Scotland Bill
Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts(8 years, 8 months ago)
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David Mundell
My right hon. Friend has asked that question before. This legislation has been debated on the Floor of this House and on the Floor of the other place. Extensive scrutiny of the Bill has taken place. Indeed, there has been the opportunity to scrutinise the fiscal framework as well, so extensive scrutiny has been delivered in relation to this legislation for the people of England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland.
The Bill has been strengthened by the scrutiny it has received, and I am pleased that the amendments that I will cover shortly are a positive and constructive culmination of that process.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
Going back to the previous intervention, it was obvious from the voices on the Scottish National party Benches that all the other Ministers, especially those from the Treasury, spoke for interests other than those of Scotland. Is it not time to move away from this form of devolution, whereby we effectively get the crumbs from the table at Westminster, to a model that Copenhagen shares with the Faroe Islands and Greenland, in which the larder is always open and they get to choose their own powers. Instead of taking the crumbs from Westminster, we should be able to take the powers that we want from Westminster when we want them.
Scotland Bill
Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts(9 years ago)
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David Mundell
Throughout the course of these debates it has been clear that the strongest advocate of full fiscal devolution in this House is my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh). He is willing to put his money where his mouth is. I am not willing to put the livelihoods of people in Scotland on the line just to demonstrate that some scheme would not work.
David Mundell
I want to deal with new clause 36, which is an important proposal—at least the hon. Gentleman’s colleagues suggest it is. In September 2014, the people of Scotland voted decisively to remain part of the United Kingdom, and to retain our two Parliaments and two Governments. The SNP reassured us repeatedly in advance of the referendum that it would be a once-in-a-generation or once-in-a-lifetime event. The First Minister herself signed the Edinburgh agreement, which committed both of Scotland’s Governments to respect the outcome of the independence referendum. However much the SNP might dislike the fact, the 2 million people in Scotland who voted no voted to keep our United Kingdom. Their votes should be respected and not set aside as an unfortunate setback on the road to independence. Most people in Scotland support our place in the United Kingdom and do not want a second referendum—that is a fact that the SNP cannot face up to.
This new clause is a distraction from the real powers contained in this Bill. The Bill gives the Scottish Parliament significant new powers, with the strength of the United Kingdom. The SNP needs to tell us how it intends to use those powers for the benefit of the people of Scotland. I will therefore not be supporting new clause 36 and am again proposing that people support my amendments.
Question put and agreed to.
New clause 12 accordingly read a Second time, and added to the Bill.
New Clause 13
Functions exercisable within devolved competence: elections
“(1) The Scotland Act 1998 (“the 1998 Act”) has effect, in relation to any function so far as exercisable within devolved competence by virtue of a provision of section 3, as if references to a “pre-commencement enactment” were to—
(a) an Act passed before or in the same session as the relevant date,
(b) any other enactment made before the relevant date,
(c) subordinate legislation under section 106 of the 1998 Act, to the extent that the legislation states that it is to be treated as a pre-commencement enactment,
but did not include the 1998 Act or this Act (or any amendment made by either of those Acts) or (subject to paragraph (c)) an enactment comprised in subordinate legislation under either of those Acts.
(2) In this section—
(a) expressions used in the 1998 Act have the same meaning as in that Act;
(b) the relevant date is the date on which section 3 comes into force.”—(Stephen Barclay.)
This amendment makes provision for various existing functions of Ministers of the Crown in respect of elections to instead be exercised by Scottish Ministers, so far as such functions are exercisable within devolved competence by virtue of Clause 3.
Brought up, read the First and Second time, and added to the Bill.
New Clause 1
Independent Commission on Full Fiscal Autonomy
“(1) The Secretary of State shall appoint a commission of between four and eleven members to conduct an analysis of the impact of Full Fiscal Autonomy on the Scottish economy, labour market and public finances and to report by 31 March 2016.
(2) No member of the House of Commons, the House of Lords, or the Scottish Parliament may be a member of the commission.
(3) No employee of the Scottish Government or of any government Department or agency anywhere in the United Kingdom may be a member of the commission.
(4) The Secretary of State shall, in consultation and with the agreement of Scottish Ministers, appoint as members of the commission only persons who appear to the Secretary of State to hold a relevant qualification or to have relevant experience.
(5) The Secretary of State shall not appoint as a member of the commission any person who is a member of a political party.
(6) Before appointing any member of the commission, the Secretary of State must consult—
(a) The Chair of any select committee appointed by the House of Commons to consider Scottish Affairs, and
(b) The Chair of any select committee appointed by the House of Commons to examine the expenditure, administration and policy of Her Majesty’s Treasury and its associated public bodies.
(7) The Secretary of State may by regulations issue the commission with terms of reference and guidelines for the commission’s working methods, including an outline definition of the policy of full fiscal autonomy for the commission to analyse.
(8) The Secretary of State must lay copies of the report of the commission before both Houses of Parliament, and must transmit a copy of the report of the commission to the Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament.
(9) Regulations under this section must be made by statutory instrument, subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of Parliament.”—(Ian Murray.)
The new Clause provides for the establishment of an independent commission to investigate the impact of FFA.
Brought up, and read the First time.
Question put, That the clause be read a Second time:—
Scotland Bill
Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts(9 years, 4 months ago)
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Mr Carmichael
I welcome you back to the Chair, Mr Crausby.
We have an embarras de richesses in the range of issues before the Committee for the next three hours, so I will try to keep my remarks as brief as possible. I am pleased that at the top of the list of amendments come those from different parts of the House about the future devolution of the Crown Estate commission.
Perhaps I am on something of a roll today: the future of the Crown Estate commission has been important to me throughout my political life. The Crown Estate was the subject of my maiden speech in this House some 14 years ago, and, revisiting the issue ahead of today’s debate, it was interesting to note that there has been some progress, particularly under the auspices of its current chief executive, Alison Nimmo. We have seen a greater willingness of the Crown Estate to engage with the communities that it most directly affects, and in the previous Parliament we heard about the creation of the coastal communities fund that brought back some 50% of Crown Estate dividends relating to the use of the seabed to coastal communities around the country. That has made a significant difference to a number of projects in a wide range of communities.
It remains the case that the operation of the Crown Estate remains unsatisfactory for island and coastal communities—especially those throughout Scotland that seek to establish a future for themselves in the development of marine technologies and renewable energy generation, which continue to rely on the good will and co-operation of the Crown Estate in relation to the construction and maintenance of piers and harbours, and for which the aquaculture industry remains an important source of livelihoods for many people. We need to see that operation devolved, in particular as it relates to the function of the seabed and territorial waters.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
The right hon. Gentleman says that the operation of the Crown Estate is unsatisfactory and needs to be devolved. It was unsatisfactory and needed devolving four years ago when he was in government, and he opposed its devolution. Why did he oppose that devolution and why has he now had a damascene conversion and changed his mind—on devolution not just to Scotland but to councils? Many people do not want the issue left at council level, decided in council boardrooms; they want it devolved to the islands.
Mr Carmichael
Four years ago, I was very much in favour of devolution to the communities: it was something on which we could not build a consensus—[Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman has asked a question; if he calmed down a little, he could listen to the answer.
Four years ago, we could not build a consensus on this issue and that was a matter for regret. I regularly pursued the issue, as I am sure the Secretary of State will recall. I am delighted now to be able to place publicly on the record my enthusiasm for devolution to council areas—possibly even sub-council areas. That is why amendment 57 seeks to facilitate the devolution to the Western Isles, Orkney and Shetland of the powers of the Crown Estate commissioners, so that the communities have the day-to-day responsibility and reap the financial benefits.
I have always been of the view that power is best exercised closest to the community affected by it, and the seabed as a resource could be much better managed if it were under the control of local communities—island communities, in particular.
Mr Carmichael
I shall allow the Secretary of State to speak for himself when he has the opportunity to do so later; I am sure we will all be on tenterhooks to hear what he has to say.
It is manifestly the case that the seabed as a resource could be better managed—and it would be if it were managed by the communities most directly affected. That would generate more income. There are tremendous opportunities for generating income from the seabed, many of which are thwarted because the Crown Estate commissioners over the years have taken an especially narrow construction of their duties under the Crown Estate legislation.
I fully accept that amendment 57 seeks to promote the interests of the Western Isles, Orkney and Shetland. I remind the House that the issue was the subject of two reports to the Scottish Affairs Committee in the last Parliament, and has also been pursued vigorously by the three island authorities in their engagement in the “Our Islands Our Future” process, which I was keen to encourage when I was Secretary of State.
I suggest that if we were able to achieve devolution to the three island authorities first, the way would be smoothed for those in the Highland region area, and Argyll and Bute in particular. I know that the issues relating to the islands and coastal communities in those council areas are very similar to those for the Western Isles, Orkney and Shetland.
Mr MacNeil
Would it not be a better approach to devolve to the islands? I see the Liberals are now ignoring and forgetting about Mull, Tiree and Islay, but the intention of the Scottish Government—to devolve to the island communities themselves—is a far better approach and we have to make sure we can have it in Scotland. We could have had it four years ago, when I moved an amendment on this issue. We did not get it four years ago, however, because the right hon. Gentleman and his party opposed it.
Mr MacNeil
I rise to oppose or to provide a different perspective on the amendments tabled by the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael). I fear that he wants to do two damaging things through his amendments. He wants to bind what the Scottish Government are doing in regard to other islands by devolving to island council authorities when the ambition should be greater and power should be given to communities. What we have is not a defined community, but a community or group of individual communities. His amendments are also restrictive, and I think it is wrong for this Parliament to tell the Scottish Parliament what it should do in the next step of devolving powers. It would be far more useful and far more innovative if the Scottish Parliament had the flexibility to do what it saw as right rather than putting into the long grass the cases of our islands of Mull, Tiree, Coll or Islay, or a number of other islands that are not mentioned here.
