United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Alan Brown Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution & Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion & Programme motion: House of Commons
Monday 14th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP)]

In a “specific and limited way” is how the Prime Minister uses the words integrity and good faith. When the Bill was launched, an establishment newspaper in Scotland called it a day of national shame and infamy. It was right. With malice aforethought, the UK Government are breaking international law and breaking devolution. We reject the Bill and will never support legislation that breaks international law.

The Bill clearly threatens food and environmental standards, and opens up a race to the bottom in all aspects of life in Scotland, from the water we drink to education and health. It leaves our businesses uncertain and wary. It is no wonder that in Scotland, poll after poll shows that it is now the majority view that independence is not only the way to ensure the needs of the people of Scotland are delivered, but the only way to protect the Scottish Parliament. The Bill is emblematic of a Government with no regard for, or will to work with, devolution. It is a bare-faced power grab. The Scottish Tory leader has boasted that he will vote for the Bill tonight. In his other job, he runs the line; in this job, he crosses the line.

Clause 46 completely undermines the devolution settlement by stripping spending powers away undemocratically from the Scottish Parliament, jeopardising the current Barnett funding levels. We know only too well, as was mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford), the consequences of allowing Tory Governments control of our spending, from when the highlands lost out to shore up votes in the south of England.

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

Is it not a fact that over a 10-year period the Scottish block grant has been cut by the Conservative Government, and these measures give free rein for the UK Government to make further cuts to the Scottish block grant and to impose their spending in Scotland, such as through this stupid Boris Brexit that nobody wants?

[Drew Hendry]

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. The people of Scotland are wise to these tricks and can see the utter contempt that this Tory Government have for their needs. Their Parliament will once again be ignored, in spite of that Parliament voting 92 to 31 against the White Paper for this Bill. The response of this Tory Government is as self-defeating as it is petty and harmful. Do not take my word for it. As the House has heard, the National Farmers Union, the General Teaching Council for Scotland, the Scottish Council for Development and Industry, the STUC, the Welsh Government and even the Chair of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee have all agreed that this is a power grab.

The threat to environmental standards is palpable. Clauses 2 to 9 contain sweeping powers to compel Scotland to accept lower standards set elsewhere in the UK on animal welfare, food safety protections and a host of other elements with a direct impact on people’s lives. When directly challenged only yesterday, a UK Government Minister refused to rule out that we will have to accept chlorinated chicken in our shops. Imported hormone-injected beef can and will undercut our farmers and their quality production. Building control standards will be affected. Private companies will be able to trade unhindered to weaken and undermine our NHS and publicly owned water company—lowering standards, raising prices and undermining health.

This Tory Government are determined to break international law. This is proof to all looking on that they will break any boundary, concerned only with their own dogma. They do not want to work with others; they are not interested. Any real co-operation and consultation is anathema to them. They are a Government petulantly demanding compliance. Any deal, understanding, commitment, promise or even legally binding treaty is disposable. The common good is of no concern, especially when it gets in the way. Trust, honour and obligation are now words to trade on and be sneered at. What other inconvenient laws are next? Where does this stop?

Finally, what is the Government’s answer to the concerns of the Scottish people, businesses and communities to the poll after poll after poll showing that independence is now the majority view—not more powers or any attempt at understanding, but a pre-meditated move to put devolution to the sword? Madam Deputy Speaker, you bet we will be voting against this affront to Scotland and democracy tonight.

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[Alan Brown]

Is that now the measure of how we are going to go forward with international treaties: when countries change their minds, they say, “Oops, I made a mistake. We’ll forget about it.”?

[Sir Bernard Jenkin]

I do not think it is a matter to be done casually and without very great care, but, as many right hon. and hon. Members, even those objecting to this Bill, are now saying, if the worst comes to the worst, we may have to avail ourselves of these powers, because it is the obligation of this House, first and foremost, to stick up for our national interests.

