By Barrie Cunning

Sitting in what can only be described as the hustle and bustle of New York City in a café just of Park Avenue in the heart of Manhattan, the weather reminds me much of what we have to encounter sometimes on a daily basis in Scotland as the rain ferociously continues to pour down on people, but the resolve of New Yorkers is equivalent to that of the people of Scotland as they battle with the elements as they go about their business.

This is the second time that I’ve met David Milliband, former Foreign Secretary and Labour Party MP for South Shields in New York who was first elected in 2001. The first time was four years ago in 2018 which seems like a lifetime ago as a lot has happened since then.

In my weekly column I often write about international and geo political affairs largely motived as a result of the Ukraine crisis and the UKs response.

I can see that for David who is the President and CEO of the International Rescue Committee, a role which he has been doing since leaving front line politics in 2013, this is something that he is passionate about that goes beyond politics and his current role.

Founded in 1933, the International Rescue Committee’s aim is to help people who are in humanitarian need and currently work across forty countries.

David wanted to draw particular attention to the work of the International Rescue Committee and said “More people are now displaced by war than since the second world war, there are more people in humanitarian need than at any time since the second world war, so in the twenty countries that are in the top of our emergency watchlist 275m people are in need of humanitarian help and that doesn’t include Ukraine.

What the IRC are trying to do here is to be the operational and thought leader of the humanitarian sector, we are about helping people who are victims of war, this is relevant to Ukraine, relevant to the failure of diplomacy, so we are trying to use our voice of what started in a war zone doesn’t end in a war zone, we all have an interest and responsibility to make a difference, and that’s what we are doing, I think that’s a message that’s ever more important now”.

When asked about the UK Governments response to the crisis in Ukraine David said: "The first thing to recognise is that the warnings from the UK and US intelligence about the invasion turned out to be right and that’s important to recognise.

"Secondly, there is a structural problem that the UK isn’t in the room when the EU is discussing how to respond to this appalling assault and not being in the room is costly, and that’s a structural problem which means that when President Biden comes to meet the European Council, Britain’s not there, and so there’s no question that Germany, France and Poland are the central players in this scenario.

"Thirdly, you’ve got to say that the government’s determination to be practical in the defence of helping Ukraine has been real of which there is cross party support for, and fourthly, you’ve got to say that the humanitarian response by the UK government has not been to European standards, Europeans let people in and ask questions later, we are still asking questions, and I think that isn’t the mood of the British people who have responded to offer a place in their home to help and support displaced refugees”.

Recent criticism and concern over the governments homes for Ukraine programme have tended to feature around safeguarding issues which David accepts and goes on to say: "You can’t spring a programme over night and you need proper systems and a war isn’t the easiest of times to start it, but the fact is that we aren’t in a position of matching the European Union’s pledge of three year visas is a problem.

"My own view is that the thickets of bureaucracy has been created by politicians and not by bureaucrats , and If you wanted to sort this out politically you could sort it out and the government has a responsibility to do so”.

Continuing the discussion around international affairs the focus now turns to that of Vladimir Putin which David goes on to add:"We are in a social media war in the twenty first century that is replaying tactics and sadism from bygone ages and I don’t want to repeat some of what I’ve read about, let’s call it mutilation of bodies while people where alive never mind the cold bloodied killing of people, but there’s a war on and the first priority should be to stop the war but not by conceding, the principle is not for us to concede but the Ukrainians have shown that they are willing to fight against living under Russian rule.

"Thinking about the future you have to give agency, give recognition to Ukrainians as a lot of the discussion about the expansion of NATO, it’s as if the countries that joined NATO where somehow swallowed, they had experience of being in the Warsaw Pact and they chose that they wanted to join NATO and the European Union, so the first principle is to respect the words and territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine.

"Secondly, the real lesson of the last thirty years is not that NATO somehow expanded but more about that Russia never fashioned a modern relationship with the outside world and that’s partly their fault but it’s also party our fault as in the 90’s they were sold a lot of quack theories, why do we have oligarchs today, because of the economic policies that they were sold in the 1990s, so there is always the geo-political question about Russia”.

No interview would be complete without asking David what his thoughts are on the Labour Party in which he said: “It’s in better hands now than it was five years ago. We suffered the worst electoral result since 1935 in 2019 and so Keir Starmer is a refreshing change and the team of senior politicians that he is gathering has got some real talent there.

"Equally, I really like the fact that Anas Sarwar, leader of the Scottish Labour Party has not sugar-coated the scale of the challenge that the Scottish Labour Party faces as he has shown that a real willingness to confront the electoral mountain.

"I think it’s important to be sober and not be complacent that winning is really hard and that it’s easy to make excuses when you lose and not confront reality.

"The biggest lesson of the 90s is that we stopped making excuses because after 1992 the Nuffield election study was called Labour’s last chance with a question mark and 1992 was a bad result as we had our lowest share of the vote in 1992 than any other previous election between 1931 and 1979.

"It was only after 1992 we confronted the scale of the challenge, after 2019 we had been put back not just electorally, but culturally, organisationally and financially, we made ourselves sectional rather than national and it’s good to see that change under Keir’s leadership as Britain desperately needs an alternative government”.