Mr Carmichael
I remind the hon. Gentleman that my amendment provides for agreement between the Scottish Government and the Treasury. Surely that would make the design of the scheme open to full input from the Scottish Parliament.
Mr MacNeil
If the right hon. Gentleman wants the full input of the Scottish Parliament, why is he trying to bind its hands? He should leave his amendment to one side and leave the Scottish Parliament as the most democratic institution and forum representing the Scottish people, allowing us to arrive at the most democratic, most sought and most wanted forum as the solution.
We know from the island authorities that they are more than happy with the direction of travel that the Scottish Government have taken. I come from one of the minor islands within a local authority area, and I know that the people who live in my island want to control themselves, not be controlled by a council chamber 100 miles away. From Uist, the council chamber is 70 to 100 miles away, while Harris, linked to the same island geographically, does not want to be controlled in Stornoway 45 miles away. In Ness and Lewis, they would rather have control themselves. We need to look at what the communities want, rather than sitting here in Westminster and prescribing what is required in these places. Let us make sure that we give the Scottish Parliament the power and authority, and then we can discuss with the communities exactly what they want, rather than have grandstanding amendments. These amendments stand in direct contradiction to where the right hon. Gentleman was four years ago—in government and in a position to influence, but he did not do so.
Mr Carmichael
I remind the hon. Gentleman that the Western Isles Council, the Comhairle themselves, were urging me to take this course of action. Do they not have democratic legitimacy as well?
Mr MacNeil
Absolutely, and when the right hon. Gentleman was in government and he was urged to do this, what did he do about it? Did his Government take the advice of the Comhairle nan Eilian Siar when he was in government?
Mr Carmichael
If the hon. Gentleman speaks to his colleagues in local government—I know he does not always do so—I am pretty sure that they will tell him that I was an enthusiastic promoter of their cause within government.
Mr MacNeil
I know what they wanted, but it is clear from that answer that the right hon. Gentleman did not take their advice. He had no influence on that Government, but he is now telling us to take their advice. He has a very different agenda. If he had accepted our amendment four years ago, we would already have had control, because the Scottish Government would have given it to us. In fact, he was a blocking force and an obstacle to progress for Scotland four years ago, as he still is. As for his colleagues who were here at the time, as a result of that very attitude, they are gone. Instead, I am one of 56 Scottish National party Members, rather than the mere five last time. I should thank the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland for his intransigence four years ago, because it was that very intransigence that led to this raft of colleagues beside me, together debating the Scotland Bill.
The Crown Estate has tremendous control over areas of life in Scotland. It takes millions out of salmon farming each year, and we want more control over what we are doing there. We could stimulate growth and activity in different areas. If we control the taxes, we can do what we feel like. We could do something about revenues from marine renewable energy going south and ensure that they stay within Scotland. We could also ensure that no development is hampered because of the money demanded by the Crown Estate—rentiers’ money that it is lucky to be getting. Years ago, it got nothing from the seabed, but a lucky windfall has now come its way in the shape of offshore renewables.
What is required is for the powers to go to the Government in Edinburgh and for that Government to decide what happens with the community of the realm in Scotland. That is where power and sovereignty rests—with the community of the realm and the people of Scotland. It is for them to decide exactly what they want. Yes, the powers should be devolved. As the Secretary of State said four years ago, the idea of the SNP was to devolve at any cost. He did not listen then, but by goodness, he is listening now.
Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)
Thank you, Mr Crausby—[Interruption.] I did not hear that interruption by the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil), which is always a great loss because his interventions are some of the most amusing that we ever hear. On this occasion, however, I am going to disagree with him. I do not like clause 31 at all; I think it is fundamentally misconceived. I have tabled a number of amendments, which I hope will improve it—if it is possible to make a silk purse out of sow’s ear.
Let me start by explaining why I do not like the clause in principle. I think there is a danger that it is attempting to give away something that does not actually belong to the state. The Crown Estates belong to the sovereign and are given in trust to the Government at the beginning of every reign. This started at the beginning of the reign of George III and has been recommitted by every monarch subsequently. However, the Crown Estates must return entire to a new sovereign at the beginning of a new reign. It is not possible—it is not right; it is not proper—for the Government to give away the Crown Estates or to put them in such a state that an incoming sovereign could not take them back in their entirety. I therefore have concerns about the underlying principle of clause 31 in that it is seeking to divide the Crown Estates, which ought not to be divisible because of the unity they are required to have at the beginning of each reign.
I also do not like it symbolically because, although I am very sympathetic to the demands of the SNP for more government in Scotland and for more rights for the Scottish Parliament, I think the Crown is more important than the union of Parliaments.
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am very grateful for the right hon. Gentleman’s characteristically helpful intervention. What was so wonderful about that bait was the outpouring of patriotic royal fervour that it elicited from my friends in the Scottish National party. I must confess that I was thrilled and surprised when a party that I had thought to have republican leanings turned out, to a man and woman, to contain some of the staunchest monarchists in the land. That is desperately reassuring—
Mr Rees-Mogg
And it is, of course, an even greater honour to give way to the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar.
Mr MacNeil
I am also grateful to the hon. Gentleman, who has described giving way to the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar as a greater honour than giving way to the right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond). I wanted to repeat that for the purpose of my own amusement.
May I return to the hon. Gentleman to the quip that I made at the beginning of his speech? I said that he had contributed to this debate four years ago, on 15 March 2011. Times have changed since then, but it clear that, in another sense, times have not really changed, because the argument that he was advancing then—the argument that the Crown Estate was the property of the monarch—is the argument that he is advancing now. Indeed, in many respects it is an argument that has been advanced for hundreds of years. It is time to move on. It is time for the royal windfall to end, and for royalty to end its control of local people. As I am sure the hon. Gentleman knows—because we have been friends for a number of years—I say that as a staunch monarchist myself.
Mr Rees-Mogg
The hon. Gentleman really cannot have it both ways. He teased the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) for being inconsistent, because four years ago he had been against the devolution of the Crown Estate and today he was in favour of it. Now he has objected to my being consistent, in that I opposed it four years ago and continue to oppose it today. Either the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland is right to have changed his mind, or I am right not to have changed mine. Both cannot be true.
Mr MacNeil
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his consistency, and, similarly, I congratulate myself on mine. I want this power to be moved to Scotland so that the most democratic forum in Scotland—the Scottish Parliament—can decide, in consultation with the people of Scotland, exactly what happens to the Crown Estate.
Mr Rees-Mogg
The problem with that view is that it does not respect the rights of property. The Crown is entitled to protection of the rights of property as much as—indeed, some might say more than—anyone else in this country. If even Her Majesty’s property, the property of the sovereign herself, is not sacrosanct and protected, but can be taken for the benefit of the people—whatever that means—no one’s land is safe.
Mr MacNeil
I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way again. I am also grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Drew Hendry) for having a word in my ear.
In Scotland, the people are sovereign, whereas here, as the hon. Gentleman will of course know, the Treasury already controls the vast majority of the revenues of the Crown Estate, and gives pocket money—albeit a tremendously large amount of pocket money—to the monarch.
Mr Rees-Mogg
I find the concept of sovereignty coming from the people very attractive. I do not dispute the concept of sovereignty rising from the people to this Parliament, with our sovereign Lady the epitome of it, the symbol of it, the very pinnacle of our society and of our nation. Within that concept, however, all subjects, and Her Majesty herself, have rights of property, and those rights should not be arbitrarily taken away. It worries me that clause 31 is going in that direction in deciding that Parliament can allocate a property right without having established that that property right belongs to Parliament, and that it is for Parliament to dispose of it in the first place.
Mr MacNeil
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way again. He is being very generous, as are you, Mr Crausby.
The hon. Gentleman speaks of the personality of the sovereign. He says that the sovereign cannot choose to whom to give the estate, and that it will go to the next sovereign. The important difference between England and Scotland is that in Scotland the people are sovereign. As the hon. Gentleman knows from his history books, there was Mary Queen of Scots and there was Elizabeth of England. There were the people, there was the country, and there were two different nations.
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am well aware of the difference of terminology in relation to Mary Queen of Scots and Elizabeth I, the “English Queen”.
Mr Rees-Mogg
The Queen of England. The two were different, in a sense, and there is a conception of popular sovereignty in Scotland that may differ from that in England—although it is perfectly possible that the reference to “Mary Queen of Scots” may have been due to concern about having a woman as monarch, and to the fact that in earlier times people were happier to have a King of Scotland than to have a King of the Scots. I am not entirely sure that the hon. Gentleman might not be more in tune with the late John Knox and his “blast of the trumpet”. I myself am not sure that I want that particular trumpet to be blown, because I think that it is a trumpet that sounds a rather wrong note. For once I am sounding more modern than the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar! I think that the issue of property rights is fundamental, and I also think that the Crown is indivisible.
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am grateful to my right hon. and learned Friend, who I think is absolutely spot on. The indivisibility of the Crown within the United Kingdom is central to the Unionist case, and I think that if a Unionist Government are willing to divide the Crown, that is a very dangerous step. I would rather give the Scottish Parliament other powers—some of which are the subject of other amendments—than give it this very important power relating to the Crown, which, as has already been pointed out, has been indivisible for longer than the Parliaments have been united. It brought the two countries together, and that was then established firmly in law.
Mr MacNeil
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his incredible generosity. He said that the Crown property was indivisible, but of course the United Kingdom itself was not indivisible, given that it was divided in 1922. Although most people do not realise it, the United Kingdom is not yet 100 years old. I think that Doris Day is older than the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. However, the question that is puzzling me is not that of Doris Day’s age, but what happened to the Crown properties that were once held and are now in the Republic of Ireland.
