Brexit: Withdrawal Agreement and Political Declaration

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

Thursday 10th January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I will focus my comments on three issues: the impact of this agreement on the Yorkshire region, the effect on local government, and UK citizens living in the EU.

Yorkshire has a population of over 5 million. Its businesses include a substantial manufacturing base, a fishing industry on the east coast, farming in North Yorkshire, a strong financial sector in Leeds, renowned universities with significant interests in EU-funded research projects and a fine cultural sector. Each of these businesses anticipates a negative impact from Brexit with a deal and some a disastrous impact with no deal.

The West Yorkshire Combined Authority has reported its concerns for the future replacement funding of the current €396 million that supports regional economic growth. This fund has enabled the installation of a superfast fibre-optic broadband network across more than 500 different postcode areas to boost business. That EU funding provides a very large resource that may no longer be available, and it will hit the prosperity of a region whose household income is already below the national average. For many Members of this House, losing a few quid here and there will make no difference. For people where I live, losing a few quid here and there makes the difference between existing and just surviving.

Individual local authorities are also trying to mitigate the significant risks that leaving the EU will bring. Kirklees Council, on which I sit, has evaluated those risks. These include the prospect that the economic downturn will significantly affect business investment and survival, and hence business rates income to fund council services. The assessment is that housebuilding will decline again, failing people who desperately need a home. Then there is the inability of employers in health and social care to fill vacancies and provide care because EU citizens, on which the care sector depends, are returning to their home countries. All these, and more, will result in even more pressure on council services that are already stretched to breaking point.

In addition, there are two particular areas of concern. The first is for the waste disposal side of the council’s statutory functions. Currently, waste can, and is, shipped to EU countries—for example, for the recycling of plastics. Waste approvals post-March 2019 will not be valid, and plastics and other waste materials will no longer be able to be sent to EU countries. There is a big question mark over what happens to this waste material when government inaction means that our own plastic recycling sector may be unable to cope.

Secondly, as this House is aware, there has been a rise in all forms of hate crime since the referendum in 2016; this has not abated. Community cohesion is, and will be, challenging for those of us who strive to see all people treated equally and with dignity. As the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury has said, this is indeed a moral issue.

Individual lives are being, and will be, profoundly affected by the decisions that we are making. Many Members of your Lordships’ House will have family members who have taken advantage of the freedom of movement to live and work in the EU. I want to end with the reflections of young people from the UK who are part of the vibrant, new classical music scene in Germany. This is what they say:

“I am living with immense uncertainty, not knowing how my circumstances are going to change. It is very stressful.”


“Will I be able to continue working Europe-wide? Currently, I’m able to move freely and easily between different European countries for work.”


“What will this mean for my colleagues working in the music field? Are we going to have to get a visa every time we have a concert in another European country?”


Finally:

“Even though I and many hundreds of thousands of others have chosen to live in another EU country, we are still British citizens. We exercised our right to freely move, live, study and work in a new country. Brexit is putting our new lives in jeopardy.”


These young people and thousands of others are not outside Parliament shouting the odds, but their voices must be heard too.

We are in danger, as a country, of listening only to the most outspoken, the most bellicose, the most threatening. Parliament has a duty to hear and respond also to the voices of those who have taken advantage of the freedoms the EU has enabled. The decision we make will profoundly affect individual lives, including the future for our children and grandchildren. The greatness of our country lies in an outward-looking, co-operative pragmatism. We are in grave danger of creating a lesser country, one that is insular and introspective. I cannot and will not support that direction of travel. People in 2016 did not vote to harm their neighbours. They did not vote for a mean-minded country. People have a right to review the decision. Parliament must give them that opportunity in a people’s vote.