Oral evidence: Global Britain and South America, HC 1617
Tuesday 2 July 2019
Ordered by the House of Commons to be published on 2 July 2019.
Members present: Tom Tugendhat (Chair); Chris Bryant; Ann Clwyd; Stephen Gethins; Connor McGinn; Ian Murray; Priti Patel; Mr Bob Seely; Royston Smith; Catherine West.
Questions 171-236
Witnesses
I: Cristina Bruce, Head of International Relations, Anglo American Plc, and Jonathan Dunn, Head of International Policy and Planning, Anglo American Plc.
Written evidence from witnesses:
Witnesses: Cristina Bruce and Jonathan Dunn.
Q171 Chair: Welcome to this afternoon’s session of the Foreign Affairs Committee. Thank you very much for coming. Would you just introduce yourselves very briefly for the record.
Cristina Bruce: Hello everyone. My name is Cristina Bruce. I am head of international relations at Anglo American and based in our office in London.
Jonathan Dunn: Good afternoon everyone. I am Jonathan Dunn. I am the head of international policy and planning for Anglo American, also based here in London.
Q172 Chair: Thank you very much for coming. We are very grateful that you have agreed to give evidence this afternoon.
We are very interested in your activities in South America, as this is connected to our inquiry into the UK’s relationships with South America. Let me start broadly: do the commercial activities of companies like Anglo American make the lives of communities in South America better or worse?
Jonathan Dunn: Would it be helpful, Mr Chairman, if I gave a little background on the company in answering that question, to help the Committee understand the context? I can certainly do that, or would you like me to dive straight in?
Q173 Chair: If your context is related to South America and not to other operations around the world, then yes.
Jonathan Dunn: It is absolutely related to South America. First, as a UK-listed group, we work very frequently with British embassies and consulates across South America, and we are closely aligned on a range of work that they do. The nature of our company and business, which I will turn to in a moment, means that we are perhaps less engaged with them on the day-to-day, what you might call classic trade work, although we welcomed the recent decision by DIT to now formally support outward investment, as well as inward investment and trade.
But because of the long-term nature of our operations in countries, our engagement with HMG goes beyond some of that trade work, into some of the longer term business environment issues. For example, we work on double taxation agreements. On FTAs, we note the signature of, or the agreement to sign, the EU-Mercosur deal over the weekend, which is good news. Also, even more widely, in terms of promoting the rule of law, we work on issues such as gender, inclusion and diversity, and we have done that hand in hand with colleagues from British embassies.
We are a global mining group, so we have a diverse portfolio of assets. But we aim to develop resources in a way that is not only good for profits but good for communities—something that we have done for 102 years. We have been in South America since 1973. We started in Brazil. We now have iron ore and nickel assets in Brazil. We moved into Chile, where we have copper assets. We are opening a mine in Peru, known as Quellaveco, in the next few years, which is also a copper mine. We have exploration activities in Ecuador and Argentina, and we are one-third shareholders in an independently managed coalmine in Colombia called Cerrejón. I suspect that might make us quite unique as a British-based multinational in terms of our footprint and the scale of our operations.
Important in the context that I mentioned is the long-term nature of the commitment that we have. For example, our Minas-Rio iron ore facility in Brazil has a reserve life of 48 years from now. We expect to operate the Quellaveco mine that we will open until a minimum of 2052, and our Los Bronces copper asset in Chile also has a life of at least another 30 years, so we are there for the very long term. That means that the way in which we develop relationships with communities, regulators and Governments—both national and local—is absolutely fundamental to what we do, and without it we cannot be successful. We believe that the most significant influence we can have is through the way in which we conduct ourselves.
That brings me to the purpose of our business, which is reimagining mining to improve people’s lives. That is at the heart of absolutely everything we do, as we try to contribute to a more sustainable future for those communities and wider societies in which we operate. We have clear targets that go beyond that. In our sustainable mining plan, the targets cover things such as education in our host communities, healthcare, socioeconomic development, greenhouse gas emissions, energy efficiency, use of water, and our aspiration to be a trusted corporate leader.
The targets are important, but, as I said, we believe that the way we conduct ourselves is absolutely crucial. In that regard, we are rolling out a new model of socioeconomic development. We call it collaborative regional development. As the name suggests, it involves building long-term partnerships with local governments, NGOs and other businesses in the regions around our mines, so that we can both co-create and jointly implement a socioeconomic development plan for that region, the logic being that we want a community, a region, an area to benefit from the mine, but not to become dependent on it, because the mine will clearly not be there forever. So we want to create sustainable value for them.
Finally, a word on our values as a company, which are safety, care and respect, integrity, accountability, collaboration and innovation. They matter to us, and we hold ourselves accountable to them. They form a central part of our code of conduct, which every one of our 70,000 employees around the world has signed up to. It is part of our individual performance and appraisal process as well. Coupled with all of that is how we choose to engage with all stakeholders around the world, Mr Chairman.
Q174 Chair: Can we come back to the question, then?
Jonathan Dunn: Of course, absolutely. For us, there is a simple way of looking at value for communities, if you like, which is financial value. We define and publish every year what we call a taxation and economic contribution report, which details against each country how much in financial terms our operations have contributed to those economies. We break that down by capital investment, wages and related payments, procurement spending, taxes and payments, and corporate and social investment.
To give you an idea of the numbers for 2018, in Brazil that accounted for US$1.35 billion; Chile, US$2.81 billion; Columbia, US$2.12 billion; and Peru, US$720 million. That is in financial terms, but we look at it a bit more broadly, in terms of creating enduring value for our stakeholders. A crucial part of that for us is supporting the development of local enterprise. Through successful programmes over the past 10 years in Peru, Chile and Brazil, we have supported 61,000 small and medium-sized enterprises and created about 66,000 jobs in those enterprises.
Then, we take it up another level. This is about value that is perhaps less economic and more about livelihoods of people. The targets I mentioned in our sustainable mining plan include ensuring that the schools in the regions around our operations are in the top 10% educationally in the country they operate in. We want to ensure that the indicators of sustainable development goal 3 on health are achieved in the communities around our operations. I have already mentioned socioeconomic development, and we want to ensure that water abstraction is reduced. There are all those kinds of areas. It is a financial, a wider economic and a broader livelihoods point.
Q175 Chair: The question that keeps coming up with extractive industries, as you will be aware, is to do with the environmental damage. You have spoken about the financial contributions to the community. How much do you evaluate your impact on the environment that you leave the community with, either during your operations or, indeed, after your mines have closed?