Mr Rees-Mogg
My assumption is that they were devolved to the Government of the Republic of Ireland, which is a perfectly reasonable thing to do when one is abolishing the monarchy. If SNP Members were, in fact, closet republicans—which, given the other arguments that we have heard recently, I do not think they are—it would be perfectly rational for them to argue that the estate should be confiscated from the Crown and should go to an independent Scotland. However, that is not the argument that we are having today. Today, there seems to be broad acceptance in the House that the monarchy should remain part of the Scottish settlement—as well as the settlement for the rest of the United Kingdom—come what may, even if Scotland were to become independent.
Mr MacNeil
I think that the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. What today’s debate is about is whether the monarch’s estate—the Crown Estate—should be controlled by Her Majesty’s Government here, or by Her Majesty’s Government in Scotland. My colleagues and I are suggesting that Her Majesty’s Government in Scotland would be a far better Government to control Her Majesty’s estate.
Mr Rees-Mogg
Hon. Members may have got the impression that I am a monarchist; I think there are few things more important in this nation than the monarchical system that we have. None the less I am consistent in my capitalist views; I do not want even my sovereign to benefit from subsidies that are paid by the Government and fall on the backs of hard-pressed people in North East Somerset who cannot afford their energy bills. I am not that much of a monarchist.
Mr MacNeil
I certainly am, it would seem, and I can hear the timbers in Buckingham palace quivering as we speak: we have now found limits to the hon. Gentleman’s loyalty. We are talking here about the Queen and everyone else in the country getting the benefits of onshore wind. If the monarch still had the power to shout, “Off with his head,” I would fear for the hon. Gentleman tomorrow morning.
Mr Rees-Mogg
One has to be careful of onshore wind turbines if one is at risk of losing one’s head; I believe the heads of bats get regularly cut off by the turbines.
Subsidies are a different point, but I would certainly not want the sovereign grant to benefit from state subsidies. I think that is a very bad method of funding almost anything. The Government picking winners tends not to work and tends to increase costs.
Amendment 126 would merely ensure that the pro rata amount would remain the same, and amendment 125 would mean the scheme agreed by the Treasury and the Scottish Parliament could not be altered to the disadvantage of the Sovereign Grant Act.
As I have said, the Sovereign Grant Act is an extraordinarily good way of funding the monarchy. It means Her Majesty is the highest marginal tax rate payer in the country. The Queen pays a tax rate of 85% whereas nobody else pays more than 45%. The Crown Estates are taken from the Queen at the beginning of the reign and the revenue is then taken to the Government. So the Queen subsidises her own Government throughout her reign. That is not an unreasonable situation, but the Sovereign Grant Act returns it, and that should be protected in any development of devolution.
Mr MacNeil
Everybody subsidises the Government through their taxes, and we in Scotland particularly subsidise the Government having paid more tax per capita every year for the last 31 years.
Incidentally, the hon. Gentleman might be pleased to know that Doris Day’s birthday is 3 April 1922; I thank the ever-vigilant SNP press officer Stuart Easton for that piece of information.
Mr Rees-Mogg
I wish Doris Day many happy returns, albeit somewhat belatedly, but the hon. Gentleman is not right that all these Scottish taxpayers have paid more tax for 31 years, because some—very distinguished—SNP Members of Parliament are not 31 years old, so certainly have not been paying tax for that long.
Jack Dromey (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab)
It is always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Downton Abbey. I want to speak on employment in relation to section H1 in part 2 of schedule 5 to the Scotland Act 1998 and new clause 63. I rose from the Grunwick picket line ultimately to be elected as the deputy general secretary of the Transport and General Workers Union. I have believed all my life in the old trade union legends of “unity is strength” and “solidarity for ever.” I have seen the consequences of disunity, including in Scotland. I remember the activities of ruthless gangmasters in the fields and fish farms of Scotland, which our agricultural section was battling against. I remember the shameful pressures that were brought to bear by supermarkets on the slaughterhouses and packing plants of the meat industry. They drove down costs along the supply chain and led to a two-tier workforce. Newly arrived migrant workers—overwhelmingly, they were agency workers—were on poorer conditions of employment. Scottish workers here for generations were directly employed full-time on better conditions of employment. That divided workforces and damaged social cohesion—there was exploitation and undercutting.
Not once did we blame the workers concerned; we sought to unite them, and it was tough. I remember one plant in Scotland where there was a fight involving 100 workers in a car park, such were the strong divisions in the workforce over that two-tier labour market. We united that workforce around a recognition that it was not newly arrived migrants who were the problem, but ruthless employers seeking to undermine and undercut.
Unity was what we achieved, not only among workers in Scotland, but between workers in Scotland and England and across the four nations of the United Kingdom. As a consequence, we won landmark achievements for workers. The Gangmasters (Licensing) Act 2004 was the most complex private Member’s Bill taken through Parliament in 30 years, and it established the Gangmasters Licensing Authority. Jim Sheridan, a former Transport and General Workers Union convener at Barr and Stroud in Glasgow, sponsored that Bill. We also achieved equal treatment for agency workers and the directly employed. Finally, following a landmark inquiry by the Equality and Human Rights Commission into what had happened in parts of the north of England and Scotland, the supermarkets were compelled to end the two-tier labour market in the meat industry supply chain. Those battles, which changed life for the better and the laws protecting workers for the better, would never have been won without a unity of workers north and south of the border, and a Labour Government.
Even under a Conservative Government, great battles were fought and won for Scotland and for Scottish workers—battles that could not have been won without that unity of Scottish and English workers. I will give two examples. First, I was privileged to lead the great battle against the closure of Rosyth dockyard. The yard was privatised in 1987. In 1991, a Conservative Government, encouraged by Conservative Members of Parliament in the south-west, moved down the path of closing Scotland’s biggest industrial establishment, Rosyth dockyard. Some 20,000 jobs hung on that decision. The Conservatives down south were saying, “Close Rosyth. Bring the work down to Devonport and we will see all the Navy’s work done on the south coast of England.”
Mr MacNeil
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his work in that period in Scotland; we have spoken about it privately before. Does he recognise that the problem of that period was that Scotland had a UK Government, like today, that we did not elect? Had we been an independent country then, we would not have had those problems and we would not have needed his mighty efforts to try to stem the damage that the then Tory Government were doing. The steps they took contribute today to the £1 billion annual defence underspend in Scotland.
Jack Dromey
Two unions saved Rosyth. The first was the campaign led by the TGWU that united the whole of Scottish public and political life. More than that, it united Rosyth and Devonport. I remember addressing a meeting of 9,000 workers at Devonport. They would have been the beneficiaries of the closure of Rosyth, and they were being encouraged by the Conservatives to back that closure, but they said no—they stood by the workers of Rosyth. The other union that saved Rosyth was the Union of England and Scotland. Had we had a Westminster Government making decisions simply in the interests of England, we would have seen the closure of Rosyth. For me, the lesson of that great battle was that unity and solidarity north and south of the border are critical.
I shall give another example. The only time that British Aerospace was ever defeated on a workplace closure was in 1989, after it had announced the closure of the Bishopton royal ordnance factory. I was proud to lead the campaign against that, too, and we won. The factory ultimately stayed open for another 13 years, employing 500 workers directly and 1,000 in the supply chain. Again, absolutely key to that were the workers down south in the Chorley factory, which was the other explosives factory. They said, “If Bishopton is closed, we will not handle the work.” Although they were English workers being told that it would be in the English interest to agree to the betrayal of Scottish workers, they refused to do it.
Mr MacNeil
I do not fully recognise the rosy picture that the hon. Gentleman is painting of that unity. If we remember, in the lifetime of the last Labour Government some 10,000 defence-related jobs were lost from Scotland, and we also have the £1 billion defence underspend in Scotland. We are told that we have greater public spending in Scotland, but that does not include those defence figures, because they come under non-identifiable spending. These non-identifiable spending figures are grossly and dramatically skewed towards the south-east and south-west of England, and Scotland is seeing an underspend. If the Union was as the hon. Gentleman is presenting it, we would not have that underspend; we would have our own taxes being spent in Scotland in that area and not have those taxes being shipped south in an area of non-identifiable spending.
Jack Dromey
I used a not dissimilar argument when it came to the lobbying on where the aircraft carriers would be built. I argued that there should be fair treatment of Scotland, with Rosyth playing a key part in the construction and assembly of those aircraft carriers.
The lesson of history on those great battles was that unity of Scotland and England and unity of Scottish and English workers are key. On other fronts, I have to say that some of the proposals emanating from the SNP cause grave concern, such as those on the future of pay bargaining. We fought throughout the Conservative years against the regionalisation of public sector pay bargaining. We were able effectively to see that off. To go down the path of separate agreements for Scotland, then for England, then for Wales and then for the regions of England would once again divide workers when unity is strength.
Mr MacNeil
The hon. Gentleman has been very kind in giving way. A few moments ago, he asked rhetorically where this takes us on pay. Had Labour agreed to allow the minimum wage to be devolved to Scotland, that would have taken us to a higher minimum wage. Instead, Labour’s position left control of the minimum wage across the entire United Kingdom in the hands of a Tory Government. Had the minimum wage been devolved to Scotland and gone up, as it would have done, that would have put pressure on that lot on the Government Benches to increase the minimum wage in England. Sometimes, centralised control is worse for the entire body than localised control in various corners.
Jack Dromey
I am sorry, but the lesson for me from my whole history in the trade union movement has been that battles for a higher minimum wage—and I would like to see the minimum wage become the living wage—are best fought by workers north and south of the border standing together in solidarity and unity.
