Exiting the EU: New Partnership

Debate between David Davis and Baroness Hoey

Thursday 2nd February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

If my hon. Friend reads the rest of that chapter, he will see that we will exclude ourselves from the common commercial policy and common external tariff, which amounts to exactly what he says.

[Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)]

I welcome the principles in the White Paper, particularly around protecting and enhancing existing workers’ rights. Will the Secretary of State confirm that there is nothing to negotiate with the other EU countries on workers’ rights because they already exist in our law and will be protected? The people who have been going around saying that such rights are threatened should be told that they are not.

[Mr Davis]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. The Government’s approach is to maintain every single piece of employment protection that exists now, which incidentally is much better than that of most European countries, and to enhance it. There should be no concern about that at all.

Article 50

Debate between David Davis and Baroness Hoey

Tuesday 24th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

What it requires is leaving the European Union, and that is what we are going to do.

[Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State accept my view that the public want us to get on with this and actually carry out what they voted for? Does he also accept that while they will not look lightly on amendments that are tabled, particularly by parties that actually want another referendum, to delay things unnecessarily, they do perhaps want amendments that clarify the situation and make us all more aware of the Government’s intentions?

[Mr Davis]

The hon. Lady, as ever, goes right to the heart of the matter. The public will not view well attempts to thwart, delay or confuse this process. They will view well attempts to elucidate what is going on, to promote the national interest, to help the negotiating position and so on, and that is entirely what the Government are going to do.

New Partnership with the EU

Debate between David Davis and Baroness Hoey

Tuesday 17th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

The referendum last year set in motion a circumstance where the UK is going to leave the European Union, and the vote will not change that. We want to have a vote so that the House can be behind and support the policy that we are quite sure it will approve of when we get there.

[Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)]

I welcome the Prime Minister’s speech today in the sense that it gives certainty to the millions of Labour supporters who voted to leave and now know that, “Taking back control”, is not just a slogan but actually means something. Will the Secretary of State assure us that in this interim period before we leave the EU, we will continue to work to negotiate trade deals with other countries—some of which might be nearly finished—so that we are ready to go when we actually leave?

[Mr Davis]

Of course we will do that; the hon. Lady is entirely right. We are constrained by a thing called the duty of sincere co-operation, which requires us not to do things that jeopardise actions by the European Union, so if the European Union currently has a trade deal in negotiation, we have to be very careful about how we impact on that. Of course we cannot actually sign anything until the day we leave, but I have a very strong suspicion that there will be a lot of things ready to sign on the very next day.

Parliamentary Scrutiny of Leaving the EU

Debate between David Davis and Baroness Hoey

Wednesday 12th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

It is astonishing how linear, or black and white, some Members think this is. We have Norway, which is inside the single market and outside the customs union; we have Turkey, which is inside the customs union and outside the single market; and we have Switzerland, which is not in the single market but has equivalent access to all of its productive and manufacturing services. There is not a single entity, but a spectrum of outcomes, and we will be seeking to get the best of that spectrum of outcomes.

[Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State will know that, throughout the country, when this issue was being discussed, the British public knew that membership of the single market meant free movement of labour. That was one of the basic principles behind why people, in their millions, voted to leave. Is it not time that we straightforwardly said that we want the fullest possible access to the single market, but that we cannot, if we are going to stop free movement, which is what the people of this country wanted, be members of the single market?

[Mr Davis]

Broadly, the argument about full access and control of our borders is an argument that the Prime Minister has already made in the last few weeks, so I do not think I need to elaborate on it. However, let us understand something about this—sometimes, we seem to be arguing over which end of the egg we open first. The argument between us is where the dividing line is on what we tell Parliament about. The hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras recognised in terms, I think, that we could not give every detail to Parliament and that, despite his letter, we could not give a blow-by-blow account—that we could not have Parliament dictate how we dealt with the trade-offs, the terms and so on. [Interruption.] Despite the noise to his right, it is fairly plain that that is what the criterion is; that is where the problem is.

Let us be clear how this applies. If someone tells their opposite number in a negotiation exactly what their top priority is, that will make that top priority extremely expensive. Ordinary people, in their ordinary lives, probably do one big transaction themselves, and that is the purchase of a house. If someone went to buy a house, and they looked at only one house, told the owner that they were in love with that house and made a bid for it, I suspect the price would go up.

Exiting the European Union

Debate between David Davis and Baroness Hoey

Monday 5th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

My hon. Friend the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee is right, and this is fundamental to one of the points I was making in my earlier remarks. There are very strong security, foreign affairs, foreign policy and environmental relationships, and a whole series of other relationships, that will continue to apply long after we have left the EU, to the benefit of both the EU and the UK.

[Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)]

I warmly welcome the Secretary of State to his new position and I know that millions of Labour voters and supporters across the country who voted to leave will be pleased that there is someone in this position who genuinely wants to get out of the EU. Will he confirm that there is a real difference between wanting to be members of the single market and wanting to have access to the single market, and that some of the remainers should learn that?

[Mr Davis]

The hon. Lady is right, and of course access to the single market is not really up for grabs; it is there for everybody and, frankly, there are many countries outside the EU that do a better job of exporting to the single market than we do, even without a trade arrangement. So of course we want to have access to the single market and we do not need to be a member of it to do that. Indeed being a member of it is what has caused some of the problems of sovereignty that drove this referendum.