Jonathan Dunn: We have a whole range of targets that we abide by, which are, for the most part, derived from the International Finance Corporation standards, which are quite commonplace across the mining sector when related to environment—on things like air quality and water.
Within those standards, there are all kinds of measures that we have to ensure. If we have got agreements to take water, we have to take no more water than we should. If we are putting water back into rivers, the quality of the water is high, or we remedy problems if they come up.
In addition to that, we have committed to net positive impact in biodiversity, meaning that, when we leave a site, the biodiversity will be at least as good as it was when we first arrived. The combination of those things means we have absolute targets and commitments to making sure that any environmental impact we have is as small as it can be. Looking forward, ideally we leave where we have been in the best possible shape we possibly can.
Q176 Chair: What do you leave in terms of financial commitment to any future discoveries that may be caused by the impact of your mining? If, say, you have been mining in an area for 20 or 30 years, you close the mine and move off, and something is discovered five or 10 years later, do you leave a bond in any way? Do you leave any form of guarantee with the Government, or whoever it is, so they can restore any damage, should it be discovered later?
Jonathan Dunn: We have a very detailed and lengthy mine closure plan process, which starts about 15 years before we expect the mine to close. That has a number of different sequences within it, which include what we think might need to be financial support for the longer term. I cannot give you any more specificity than that, in the sense that it is very dependent on the individual circumstances in the individual mine, but, as we are going through that process, we carefully consider where we feel we need to leave some form of financial support.
Q177 Royston Smith: I have a number of questions. We were in Colombia last week, and they talked about illegal mining operations. What are illegal mining operations? How do they differ from yours? I did not really get a straight answer when I was there. I don’t know whether you can give me a straight answer now—it is a bit unfair to ask, I know. What are they, and how do they differ from what you do?
Cristina Bruce: We can distinguish three different types of mining. One is the type of mining that we do, which is fully permitted and dependent upon a whole range of bodies of legislation. That can include large mines or small mines. Then you have illegal mining, which can include artisanal mining that is not covered by a regulatory framework—for example individuals, families or slightly larger groups of people who are doing things on a small scale. Then you can have illegal mining that is quite large, but that operates without the legislative framework and the permits that they need. That can sometimes be linked to other illegal activities. Those are the three main categories. Some countries have legislation that permits artisanal mining, so there is some artisanal mining that is not illegal. That gives us three categories, with an additional fourth category.
Q178 Royston Smith: How does their method of extraction differ from yours, if it does differ?
Cristina Bruce: The actual chemical, technological methods will be fundamentally the same, but you have no guarantees around the standards that mines are abiding by. Because they are not legal, they would not be overseen in the same way that our mines are, so they would not have relationships with the regulatory authorities, they would not have an audit and they certainly would not have the same kind of oversight, mine closure planning or funds to look after legacy issues in perpetuity, etc.
Q179 Royston Smith: Which values does your company apply when you are operating your extractive industries overseas? What are the main values, not necessarily that differentiate you, but that you abide by?
Cristina Bruce: Jonathan has already listed our main core values. They are the values that we operate by: safety, care and respect, collaboration, integrity, accountability and innovation.
An example of that would be an initiative that we refer to as the Quellaveco dialogue table. Anglo American entered Peru in 1992, when we bought into a copper project—a project is a mine under design and development—near the Chilean border. As the years passed and we progressed the development of the project, we realised that there were significant concerns from community members around water and the environment, and how we would behave as we developed the mine. In 2010, we decided to halt all technical work on the mine and look at how we could develop a strong relationship with our host communities and the different levels of Government, to ensure that they consented to our presence and were all supportive of the project.
What we did at the time was very innovative. It involved collaboration with 25 of the main regional stakeholders. We also had 10 national-level observers. These stakeholder groups came together for just under two years. They focused on three workstreams: water, environment and corporate social responsibility. It was an opportunity for us to really listen and learn from them about what their concerns were about the project that we were in the process of designing. As a result, we actually changed the mine that we had been designing. For example, we committed to returning a river to its original bed upon closure, and we also changed the water basin from which we were going to draw water in the design.
With reference to accountability, which is one of our values, we set up a series of monitoring committees, where we train local community members, who are then able to hold us to account when it comes to our environmental performance, and to hold us to account on all the agreements we reach through this process.
The Quellaveco dialogue table was completed in March 2012; it resulted in 26 agreements. As the project has progressed—we have now started construction—those are the agreements that we are held to. We are in regular contact with those stakeholders and representatives of those groups to make us stick to those agreements.
That is an example of how our values made us take quite a radical decision: to completely halt something and to then focus exclusively on community engagement for two years is relatively rare. It was an immensely powerful experience for us.
Q180 Chris Bryant: Could I ask you about Cerrejón in Colombia? I visited Colombia last year, although I did not visit Cerrejón. I went courtesy of ABColombia, and I visited other mines, but not any of yours. As I understand it, Cerrejón is an open-pit coalmine, yes?
Cristina Bruce: Yes.
Q181 Chris Bryant: The largest in the world, probably?
Cristina Bruce: It’s not the largest in the world. I couldn’t tell you exactly, but it is certainly in the top 10.
Q182 Chris Bryant: Open-pit basically means that you are digging away most of the ground. You are not sinking a pit deep down, as we would have done in south Wales. You are taking the mountain, as it were.
Cristina Bruce: With open-pit mining, you have an ever-bigger hole rather than tunnels under the ground.
Q183 Chris Bryant: That has two major implications. One is for the people who were living there beforehand. Why have they not yet been rehomed, considering that you have already lost two court cases on this?
Cristina Bruce: Let me just clarify Anglo American’s involvement with Cerrejón. Cerrejón is equally owned by three shareholders: Anglo American, BHP and Glencore. So our involvement with Cerrejón is that of a 33% equal shareholder. Cerrejón is itself an independently managed company in Colombia.
With regards to resettlement and Cerrejón, I’m afraid that the question is not totally accurate. Five significant communities at Cerrejón have been resettled. Resettlement is a long process, and the resettlements at Cerrejón have been most recently designed to abide by International Finance Corporation standards on resettlement. One of the challenges around resettlement at Cerrejón is that some of those resettlements were started before the existing standards were in place. Of those five resettlements, all are complete in that the families are in their new homes. What is not complete are the final stages of resettlement, which is about monitoring people’s livelihoods and wellbeing, and putting in place programmes to support the development of their livelihoods. That work is ongoing.
