Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Lord Dodds of Duncairn and David Lidington(7 years, 6 months ago)
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Mr Lidington
We have always said that we would come up with some more details about our strategic aims going into the negotiation, but it would harm our national interest if we were to go into the sort of detailed explanation of our negotiating position that the Opposition urge upon us. That is not how any of the other 27 Governments are either acting or thinking, and we should learn from that example.
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
Does the Leader of the House agree that tonight’s vote on the Prime Minister’s amendment, which we fully support, is a vote of the highest significance and greatest importance, because for the first time right hon. and hon. Members will have the opportunity to vote on whether they respect the will of the people of the United Kingdom and whether they will get on and implement it? People will be able to read in tomorrow’s Hansard who stands by respecting the will of the people of the United Kingdom. Does he also agree—I am sure he will—that the more red, white and blue he makes it, the better for us on the Unionist Benches?
Mr Lidington
As so often, the right hon. Gentleman makes a powerful and important point. The vote tonight will be the first opportunity for Members to decide whether or not they support the Government’s timetable for triggering article 50 by the end of March 2017. Any right hon. or hon. Member who votes against that motion will, in my view, be seeking to thwart the outcome of the referendum in the most profoundly undemocratic fashion.
Business of the House
Debate between Lord Dodds of Duncairn and David Lidington(7 years, 7 months ago)
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Mr Lidington
I am glad that my hon. Friend has raised this matter, because the Chancellor announced in the autumn statement an additional £450 million to trial innovative digital rail signalling technology. The peninsula rail campaigners may be able to seek to benefit from that pot of money. I hope he will very much welcome, as a token of the Government’s commitment to the south-west, the £10 million of additional development funding announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer for the railway line from Exeter to Newton Abbot via Dawlish. I am sure all colleagues from the south-west will welcome that much needed work.
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
May we have a debate in Government time on openness and transparency within the BBC, so that we can explore its London-centric, anti-regions and anti-countries of the UK approach? Such an approach is exemplified by its nominations for the sports personality of the year, all but two of whom are from England and from which Carl Frampton—he has been recognised as the greatest boxer of the year, as a double world champion at two different weights—has been excluded, causing outrage across the communities in Northern Ireland. A debate on people’s ever growing concern about the BBC would be very timely.
Mr Lidington
The right hon. Gentleman makes the point powerfully. As he would expect me to say, the BBC is and rightly should remain independent of ministerial direction. However, I think the entire House will want to salute the contribution that sportsmen and women from Northern Ireland make to our national success, and long may that continue to be the case.
UK’s Relationship with the EU
Debate between Lord Dodds of Duncairn and David Lidington(8 years, 5 months ago)
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Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
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Mr Lidington
My hon. Friend has been consistent, at least, in his opposition to British membership of the European Union for many years, regardless of the terms that Ministers suggested for such membership. I believe that he is wrong, because the kinds of institutional and legal changes proposed in these texts indicate a very different approach to the European Union—an approach that is much more grown up and accepting of the diversity of the Union today than ever before.
Mr Nigel Dodds (Belfast North) (DUP)
On several occasions so far, the Minister has referred to the process being ongoing. He has talked about taking another step and said that we have not reached the end yet, that the negotiations continue and that there is hard work to be done. Can he outline the areas in which Her Majesty’s Government are pressing for more? Are they asking for any more, or is this it as far as the British Government are concerned, and we are just waiting for others to respond?
Mr Lidington
The scope for the renegotiation was set out in the Prime Minister’s letter to President Tusk last December, and the document that we have today is a working set of negotiating texts. When the right hon. Gentleman examines them in detail, he will see that various passages are square bracketed, where there is an indication that no agreement has yet been reached. There is work still to be done on those areas.