The EU says it will act against the UK through the European Court, but there is something absurd about the EU attempting to impose its laws on a member state after it has left the bloc—when did the voters endorse that? There is something ironic, even bizarre, about MPs in this Parliament demanding that the EU should continue to impose its laws instead of themselves wanting to make the laws for their constituents—they still do not accept Brexit. One wonders whether the Government recognise better than many here how most voters will react to this. Most of those shouting the loudest now showed how little they understood the voters in the 2016 referendum. Voters will support a Government who are determined to resist the unreasonable enforcement of the withdrawal agreement by the EU. Today, the Government have a strong mandate and a secure Commons majority for taking back control of our laws—voters will expect no less than that and they will give little quarter to this Parliament if they are let down again.

We are in a process of constitutional transition, from being subordinated by the EU legal order towards the restoration of full independence. While we are in this penumbra period of mixed constitutional supremacies, it is unsurprising that this kind of controversy should arise. Our other allies and trading partners will have far more respect for the UK if we stand up for our interests in this way than they will if they watch us accepting that we are to remain indefinitely a non-member subsidiary of the EU. The Government must ensure that there will be a clear end to the jurisdiction of the EU Court; that is the test of whether we are taking back control of our own laws, and our democracy demands it.

[Brendan O’Hara (Argyll and Bute) (SNP)]

What a self-made mess this Government find themselves in, and it was beautifully articulated by the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin). For three long years this Government struggled to get their withdrawal agreement through this place. So much time was spent on it that I doubt that there was a dot or comma of that agreement that was not known to the Government. In January, they signed a legally binding international treaty. The Prime Minister signed it and described it then as a “negotiating triumph”. Not only was it a negotiating triumph, but, as he told the electorate in December, it was “oven-ready” and good to go. He told the electorate, “Vote for me and I will get Brexit done”, and for reasons that I will never fathom, the people of England did. So in December, flushed with a huge majority, he led every single Tory MP through the Lobby to support his deal. However, the Government now want unilaterally to move the goalposts and renege on what they signed up to at the start of the year. In so doing, they are wilfully prepared to break international law, take the UK’s already diminished reputation further into the gutter and take a wrecking ball to the devolution settlement. Even for this Government that is quite an achievement.

Are Ministers asking us to believe that, despite three years of intense negotiation, they did not actually understand what they were voting for, and that they did not understand what their confidence and supply partners from the Democratic Unionist party were saying about differential arrangements between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK? Are we to believe that they were unable to grasp the implications of their own Northern Ireland protocol—the one they designed with the EU to prevent a hard border on the island of Ireland? It is not credible because it is not true.

[Alan Brown]

My hon. Friend makes a fine point: it is not credible and there has been bluff after bluff. Is it not the case that when the warnings were pointed out, Ministers stood at that Dispatch Box and said, “Don’t worry, we have a magic solution There won’t be any cameras or infrastructure at the border; technology will solve it all.”? We have technology that can control the movement of people and goods and deal with different customs arrangements”? Yet another bluff from an incompetent Government.

[Brendan O’Hara]

My hon. Friend hits the nail squarely on the head. That is absolutely true. They knew exactly what they were signing up to and exactly what they were voting on—a fact acknowledged by the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster himself, who said in April that the deal ensures that we can leave the EU, and it is “entirely consistent” with the Belfast agreement and all our other domestic and international obligations.

So, how did we get from the agreement being a negotiating triumph in January, and being entirely consistent with domestic and international obligations in April, to today, with a Government boasting that they will knowingly breach international law if they do not get their own way? I believe that, in short, it is because those at the heart of this Government have decided, in true Trumpian fashion, that the UK will no longer play by the rules. They have cynically done their sums and reckon they have the numbers to push this legislation through. It is the behaviour of a Government who have lost their moral compass—a Government who have been reduced to using the Good Friday agreement as a bargaining chip.

It is little wonder that the United Kingdom is fast becoming regarded as a bad-faith actor among the international community, where adherence to international law and the obligations that come with it are what sets us apart from rogue states and dictatorships. The irony of all this is that it emerged against the backdrop of the faux outrage about the last night of the proms and whether it was appropriate to play “Rule, Britannia! Britannia, rule the waves!”; we know it is a case of Britannia waives the rules. It is not just now; it was ever thus. Ask the Irish and the people of India. Go to large swaths of Africa. Go anywhere that is still recovering from the wreckage of British colonialism and the people there will give chapter and verse about Britannia bending, breaking, inventing and waiving the rules all day long to suit its own ends. The world had hoped and probably half expected that those days were gone; sadly, they clearly are not.