Q184 Chris Bryant: I understand that. Maybe I am wrong, or maybe you are wrong, but I think you might be wrong about Tabaco, which is one of the communities that was evicted in 2001. The company lost its first legal battle in 2002, and was told that they had to be resettled. That happened again in 2008. They still have not been resettled, and it is now 2019. I understand the point you are making about new standards having come alone, but that was because everybody complained that the properties they were being moved into were uninhabitable.
Cristina Bruce: Tabaco is not one of the five communities that Cerrejón has been resettling. Tabaco is a community that was evicted through expropriation from their land before the current owners of Cerrejón were in place. The current owners identified that as a significant legacy issue for the mine, and therefore Cerrejón underwent a 10-year process to work with Tabaco to identify what solutions could be found.
One challenge is that, when the families from Tabaco were moved, the mine was actually owned in part by the Colombian Government, and therefore any solution arrived at now has to be done in conjunction with the local municipality. The agreement reached over the last 10 years is that Cerrejón should provide the land for the homes to be built on and the community centre that will serve as a focal point for the community of Tabaco. The actual homes themselves have to be built by the local municipality, so there have been challenges around that construction actually starting.
Another challenge is that time has passed, and some new members of Tabaco are interested in changing some of the initial agreements, which has also contributed to the halt.
Q185 Chris Bryant: But the company signed an agreement 10 years ago that still has not been implemented. The end result is that the people evicted from their land in 2001 still haven’t got restitution.
Cristina Bruce: The restitution is being worked on. As I have explained, it has been impossible for Cerrejón to construct the community centre. Cerrejón is not responsible for the construction of the houses, and it has been doing everything it can to work with both the Government and the communities to find a resolution.
Q186 Chris Bryant: But you can see why local people might go, “Oh, not another dot dot dot mine. They are going to take away our mountain and our homes. They will say they are going to do this, that and the next thing, and everybody will come to an agreement, but in 18 years’ time, somebody will be blaming the Colombian Government from 18 years ago or blaming other companies, or saying, ‘We’re not really fully in charge of the company,’ or, ‘The company has changed its structure.’” The people who lose out in all of that are the local people, aren’t they?
Cristina Bruce: When a mine fails to secure a good relationship with local community members, you are quite right that community members suffer the consequences. That is one reason why Cerrejón is focusing on a comprehensive, regional roundtable series, engaging with all 330 communities in the footprint of the mine, in order to try to understand their concerns and to definitively address them. That is a specific initiative to tackle that very challenge. Cerrejón is a mine that has quite a lot of legacy issues, and the management is doing its absolute utmost to resolve them, but there are frustrations and challenges.
Q187 Chris Bryant: I think 8 million tonnes of coal came from Cerrejón to the UK last year. What do you think about Britain setting very tough carbon targets and spending money on renewable energies?
Cristina Bruce: Jonathan is our climate change lead, so I will pass that to him.
Jonathan Dunn: I am not sure that Cerrejón coal came to the UK at all last year. I will have to double-check that and come back to you. In terms of climate change positioning, we are already aligned with the nationally determined contributions—NDCs—as they stand in the countries in which we operate, and we intend to continue to improve. On emissions intensity, for example, we have a target to reduce emissions from our operations by 30% by 2030. We are looking to strengthen those as well. I do not think that there is any divergence at all from what the British Government are looking to do.
Q188 Chris Bryant: And the company has never lobbied against subsidies for renewable energy?
Jonathan Dunn: Not to my knowledge, no.
Q189 Ian Murray: Can I just press you a little bit on that? There have been two tragedies in Brazilian iron ore mines in the last four or five years, with the most recent being the high-profile one this year. It says on your website that you have a unique footprint in Brazil for iron ore. How confident are you that your procedures and policies will ensure that there is no repeat of those tragedies that we have seen elsewhere in Brazil?
Jonathan Dunn: The Brumadinho incident, which you are referring to, was deeply tragic for all concerned. Many of our colleagues in our Brazilian operation have friends and former colleagues who were directly affected, and some in fact lost friends and colleagues, so it very much affected the whole mining sector. Obviously, it affected the town of Brumadinho in an unspeakable way.
We have what we call tailings storage facilities—that is the phrase we use because they are not all exactly the same, and we cannot just call them a tailings dam—around the world. We have more than 50 managed facilities around the world, and we have a very stringent Anglo American technical standard. We have compared it to the regulations in different countries around the world, and it is more stringent than the regulations in the different jurisdictions in which we operate. Our aim is for our tailings storage facilities around the world to meet that standard.
Turning to Brazil specifically, there are two different aspects of this. The first is to ensure the integrity of the structure. We have a very big tailings dam at the Minas-Rio iron ore facility, which is in the same state—Minas Gerais—where the incident at Brumadinho occurred. That is a different type of construction to the dam that burst. It is what is known as a water retention structure; it is the type of dam designed to hold back water, unlike the dam that failed, which was made up of the actual waste material—a so-called upstream construction. The dam is monitored at various different stages, but on a daily basis, with both visual inspections and technical monitoring. That is one part.
Obviously, there is then the question of, “In the very unlikely event of a rupture, what would the impact be?” In that regard, we are taking, essentially, a zero-risk approach. At the moment, the rules in Brazil state that, within 10 km downstream of a tailings facility, you need to be looking at resettling the communities, but it is not the law. We have two communities within that range, and another community at 12 km down.
We are working with all three of those communities on a voluntary resettlement; we are offering to resettle those communities. They do not have to accept that offer if they do not want to, but that is the process we are working on: on the one hand, ensuring the integrity of the structure and monitoring that continuously, and, on the other hand, ensuring that, in the event of a failure, the ramifications would be nowhere near as severe as they have been elsewhere.
Q190 Ian Murray: There have been reports—unverified, of course—that employees at the dam that burst had made their safety concerns known for some time, and those were ignored by Vale and other companies. Do you have a whistleblowing hotline, or a whistleblowing procedure?
Jonathan Dunn: We do. It is available for any complaints, both internally and externally. It is called YourVoice; it is entirely independent, run separately from the company, and you can call in and voice such concerns.
Cristina Bruce: Just on the questions about tailings, Jonathan’s reply focused on our presence in Brazil. At a global level, there has been an initiative, led by the Church of England pension fund and the Swedish council of ethics, to represent a group of investors and express their concerns about tailings. They have been working closely with industry, and we have been participating in that initiative.
The result has been unprecedented for the industry to date—disclosure around what tailings storage facilities we actually have. We did that full disclosure on 7 June, and that lists every tailings facility that we have and what type it is, and then answers 20 questions that provide greater information about that. The aim is to be as transparent as possible on this issue.
On the other thing that we have voluntarily done, we are quite proud of our technical standard when it comes to TSFs. Therefore, in order to share that, we have made it publicly available and open to the use of any other company in the industry.