Mr Grieve
I had not intended to speak in the debate, but the rather pejorative comments of the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) in which he described my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg) as representing Downton Abbey prompted me to do so. My hon. Friend might at times appear to have a rather archaic way of approaching some of these issues, but in practice his analysis of the devolution of the Crown Estate that is proposed in the Bill is correct.
The Crown Estate is indivisible, because it is the Crown Estate of the United Kingdom. There is absolutely no reason why the revenue from it should not be allocated in different ways, including to the Scottish Government—I have no difficulty whatever with that proposal—but an issue arises in relation to the duty of this House to fulfil what is both a statutory and, in a sense, a fiduciary duty to ensure that the estate is properly managed and to hold to account the Ministers and, ultimately, the Commissioners who are responsible for that. The point has been made that the provisions in the Bill do not allow for the estate’s alienation, but that does not mean that it could not be so mishandled in the course of its management that its value did not diminish substantially. I assume that, as a result of the Bill and of Sewel motions, this House would no longer be in a position to scrutinise how that management was taking place if that were to happen.
The Crown is a reserved matter, and the running of the Crown Estate is intimately concerned with the affairs of the Crown, so this proposal is a constitutional novelty that my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset was quite right to highlight. I hope that the Secretary of State will tell us more about the issues relating to alienation, about the management of the Crown Estate and about the extent to which this House—which is ultimately supposed to maintain the dignity of the Crown—will have a role hereafter in respect of those parts of the Crown Estate that are being managed elsewhere.
Mr MacNeil
The right hon. and learned Gentleman referred to the proposal as a “novelty”. He might have missed the earlier intervention by my right hon. Friend the Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond), who said that the administration of the Crown was given to the Irish Free State in 1923. What view does he take of that novel innovation?
Mr Grieve
I disagree with the right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond), because the creation of the Irish Free State in 1923 involved the creation of a separate sovereign state. In the light of last year’s referendum result, that is not what we are doing here. We are trying to create a quasi-federal state that will recommend itself to the citizens of all parts of the United Kingdom while preserving this basic unity. One of the bases of that unity is the Crown, and the Crown Estate is intimately linked to the Crown. That is why matters relating to the Crown have always been reserved here. To that extent, the proposed change should not pass without comment, and I will be interested to hear from the Secretary of State how the safeguards will be introduced.
There are other oddities relating to the way in which the clause is drafted. Indeed, I have spent quite a lot of time trying to fathom out why it has been drafted in this way. I think it is understood that parts of the Crown Estate could end up not being devolved, because certain aspects of partnership operations would not allow for that to happen. I would be grateful for the Secretary of State’s comment on the fact that the option appears to have been preserved for the creation of a completely new and separate Crown Estate in Scotland, based on purchases made in Scotland by the Crown Estate Commissioners of the United Kingdom, who are still based in London. Without that option, the wording of some of the provisions in clause 31—particularly of proposed new subsection 90B(5)—would otherwise be incomprehensible. I would be interested to hear what the Secretary of State has to say about that. I must assume that it has been done deliberately in order to allow for the possibility of the Crown Estate’s Commissioners of the United Kingdom to continue to make investments north of the border if they so wish. There is nothing wrong with that, but it raises further questions.
Perhaps I am approaching this from too much of a lawyer’s point of view, but the nature of this debate does not seem to lend itself to simplicity. The lack of simplicity has the potential to undermine the aim that I have, as a Unionist, to find a long-term or permanent settlement—albeit not the one under which I lived 20 years ago—that will last for the United Kingdom and for all its parts. I hope that the Secretary of State will forgive me for saying that this aspect of the legislation highlights an underlying concern that we are gently salami-slicing our constitution.
The right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) raised the question of changing the Standing Orders of this House by means of only one afternoon’s debate. I have considerable sympathy with that point, and I hope that I will be in a position to add to it tomorrow. There might be good reasons why that is the only way we can proceed, but I believe that we shall have insufficient time in which to debate the matter properly.
For all those reasons, I hope that my right hon. Friend will provide the answers to all my specific questions on the details of the Bill in due course. It strikes me that the end product could be two Crown Estates north of the border, one of which has been devolved—although it is unclear how this Parliament would retain its fiduciary duty to ensure the estate’s good management—and another completely new one that could be created some time in the future.
Mr MacNeil
The right hon. and learned Gentleman talks about the possibility of two Crown Estates, but there could be more, such is the potential for innovation in Scotland. The move to give control of the Crown Estate to Edinburgh is not the end of the story. We could see separate Crown Estates for the island of Eriskay, the islands of South Uist and North Uist and the island of Benbecula, for example. Things could change quite a lot. He is very much mistaken to suggest that the Crown Estate is the glue that holds the United Kingdom together. We are looking at what will work practically and for the benefit of the people who live in island and coastal communities.
Mr Grieve
I certainly do not think that the Crown Estate is the glue that holds the United Kingdom together. I can reassure the hon. Gentleman on that. There are all sorts of other things that provide that glue.
I said that I was perhaps looking at this too much from a lawyer’s point of view, but I like to look at structures that have some coherence. This particular structure is showing signs of not being coherent. One of the problems with these debates in which we try to reach a sensible and lasting constitutional settlement is that although I would love to accept the arguments put forward by the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil), I am conscious of the fact that he does not really want a solution to the problem. Just as the Irish question is said to have changed every time Mr Gladstone asked it, so the hon. Gentleman changes the question each time an answer comes up. He has a desire for certain structures, and although I will do my best at all times to deliver what the Scottish people want, I do not always find it easy to accept the songs that he sings, which are generally designed to lure the Union of the United Kingdom on to the rocks.
Ian Murray
The right hon. Gentleman asks me to withdraw my remark, but he asked to intervene before I made it, so he obviously wanted to intervene about something else. As they used to say on the radio, “What’s your point, caller?” [Interruption.] I can stand here and waste time until 8.37 pm if SNP Members want me to. I believe that many of them want to speak, but if they want to continue to waste time, that is entirely up to them. I can stand here all evening and then allow the Minister to speak shortly before we move on.
I believe that most of the clauses in this part of the Bill match the spirit and letter of the Smith agreement, but we wish to make sure that there is clarity, and to go slightly further. We have identified areas where the Bill can go further, primarily by placing more specific duties on the Scottish Parliament and Scottish Ministers, and also on the Secretary of State to deliver on these powers. Labour’s amendments would require the Scottish Parliament to work towards gender balance in the membership of the Scottish Parliament and on the boards of Scottish public authorities; require the Scottish Parliament to establish a process to end the system of employment tribunal fees in Scotland; devolve the enforcement of equalities legislation to the Scottish Parliament; and make sure that Scotland can, if it so wishes, implement a not-for-profit people’s railway.
We have already heard some debate about the Crown Estate, so I will canter through this part of my speech rather quickly to allow other Members to speak. Clause 31 transfers management of the Crown Estate’s Scottish assets and income to Scottish Ministers. That terminology is vital in terms of some of the questions we have for the Secretary of State. These assets account for about 3.9% of Crown Estate revenues. They include several rural estates; commercial property in Edinburgh; mineral and salmon fishing rights; approximately half of the coastal foreshore; and almost the entire seabed, including rights on the continental shelf. Crucially, the clause does not transfer rights over joint investments. As the hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Drew Hendry) said, there has been considerable local press coverage about Fort Kinnaird in Edinburgh as it is not owned by the Crown Estate but is merely a joint investment. Why it is specifically excluded given that—the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right—even if it is just a 50% shareholding, it should be deemed to be an asset in terms of a being shareholding? It would be useful if the Secretary of State clarified that.
I largely agree with the clause as drafted, albeit with two small amendments. The first is the amendment tabled by the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael). I understand that the reason for the current wording of the clause is that the Treasury requires the legislative consent of Scottish Ministers before making such a scheme. However, once that consent has been given, as I assume it would be, the wording does not definitely require the formation of a scheme. Our amendment 52 would replace reference in line 36 to “Scottish Ministers” with “Scottish Parliament”. Ministers are transient, whereas the Scottish Parliament is permanent, and that should be recognised in all the clauses of this Bill.
The transfer of Crown Estate assets entails the transfer of staff and tenants to a new employer and landlord. It is vital that that transition is as smooth as possible to minimise unnecessary disruption and anxiety to workers and to tenants. I would welcome an assurance from the Government that every effort is being made to ensure that that will be the case. The right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) and the hon. Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg) asked some legitimate questions that the Secretary of State should take on board and try to answer.
Finally on the Crown Estate, will the Secretary of State deal with the issue of the coastal communities fund? That is not directly funded by the Crown Estate but by the Treasury as part of the revenues of the Crown Estate. Will that situation continue or will the responsibility transfer to the Scottish Government? The fund is hugely important for Scottish coastal communities, and it is important to get clarity on its continuation, whether paid for by the Treasury or by the Scottish Government.
We will support amendment 57, in the name of the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland, as we believe in the concept of double devolution to get powers into the hands of the communities best placed to use them effectively. I agree with what the right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond) said about coastal communities. I recognise, however, that the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland is using this as a probing amendment to make sure that the issue can be on the agenda. He is right that it does not have to be included in the Bill, but I am glad that it has been raised.
Clause 32 devolves powers over equal opportunities bodies to the Scottish Parliament. The Labour party has always been a staunch proponent of women’s rights and the promotion of female representation. As respected organisation Engender has observed, there is compelling evidence to suggest that lack of gendered power balance in the wider public domain has a major impact on equality of outcomes across Government Departments. I therefore welcome the transfer of these powers, which will add to the tools available to the Scottish Parliament to tackle gender inequality in all its guises. There are very few legislative opportunities to provide for meaningful advancement in these areas, so we should grab those opportunities when they arise. We have seen that voluntary quotas or non-statutory targets can go some way towards this but are not as effective as legislation.
