Scotland Bill

Debate between Ian Murray and Pat McFadden

Monday 9th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr McFadden]

The House is very pressed for time.

We have had experience of what happens in those circumstances. We know that 10 women a day have travelled here from the Republic of Ireland because of the different legislative frameworks. I do not predict that that will happen in this instance, but the new clause allows for the possibility. The logic was right before. There is no logic in allowing for two legislative frameworks 18 years on.

[Ian Murray]

It is a pleasure to talk to our new clauses and amendments on this part of the Bill. We have a lot of ground still to cover in this short debate, but it is important to state at the outset that crucial welfare clauses in this Bill deliver on the vow and the Smith agreement in both spirit and substance. That was not the case before the Government tabled their latest tranche of amendments last Monday. That is why, as my SNP colleagues rightly highlighted earlier, the deputy leader of the Scottish Labour party said that the vow had not been met, and indeed the architect of the vow, the right hon. Gordon Brown, the former Prime Minister, made exactly the same points. However, now that the amendments are before the House, we believe that the benefits issue has been resolved and that therefore the vow has been delivered. This is a crucial victory for the Scottish Parliament, the importance of which cannot be overstated. I said at the end of the Committee stage that if the Government did nothing else they should concede to my amendment 31 to allow the Scottish Parliament the power effectively to design its own social security system. Their new clause 34 does that, and we will support them on it.

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[Ian Murray]

I shall move on, because we are running out of time—[Interruption.] We have already heard complaints about the restricted time for the debate. I would have thought, given that we agree on the welfare provisions, that the braying mob on the SNP Benches would have taken a little time to run through some of them.

Now that the Secretary of State has come round to Labour’s way of thinking on the power to create new benefits, the Bill strikes the right balance between reserved and devolved areas. The Smith agreement said that the welfare state and the social security system should remain shared across these islands. New clause 3, whose provisions are linked to new schedule 1, would provide for a cross-Parliament Committee on welfare devolution to oversee the transition and implementation of welfare powers transferred by the Bill. That would go some way towards resolving the point raised by the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Callum McCaig). The Scottish Council on Voluntary Organisations has welcomed the new clause, stating that it is a

“pragmatic proposal given the need to ensure continuous, timely delivery of social security payments to those who receive them.”

It goes without saying that any new Committee must be open and transparent. We have already seen the Scottish Government claiming that they might reject the Scotland Bill if the secretive fiscal framework is not to their liking. We cannot afford for that to happen with these important welfare provisions.

Turning to new clause 5, I have said that Labour’s key aim is to deliver in full on the recommendations of the Smith agreement, but we are prepared to go beyond it if we see a reasonable argument for doing so. The new clause goes beyond the agreement in seeking to devolve the childcare element of universal credit to the Scottish Parliament.

Amendments 21, 22 and 23 cover another area in which I believe we should go beyond the Smith agreement’s recommendations—namely, making payments to individuals who have been sanctioned. The hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Dr Whiteford) mentioned this in her eloquent speech. The Labour party is committed to reviewing the UK sanctions regime, the punitive nature of which is beginning to spiral out of control, forcing people into destitution on the back of draconian DWP targets. That is why we believe that the Scottish Parliament should have the power to make payments to individuals who have had payments unfairly reduced, suspended or withdrawn due to the UK Government’s sanctions regime.

We have also tabled amendments 24 and 25, which I shall address alongside Government amendments 77 and 78. These all concern the perceived existence in the Bill of a UK ministerial veto in relation to the regulation-making powers for universal credit being transferred to the Scottish Parliament. I am grateful that the Secretary of State has again listened, not only to the Labour party but to the SNP, on this issue. The Government have now redrafted the relevant clauses and removed the perceived veto. When I wrote to the Secretary of State asking him to confirm this, he gave me an assurance that the UK Government would have a “legal obligation” to implement any changes made by Scottish Ministers.

I welcome the Secretary of State’s amendments 70 and 71, which will remove the restrictive definitions relating to carer’s allowance, but I am disappointed that he has not removed the similar definitions in relation to disability allowance, as many of the disability charities in Scotland requested. Amendment 194 offers an alternative broader and more flexible definition of disability benefits, and I hope that if the Secretary of State cannot give us a satisfactory answer on this matter tonight, we will pursue it in the other place at the Bill’s next stage.

Let me deal briefly with the issue of abortion, making it clear from this Dispatch Box that nobody in this Chamber is saying that the Scottish Parliament does not have the capacity or indeed the responsibility to deal with abortion. The Smith agreement said that there would be a process, and, as we have heard eloquently this evening from my right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper), the devolution of abortion has to be dealt with properly and sensitively. The Secretary of State avoided my intervention earlier. He said in this House in July that the Smith agreement did not allow for the devolution of abortion at this stage and it would not be in this Bill, but that a proper process would be put in place to ensure that it is done sensitively, properly and in consultation with women’s organisations in Scotland. I do not think that his frantically calling round women’s organisations in Scotland on the day he tables the amendment is satisfactory consultation or that it takes into account the issues that many women in Scotland have contacted me about.

This is not about the time limit for abortion; this relates to the entire complex matrix of the legislation that sits behind abortion. It is about the issues relating to the criminality of abortion, the authorisation of abortion and where abortions can be carried out. It is not just about 24 weeks; it is about much more than that. The Secretary of State should reflect on the fact that a proper consultation needs to be put in place, otherwise he is in danger of doing something incredibly dangerous to abortion in this country.

[Mr McFadden]

The Secretary of State has said time and again when taking interventions that the Scottish Parliament has the capacity to legislate on abortion. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is a question not of whether there is capacity, but of whether or not it is desirable to have two different legislative regimes for this in Scotland and England?

[Ian Murray]

Regardless of who legislates for it, we may end up with different legislative regimes on either side of the border. I am perfectly confident in the Scottish Parliament, and I take the First Minister’s word that she will not change the regulations, but that is not to say that the regulations down here might not change and we end up with abortion tourism. Nobody wants that across the United Kingdom, and my right hon. Friend, who took the Scotland Act through this place—

[Mr McFadden]

No, I did not.

[Ian Murray]

My right hon. Friend did not take it through this place but he was heavily involved in it, and he knows about the issues relating to abortion and the position taken.

Amendment 26 makes it explicit that, among the exceptions to reserved matters on equal opportunities, the power to set gender quotas is being devolved to the Scottish Parliament. The Labour party takes this issue very seriously, and we thank Women 50:50 for helping us with these issues. I also commend amendment 225.

We now have a welfare section in this Bill that is in line with the Smith agreement. Everyone in this Chamber should be incredibly proud of that achievement and now we must move on to the debate about how we use these powers.