Jonathan Dunn: May I say two more things very quickly? First of all, in the innovation space, we are looking to use technology to ensure that we are monitoring the existing type of tailings dams in a completely innovative way. For example, at Quellaveco, the mine we are building in Peru, we are building micro-sensors into the foundations of that dam so that we can monitor in a seismic way any micro-seismic movements there. We are also developing technologies that we hope will eliminate the need for any tailings at all, by removing the water earlier in the process, so you end up with a dry stack; you can very quickly take the water out of what you are stacking, in which case you remove the risk completely.
Q191 Catherine West: You will be aware of the voluntary principles that are part of the framework in which you operate. What would you say are the changes that the company have made since signing up to the voluntary principles?
Jonathan Dunn: As you say, we signed up to the voluntary principles in, I think, 2005, and we have been working with International Alert since 2010 to implement them. We think they are a really vital way of bringing together business, government and the NGO sector in this particularly crucial area of human rights protection.
We have learned a huge amount through that process, by essentially making sure that the principles are embedded in our working practices to ensure that everybody who needs to be involved in, or aware of and acting in alignment with, the voluntary principles is signed up to the right code of conduct and has the right training, and that we think about all the different tentacles of the way the voluntary principles feed down into our business. That means not only our own operations, but the operations of those people we are contracting, most obviously in the security space, but equally, subcontractors. We have learned essentially about the way in which it feeds down through the business.
Q192 Catherine West: One of those principles is the International Labour Organisation’s declaration on fundamental principles and rights at work. I note that in 2013 there were some issues around your dealings on labour rights. Could you update the Committee on that?
Jonathan Dunn: Could you be a bit more specific?
Catherine West: In 2013, I understand that miners in rural communities claimed damages for health pollution.
Cristina Bruce: Sorry—which geography?
Jonathan Dunn: Do you know which country it was in?
Catherine West: In Cerrejón—part of your operations. Could you update the Committee on how you are doing on the voluntary principle around labour rights?
Cristina Bruce: Sorry, could you repeat the question?
Catherine West: A legal case was brought by the Bar Human Rights Committee of England and Wales around basic rights for workers, particularly in relation to public health concerns to do with the pollution of air and water.
Cristina Bruce: I don’t know the exact incident you are speaking of. It predates my involvement, but with regards to Cerrejón’s respect for worker rights, the trade union’s history in Colombia has been difficult because of the civil conflict. Cerrejón has been very clear that it fully supports worker and union rights. If there are ever any threats against union members, Cerrejón is very swift to publicly condemn any threats and to ensure that it adds its voice to calls for government investigations into said instances.
I think the incident you are referring to also raised concerns around health. Cerrejón abides by Colombian legislation when it comes to health standards. Colombia is in the process of changing that legislation to abide by World Health Organisation standards, so in turn, Cerrejón will abide by World Health Organisation standards. That involves a series of constant checks and monitoring stations using mine modelling and dust monitoring stations to ensure that all standards are abided by. La Guajira, the northern part of Colombia where Cerrejón is based, has had very significant drought issues over the last five years, so dust levels can be high, and the management of Cerrejón have had to close down significant areas of the mine. If they are concerned that the dust levels will go too high and will therefore be of concern, regarding legal limits and worker health issues, there is no hesitation: areas of the mine will be closed.
Q193 Catherine West: Is there a sense that the operation is making the drought worse?
Cristina Bruce: I think there are two aspects with drought. One is rain, and there is nothing anyone can do about the rain. Communities have expressed concern about how much access to water they have. The main river basin in La Guajira is the River Ranchería. Cerrejón absorbs 1.52% of the water of the River Ranchería. More than 95% is used for agriculture. I list that statistic as it gives a sense of the percentage of water being used by the mine. Of that water, 92% is not appropriate for human or animal consumption, and it is mostly used to control dust. You have different technologies that involve, in effect, using water or water-based solutions to control dust levels.
From a technical standpoint, no, the mine does not overly contribute to or exacerbate what is a very difficult situation. The drought has been very significant in La Guajira. In addition, Cerrejón has a foundation that focuses on helping community members to build water solutions—for example, local bore wells or solar-powered wells—so that they can access water. So far, 263 communities—19,000 people—have benefited from the work of the foundation at Cerrejón.
Q194 Catherine West: Is there an estimate of the number of individuals who have been displaced? Colombia has one of the largest numbers of displaced people due to conflict and other things, but this operation has been going for quite some time, so is there an estimate from AA of how many people have been displaced since it began operating?
Cristina Bruce: I can look into a number and give you a number. It is a challenging issue to discuss because, exactly as you say, displacement in Colombia is not necessarily directly linked to the presence of a particular industry. There are the five communities that have been resettled, and then there are some legacy issues. I would be happy to look into a more indicative number.
Q195 Catherine West: That would be helpful. In general, is there a reporting mechanism on the voluntary principles?
Jonathan Dunn: Just to separate, because we have been talking a lot about Cerrejón. For our managed operations, first, we do human rights due diligence each year through our Social Way process. Our Social Way is the way in which we ensure high-quality social performance in all our operations. We are pleased to say that the reporting tool underneath it, the SEAT, has been used by many others in our sector and elsewhere as a model of best practice. That requires us to look forward, so we are not just reacting to problems but looking forward to what we think the human rights risks might be in an operation and doing what we can to mitigate any potential impact ahead of time. We then report against all that through our sustainability reporting each year.
Q196 Priti Patel: Just to continue the discussion about the voluntary principles, I think we get a clear insight into the standards that you as an organisation apply, and the way in which you report back, but can you speak more about the role of the Foreign Office and how they engage with you and the industry as a whole—extractive companies operating within regions—and about the role they play in ensuring that businesses abide by the principles? Is there more that the Foreign Office—the British Government—can do? They have been leading the charge on the voluntary principles now for some time.
Jonathan Dunn: We are very grateful to the Foreign Office for their work and support on the voluntary principles. As you say, there is an active group of a few countries, including the UK, which has been heavily involved in promoting, pushing and encouraging companies and countries to sign up to the voluntary principles. We welcome that.
Specifically, in Peru we sit on a working group with the embassy, chaired by the Swiss embassy, to try to build understanding in Peru of the voluntary principles and to encourage, ultimately, the Government of Peru to sign up, because they are not currently participants. I do not think we necessarily would look for even more, but we would look for the continued support of the FCO and the wider HMG contribution.
