The Prime Minister made the following remarks at the CHOGM
openeing ceremony.
REMARKS
Your Royal Highness,
President Kagame,
Madam Secretary General,
Your Excellencies,
ladies and gentlemen,
I’m honoured to perform the final duty of the United Kingdom as
Chair-in-Office of the Commonwealth
and hand over the baton to President Kagame, and wish
him every success as Chair of our unique association,
encompassing 54 countries and a third of humanity.
One of the newest members is now at the helm,
and more nations are seeking to join,
which tells you everything about the health and vitality of our
Commonwealth,
because for all the differences between us,
we are united by an invisible thread of shared values, history
and friendship.
The Head of the Commonwealth, Her Majesty the Queen, incarnates
everything that brings us together
and it’s fitting that in the year of her Platinum Jubilee,
the association she cherishes should be gathering in the
continent where she became Queen.
When the UK became your Chair-in-Office in 2018, the word “Covid”
had not been invented
many of us had no idea what a “coronavirus” was, and
nobody could have known that the worst pandemic for a century
would soon claim millions of lives.
The British government put together the partnership between
Oxford University and AstraZeneca that produced the world’s most
popular vaccine,
and during our time as Chair-in-Office, the UK
supported the delivery of more than 1.4 billion doses of
Covid vaccines to Commonwealth countries.
The pandemic posed a common threat to all humanity and the
same is true of catastrophic climate change.
No-one understands this better than our Commonwealth friends in
the Caribbean, the Pacific and the Indian Ocean
who can see the incoming tides surging ever higher up their
beaches,
threatening to inundate their villages and towns,
and, in time, the entire land mass of some island states.
For them, the baleful effects of climate change are not vague or
theoretical,
but already happening before their eyes.
When we hosted COP26 in Glasgow last November,
it was these fellow Commonwealth leaders who spoke with greatest
urgency and authority about the perils of quilting the earth with
greenhouse gases.
And we in the developed world have an obligation to help our
friends to cope with a danger they had no hand in causing,
and during the UK’s time as Chair-in-Office,
the Commonwealth Finance Access Hub mobilised over $38 million
for the most vulnerable members,
but of course we must press on and do more.
And if I could imagine a silver bullet that would solve an array
of problems and transform countless lives,
it would be to give every girl in the world the chance to go to
school.
At the last CHOGM in London in 2018, the UK announced £212
million for the Girls’ Education Challenge,
and I’m delighted to say that this initiative is now at work in
11 Commonwealth countries,
ensuring that girls are able to gain at least 12 years of quality
education.
We need to empower them to play their full part in the economy
when they leave school,
so the UK is funding the “She Trades” Commonwealth programme,
which has already helped over 3,500 women-owned businesses to
become more competitive and generate more than £32 million of
sales.
And if there is anyone who doubts the ability of the Commonwealth
to speak with one voice,
it was in 2020 that the UK delivered the first ever Joint
Statement by all 54 Commonwealth members before the Human Rights
Council in Geneva,
recalling – and I quote - our “proud history of acting to
strengthen good governance and the rule of law”.
One of the gravest affronts to everything we stand for is
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
and Putin’s blockade of the ports that would otherwise be
shipping food to the world’s poorest people.
At this moment, nearly 25 million tonnes of corn and wheat is
piled up in silos across Ukraine, held hostage by Russia.
Britain supports the United Nations plan to get that food out
and we will invest over £370 million in global food security this
year, including £130 million for the World Food Programme.
We want to work alongside our Commonwealth friends to understand
your needs and priorities
and deliver joint solutions to a crisis that Putin has
deliberately engineered.
For now, it only remains for me to thank every Commonwealth
member for having given the United Kingdom the chance to serve as
Chair-in-Office.
And as I pass on this responsibility to President Kagame,
a close friend and partner,
I know that he shares my boundless optimism
about the future of the Commonwealth at the forefront of the
international agenda, and benefiting all our peoples.
Thank you all very much.
