Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Alistair Carmichael and Angus Brendan MacNeil(9 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Carmichael
I assure my hon. Friend that the basic principle of the Smith commission proposals is that there should be no detriment to any part of the UK—that was very much what the people of Scotland voted for on 18 September. Of course, it remains to be seen what will happen to levels of APD, once it is devolved, but he should take comfort from the fact that the principle is already well established that variable rates within the UK are possible, and he would be well advised to speak to the Chancellor of the Exchequer in that regard.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
Had the Smith commission been faithful to the famous vow and had the Better Together parties not watered down the tepid Smith commission, does the Secretary of State think that the benefits to the north of England, as well as to Scotland, would have been greater?
Mr Carmichael
I know that it hurts the hon. Gentleman and causes him genuine pain, but the truth of the matter—he will have to accept this sooner or later, so he might as well get on and accept it now—is that the Smith commission has delivered on the vow. That was why his party signed up to it, even if, having done so, the Scottish National party could not run away from its commitments fast enough.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Alistair Carmichael and Angus Brendan MacNeil(9 years, 11 months ago)
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Mr Carmichael
Unfortunately, this is a tale I hear as I travel around Scotland, especially in the highlands and islands. The communities my hon. Friend is talking to—I am sure he represents many of them—are not unreasonable, but they do want to know what to expect, so that they can plan for their services and their businesses. One would not think that it was that difficult.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
Mobile coverage is an important social utility, as we have seen quite recently. Because of storms and lightning, BT lines have been down for weeks in parts of Lewis and Harris. Special thanks are due to BT and hydro engineers, who have been working hard in very bad weather to repair utilities. What are the right hon. Gentleman’s Government doing to ensure that island and rural areas are not left behind with 90% 4G telephone coverage, especially considering that 2G and 3G have been bad and that, with its high data speeds, 4G coverage is an excellent system for accessing broadband?
Mr Carmichael
May I first join the hon. Gentleman in paying tribute to the hydro engineers and telecoms engineers, who are working throughout the highlands and islands even as we speak? They provide an excellent service to our local communities and we should place on record our gratitude towards them. They work in very difficult circumstances.
On 4G coverage, the hon. Gentleman will no doubt be aware of the deal my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport made recently with mobile network operators. That offers the opportunity for greater coverage of 3G and 4G. We will need to see, when they come forward with the actual proposals, what that will mean for our communities, but I can assure him that I am keeping an eye on it.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Alistair Carmichael and Angus Brendan MacNeil(10 years ago)
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Mr Carmichael
I am indeed aware of the projects to which my right hon. Friend refers, and I share his disappointment that, apparently, information as fundamental as that has not been given to his constituents. It is difficult to see why people would want to keep it a secret.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
8. Superfast broadband could be assisted by the high data speeds given by 4G mobile. What will the Secretary of State do to ensure that high data speed 4G comes to rural and island areas sooner rather than later?
Mr Carmichael
The hon. Gentleman rightly identifies 4G as an opportunity for communities of the sort that he and I represent. He will be aware of the money that has been put into the mobile infrastructure project by this Government. That work is going on and will ultimately assist in reaching 4G.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Alistair Carmichael and Angus Brendan MacNeil(10 years, 5 months ago)
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Mr Carmichael
It is worth reflecting that that figure is in the public domain only because the document was leaked. The truth of the matter is that, whenever there is any difficult news to be had, the Scottish Government will go to any lengths to suppress it, because, frankly, they are prepared to tell us anything that they think will make us more likely to vote for independence.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
13. With the renovation costs of the Westminster Parliament expected to be £400 million a year every year for 10 long years, Professor Patrick Dunleavy said yesterday at the London School of Economics that the set-up costs for an independent Scotland would be £200 million and not the £1.5 billion that is on the Treasury website. Will the Secretary of State see to it that that figure is corrected and that the Westminster Government apologises both to Professor Dunleavy, an expert in this area for 30 years, and to the people of Scotland for that error and misinformation? [Interruption.]
