Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Liz Saville Roberts and Boris Johnson

Wednesday 30th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend, who does a superb job of representing his constituents. My own footballing skills are—[Interruption.] I can do it, Mr Speaker, and I enjoy it, but the most important thing is to have a team that is united and will deliver a great future for this country. That is what we offer, and I am afraid it is in sharp contradistinction from the Labour party, because last night more than 100 of them could not even be bothered to vote for a general election, which they are shortly about to contest. What kind of confidence is that in their leader?

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

Ni fyddwn yn gweld eich tebyg eto yn y Tŷ hwn a byddwn yn gweld eich eisiau, Mr Speaker: I do not think we will see your like again, and we will miss you in this House.

We are coming to the close of nine years of Tory misrule, misinformation and broken promises. Leading us in this merry dance is the Prime Minister, a lord of misrule at this shambolic Christmas election. But my party has long been prepared for this election. In Wales we have a simple choice: we can back our country by voting Plaid Cymru or be let down once again by one of these deeply divided Westminster parties that offer nothing but more Brexit chaos. Will the Prime Minister be honest for once with Wales: there is only one way out of the chaos, isn’t there, and that is to remain in the European Union?

[The Prime Minister]

I thank the right hon. Lady for her beautiful Welsh—although I could not get all of the Welsh—but I remind her that the most important point that she might bear in mind is that her constituents, the people of Wales, voted to leave the European Union. And that is what the people of this country voted for; that is what the majority of the constituents of those on the Benches opposite voted for, and it is high time that they honoured that promise.

Prime Minister’s Statement

Debate between Liz Saville Roberts and Boris Johnson

Saturday 19th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The better angels of the Leader of the Opposition’s nature may still agree with that position; my impression is that he has been in some way captured and held hostage by those who wish to convert the Labour party into the party of revoke, and of dither and delay, a second referendum, more turmoil, and more uncertainty for business for years to come.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

The Prime Minister asks us with passionate words to vote with our hearts for his deal, but my head cannot get round the fact that we are being asked to accept his words in trusting ignorance of their full implications, and my heart tells me that the people of Wales will never be well served by his Government; we are only ever an afterthought to this Prime Minister. He has refused to share the impact assessments, and he revealed this 535-page legal text for us to comprehend only today. How could Plaid Cymru ever support his billionaires’ Brexit?

[The Prime Minister]

It seems to me that the right hon. Lady may conceivably have made up her mind about the 535 pages that she has in her hand before she scrutinised every word of the text. I am a fan of hers, but I gently remind her that, as she and I both know, Wales voted to leave. She should respect that.

Brexit Negotiations

Debate between Liz Saville Roberts and Boris Johnson

Thursday 3rd October 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

That is exactly what we intend to do. The purpose of this deal and these proposals is to get Brexit done and for us all to move on as a country and move on together. I believe that they represent a very good way forward for the UK. They will enable us to do free trade deals and to regulate our own laws and our own system. Above all, they will enable the UK to leave the EU, as the people of this country were promised, whole and entire, and to protect our precious Union with Northern Ireland.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

The Prime Minister’s blame game goes down very well on the stage-managed Tory conference platform, but I wonder whether he has stress-tested the technical details of his proposals on the UK’s constitution—or did he require only the DUP’s consent? I note that his proposal claims to equip the Stormont Assembly with the levers to control the direction of Northern Ireland’s national question. Does he not agree that this sets an interesting precedent for the Senedd to be equipped to review Wales’s constitutional relationship with Westminster every four years, too? Or does just he hope and pray that somebody will stop him?

[The Prime Minister]

As the right hon. Lady knows, there is a unique situation in Northern Ireland under the Good Friday agreement, and what we are proposing today gives this country the opportunity to develop and intensify that, but I am willing to listen to her pleas for the Senedd and I will consider them closely.

Prime Minister's Update

Debate between Liz Saville Roberts and Boris Johnson

Wednesday 25th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my right hon. Friend. I will not only try to imitate Horatio Nelson; I will lash myself to the mast, figuratively speaking, like Odysseus and stop my ears to the siren cries of those opposite who would try to frustrate the will of the people and block Brexit. That is what they want to do, but we are not going to let them do it.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

May I congratulate Opposition leaders on their resilience and resoluteness of intent in the face of the Prime Minister’s incontinent goading? This Government will abide by legislation to extend article 50 unless this House decides otherwise.

The Supreme Court decided that the Prime Minister did not prorogue this place in order to deliver a Queen’s Speech but to stymie parliamentary debate. I would not presume to impugn the honour of the Prime Minister, but the Supreme Court clearly does not believe his motives to be—how can I put this?—legitimate.

In 2004 the Prime Minister, who was then the Member of Parliament for Henley—

G7 Summit

Debate between Liz Saville Roberts and Boris Johnson

Tuesday 3rd September 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend, who has pursued this line of thinking for many months. I must say that I think there is a better and more elegant way of doing this. We can excise the offending bits of the treaty. We can make a great deal of progress. We can have a new treaty. It will be a vast improvement. I think that Opposition Members should look forward to that and should be encouraging and supportive of this Government’s efforts in getting us out of the EU in a way that they voted for time and time and time again.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

The Prime Minister insists the UK will be ready for no deal, while at the same time duplicitously using threat to force the European Union to cave in to his non-existent alternative arrangements. Will he admit that a no-deal scenario would be catastrophic, or will he continue to face both ways—deceive the public and use no deal for his own electoral gain?

[The Prime Minister]

I am afraid I do not agree with what the right hon. Lady said about no deal. As I said on the steps of Downing Street, I think there will be bumps on the road, but this is a very great country and a very great economy, and we will get it done. I am afraid that the most fatal thing to getting a deal is for this country to show that it is so apprehensive about coming out on other terms as to accept anything that the EU prescribes. That is, I am afraid, the course down which the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) is beckoning us to go. That would be a disaster.

Priorities for Government

Debate between Liz Saville Roberts and Boris Johnson

Thursday 25th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question. The simple and short answer is yes, and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health is only too happy to talk to him at his earliest convenience.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

Diolch yn fawr, Lefarydd. Data shows that the Prime Minister faces a binary choice: delivering Brexit on 31 October or maintaining his grip over the four nations of the United Kingdom. He can indulge in bombast and gesticulation all he likes, but the facts are irrevocable, so can he confirm to me, which is his heart’s desire: leaving the European Union or retaining the United Kingdom? He has to pick one, do or die.

[The Prime Minister]

Diolch yn fawr, Mr Speaker. My short answer to the right hon. Lady is that, of course, the people of the whole United Kingdom voted to leave the EU, and the people of Wales, to the best of my knowledge, voted emphatically to leave the EU, and that is what we will do.