Former Diplomatic Editor at The Times Michael Binyon meets sixth Secretary-General of the Commonwealth Baroness Patricia Scotland to hear her plans for the role

Baroness Patricia Scotland has high hopes for the Commonwealth. The 53-nation organisation should promote effective economic, cultural, educational and parliamentary partnerships across the globe, she says, giving large and small countries, rich and poor, an equal voice in promoting human rights, liberty and action on the environment.

Her aim, she says, is to harness this huge potential to achieve real change in social conditions, the environment and women’s rights across the Commonwealth.  She is particularly enthusiastic about improving conditions for women. Domestic violence affected one in three women across the globe, she said. The cost was enormous. In Britain alone it was found that a quarter of all violent crime was domestic, 89 per cent of all victims were women and some 120 women a year were killed by their partners. The cost to Britain’s economy was £23 billion a year. So when she was Attorney General she made this a priority, chairing inter-ministerial groups to creative corporate initiatives to fight domestic violence. As a result, domestic crime between 2003 and 2010 fell by 64 per cent, with a saving of more than £7 billion. Baroness Scotland wants to repeat such initiatives across the Commonwealth.

She has also said she wants to see the decriminalisation of homosexuality in all 53 member states. In more than a dozen, mainly in Africa and the Caribbean, it is still a criminal offence, and in some countries, especially Uganda, there have been attempts to increase the penalties, with even proposals for the death penalty.

Baroness Scotland is carefully diplomatic in discussing the issue. She will not single out any particular country, and insists it is far more effective to point out the social and economic gains from ensuring full rights for all citizens in any country. “There is an economic cost if barriers are put in the way of citizens.” She also noted that member countries were full sovereign states, and resented outside attempts to cajole them into changing their laws. “If you stick your fingers into people’s eyes they don’t take kindly to it. It is more helpful if you walk in their shoes and feel the pressures they have and help them with their ambitions,” she said.

Born in Dominica in 1955, Patricia Scotland moved with her family to Britain when she was only two years old. She then had a meteoric rise in her career. She obtained her LLB in 1976, was called to the bar in 1977 and was appointed Queen’s Counsel in 1991. She received a life peerage and was created Baroness Scotland of Asthal in 1997. Ten years later, she was appointed Attorney General.

A campaign in which she was deeply involved was the attempt to stop forced marriages. As a junior minister in the Foreign Office, she pioneered legislation to help rescue women who were taken abroad and forced into marriage. Again, however, a Commonwealth-wide campaign would have to rely on persuasion rather than decree. “Let’s start by finding what unites us all. Forced marriage is contrary to every major faith.” She would like to see a women’s agenda for the Commonwealth that started with a round-table of women’s leaders to talk about aspirations and ensure that women’s voices were heard. She insists that men had a role to play: “Some of the greatest feminists have been men.” She took her own father as an example: he had 12 children, and insisted that they all had equal opportunities.

“A nation can leave – or it can be asked to leave. It is an alignment of nations that can do things if they choose. We are looking at building consensus, so we have to start on issues where we agree. Then, having built trust and confidence, we can become collaborative partners.”

The role of Secretary-General is a difficult one. The Commonwealth works by consensus, and there is little scope for its chief executive to take political decisions, especially any that are controversial. But the danger is that the Secretary-General will remain so much in the background that he or she will become invisible, unable to project the organisation to the outside world. “The Commonwealth is a flexible, consensual family of nations,” she said. “A nation can leave – or it can be asked to leave. It is an alignment of nations that can do things if they choose. We are looking at building consensus, so we have to start on issues where we agree. Then, having built trust and confidence, we can become collaborative partners.”

One topical issue seems tailor-made for the Common-wealth: climate change. It is an existential threat to many of the smaller members – islands that are threatened by rising sea levels. Indeed, it was the smaller Commonwealth members that were largely instrumental in forcing an acceptable compromise at the recent Paris summit on climate change. Baroness Scotland has kept close links with Dominica, the island of her birth (a fact that was useful in galvanising support for her appointment among many of the smaller members). She cited Erika, a recent devastating storm on the island, as an example of the damage done by more violent weather patterns to small Commonwealth members.