Our amendment 123 would amend clause 32 to include a specific requirement for gender balance among Members of the Scottish Parliament and members of boards of Scottish public authorities. That would devolve the issue to the Scottish Parliament and allow for it to be debated and properly implemented there. The Scottish Parliament has achieved much to be proud of, but in this area we are lagging behind our European partners. We should also deal with the dreadful record on such issues in this place. In appealing for the Committee’s support on this, I reassert my belief that equality is not a party-political issue. I want us to work together on it. I thank the cross-party campaigning group Women 50:50 for their support for the amendment and their “It’s as easy as 123” campaign. I hope that Members will also support new clause 41, which would require Scottish Ministers to undertake and publish a review of the measures they are taking further to help and promote gender equality in the membership of the Scottish Parliament and on the boards of Scottish public authorities.
New clause 66, tabled by the hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) and new clause 56, tabled by the hon. Member for Southport (John Pugh), propose the devolution of abortion law and other connected laws, with regard to the relevant section of the Scotland Act 1998, to the Scottish Parliament. We will vote against the new clauses if they are pressed to a vote because we believe that a woman’s right to choose should be determined by robust medical evidence and not by where they live.
There is no reason why women in Edinburgh should face a different experience from women in Exeter. Many would argue that the current system needs to be improved, but that would be best achieved in a UK framework and should be part of a debate separate from that on the constitution.
Mr MacNeil
That is remarkable, because those matters are linked to countries’ constitutions. The limits are different in almost each and every European country. Why cannot they be different or the same across the UK—whatever the most democratic forums in each part of the UK choose? I am surprised at the hon. Gentleman’s negation of democracy.
Ian Murray
The next part of my speech offers an explanation of our opposition to devolving that particular issue across these islands.
Ian Murray
The hon. Gentleman is chuntering again. I will come on to the Northern Ireland issue. This is an incredibly serious issue and we should discuss it in a sober, proper and mature manner. Whether someone is pro-choice or pro-life, these are incredibly sensitive and emotive issues to which we should give due consideration.
Our opposition to devolving this particular issue is threefold. First, we stand with the 13 organisations from Scottish civic society, including Amnesty International, Scottish Women’s Aid and the Scottish Trades Union Congress, which have called on us to vote against the amendments. We share their concerns that the proposal has not been properly consulted on and that, on existing evidence, it could lead to harming a woman’s right to choose. The statement they have sent to all Members of this House concludes:
“Women across the UK have fought for women’s bodies to be their own and, to this day, fight opposition to a woman’s right to choose. We do not wish this amendment to open the doors to those who seek to undermine this right.”
Ian Murray
Well, devolution in a lot of instances is not logical, because—[Interruption.] I am answering the intervention of the hon. Member for Gainsborough. If the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil) wants to intervene, I am more than happy to allow him to do so, but he must let me answer the intervention first. A lot of devolution is illogical, because that is how devolution works.
I hope that the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar will allow me to get to the second and third reasons for our opposition to the devolution of abortion at this stage. As I have said, our first reason for opposing it is that we are being asked to do so by women’s organisations in Scotland. Secondly, the Smith commission clearly stated that
“a process should be established immediately to consider the matter further.”
That has not happened. On 21 July, a Scottish Government spokesperson told the BBC that talks with UK Government Ministers on the devolution of abortion law had begun prior to the election. I would welcome an intervention from the Secretary of State or, indeed, anyone on the SNP Front Bench to inform the House about the discussions that have taken place so far, but the Smith agreement is clear and the promised process has not emerged.
This is not the proper process for which Smith asked. I understand that the issue was put on the table rather late in the day at the Smith commission and that it was agreed that there would be a proper process of discussion, debate and dialogue before any particular change is made to the constitution or the law.
Ian Murray
I do not disagree with the hon. Gentleman: that is the STUC’s view. The TUC takes a slightly different view. We have to be very careful, as the TUC points out, that we do not create a race to the bottom. As I have said, it strongly counsels against a race to the bottom.
Ian Murray
This amendment is about people paying a fee to enter the employment tribunal system. It would give the Scottish Parliament full control over how that system operates, under the legislative framework of the United Kingdom. That is how a lot of issues work, including health and safety and the Scottish courts system. That is how the justice system in Scotland, which has always been independent of the rest of the UK, operates and it is a perfectly fair way for devolution to work.
Amendments 159 and 160 relate to fixed odds betting terminals and the supervision, inspection and enforcement under the Gambling Act 2005. My hon. Friend the Member for Hyndburn (Graham Jones) might go into that in more detail if he catches your eye, Sir David.
I am not sure whether the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson) is in her place, but in an earlier sitting of the Committee, she mentioned that the Scottish Parliament controls much of road safety, but does not have legislative competence over pavement parking. As she did not table an amendment to sort that out, we brought forward new clause 22, which has the full support of the Living Streets charity, to rectify the anomaly. It intends to ensure that parking offences such as parking on pavements or by dropped kerbs and double-parking can be enforced by the Scottish Parliament. I am grateful to Living Streets for bringing this matter to our attention. Having spent a day blindfolded with the guide dogs in Corstorphine in Edinburgh, I think we should all take cognisance of the way in which people with sight problems are able to get around our towns and cities.
Clause 39 devolves Executive competence in relation to the policing of railways in Scotland by specifying as a cross-border authority the British Transport police authority. The clause is in keeping with the Smith agreement, but it was not part of the agreement that the British Transport police should be devolved in order that it may be abolished. That is what is being proposed by the Scottish Government, who want to transfer the existing functions of the British Transport police to Police Scotland. The abolition is vehemently opposed by the unions and the British Transport police, and their strong views should be taken into account. Will the Secretary of State comment on that issue?
Finally, new clause 63 calls for an assessment by the Low Pay Commission of the effect of the Scottish Parliament having the power to alter the national minimum wage rate for Scotland. The national minimum wage is one of the proudest achievements of the last Labour Government and we will defend it to the death. However, it has become a maximum wage for too many people and we must encourage the private sector to move beyond the minimum wage to a living wage. Low pay is one of the biggest political issues of our time, particularly in the run-up to the Budget, with the proposed cut to tax credits.
Mr MacNeil
I am anxious to know why Labour want control over the minimum wage in Scotland to be in the hands of the Tories.
Ian Murray
The minimum wage in Scotland is not in the hands of the Tories; it is in the hands of the Low Pay Commission.
Ian Murray
I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman realises this, but it is the Low Pay Commission that recommends the rate of the national minimum wage to the Government. As someone who sat on the Committee that considered the statutory instruments that implemented the recommendations of the Low Pay Commission, I say that I would like its recommendations to go further, but it is up to the commission to set the rates.
I say to the hon. Gentleman that we had a firm manifesto commitment to ask the Low Pay Commission to increase the national minimum wage over a period of time to 58% of median earnings. We have to be careful in this area. That is what new clause 63 is about. If he reads it, he will see that. We have to be extremely cautious about not undermining the national minimum wage by devolving it to Scotland. The new clause is perfectly clear about what we are trying to achieve. It asks the Low Pay Commission to complete a full analysis of the consequences of devolving this power.
If the hon. Gentleman does not believe me, he should look at what we received from the Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union today. It is promoting a £10 minimum wage, so it has no axe to grind in terms of our policy on 58% of median earnings, because it wants to go much higher. It has been campaigning on that rather successfully for some time. It says that devolving the national minimum wage to Scotland could enable the vision of the Prime Minister’s Government of lower pay in some regions to come true, particularly in northern constituencies and in Scotland. It states:
“We need to be extremely cautious over the…demand for devolving powers surrounding the minimum wage. This move would bring about an end to the national minimum wage”
in Scotland. We are saying that we need to be cautious. I ask the hon. Gentleman to read new clause 63 before he intervenes again. I will allow him to intervene again if he does so.
Ian Murray
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There is no bigger champion of workers’ rights, the national minimum wage and union rights in this place. We must deal with poverty pay. [Interruption.] If the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar wants to read new clause 63, I am happy to let him intervene again, but he obviously has not because he does not realise that new clause 63—[Interruption.] If he will allow me to explain, new clause 63 asks the Low Pay Commission to do a full analysis of the potential consequences of fragmenting the national minimum wage across the United Kingdom. That is something that Opposition Members of all colours should wish to see, because if we undermine the national minimum wage, we undermine the entire structure that is meant to prevent low pay in this country.
Mr MacNeil
It is terrible that Labour sees the national minimum wage only as something to be undermined; it is something that has to be bolstered. What does the hon. Gentleman think the effect would be on the national minimum wage in England, Wales and Northern Ireland if it were increased in Scotland by, say, 10%? It would drive it higher.
Ian Murray
In fact, what the hon. Gentleman has just said is exactly what it says in new clause 63, which tells the Low Pay Commission to look at the consequences. The consequence of undermining the political consensus on the national minimum wage would be fragmentation and a race to the bottom. The TUC is clear in its press release today:
“It is also a complete false economy… Breaking up the national minimum wage would carry similar risks, leaving workers in many parts of the country facing poorer pay in depressed local economies.”
It speaks of a potential “race to the bottom”. We should listen to the people who have fought for their entire lives for the national minimum wage. The difference between me and the hon. Gentleman is that he does not agree that everyone across the entire United Kingdom deserves better pay. The fight to eradicate poor pay in this country does not stop at the border.
David Mundell
If I could just finish my point.
I was interested to hear the rationale for the points made by the hon. Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens). In a previous day’s debate, an amendment was moved on why national insurance contributions should be devolved to the Scottish Parliament, yet not one Member spoke to that amendment or explained to the House why Scotland would benefit from the devolution of national insurance contributions.