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Alistair Carmichael and Angus Brendan MacNeil(10 years, 7 months ago)
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Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
According to the House of Commons Library, 200,000 UK jobs depend on trade with the Republic of Ireland—double that of Canada and Norway. Ireland used to be part of the UK, but trade between the two has never been higher. The UK is Ireland’s No. 1 trading partner, and among the recently independent nations of the European Union, foreign direct investment rose by 215% in the first four years of independence. For those realities, what scare stories will the Secretary of State use?
Mr Carmichael
It is not a scare story to point out that the White Paper presents a prospectus and a future where there would be barriers and where the mere existence of a border would be an extra cost. If the hon. Gentleman wants to know the truth of the matter, he need look no further than at the situation that exists between Canada and the United States. The hon. Gentleman might not like it, but that is the truth.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Alistair Carmichael and Angus Brendan MacNeil(10 years, 9 months ago)
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Mr Carmichael
Indeed. The Barnett formula has been part of Scotland’s political landscape for almost 40 years and delivers a good level of public spending for people in Scotland—in the region of £1,000 per head each year over the figure for the rest of the United Kingdom. That reflects Scotland’s distinctive needs. That is why it is here to stay.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
There is huge and growing inequality. Staggeringly, according to Oxfam, five families in the UK own as much as 20% of the population do. The Financial Times stated on Monday that the burden of austerity has fallen most heavily on the least well-off. Can the Secretary of State explain to the growing number of people using food banks in Scotland the benefits of being in the UK? They are not better together; they are at the food bank.
Mr Carmichael
No subject, apparently, is so complex or involved that it cannot be trivialised by the Scottish nationalists. The reasons people have to resort to using food banks are complex, and many of them have more to do with the difficulties they face in work than with being on benefits. I am quite prepared to listen to representations from every part of the House about what the Government can do, but frankly I do not expect to hear anything constructive from the hon. Gentleman.
Scotland’s Place in the UK
Debate between Alistair Carmichael and Angus Brendan MacNeil(10 years, 10 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr Alistair Carmichael)
Let me begin by congratulating the hon. Member for Glasgow North East (Mr Bain) on securing the debate and expressing my gratitude to the Backbench Business Committee for selecting it. It has been an excellent debate, made all the better by the fact that we have heard voices from the whole of the United Kingdom. It has brought contributions of both passion and intellect, and I think we should thank all who have taken part in it.
This is one of Scotland’s two Parliaments, and it is right that we should take the opportunity to discuss Scotland’s future at a crucial moment in our history. This Parliament makes key decisions for Scotland as part of the United Kingdom in many areas: the economy, defence, international relations and pensions, to list but a few. As an integral part of the United Kingdom, this Parliament, and those within it who represent constituents throughout the UK, make decisions on behalf of the whole of the United Kingdom. However, this Parliament also recognised in 1997 that some decisions are better taken closer to the people, and it was through this House that the Scotland Act 1998 was delivered, providing real devolution of power within a strong United Kingdom. That decision was revisited by the work of the Calman commission in 2008, and implemented in the Scotland Act 2012.
The balance of powers between this Parliament and the Scottish Parliament is a dynamic settlement, and will rightly continue to be so. The debate on where that balance is struck is a debate that presupposes our continued membership of the United Kingdom family, but the question that will face us on 18 September is quite different: should we remain part of that family, or should we become an independent country?
Choosing to leave the United Kingdom would be a fundamental and irreversible step. As part of the UK family, we have a shared history and share many common values. As part of the United Kingdom, those of us in Scotland—like people living in England, Wales and Northern Ireland—benefit from the UK’s size and scale. We also benefit from the UK’s international influence, and from its economic strength. Scotland, like the rest of the UK, contributes to those benefits. We contribute in all manner of ways: economically, culturally and socially. As the hon. Member for Carlisle (John Stevenson) put it: together, we are truly greater than the sum of our constituent parts.
