Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Clark of Kilwinning and Sandra Osborne

Wednesday 7th May 2014 Commons Chamber

[Katy Clark (North Ayrshire and Arran) (Lab)]

2. What discussions he has had with his ministerial colleagues on the effects of housing benefit changes in Scotland.

[Sandra Osborne (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (Lab)]

9. What discussions he has had with his ministerial colleagues on the effects of housing benefit changes in Scotland.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (David Mundell)]

I have had regular discussions with ministerial colleagues about the effect of housing benefit changes in Scotland, and in particular about the application of discretionary housing payments to those affected by the removal of the spare-room subsidy. Those discussions led to the announcement on Friday 2 May that the setting of the limit for such payments could become the responsibility of the Scottish Government.

Housing Benefit

Debate between Baroness Clark of Kilwinning and Sandra Osborne

Wednesday 26th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Sandra Osborne]

I do indeed, and the policy is putting more pressure on the housing service, not taking it away. I also fear for those who have struggled to pay the bedroom tax, because I know fine well they cannot afford it. I worry about where they are getting the money from, and whether it is pushing them in other directions such as food banks or very high-interest loans. It is not possible for me to over emphasise the fear, concern and anger that the bedroom tax has caused, together with the Atos debacle and the fact that people are being suspended from benefits at the drop of a hat.

[Katy Clark (North Ayrshire and Arran) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend’s constituency is similar to mine. Is it her experience that the people who come to see her about the bedroom tax are disproportionately the disabled and carers, and does she agree that it is particularly distressing for those groups?

[Sandra Osborne]

That is one thing that causes a great deal of anger among those affected, and also among the general public in my constituency, who happen to be very caring people. When she sums up the debate, will the Minister confirm whether the Government intend to retain the Scottish welfare fund?

We are here to talk about the sheer ineffectiveness and shambolic implementation of the bedroom tax. What kind of policy requires mitigation for more than half the people affected? Some 70% of applications have been approved for discretionary payment, with more applications all the time in one of my areas. The revised budget will be fully spent by the end of the year—there is no big surplus, as was inferred earlier.

Scottish Referendum (Trident)

Debate between Baroness Clark of Kilwinning and Sandra Osborne

Thursday 7th March 2013 Westminster Hall

[Katy Clark]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention, but I will not stray too far down that avenue. I suspect that that would move us away from the subject of today’s debate, about which you might have something to say, Mr Bone. However, he makes the powerful point that the Scottish Government must be aware that if they succeed in persuading the Scottish people to vote for independence next year, there will be implications in a range of areas.

[Sandra Osborne]

Does my hon. Friend agree that if there were unresolved bitterness about Trident between a newly separate Scotland and the rest of the UK, that would affect all the negotiations and influence our international partners—for example, in relation to any application to join the EU?

[Katy Clark]

My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. The Scottish National party often forgets that not only will England, Wales and Northern Ireland have views on this issue, but many other European countries will be interested in the internal implications for themselves. For example, Spain may not want to create the precedent of allowing one part of a current member country of the European Union an easy process for continuing to be a member of the EU, given that it has to deal with situations such as the one in Catalonia.

The general point is that we cannot presume that negotiations would be easy on all matters if Scotland voted for independence. The hon. Member for Angus (Mr Weir), who spoke on behalf of the Scottish National party, therefore needs to think about his comment that it would be laughable for an independent Scotland to have to take at least a share of the cost of relocating Trident. Whatever the Scottish National party’s views about what is a reasonable negotiating position, it should be aware that it might have to negotiate with people with very different views.

That is one reason why there has been a great deal of speculation in Scotland about whether the Scottish National party would honour its position of not having nuclear weapons in Scotland if we became independent. I very much hope that it would: we should not have nuclear weapons in any part of the United Kingdom. I would therefore be sympathetic to much of what the hon. Gentleman said about the implication for jobs, if we were talking only about Trident. Of course, a whole range of work has been done on which people employed at Faslane and Coulport are related strictly to Trident and its replacement, and which are related to other military activities that currently take place in Scotland but may not continue to do so.

As I said in my intervention on the Chair of the Select Committee, there is now an incoming fleet of seven Astute class submarines, eight Sandown class minehunters and the administrative headquarters of the Royal Navy in Scotland, northern England and Northern Ireland. As the Chair said, further work will come to that area as a result of our union with the other constituent parts of the United Kingdom.

The hon. Member for Angus said that the defence budget for an independent Scotland would be about £2.5 billion. It would be interesting to hear at some point—perhaps from his colleague, the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart), or from the Scottish Government—exactly what that would look like and mean, particularly for the areas affected should Scotland decide to become independent and to withdraw Trident, given what the Ministry of Defence has said about the implications of that on other parts of military policy.

I am grateful to have had the opportunity to speak in this debate. It is an important debate for Scotland, because the reality is that the Scottish National party’s policy on Trident has been successful for it over many years. In Scotland, there is a very different tradition on such issues than there is in other parts of the United Kingdom. In opinion polls, the replacement of Trident has consistently been unpopular. Indeed, over many decades, many people in Scotland have opposed nuclear weapons. Whether we go back to the 1950s and 1960s, with the demonstrations against Polaris, or the 1980s, with those against both Cruise and of course Trident, which was brought in afterwards, the anti-nuclear movement has been very strong in Scotland.

For the purposes of this debate, whether people are for or against nuclear weapons should not be a reason for taking one side or the other on independence. If Scotland decide to become independent, we would still be grappling with the same issues and having to deal with other parts of this country. I therefore say to the Scottish National party that as much honesty and information as possible in this debate would be in everybody’s interest and ensure that the people of Scotland can make an educated choice when the time comes.