The Committee stage has provided an opportunity for amendments to be put forward. I accept that some amendments are genuine and could, if adopted, make the Bill better. Some amendments have not been genuine amendments. We spent a long time debating full fiscal autonomy when it was quite clear that the SNP Scottish Government did not want to see the amendments relating to that passed. We have had a series of amendments laid before Parliament over the four days. I am giving an absolute commitment that we will reflect on them and come back on Report with amendments to the Bill.
I recognise that there have been many constructive contributions to today’s debate, not all by the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil) it has to be said.
David Mundell
A number of proposed technical changes could clearly improve the Bill.
Mr MacNeil
On a point of order, Mr Amess. The Secretary of State has named me and my constituency. Do I not have the right to intervene on him?
The Temporary Chair (Sir David Amess)
That is not a point of order; that is a point of debate.
Scotland Bill
Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts(9 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
New clause 3, which stands in my name, would deliver full fiscal autonomy, real home rule and a Scottish Parliament in control of everything save defence and foreign affairs. I am only a Back Bencher and I do not have the assistance of Government officials, so if the new clause is defective in technical detail, I apologise. If it were voted for tonight, however, it would establish a clear principle and a way forward.
The contention is clear: the new clause would deliver full fiscal autonomy. The Scottish Parliament would have full freedom to raise all taxes as it liked. It would not be restricted to fiddling around with bands; it would control all thresholds and all VAT dividends, and it would have full freedom to spend that money as it liked. That is what real Parliaments do, and that is why they are responsible.
The Scottish Parliament is constructed in a manner that is inherently conducive to the culture of grievance, and that would still be true even if the Smith commission proposals were adopted. The Scottish Parliament will raise only 50% of what it spends. Worse, under the 30-year-old, discredited Barnett formula, which even its conceiver condemned towards the end of his life, Scotland’s block grant will be based not on needs but on English levels of spending. No matter which tartan is chosen to clad the Scottish purse, the purse strings will still be controlled by England. That, I believe, has to change.
Following reports by the Office for Budget Responsibility and the Institute for Fiscal Studies, it has been said that Scotland faces a £7 billion black hole. Presumably, however, the SNP wanted independence in the next year. We cannot have an independent Parliament that does not have full fiscal autonomy, so let us have a real, informed debate about the figures.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
When the hon. Gentleman uses the term black hole, does he mean a deficit? When people talk about the UK’s deficit, they say “deficit”. When they talk about Scotland’s deficit, they say “black hole”. Why the use of pejorative language?
Sir Edward Leigh
It can be referred to as a deficit. We have listened to the Institute for Fiscal Studies and the Office for Budget Responsibility, so now let us have an informed debate.
I want to make it clear, by the way, that I am not in favour of cutting Scotland loose. I am in favour of United Kingdom solidarity, and I am in favour of a new grant mechanism, if the need for one is proven. My aim is not to trap the SNP, call its bluff or reveal its timidity. I genuinely want to give the Scots what they want: the freedom to run their own affairs and not to blame others if things go wrong, but all within the buttresses and safety of the United Kingdom. I am a fervent Unionist.
Sir Edward Leigh
My personal view, for what it is worth, is that if we are to create a sustainable Union we must, in effect, create full fiscal autonomy for Northern Ireland, for Wales, for Scotland and, ultimately, for England. This almost imperial Parliament would remain determining the support mechanisms to ensure safety. So, yes, in that sense I am a federalist.
Barnett is a gift to those who want to break up the Union. It is also incredibly expensive for the English, with £1,680 more a year spending per head in Scotland than in England because Scottish spending is inextricably linked to English spending. When that is cut, SNP Members quite understandably—I do not blame them for this; they are good politicians—can cry foul, as they did last week, and say, “The Scots people didn’t vote for austerity but it’s being imposed on us.” They can vote on every education and health measure, and say, “What you spend in England on health and education is going to determine what we spend.” We then get a crazy situation whereby if some taxes in Scotland are raised the grant will go down. This simply does not work. It is not a recipe for preserving the Union or for a sustainable future.
Mr MacNeil
The hon. Gentleman mentions the Barnett figures. He will of course point out, for completeness, that Barnett is only about two thirds of total spending. For further completeness, he will also point out, I am sure, that the Barnett figures for London and Northern Ireland are higher than those for Scotland.
Sir Edward Leigh
I do not want to get into a sterile debate about whether London subsidises Scotland or vice versa; I simply want to be fair and open. I am happy for Scotland to have all its oil. It can determine its oil policy and its level of taxation, and as the oil revenues decline, if they do decline, I am happy for the United Kingdom Government to step in and increase its grant.
Sir Edward Leigh
I hear what the hon. Gentleman says and nobody is suggesting that, even if my new clause 3 were passed tonight, full fiscal autonomy would start immediately. Of course there has to be a discussion and, inevitably, if oil revenues are declining, there has to be some sort of support mechanism from the United Kingdom Government. I say to SNP Members that they can have this new clause. Parliament is a democratic Assembly. I do not want to overplay my importance—I suspect the Whips might ensure that my new clause is defeated—but this is an historic opportunity to give full home rule to, and to establish that principle for, Scotland, which is what the Scottish people want.
Sir Edward Leigh
The hon. Gentleman is now going to tell the Committee that he supports my new clause.
Mr MacNeil
We seem to be very happy with the hon. Gentleman’s new clause at the moment, but he talks about support mechanisms as though they are unique to Scotland. Will he concede that the UK has itself been reliant on support mechanisms since 2001 and that it has not raised the taxes to match its expenditure since then?
Sir Edward Leigh
I am afraid we are getting into the historic arguments of who is to blame: is it the UK Government? The Scottish Government face a fundamental problem, in that spending is 20% higher but tax revenues are, inevitably, lower. That is a fundamental problem that SNP Members have to—[Interruption.] Well, I have lost them there—fair enough.
We can have that debate, but let us not get too bogged down on that. They want independence; they can have it—[Interruption]—full fiscal autonomy.
The fact is that the SNP’s capture of all but three of the Scottish seats is an even greater victory than Sinn Féin’s in Ireland in the 1918 general election. Then the Unionists managed to secure 22 of the 105 Irish seats. We have to listen: this is actually a very serious issue.
John Redwood
If SNP Members will allow me a little time, I will say things that they will like. I am not trying to make life difficult for them.
This is my analysis. In the referendum the SNP went for something more akin to home rule than what I would regard as full independence, but at that stage the Scottish people said no even to that. They seemed to say yes to the rather larger devolution of powers that the three main Unionist parties were then offering. However, we are now experiencing new circumstances.
Like my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh), who has tabled a very interesting amendment, I think that this Parliament must listen to the new voice of the Scottish people. It is clear that there has been a shift of opinion towards more home rule than the Unionist parties were offering at the time of the referendum. That is why we are here today, listening very carefully to what the SNP has to say, and that is why I think it extremely important for us to have this debate on full fiscal independence, or fiscal autonomy. It would be one way for our Parliament to respond when the Scottish people have said, “We do not want to be completely independent as a separate country, but we want much more self-government—or home rule—than was envisaged by the Unionist parties at the time of the referendum, because we can see that that was not very popular.”
The Unionist parties collectively did rather badly in Scotland come the general election. [Interruption.] Well, between them, they received just under half the vote, while the Scottish nationalist party received just over half the vote. Because the Unionist vote was split, practically no Unionist Members of Parliament were elected, but it is still the case that Scottish opinion is fairly evenly balanced. The Scottish nationalists did not get 70% or 80% of the vote. If they had done, then, as far as I am concerned, they would really be in a position to tell us the answer, but, as judged by the vote, they speak for only about half the Scottish people. However, as representatives, they speak for practically all the Scottish people because they have most of the Members in this place.
I am listening very carefully and will want to hear more about what SNP Members want, but I am also very conscious that, in parallel with this exercise on powers as set out in this Bill, in some way far more important negotiations are already under way on what the new financial settlement will be, and those are not yet being reported to this House. That is crucial not just to the SNP and its representation of the Scottish people, but to the people of England. I find the more home rule that is on offer and the more we hear the Scottish voice, the more I have to be an advocate not of the Union, but of England, because someone needs to speak for England and to say that the consequences of much enhanced Scottish devolution, and some fiscal devolution as well, are serious for England. England needs to be in the discussion just as Scotland does, as this is our joint country and a major change in its arrangements will have a fundamental impact on England.
While I am very attracted to the idea of my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough that it would be a shrewd move to, for once, get ahead of the Scottish appetite for home rule and on this occasion to grant full fiscal devolution, we need to ask how feasible that is and what the consequences will be for Scotland and England. If Scotland wishes to be part of common welfare and pension guarantees, some limitation is already imposed on the spending side of full fiscal devolution. We have to think about the position of England if cross-guarantees are being offered for some part of that welfare package. If we are going to proceed in the way the Government currently plan and the way the negotiations are currently being undertaken—as I understand it, there is an attempt to find a way of adjusting the block grant for Scotland to take into account the new Scottish responsibilities, as some items of spending will have to be added in as a result of the devolution of new functions, and there will be a reduction in the block grant to take account of those taxes that are now Scotland’s to fix and collect—therein lies an immediate problem.
Mr MacNeil
Would not an easier solution be for Scotland to collect its own tax, as Catalonia does, and then pay into the centre, rather than the centre paying out? The taxes should be raised by the Government of the territory paying the taxes and paid into the centre rather than giving them to the centre for it to then pay out. In that way, the centre will have to stop saying it is subsidising people when it returns their own taxes.
John Redwood
But if Scotland wisely decides to have lower tax rates to make itself more popular, the Union will be losing out if those lower tax rates collect less money.
Mr MacNeil
The right hon. Gentleman should realise that it is not lower taxes that have made the SNP more popular; it is better public services in Scotland—that has given us 50% of the vote versus his party’s 37%.