If we vote for independence, however, we walk away from those benefits. Scotland’s future would be based on a series of protracted negotiations with dozens of different states and organisations. Which currency would Scotland use? How would Scotland join the EU, and what terms of membership would it be able to secure? Would Scotland have to join the euro or become part of the Schengen arrangements? These are all questions to which the people of Scotland want answers. The nationalists owe them answers, but so far they have failed to deliver them. The truth is that all these issues would require detailed negotiations to pull Scotland out of the United Kingdom family of which it has been an integral part for over 300 years and to establish a new set of international relationships. Independence is a 20th century—or maybe even a 19th century—solution in search of a 21st century problem. Across a world in which change comes at a breathtaking pace, the prevailing trend is to pull down barriers and borders, not to put them up.
Mr MacNeil
The right hon. Gentleman says that some questions need to be answered. We know that some of them can be answered only by the European Commission. As Scottish Secretary, he should be Scotland’s man in Westminster, rather than Westminster’s man in Scotland. Will he ensure that the UK Government go to the European Commission and get answers to those questions that he describes as vital?
Mr Carmichael
The answers to those questions, if they were ever to be posed, would not be given by the European Commission; they would be given by the 28 member states of the European Union. The hon. Gentleman gives me the opportunity to remind the House that we have already heard from a number of them that this would not be a straightforward, painless process. If Scotland walked away from the United Kingdom, she would walk away from membership of the EU and would be required to negotiate her way back in.
As part of the United Kingdom, Scotland enjoys the best of both worlds. We have a strong Scottish Parliament in charge of key areas of Scottish life: health, education, transport and criminal justice. When it makes sense to do so, key decisions of the state are reserved to the UK Government and Parliament here to be taken on behalf of all citizens across the United Kingdom. Ours is a flexible settlement. When it makes sense to do so, we revise the settlement to provide further powers and to increase the Scottish Government and Parliament’s responsibility and, crucially, their accountability, not just for spending money but for raising it too.
The Scotland Act 2012 will substantially increase the Scottish Parliament’s powers, and it does so on the basis of evidence, consensus and consideration, ensuring that we adapt and evolve, but never at the expense of losing what works well and what works in the interests of all, right across the United Kingdom. All this—the creation of a Scottish Parliament and the incremental provision of further powers for it—has been designed by Scots and delivered by Scots for Scots, through this United Kingdom Parliament. Our devolution settlement is well and truly stamped “Made in Scotland”.
Right now, however, the issue on which we are all focusing is whether Scotland will remain part of the Union. Let me turn to the question of currency. It has featured strongly in this debate, and little wonder. The currency that we use is vital to all of us. It is vital for individuals buying food and paying off loans; for businesses paying employees, and trading with one another and across borders; for our banks and financial institutions; and, of course, for Scotland’s economy as a whole. Last week, the Governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney, set out his views on currency unions in very measured and, as he described it, “technocratic” terms. Governor Carney highlighted the principal difficulties of entering a currency union: losing national sovereignty; the practical risks of financial instability; and having to provide fiscal support to bail out another country. A currency union would involve giving up some national sovereignty over economic policy. Why would it be in an independent Scotland’s interest to join a currency union?
Mr Carmichael
It was not worth taking the hon. Gentleman’s last intervention, so I am not going to take this one.
Joining such a union would result in severe limits to Scotland’s economic freedom and a risk of losing economic resilience and credibility. What about the continuing UK? We heard about this from the hon. Member for Chichester (Mr Tyrie). A currency union would expose the continuing UK to the risk of bailing out banks in an independent Scotland if they were to get into difficulties again—these would be banks over which it would have no control, their being regulated under a different system in a foreign country. That is why we have consistently said it is highly unlikely that a currency union could be agreed, because it is highly unlikely that a currency union could be made to work. No one should vote for an independent Scotland on the basis that they will get to keep the UK pound sterling. Independence means leaving the UK’s monetary union; the only way for Scotland to be sure of keeping the UK pound as it is now is to stay in the UK. Nothing the Scottish Government have asserted changes that reality.