Q197 Priti Patel: Do you see a greater role for the FCO and HMG more widely in artisanal mining, bringing them much more into the mix of voluntary principles and raising standards around the world, particularly in developing countries where the British Government spend a lot of money, through not just the FCO but other departments such as DFID, focusing on economic development and driving outcomes that help to drive employment and growth objectives?
Jonathan Dunn: Clearly, the risks associated with artisanal mining—most obviously those on the safety question—are ones that we as a company would like to see avoided as much as possible. Anything that can be done to bring good standards to all types of mining is a good thing.
Q198 Priti Patel: How are you leading the way in trying to bring others along that journey?
Jonathan Dunn: The main way we do that, as Cristina has mentioned, is by making available many of our standards for others to share. In different jurisdictions, there are different levels of conversation. Essentially, one of the challenges is often knowing how to bring together all the different standards that we have talked about—the IFC, the voluntary principles, the UN guiding principles, other types of international regulations—and combine them with domestic law, which is often very different in different jurisdictions. Where we as a bigger company can support that, we try to do so.
Q199 Priti Patel: How persuasive do you think you are as an organisation in demonstrating leadership roles, in terms of the voluntary principles, to other organisations that could come on that journey, and in influencing the British Government to leverage not necessarily more pressure but a better dialogue at a bilateral level with other countries?
Jonathan Dunn: It is probably for others to say how influential and persuasive we are. We consider it to be a really important part of what we do. We consider it to be an important way of operating, and we try to lead through example as much as possible.
Q200 Priti Patel: On this bilateral point, I appreciate that you are a private company, and a very large player in the extractive industries. Do you see the British Government—the Foreign Office—doing more through multilateral organisations to drive up standards, and working with others and taking them on that journey? How strongly does that feature in these discussions that seem to take place?
Jonathan Dunn: I think it is as much about ensuring implementation of what is already there. In our view, many of the standards are very good, but they need to be implemented well. The Foreign Office is doing a lot of work to try to encourage that, but ultimately it might be for domestic Governments to ensure that it is done in an appropriate way in their jurisdiction.
Q201 Priti Patel: Finally, on the point about the principles, what is the view in the sector and in your organisation on whether the UK Government should press for the principles to be mandatory, rather than voluntary?
Jonathan Dunn: By their very nature, they require the sectors to show real commitment. We have to show a commitment to it, and we have to be held accountable to that commitment. We see the other legs of the tripartite group, the Governments and NGOs, doing the same thing. For us, the showing of commitment should be enough. We do not take a strong view as to whether they should be mandatory or not. We would like to see more countries, more companies, committing to the voluntary principles.
Q202 Chris Bryant: Can I ask about Peru and Quellaveco? I think you had some difficulties that the Government have decided to set aside, so you are ploughing on. Is that right?
Cristina Bruce: Sorry, what difficulties are you referring to?
Chris Bryant: There was quite a lot of local opposition. In the same sort of way as China Minmetals Las Bambas mine was having lots of local opposition, the China Minmetals copper mine is not going ahead, as I understand it, but yours is now, because the Government have decided to go ahead. Is that right?
Cristina Bruce: That is not quite how I would describe the situation. As I explained earlier, the significant opposition and areas of concern that we faced at Quellaveco were in around 2010. We deliberately decided to stop any further development of the mine until we had resolved those concerns. It took just under two years to engage with stakeholders in such a way that they are now very strongly in favour of the mine. I cannot speak for Las Bambas and the situation at MMG, but my understanding, just from the press, is that their challenges are much more recent. We have not faced any significant opposition to Quellaveco since the Quellaveco dialogue table process in 2012. In the downturn in the copper industry about four or five years ago, if anything, we were facing very significant pressure from community members to accelerate our plans and to continue with the development of the mine, because of their commitment to the project.
Q203 Chris Bryant: But the Peruvian ombudsman has noted very significant numbers of social conflicts over the years, most of them to do with mining.
Cristina Bruce: In Peru, there is a very high level of conflict around mining. The ombudsman at least biannually produces a list of what those conflicts are. Quellaveco is not one of them.
Q204 Chris Bryant: I think there were 176 this May, relating to mining in general.
Cristina Bruce: Yes, there are really significant social conflict issues around mining in Peru, but they are not linked to our project.
Q205 Chris Bryant: I might have got this wrong, but I think that the Peruvian Government are introducing what is effectively a licence fee, so that some of the moneys that, in the normal course of things, the Peruvian Government would have received will be allocated specifically to some municipalities and communities—a canon, I think they call it. Is that right?
Cristina Bruce: Yes, a common structure is that mining projects pay royalties to the central Government. Those royalties are then distributed either to the region that hosts the resource or to other regions. Exactly what that equation is varies quite a lot, according to which Latin American country, or which country in general, you are dealing with. Legislation at times has changed that balance, because the challenge for them is to ensure that both producing and non-producing regions feel that they are receiving enough benefit.
Q206 Chris Bryant: Do some countries do that better than others?
Cristina Bruce: I am afraid that I genuinely cannot comment on which country might do that better than others. What I can say is that it is an uneasy equation to get right. In most of the Latin American countries in which we operate, the pendulum has swung and different reforms, or different pieces of legislation, have tried to get the balance right.
Q207 Chris Bryant: But often you are dealing with either Campesino or indigenous peoples, in many of the areas where you are talking about mines. You are quite a long way from the major mestizo cities. Both the Campesino and indigenous peoples have a very strong identity with the land, but in each of these countries they have seen extractive industries as a means of earning money for the country—for the whole nationality, rather than for the people who were on that land. How is that tension played out?
Cristina Bruce: I think it is a very real tension. We as a company have had, I suppose, to consider this in two ways. One is to engage with government about this issue of an effective fair share—how the benefits are distributed. At a local level, in different countries we have what we call municipal capacity development programmes which, in effect, try to strengthen the capacity of local government to execute or design projects that use some of this royalty money, so that local communities can benefit. One aspect is to try and support government to fulfil their local responsibilities in an ethical way.
Secondly, we as a company have had to really think about what it means to respond to increasing societal expectation of what we as mining companies deliver on a local level. That means how many people we employ, what local supplier programmes we have in place and what small and medium-sized enterprises we support. That would lead me on to the example that Jonathan has already spoken about, which is the realisation that we need to really think about sustainable solutions for development beyond the life of mine. We need to work with Government, NGOs and other industries to try and identify projects that we can work on collaboratively to support the regions where we are present, because of the degree of societal need and expectation that we, through something as simple as local employment, cannot do well.