John Redwood
No, I do not think that we need a constitutional convention, because that would create endless delay and complications. I agree with previous comments that we are here to try to solve this problem for our respective constituents. I spent quite a lot of my time during the election speaking for England and saying that I wanted to ensure that England got a reasonable deal out of this. SNP representatives clearly did the same in relation to Scotland, and we both achieved similar levels of success in attracting lots of votes for what we were saying.
Mr MacNeil
The right hon. Gentleman talks about getting good deals for the various parts of the UK, but let us look at the wider British Isles. Does he think that the aggregate GDP of the British Isles would be as high as it is today without the full fiscal autonomy that the Republic of Ireland, the Isle of Man and the United Kingdom all enjoy? If the aggregate GDP of the British Isles is higher for those reasons, does he not agree that it will be higher still when Scotland achieves its full fiscal autonomy?
John Redwood
I start from the point of view of democracy. A democratic state has to have the full range of powers, including fiscal autonomy and its own currency. That is different from asking: what is your state? I would still rather have the United Kingdom as my state, but I have just explained that if it is the will of the Scottish people that the UK is no longer their preferred state, they must leave—of course they must.
Mr MacNeil
The right hon. Gentleman is being very kind in enabling our dialogue to continue. I am sure he would acknowledge that the UK functioned between 1603 and 1707, when the Parliaments were independent.
John Redwood
Well, it functioned after a fashion, but I would not have wanted to live through that time. The nations were clearly not nearly as rich as they are today. Labour Members sometimes try to pretend that we have gone back to an ancient age, but I am sure that none of them would willingly go back in time and live in that era, because we are obviously so much better off now.
Mr Graham Allen
Sir David, it is a great pleasure to see you in the Chair this afternoon. Like many colleagues, I had assumed that you would be in your green tights dancing around the maypole with many other dignitaries at Runnymede. [Interruption.] Yes, the thought does bring tears to the eyes. I am talking about a serious occasion, but it is, by necessity, a backward-looking, occasion. Eight hundred years ago, in what was a great leap forward in its time, Magna Carta was sealed, if not signed. What we have been hearing about today—and this has been a really superb debate so far by all parts of the House—is the next 800 years. We are certainly looking at the foreseeable future and at our democracy. One thing we cannot do is go back to business as usual. We have a majority party in the House, and we cannot just ram stuff through the Commons. We must consider all these sorts of Bills seriously.
I mean no offence when I say that the Scotland Bill is not the property of the people of Scotland let alone of the political parties of Scotland. The Scotland Bill is about the Union. Whether we are in a transitional period or whether we have another 800 years of happy family relationships is still to be decided. As we discuss this Bill, the local government devolution Bill, and the European referendum Bill, those colleagues who are new to the House—to all parts of the House—should be excited that they have come here at this moment. It is a time of immense potential. People from all parts of this House have expressed the view that we need to look at this matter seriously. The word “statesmanlike” has been thrown around quite a bit, but it is pertinent to this debate. What we do today and over the next four Mondays will be of great importance to all of us in the Union.
Mr MacNeil
As usual, the hon. Gentleman is making a thoughtful contribution. He said that the Scotland Bill is the property of the House, but he will recognise that the House has been forced, kicking and screaming to reach the point it is at the moment. In the previous Scotland Bill, an amendment was moved to devolve Crown estate control to Scotland, and the House would not agree to it. It has now conceded on that point because of the weight and the power of the votes from the people of Scotland and it has done so easily. Is it not a huge mistake for this place to give away too little too late and not to listen to the hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh)?
Mr Allen
I am probably one of the worst in this House for blaming Westminster. Westminster and, above all, Whitehall—that is a distinction that we can educate each other in over the next five years—deserve to have that blame attached to them, but the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues are now part of Westminster. They will need to use the Westminster system and to be a part of it, if only because they wish to get such Bills passed. The Bills that have been passed to free Scotland in the way that it needs to be freed up, that Nottingham, Leicester and Derby need to be freed up and that England, Wales and Northern Ireland need to be freed up have been passed by this place because of the efforts of people such as Donald Dewar and those who got the Scotland Act 2012 through and because of the efforts of all the parties in this House, who will, I hope, pass the Scotland Bill effectively through this Committee.
Mr Allen
If I may just make this point while I am thinking about it, I will then give way. If we continue that process, we might end up in a place that is better for everybody and we might end up with the sort of liberation of our localities and communities that we all want, whichever nation of the Union we represent.
Mr Allen
We all have a stronger common interest than we sometimes dare admit, and we certainly all have an interest in making devolution work. The bigger issues that I want to come on to concern some of the structures through which we might all work together to do some of that. Some were raised by my Select Committee, which was an all-party Committee of this House and proved that we can do other things and move forward on devolution.
Let us imagine where we might be in 20 years’ time with the federal Parliament, which this is. Even the strongest small c conservative—they can be found throughout the House—would not say that we will be in exactly the same place in 20 years as we are today. That would be inaccurate. We will definitely be in a different place. What will it look like? I suspect the position will unfold. It may not be devised at 10 o’clock tonight, as the amendments envisage, but there will be progress over those 20 years. What does it look like? For some it looks like separation or independence. For others, it looks like a Union refreshed and renewed. For me, it looks like my people in my area being allowed to make more decisions of their own as of right, not because people feel they are giving them a little play out of Westminster.
Mr MacNeil
I see that my patience has paid off and I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. Is not one of the problems, in yet another Scotland Bill three years after the previous one, that Westminster may give away a little bit here and a little bit there? Would it not be better to turn the telescope around and have the relationship that the Faroe Islands have with Denmark? They can take the powers that they want to take and it is not a big deal for Copenhagen to give Tórshavn those powers. In Westminster it seems a massive deal to give people control over the minimum wage in Scotland—a power that Labour blocked, for goodness sake. It should not be like that. If Scotland wants it, let Scotland take it and let this place be gracious about it.
Mr Allen
It is always good to knock off a quick anti-Westminster point, so I will join the hon. Gentleman and say that everything that he resents about Whitehall, I resent at least as much in so far as it impacts badly on one of the 10 poorest constituencies in the United Kingdom, so—I mean this in a friendly way—he does not need to lecture me about how inadequate Westminster and Whitehall are at freeing up and liberating people to get better jobs, improve skills and improve their schooling, all the things that all of us hold in common as we move forward.
What I am saying is that we need to figure out how progress that has been made in Scotland—massive progress, which I fully support—can be replicated, not just in a narrow sense of “This is good for us”, but if it is so good, how it can be good also for Wales, Northern Ireland and England.
Mr Allen
I am sure that I would be called to order if I went into too much detail on the pros and cons of a written constitution. Suffice it to say that reams and reams of judge-made law exist, but our citizens are not allowed to see the basis on which that framework is put into place.
Mr MacNeil
Further to the point of order made by the hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley), France knows that it is France, but the UK does not seem to know that it is the UK. That is an extraordinary state of affairs.
The Temporary Chair
Order. Again I say to the Committee that that is a point of argument, not a point of order.
Stewart Hosie
I welcome the hon. Gentleman to Parliament, but he does not need to jab his finger and point. The small business bonus has cut or reduced business rates for 80,000 people. At £640 million, the Scottish Government are delivering the most effective business rate tax relief across the whole of the UK. One could make a very strong case that we have ended a tax on ill health by removing prescription charges. The hon. Gentleman’s failure to know what he is talking about was why he was defeated in Angus by my hon. Friend the Member for Angus (Mike Weir).
So far, we have not heard a single speech as to why we should not have full fiscal autonomy. I am sure that one will come, but let me focus on that matter now. The objections that we have so far heard are rather odd and almost entirely without principle. In essence, in order to say no, our opponents fall back on one or two flawed analyses of the Scottish economy, which are basically snapshots of one particular point in time.
Mr MacNeil
Was that not an extraordinary intervention from the hon. Member for South Leicestershire (Alberto Costa)? The Conservative party wants to handcuff itself and not use any of its tax powers at all, as we heard from the Chancellor only last week. Does that not show the deep malaise of understanding? When we have tax powers, they are not used all the time. For instance, in the last Parliament, VAT was changed only once. Let us hope that the Conservatives do not use that power again. The point about having tax powers is to use the power that is necessary or important to use at a particular time. Tax powers are not used willy-nilly, as the hon. Gentleman’s own Chancellor has conceded.
Pete Wishart
I thank you, Sir David, for calling me to speak, and I thank my Back-Bench colleagues. Have not we been blessed on this first Committee day of the Scotland Bill? We have had contributions from the hon. Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope), from the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen)—who unfortunately is no longer in his place—and from the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones). What have we done to deserve such good fortune today? We have all very much enjoyed their speeches. This just goes to show how different these debates are now. My hon. Friend the Member for Moray (Angus Robertson) and I are veterans of Committee debates on Scotland Bills, and we remember the braying, the aggressive shouting down and the interventions by 40 Scottish Labour Members of Parliament. They are no longer here. This is the salutary lesson of today’s Committee debate. We are now in the new Scotland, which has made certain critical decisions about how it wants to be governed and how it wants to progress with its constitutional agenda. The challenge for this Government, and for those on the Labour Front Bench, is to respond to that. They can ignore my hon. Friends who are sitting on these Benches in such great numbers—we represent 56 of the 59 seats in Scotland—and they can ignore the fact that the SNP secured more than 50% of the vote. They can pretend that we do not exist and hope that we go away, but we are going nowhere. We are going to be here on Committee days, demanding that the Scottish people secure what they voted for in overwhelming numbers.
I support my hon. Friend the Member for Moray in setting out the three key principles that we are advocating. The critical one—the one that we have to secure—is that the Scottish people get what they voted for and what they expect from this House, which is to have the Smith commission proposals delivered in full, alongside everything that was promised to the Scottish people in what Gordon Brown, the former right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath, called the “vow plus”, including federalism and home rule.