“What is the Commonwealth?” she asked rhetorically. “It is a means to create partnerships to deliver change that is meaningful, effective and doable. All have to choose to do it together”. She gave the eradication of polio as one example, and tackling tracoma as another – as well, of course, as climate change. “We have to identify an objective that is important to every member. The issue of blindness is clearly one of those.” All countries could be asked to make a contribution to a Commonwealth campaign. Australia, one of the richer members, has already offered to match any amounts up to £50 million that are raised.

One problem for the Commonwealth is that in Britain it commands little political or media attention. The press tends to attack the Commonwealth and its Secretary-General as ‘spineless’ if he or she does not take action against any member state that holds a suspect election or tramples on human rights. But the media rarely pay attention to less political issues of development and cooperation. Baroness Scotland certainly does not want to be seen as spineless, and one suspects she will be firm and persuasive in her private discussions with various leaders. She said: “I can’t just wag my finger. But you have to tell people things they may not want to know but need to hear. There can be real conversations with people where both sides have to listen carefully, and where aspirations can be achieved.”

It was not simply a question of the larger and richer members setting the pace and expecting the poorer developing countries to follow: “Sometimes the smaller countries can be trailblazers.” She cited the example of Rwanda, which has installed the latest 4G mobile phone technology across the country and uses this extensively in the health system for e-assisted consultations and long-distance nursing and treatment. Kenya, too, was developing telephone banking across the country. “What would be nice is if we could produce a handbook of best practice for all Commonwealth members.” she said.

She does not formally take office until April. The next few months will be spent travelling extensively, visiting members in every continent. She will do a lot of listening. But, one suspects, when she assumes office she will also have plenty to say.

“The Commonwealth is a flexible, consensual family of nations,” she said. “A nation can leave – or it can be asked to leave. It is an alignment of nations that can do things if they choose. We are looking at building consensus, so we have to start on issues where we agree. Then, having built trust and confidence, we can become collaborative partners.”

One topical issue seems tailor-made for the Common-wealth: climate change. It is an existential threat to many of the smaller members – islands that are threatened by rising sea levels. Indeed, it was the smaller Commonwealth members that were largely instrumental in forcing an acceptable compromise at the recent Paris summit on climate change. Baroness Scotland has kept close links with Dominica, the island of her birth (a fact that was useful in galvanising support for her appointment among many of the smaller members). She cited Erika, a recent devastating storm on the island, as an example of the damage done by more violent weather patterns to small Commonwealth members.

“What is the Commonwealth?” she asked rhetorically. “It is a means to create partnerships to deliver change that is meaningful, effective and doable. All have to choose to do it together”. She gave the eradication of polio as one example, and tackling tracoma as another – as well, of course, as climate change. “We have to identify an objective that is important to every member. The issue of blindness is clearly one of those.” All countries could be asked to make a contribution to a Commonwealth campaign. Australia, one of the richer members, has already offered to match any amounts up to £50 million that are raised.

One problem for the Commonwealth is that in Britain it commands little political or media attention. The press tends to attack the Commonwealth and its Secretary-General as ‘spineless’ if he or she does not take action against any member state that holds a suspect election or tramples on human rights. But the media rarely pay attention to less political issues of development and cooperation. Baroness Scotland certainly does not want to be seen as spineless, and one suspects she will be firm and persuasive in her private discussions with various leaders. She said: “I can’t just wag my finger. But you have to tell people things they may not want to know but need to hear. There can be real conversations with people where both sides have to listen carefully, and where aspirations can be achieved.”

It was not simply a question of the larger and richer members setting the pace and expecting the poorer developing countries to follow: “Sometimes the smaller countries can be trailblazers.” She cited the example of Rwanda, which has installed the latest 4G mobile phone technology across the country and uses this extensively in the health system for e-assisted consultations and long-distance nursing and treatment. Kenya, too, was developing telephone banking across the country. “What would be nice is if we could produce a handbook of best practice for all Commonwealth members.” she said.

She does not formally take office until April. The next few months will be spent travelling extensively, visiting members in every continent. She will do a lot of listening. But, one suspects, when she assumes office she will also have plenty to say.