Jonathan Dunn: Sorry to interrupt. To pick up on just one point, very relevant to Quellaveco, that links back to your question about the British Government, we are designing a collaborative regional development approach for Southern Peru around Moquegua, which is the main city closest to the mine, working with the local government and a couple of implementing partners. We are not there yet, but the first stages are in detailed geospatial mapping, which looks across the region and then analyses what the potential in that region might be for various different projects and then looks to work with different organs to deliver those projects. Moquegua is a reasonably affluent part of Peru, relatively, it has a strong basis in education and there is a technical college there that could potentially become a technical college that was developing skills for mining in the 21st century. Why couldn’t Southern Peru be the exporter of talent rather than it being somewhere that somehow was dependent? That is one idea that is being considered.
I mentioned it linked to the British Government because, at the same time, there is a lot of work being done with the UK-Peru Infrastructure Task Force, which, first and foremost, looked at the Pan American games that is happening this year, but is looking to build UK companies’ opportunities in infrastructure around Peru. They are looking at Southern Peru too and we have made sure that what we are doing and what that taskforce is doing are closely aligned, as it would clearly not make any sense for there to be parallel processes straining the local Government’s capability to engage, all of which involves some kind of UK involvement.
Q208 Chris Bryant: One final question from me. Colombia has a system that enables municipalities to hold referendums or plebiscites on issues. Some of these have been held on whether a mine should be allowed to proceed: for instance, in Cajamarca where with La Colosa, which I know it’s not yours, AngloGold Ashanti seeks to build one of the largest gold mines in the world. If a plebiscite says 98% no, would you proceed?
Jonathan Dunn: I was going to say something about referendums but it’s probably not the place to do that. It’s a hypothetical situation that we are not facing. When you go back to the original basis of the way we try and work, we try and build long-term partnerships with the people we know we are going to have to work with for 40, 50 or 60 years. Clearly, if you get those discussions and the development of those partnerships wrong, you will not have what we call the social licence to operate. You might have the practical licence to operate from the Government, but if you haven’t got the support then you will face the kind of opposition you talked about in Peru.
Q209 Chris Bryant: So the social licence to operate is as important as the legal licence to operate?
Jonathan Dunn: Absolutely.
Cristina Bruce: To give a smaller but pertinent example, Anglo American has had exploration concessions in Colombia. At one of those concessions, we were in a situation where the community was very supportive of our presence, but because of the civil conflict situation in Colombia, in order for us to be able to be present, the Government obliged us to have armed forces with us securing our protection. That made local community members feel very threatened and so they were very clear with us that they accepted our presence but they did not accept our presence in conjunction with those representatives and therefore we had to make a decision. We made the decision to withdraw because, exactly as you just discussed with Jonathan, ultimately, if we do not have the consent from our host communities, our presence is unfeasible.
Q210 Chair: What happened to that concession?
Cristina Bruce: We didn’t develop it.
Q211 Chair: Did anybody else?
Cristina Bruce: I am not sure; it will have been over the past few years. I would doubt that right now someone would have taken it on, but I don’t know.
Q212 Ann Clwyd: It sounds to me sitting here that you are the nice faces of Anglo American.
Cristina Bruce: He isn’t! No.
Q213 Ann Clwyd: As you know, organisations, NGOs, human rights organisations have criticised mining companies for a number of things. I know that a recent report by War on Want found that mining companies, including Anglo American, have created problems for both local communities and their local areas. Some of my colleagues have referred to those.
The report states that, “Mining conflicts are fuelled by environmental degradation, competition over water, the dismantling of local organisations, fraud, corruption, dispossession, repression and the criminalisation of community opposition.”
Although mining contributes to prosperity and opportunity across the region, it also has negative effects, particularly environmental and social ones. Would you like to comment on that?
Jonathan Dunn: Whether or not we are the nice faces of the company, I will quote our CEO. You can decide whether he is the nice face of the company or not, but he is certainly the leader.
Mark Cutifani would say mining disturbs less than 1% of the earth’s surface but services the needs of all of us. All of us who are carrying a smartphone, all of us who drive a car, all of us who use anything that is not farmed, it is mined, so we all benefit from it.
The problem is that in that less than 1% of the earth’s surface, the people closest to that are those who are most negatively impacted by the fact that it is a disruptive industry. Our intention is to minimise that disruption and the impact, and provide the sorts of things we have been talking about, to ensure that those closest to the mine also benefit from the mine’s existence. Where things go wrong, which occasionally things inevitably do, you tackle it according to the values that you have as a business.
Cristina Bruce: To add to that, we can’t speak for the entire mining industry; we can speak for Anglo American. The industry has had many challenges and has got many legacy issues. We need to think about how we as a company stay true to our values.
Something that is changing over these years and fits very much with our purpose to try to reimagine mining to improve people’s lives, is that we have a big initiative to look at what the mine of the future is going to look like. We are looking at technology that will significantly reduce the amount of water that our mines use, that will significantly reduce the footprint of our mines—the physical space that our mines occupy.
We are looking at technology that will significantly increase safety in the industry and radically transform what our presence is. That is something that we are investing a huge amount in. We look to see those changes coming over the next two to 10 years.
Q214 Ann Clwyd: I have a quote from Lucia Ortiz, international economic justice co-ordinator for Friends of the Earth: “The interests of corporations such as Anglo American clearly come before the people’s interests at the climate talks and this is outrageous. Anglo American is well known for the massive impacts of its unsustainable mining operations. Decision makers should listen to the people, not to corporate polluters.” Pascoe Sabido, from the Corporate European Observatory, said, “Anglo American has aggressively lobbied against subsidies for renewables because it favors dirty energies such as coal and shale gas...Co-hosting cocktail parties with our governments is one of the many ways corporate polluters such as Anglo American lobby for their false solutions to the climate crisis.” Those are pretty hard-hitting comments.
Jonathan Dunn: They are pretty hard-hitting comments. First of all, I do not recognise the substance of that. As I said before, to my knowledge—I will go and check—we have never lobbied against renewables, nor have we supported such lobbying by an association of which we are a member. We were asked by our shareholders a year ago to ensure that the associations around the world of which we are a member—there are about 70 of them—are aligned with our policy positions on climate change. We did that, and it showed that where there were some issues with alignment, we encouraged and influenced a change in the direction of those associations.