Mr MacNeil
My hon. Friend mentions the vow plus and the promises made to the Scottish people. In reality, these powers are wanted not only by the yes voters but by the no voters as well. The fact is that 100% of the people of Scotland voted for these powers. Whether they voted yes or no, they voted for this.
Pete Wishart
My hon. Friend always gets right to the heart of the matter. We know that everything in this Bill that we have been trying to secure is supported by the Scottish people. It is also supported by the massed ranks of SNP Members here, and by the 60% of the Scottish people who want everything devolved to the Scottish Parliament other than foreign affairs, defence and treason. The hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) forgot to mention treason in his list of powers that would remain reserved. An opinion poll last week showed not only that we won more than 50% of the vote but that we are now on course to win 60% of the Holyrood vote next year. It showed that there is a clear desire to ensure that we move forward progressively.
I shall turn to the central issues in the Bill, starting with the permanence of the Scottish Parliament. That was about the most useful thing to emerge from the Smith commission’s report. It followed the vow that was reported in the Daily Record as stating that the permanence of the Parliament should be a predominant issue. We were disappointed that the draft Scotland Bill could not find an appropriate form of words to encapsulate that proposal. The thing that has struck me is the Scottish people’s surprise that this House could actually do away with the Scottish Parliament. I do not think that people really believed that that was the case. We have to resolve this issue.
The Scottish Parliament is now the key focus of the national debate on our nation and our political culture in Scotland. As we have continued to secure more and new powers for the Scottish Parliament, it has become an intrinsic feature of what we are about as a nation. The fact that this House can simply decide, perhaps on a whim, to abolish the Scottish Parliament is totally unacceptable to the Scottish people and has now to be put right. We have this one opportunity to address it by getting our amendment through this evening—we could sort this out.
I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) because he recognised that situation when he was Secretary of State for Scotland. He said—I paraphrase him and I will let him intervene if I have this wrong—that something must be done about it. It was then thrown over to the new Secretary of State to pick up; it now falls in his lap, and he has to address it and ensure that we get what we want, which is the permanence—
Pete Wishart
Sorry, I was expecting a bit more of a substantial contribution from the hon. Gentleman, and I am almost disappointed we did not get some more fulsome prose from him. I thought he made quite a good case for his new clause, but I say ever so gently to him that we favour our amendment, because it is the way we should be doing this. It seeks to give time for the Scottish Parliament to progress towards full fiscal autonomy. If we suppose Government Members are right that there is this huge deficit that we keep hearing about again and again, surely they should be working with us, through a fiscal framework, to work towards full fiscal autonomy. Surely what should happen is a process that starts by giving us the important early new powers—powers over the minimum wage, national insurance contributions and welfare. There is a process of moving towards this. If they are right about that, what is wrong with working with us to try to achieve and secure it? Surely that is how we should be doing this. As I have said, the themes are the same; oil and gas is a burden and a curse with independence, as it is with full fiscal autonomy. It is as though they have learned absolutely nothing, because these were the very themes put to the Scottish people during the general election campaign. I am not trying to speak for the Scottish people, but on the doorstep I was hearing that there is a tiredness and a deep despondency among the Scottish people at being told that they cannot do something, that they are in such a diminished position that we cannot take responsibility. That argument does not work any more. We have been through a process of national self-definition, of finding ourselves and of ensuring that we try to do something different.
Mr MacNeil
That despondency and disbelief among the Scottish people becomes even stronger when we look at those islands close to Scotland. The Faroe Islands, for example, have 50,000 people and full control of their taxes. The Isle of Man has 80,000 people and full control of its taxes. Scotland, which is the size of Denmark, cannot have full control of its taxes, because the Government say so. That time is now over.
Pete Wishart
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his intervention. He is a great champion and passionate advocate of the island nations. This evening, we invite this Committee to support us in the next stage of Scotland’s constitutional journey, which is about securing more powers, making our Parliament permanent, and granting full fiscal autonomy to our nation so that decisions about how we run our country are made in Scotland by the elected Members who represent the people of Scotland. Tonight, I invite the Committee to support us in that effort.
Mr MacNeil
At the time of the referendum, the yes side included full fiscal autonomy in its proposals. After the vow, the no side also included full fiscal autonomy. What has changed since the referendum that has made the no side resile from that? The vow was as near to federalism as possible, and it would have included full fiscal autonomy. Why does the hon. Gentleman now want to leave those powers in the hands of the Tories at Westminster rather than with the Parliament of the Scots in Edinburgh?
Ian Murray
There is a very simple answer to that question. We all want what is best for Scotland. The latter part of my speech sets out how full fiscal autonomy would be bad for Scotland according to all the information we have. We can either have a sensible debate in this Chamber about our fundamental principles on people’s lives and livelihoods in Scotland, or we can have a political knockabout on who will vote with who, who prefers who and who said what to whom during the referendum debate. The Bill is critical to future livelihoods in Scotland, and if all we can get from those on the SNP Benches is simple party point scoring we will get no further forward in improving the Bill.
To answer the question asked by the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil), we are here today because the vow put together the Smith agreement. The five political parties, including the SNP, which was represented on the commission, have come forward with proposals that are now in the Bill. Labour wants to take the Bill a little further. I keep emphasising that and I emphasised it consistently on Second Reading.
Ian Murray
I will give way to the hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford), who got in before the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar.
Ian Murray
This is the nub of the matter: if we try to scrutinise what would be a devastating policy for Scotland, we are accused of not being ambitious for Scotland. For the avoidance of doubt, that £7.6 billion is over and above the UK deficit. I agree with the hon. Lady that the Conservative Government made a complete shambles of getting rid of the deficit in the previous Parliament, breaking all their promises and only halving it. But the actual deficit—I have the IFS paper here—is not just £7.6 billion, but £7.6 billion over and above the current UK deficit, which is £14.2 billion. That is not a lack of ambition for Scotland, but a warning against a fiscal policy that would be folly for families up and down Scotland.
Ian Murray
I will give way to the hon. Gentleman, before he bursts a blood vessel.
Mr MacNeil
It is now clear that the policy of Labour’s Front Benchers is to leave Scotland’s tax powers in the hands of this Tory Government. The vow did not say that; the vow included full fiscal autonomy. Will the hon. Gentleman tell us when he changed his mind?
Ian Murray
The Bill before us will transfer nearly 50% of tax and 60% of spending to the Scottish Parliament. We promised to make it the most powerful devolved Parliament in the world, and that is a promise we will keep. As I have always said, we will ensure that the Bill is delivered in full, both in spirit and in substance. We will go further, as we will debate in Committee in due course.
Let me return to the £7.6 billion deficit—[Interruption.] I know that SNP Members do not like to talk about the £7.6 billion deficit, but it is important to get it on the record. It is unfortunate that they have consistently misquoted the figures from the Institute for Fiscal Studies, and indeed it has had to ask them to retract what they have said about its figures.
We have also heard no mention of the Office for Budget Responsibility’s oil report, which was published last week. It showed that the reliance on oil as an underpinning of the Scottish economy is no longer a viable projection. The collapse of revenues from oil will see the tax take from that source drop from £37 billion to just £2 billion over the 20-year period to 2040. That would be catastrophic for Scottish public finances. The question, then, is this: will SNP Members vote with the Tories to deliver what they want, as they have said they will do, or will they finally admit that their flagship policy of full fiscal autonomy is economically illiterate?
David Mundell
Today is the first of four days in Committee on the Scotland Bill. I assure the hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Tommy Sheppard), whose contribution I enjoyed, that I will be listening and reflecting. Contrary to the suggestion made by the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart), this is not the only opportunity for changes to be made to the Bill. I will be meeting the Devolution (Further Powers) Committee of the Scottish Parliament next week to discuss points that it has raised in its report.
I would not normally begin a contribution by suggesting that anyone read one of Gordon Brown’s books, but tonight I will do so. Gordon Brown has been misquoted a number of times in the Chamber today, and it is important to put on the record the fact that in his book “My Scotland, Our Britain: A Future Worth Sharing”, he states that neither his proposals nor those of any of the pro-UK parties involved a federal solution. Although they came close to the idea of home rule, they were not home rule. Therefore, it is a myth, which has been perpetuated this evening, that Gordon Brown has called for either federalism or home rule.
David Mundell
The hon. Gentleman has already spoken a great deal on the subject this evening. I would also like to see empirical evidence to back up the suggestion made by the hon. Member for Edinburgh East that the vow and the offer of additional powers made a significant change to the referendum result, because I do not believe that such empirical evidence exists.
David Mundell
What I am suggesting is that the hon. Gentleman cannot bring forward a shred of evidence to suggest that those proposals changed the referendum result and that somehow the people of Scotland have been defrauded. The people of Scotland voted decisively no in the referendum. They voted for a strong Scottish Parliament within the United Kingdom. The vow, which was set out in the Daily Record and other outlets, was taken forward on the basis of the Smith commission, of which the Scottish National Party was a part and to which it was a signatory. I received an interesting letter today from John Swinney, the Deputy First Minister of Scotland, who was a signatory to the Smith commission recommendations. He now tells me that the Smith commission recommendations, which he signed, were incoherent. I do not understand how he came to sign those recommendations if he genuinely believed that they were incoherent. If that was the case, he should have been making some of the arguments that we have heard this evening and during the general election campaign.
David Mundell
Not at this stage. The result of the general election represented a call from the people of Scotland for the delivery of the powers in the Smith commission recommendations. The Scottish National party set itself up as the voice of the people of Scotland to ensure that those powers were delivered, and they will be delivered in the Scotland Bill.