal monuments of the human spirit, a testimony to that longing for liberty and justice for which all men yearn.

Indeed, this Hall, so long the home of our great Courts of Justice, reminds us that, without the rule of law, there can be no democracy. [end p5]

It represents, too, the continuity of our Parliamentary tradition.

A tradition that, across the years, we have taken to the many countries which are now members of the Commonwealth.

A tradition which upholds the force of argument and rejects the argument of force.

A tradition which is at the heart of this [end p6] Association.

As Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, I have attended four Commonwealth Heads of Government Meetings.

That is relatively few compared with the record of some Commonwealth leaders, but I look forward to a fifth in Canada in October next year. [end p7]

What has struck me about those meetings is not just the advantages of our common language—great as they are: it is that real discussion takes place between Heads of Government.

Not just exchanges of platitudes (though of course we would be lost without them).

Not just the noisy clash of verbal battle (a custom which I fear you will have learned from our House of Commons). [end p8]

But real debate which reveals aspects and experiences previously unknown or little appreciated by colleagues.

We learn how different our problems are, from small islands of a few thousand people to the largest democracy in the world with 750 million people; from societies with their roots deep in the past to newly emerging states for whom technical cooperation within the [end p9] Commonwealth means so much.

Indeed I know from the many Commonwealth leaders who come to Downing Street, how highly valued that practical cooperation is.

It is difficult to define the nature of the Commonwealth.

It does not have a Charter like the United Nations. [end p10]

Nor a Treaty like the European Community.

Nor is it a regional grouping like the Organisation of African Unity or Association of South East Asian Nations.

Nor is it the role of any one country to hold the Commonwealth together.

It has long ceased to be called the British Commonwealth.

The Commonwealth belongs equally to all its members. [end p11]

As the heads of Government agreed in Singapore in 1971, we are, they said, “a voluntary association of independent sovereign states, each responsible for its own policies, consulting and co-operating in the common interests of their peoples and in the promotion of international understanding and world peace” .

And may I add that we subscribe to the [end p12] same values.

The basic values of democracy, freedom, justice and equality before the law.

But just subscribing to them is not enough.

We cannot preach them to others unless we practise them ourselves.

We don't ask of each other that we all observe the same political philosophy, or that we [end p13] should all run our economies or our societies on the same lines.

Indeed, it would be absurd to do so: out histories, our customs, our cultures are too diverse.

And over the past years the Commonwealth has in practice tolerated and accepted a very wide range of governments and policies. [end p14]

To cite an example: we all detest the system of apartheid in South Africa and want to see it demolished as soon as possible, but we don't quite agree how best to do it.

There is nothing unusual in agreeing the end but disputing the means.

It was never envisaged that the Commonwealth would be or become an instrument for joint executive action. [end p15]

As free and independent sovereign states, we have have a legitimate right to our own views.

And the right, too, to hold those views without our motives being questioned.

That is the essence of tolerance, of which Your Majesty spoke, so important to the Commonwealth.

As one of our great Parliamentarians said: “Tolerance is good for all, or it is good for none.” [end p16]

Conclusion

A gathering such as this of respected Parliamentarians is one of the great Commonwealth occasions.

During this Conference you will share your ideas and ideals and make many new friendships—as I made many friends when I attended my first Commonwealth [end p17] Parliamentary Conference in 1968 in Nassau.

And you will return home to share some of the world-wide wisdom gathered here with your Parliamentary colleagues.

Edmund Burke, whom I quoted a moment ago, once said:

“Individuals pass like shadows but the Commonwealth is fixed and stable.”

[end p18]

Of course, he had a different Commonwealth in mind, but his words apply no less to our Commonwealth of diverse and widely-spread independent nations united in their basic values, and united through The Queen as Head of the Commonwealth.

If we hold fast to those values, the Commonwealth itself and this Association will continue to play a uniquely influential role in world affairs. [end p19]

May I too wish you all a happy and successful conference.