We are also committed to being part of the solution to climate change. What does that mean? It means, first, making mining more sustainable in some of the ways that Cristina mentioned. Reducing the footprint also means reducing the emissions footprint of the mine. We are working very hard to work out how to have a carbon-neutral mine. It is not an easy thing to do. One of the things that we have done is announce our plan to have the first hydrogen fuel cell haul truck running by July next year. Essentially, the point would be that if you had a battery electric vehicle, which you can do for a normal family car, you would need a 7-tonne battery to run a haul truck, because they are big machines. Our logic is to create a battery electric or electric haul truck, but use a hydrogen fuel cell to run it. That would suddenly do away completely with the diesel emissions that come from haul trucks—initially on our sites, then more widely. We are looking at such technologies, and actively looking to become a carbon-neutral mining company, but we have not yet put a date on that because it is technically complicated and we are working through it.
Q215 Ann Clwyd: Can you tell me how Anglo American consults local communities before operations start in their area?
Cristina Bruce: Our approach to consultation is outlined in a group standard; our performance at operations is guided by a series of standards. We have a standard called the Anglo Social Way, which outlines the expectations that we as a company place on our projects and operations to carry out consultation. It starts with a process by which you identify the key people, communities and families around a potential mine. You focus particularly on ensuring that vulnerable groups have an adequate voice. That might involve engaging with them in a particularly sensitive way, or providing training if necessary, so that they are empowered to understand and to hold us to account in the areas we are discussing. That engagement process is ongoing—it starts when we have entered an area for the very first time and people do not even know who Anglo American is, and it continues in parts of the world where we are long established and much further advanced in developing a mine. There is no cut-off. Even in places where we have been operating for many years, engagement is continuous. It has to be.
Q216 Ann Clwyd: Could you give me an example of where something has changed significantly as a result of local consultation?
Cristina Bruce: I have spoken about Peru. The Quellaveco project will ultimately be a $5 billion investment in Peru. For us as a company to have halted the planning of that, and to have gone to community members and accepted that they wanted us to significantly change its design, is a very powerful moment and, I hope, a clear example. They had very strong concerns about where we would draw water from. As a result, we changed the water basin from which we would draw water, in order to draw water from a river that naturally has a very high sulphur content. Therefore it was a river that they were not interested in, because they were not drawing water from it, and so we shifted the design of our mine.
Q217 Chris Bryant: Finally, on Brazil, the Minas-Rio project is, I think, owned and run by one of your subsidiaries.
Jonathan Dunn: No, it is operated by Anglo American.
Q218 Chris Bryant: Oh, right. As I understand it, you take iron ore, you put it in water, suspend it in water and them pump it for 525 km to the sea, where it goes on ships, I guess, or you do something with it there, and it goes on.
The construction of the pipeline was problematic, as I understand it, cutting agricultural lands in half, but you also had a big spill late last year and you started up again early this year, I think. Is that right?
Jonathan Dunn: No. We had a spill in March last year, if I’m not mistaken, and we started up again in December last year. I would have to double-check the dates, but it is around about that.
Q219 Chris Bryant: And what are the effects for local people of that spill?
Jonathan Dunn: First of all, just to be absolutely clear, the design is as you describe: an open-cut iron ore mine in Minas Gerais; then there is a pipeline, which I think is 529 km, to be exact, where we turn the iron ore into slurry and pump it down to the port at Açu in the state of Rio, so it’s across two different states in Brazil; and then it is exported from there.
To pick up the point about the pipeline construction, we followed all of the requirements that we have with regard to building the pipeline, so of course there will be some challenges in building a pipeline 529 km across that amount of land, but in broad terms it has been very successful.
There were actually two pipeline leakages last year, in short order. The iron ore slurry itself is non-toxic, which is an extremely valuable thing in that regard, because although it is not very pleasant, it is not toxic.
The immediate things that we did were to ensure that the water supplies of the communities affected were supplemented with various forms of trucks. And then, very quickly—
Q220 Chris Bryant: Various forms of?
Jonathan Dunn: Trucked water—apologies. Then, we ensured thereafter that, first of all, we shut down—it ended up being for nine months—while we did a full inspection of the whole pipeline. We replaced some sections; we had a very low tolerance for risk and replaced those sections. All the time we spent a lot of time ensuring the recuperation of the environment, which had been affected. The leaks were relatively small, so it was not a huge area of the creek. We actually improved from what there had been before; we consulted and improved the environment. For example, there were streams that had been very heavily eroded and we helped to reinforce the banks, to ensure that the course could continue where the local communities wanted it to be.
A crucial part of it actually was that obviously the people in the community are often our workers, and we had nine months of no operations. We took the decision not to lay anybody off at all. That was challenging at first. We had them deployed to other parts of the business, including our operation elsewhere in Brazil, but we focused very much on training and development through that period, as a means of using the time well but also we were concerned about people’s health, both physical and mental, so we kept them occupied, engaged and part of the company.
We are actually very proud of the way we were able to come back with various different studies that have been done that show that the level of trust in Anglo American around the mine is certainly no lower than it was beforehand and is possibly higher. Despite what was a really difficult time for us, we thought the recovery was an extremely successful one.
Q221 Chris Bryant: We have had fed into us that, during that process and when you had to do quite a bit of consultation about how you were going to deal with the issue, all the events were very heavily policed, with armed police, and it felt quite intimidating for people who felt unable to express their full opinions.
Jonathan Dunn: Are you drawing that from the evidence that has been submitted to the Committee already?
Chris Bryant: Yes.
Jonathan Dunn: I think that is related to a slightly different event. Let me explain what I think that relates to. Through the process of environmental licensing for the expansion of the mine—there was a natural progression; this was in parallel, and they were happening at similar times, but there was a different process—there were various hearings to provide community consultation and ultimately decide on the licensing process. We became aware of complaints through the office of the UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders. We engaged directly with that office. We gave a full, detailed reply to the complaints that had been raised. What we can absolutely be certain of is that there was no malice. That does not mean that things were necessarily what they should have been, but there was certainly no malice in what was done. That, I think, is the issue that is being referred to in the evidence.
Q222 Chris Bryant: If you are the good guys, who are the bad guys who give your industry a bad reputation in South America?
Jonathan Dunn: I really don’t think that is for us to say.
Q223 Chris Bryant: So there are some. [Interruption.] You can’t do a shrug. Hansard won’t write down a shrug.
Jonathan Dunn: I am not sure I even shrugged, did I?
Q224 Chris Bryant: I think you definitely shrugged.
Jonathan Dunn: I genuinely don’t think it is for us to say.
Q225 Chris Bryant: Go on. What is going to happen? The industry has a bad reputation.
Jonathan Dunn: The industry has a bad reputation because of things that have not gone right in the industry both in South America and elsewhere. We would certainly like to see ourselves as doing things for the right reasons in the right way. We don’t always get everything right, that is for sure, but we certainly try to.