Earlier this week I was asked by a journalist what I expected to be doing on 19 September this year. I was able to reply that I am almost certain that I shall be celebrating the continuation of a highly successful Union, one that has been built on shared effort, common endeavour and, yes, love—19 September will be my 27th wedding anniversary. As I celebrate that anniversary with my English-born wife and my half-English, half-Scottish children, I am confident, but by no means complacent, that we shall be able to toast the continuation of that other highly successful Union, the one between England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Alistair Carmichael and Angus Brendan MacNeil(10 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Carmichael
That is indeed the case and I am confident that they will do so, because the people of Scotland value having the pound sterling as their currency. They value having the Bank of England as a lender of last resort and they value the fact that, as a result, risks and opportunities are spread across the whole United Kingdom.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
The White Paper has caused ripples. The polls are tightening and the Tories, with their Labour friends, are worried, but still the Prime Minister is afraid to debate with Alex Salmond, the First Minister of Scotland. This week the Financial Times tells us that an independent Scotland could expect to start with healthier state finances than the rest of the UK. Our GDP per head is higher than France’s and Italy’s. Will the Secretary of State use his position to ensure that people know these facts and stay away from scares and fears designed to stop them making the best decision for Scotland?
Mr Carmichael
Indeed I will, because these are all things that we have achieved as part of the United Kingdom. It all demonstrates what is possible for Scotland as part of the United Kingdom. As for any question of debate, we have dealt with that already, but is it not remarkable that when Scottish National party Members could be answering questions, all they want to do is have a debate about the debate?
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Alistair Carmichael and Angus Brendan MacNeil(11 years ago)
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Mr Carmichael
We have had no such discussion so far. The truth of the matter is that either we can have an open area with no border controls or we can have closely aligned immigration policies—unlike the position of the Scottish National party, we cannot have both.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
For years, immigrants have been vital to the economy—in my constituency, I see the importance of Filipino fishermen—and, since the Union, the problem in Scotland has been emigration, not immigration. But what can we do for Syrian refugees, to enable them to come here as legal immigrants? Although the Secretary of State might have failed to get his colleagues to vote for war in Syria, what might he do this Christmas to help refugees come from Syria, especially given that Germany is taking 80% of the European total and the UK is taking zero, which Amnesty International says should cause heads to hang “in shame”?
Mr Carmichael
This country has a long and proud record of offering asylum to those who seek it and those who deserve it and need it. That will continue to be the case.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Alistair Carmichael and Angus Brendan MacNeil(11 years, 1 month ago)
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Mr Carmichael
I have made it clear that I consider the posters to be inappropriate. They were part of a trial, they have gone and they will not be back. I do not think anything else really matters.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
3. What recent discussions he has had on the effects of increasing energy prices on households in Scotland.
The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr Alistair Carmichael)
Rising energy bills are obviously a serious concern for consumers and businesses. Over the past weeks, I have discussed the issue with representatives of the major energy companies. We continue to work closely with Scottish Government Ministers on all matters facing the economy in Scotland, including energy prices.
Mr MacNeil
As a fellow islander, may I say that it is good to see an Ileach, an Islay man, at the Dispatch Box? With my constituency suffering the highest level of fuel poverty in the UK, can the Secretary of State investigate the benefits that some renewables might bring to offset that? Although it is good that the islands will have different renewables strike prices, he well knows that not all islands are the same. Will he represent that view to the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, to make sure that all islands can benefit and we can tackle these high energy prices?
Mr Carmichael
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for allowing me the opportunity to remind the House of this Government’s great achievement in establishing, and putting out for consultation, a strike price for island communities, which will make the development of renewable energy in communities such as his and mine a viable proposition at long last. That may have a contribution to make to tackling fuel poverty. I have already worked closely with the leader of his local council in this matter, and I urge him to do the same.