Cristina Bruce: I can add to that that it is not in our interests for illegal mining to exist. Artisanal mining—where it is a respected part of culture, has historical value and is done in a safe manner—has its place, but artisanal mining where there is deep insecurity and no respect for health and safety standards is a terrible thing. We have no interest in companies that do not respect local legislation and international standards wherever possible. That is why we as a company try to make our standards open and available to the public. It is also why we are a founding member of the International Council on Mining and Minerals, which is an association of the 27 mining companies that try to share common high standards. We participate in that to try to raise standards for the ICMM, but also to provide those standards wherever possible to the rest of the industry.
Q226 Ian Murray: To follow up on the question that Mr Smith asked earlier, what connection or involvement do you have with national crime agencies and local crime agencies in trying to tackle illegal mining? Obviously, it is used by international organised crime gangs, and they are selling similar products to those you are pulling out of the ground. What contribution do you make to stopping that international trade in illegal mining?
Jonathan Dunn: I am not aware of anything in South America, if I am honest. The most obvious example is De Beers, which is one part of the Anglo American group. With regards to ensuring responsibly sourced and traceable diamonds, we have done a huge amount of work in southern Africa. In regards to South America, I cannot immediately think of an example. I don’t know whether you can, Cristina?
Cristina Bruce: No, in South America we do not have the type of links that you refer to. Again, there is the distinction between illegal mining and artisanal mining. One of the challenges we have is that our presence in Latin America is not close to or directly impacted by some of the more challenging artisanal mining areas. One of the questions we therefore need to consider is how we can contribute on a problem that impacts our reputation as an industry but that actually, almost by happenstance, does not directly impact us that much in Latin America. Through institutions such as the ICMM, we work on initiatives to look at some of those challenges, and that is a piece of work that needs to continue to grow. That is as far as we go.
Q227 Chair: I just want to ask about a more widespread issue that raises its head not only in South America, but in extractive industries— certainly in countries where there is a single large pool of money coming from a single industry—and that is state-level corruption. Though I am sure you obey the highest standards, how do you deal with state-level or indeed sub-state level corruption?
Jonathan Dunn: I think it is about the way we act in terms of the transparency of what we are doing. We are on the board of the EITI—Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative is, I think, the full name—alongside the British Government. We try and walk the walk—I think that is the key thing. We clearly behave with integrity in the way we transfer funds around the world.
Q228 Chair: So you will never pay a bribe?
Jonathan Dunn: No.
Cristina Bruce: No, and our values very strongly state that. We have a code of conduct that includes business integrity. Any employee that we feel is exposed to that risk is given tailored training to ensure that they are cognisant of the standards that we as a company have.
Q229 Chair: What do you mean by “exposed to that risk”? Do you mean that they may have connections to the local community that would expose them to that? Or do you mean that you suspect they may already have done it?
Cristina Bruce: No, the former. I am trying to give as honest an answer to your question as possible.
Chair: I would hope that’s what you have done with all the questions.
Cristina Bruce: Corruption is so pervasive that you are talking, potentially, about initiatives like the EITI that tackle state-level transfers of funds. But you are also talking about something as simple as facilitation payments when you are going through an airport. Our employees therefore need to be empowered to understand that that is also corruption, and that it is unacceptable for us as a company. Therefore we offer capacitation to make sure that people are aware of that.
Q230 Chair: You must come across incidents where you feel that you have lost a concession because the company that won it acted in ways that you would not, in terms of corruption. Are you good at reporting that?
Cristina Bruce: My understanding of the way that concessions work in the mining industry is that it is not a bidding process in which you feel, “Oh, if we had just bid a bit higher, we would have won.” That situation does not arise. Where that situation might arise is, say, if we have got supplier contracts. Again, that is where we need to rely on the strength of our governance processes. When I say that our code of conduct is integrated into people’s KPIs—
Jonathan Dunn: Key Performance Indicators.
Cristina Bruce: Sorry, the annual performance appraisal process. If people are found to be wanting in terms of their performance, they are asked to leave the company.
Q231 Chair: When did you last fire somebody for that?
Cristina Bruce: I genuinely cannot give you a date. We are looking at ways of being more transparent around the results of our whistleblowing process. One of the challenges is that you have legal sensitivities around disclosing too much information about what is raised. Literally last week, we were having an internal conversation about how we increase transparency around those examples so that people are aware that it happens. That therefore empowers people to continue good behaviour, while also providing proof that we tackle these situations, and respecting any confidentiality at the same time.
Q232 Chair: I have certainly heard reports of various firms who have offered scholarships at extraordinary rates, where the only possible applicant for the scholarship is the son of the Mining Minister, for example, or where the university could only possibly be open to somebody in the ruling family.
Cristina Bruce: No. We do support some scholarships. We have a very clear policy of not having anything to do with candidates in the selection process.
Q233 Chair: Nor even setting up the selection process so that it could only possibly have one outcome, even if you have nothing to do with the candidates?
Cristina Bruce: No.
Jonathan Dunn: One of the things worth noting is that, in some of the jurisdictions we are involved with, the level of expertise in mining within the Government may not be that high, and it is in our interest for the level of expertise to be higher. Using those scholarship programmes to help increase the capacity is a very important part of what we do as well, but I agree that it has to be done in a way which suggests no favours are being offered.
Q234 Ian Murray: We’re a fairly friendly bunch on the Foreign Affairs Committee, but why you were so reluctant to come and appear before us?
Jonathan Dunn: When we first saw the nature of the inquiry, we actually thought, because it was focused on Global Britain and the Government, that providing written testimony would be sufficient. We have had a wide-ranging conversation now around all sorts of things to do with the mining sector, which hopefully you found useful, but we were not aware that was where the direction of the inquiry was going, so we thought that written testimony would be sufficient.
Q235 Ian Murray: When we wrote to you a second time, you decided you would come in person?
Jonathan Dunn: Yes, when you asked us to come, we were, of course, going to accept the invitation—we were honoured to do so.
Q236 Chair: That’s not quite my recollection of the conversation in the letters I wrote. My recollection was that we were quite clear we were interested in the extractive industries as one of the major UK investments in South America, and we got in touch with you on that basis. You were extremely reticent—this is possibly above your level; I do not know—to come. We wrote to you a couple of times, including the last time, saying pretty clearly that if you did not come, we were going to summon you. So I have a somewhat different recollection.
Jonathan Dunn: Okay. All I can say is that, when we first saw the request to provide evidence, we thought that written evidence would be sufficient. We are obviously happy to be here right now. I hope what we have provided is useful to the inquiry.
Chair: Thank you. I think we will leave it there.