For Scotland, it does not have to be this way: we have an escape route available to us—an escape route with independence that will take us back to the family of nations of the European Union, as a law-abiding European country on an equal footing with every other independent country. It is little wonder that opinion poll after opinion poll has shown a majority for independence. I confidently predict that tonight’s shenanigans will bring that independence closer and Scotland will become an equal member of the European Union, because that is the fast-approaching settled will of the Scottish people.

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[Douglas Ross (Moray) (Con)]

Following the speech of the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart), I simply say that Scotland is my nation as well. The SNP does not speak for Scotland. The SNP is not Scotland. I am proud to be Scottish and British, and when the SNP stands up and claims that it speaks for the whole of Scotland, it does not. The hon. Gentleman would be advised to stop making out as if it does.

I want to make the point that this Bill at its heart, at its core, at its centre, is about jobs and businesses. Is it not telling that in all the SNP speeches that I have listened to tonight, jobs and businesses have not been mentioned once? The SNP was opposed to this internal market Bill long before the events of the past few days, because it is opposed to what it means for Scotland and to what the UK Government can do for Scotland and for the 545,000 jobs that the Fraser of Allander Institute says rely on the internal market of the United Kingdom. In 2018, that internal market ensured £51.5 billion of trade between Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom—three times more than the trade that Scotland does with the whole European Union put together.

This Bill’s protecting and enshrining our internal market in the United Kingdom is about protecting those jobs and those businesses. It is about ensuring that businesses in Forres and Fort William can do the same trade across all four nations of the United Kingdom as those in Felixstowe and Farnborough. That is what is important about this legislation. That is why we have to ensure that it is there, and that it is capable of delivering for individuals, for businesses, for their jobs and for the communities that they serve. That is why I believe that at the heart of this legislation we should be speaking about what it means for our communities, our businesses and our jobs the length and breadth of the country.

I want to focus on remarks by the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart), and by the SNP the whole time, about how this is somehow a power grab. It cannot be a power grab when more than 100 extra powers are going to Holyrood, to the Scottish Parliament and to the Scottish Government, and not one is being taken away. That cannot be explained as a power grab.

[Alan Brown]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Douglas Ross]

I apologise to the hon. Gentleman; I like debating with him and he has tried to get in plenty of times, but I must say to Members on both sides that debating time is about to be constrained by a further minute for each speaker and there are more than 100 Members on today’s call list, so I will not take interventions.

There is no power grab; 100 extra powers are going to the Scottish Parliament, and not a single one is being taken away. For some reason, SNP Members are now against the UK Government investing in Scotland. This is the same SNP and Scottish Government who are saying, “We don’t want your money in Scotland.” Well, I do. In my nation of Scotland, I want to see our two Governments working together as they do on city and growth deals the length and breadth of the country. Every part of Scotland is now covered by a city and growth deal, which shows our two Governments working together and investing together. That is what people want: not a rehash of the division of the past, which the SNP continually wants to drag us to, but looking to the future of Scotland—looking to the future of what we can achieve together as a United Kingdom, with our UK internal market delivering for jobs, communities, the economy and businesses. That is what we want to focus on.

I understand the concerns of Members across the House, but by voting for this legislation at stage 2—Second Reading—tonight, we will allow it to go into Committee and allow the democratically elected Parliament of the United Kingdom to scrutinise, debate and, potentially, amend it. That is what we should be doing.

United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Alan Brown Excerpts

Report stage & 3rd reading & 3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 29th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Paul Scully]

I have had non-viability and flunking today—I am doing well! I will come to this in a moment. We are framing this in a number of pieces of legislation. I have talked about the Environment Bill, which was introduced in January. It will require the Government to set at least one target for each of four priority areas: air quality, biodiversity, water and waste reduction, and resource efficiency. It will also protect the environment from future damage by—

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Paul Scully]

The hon. Gentleman keeps wanting to intervene. At least he has had the decency to put his name down on the speakers list this time, so maybe he will have a chance to make his points when he speaks later.

The Environment Bill will protect the environment from future damage by embedding environmental principles at the heart of policy development across Government, with clear and pragmatic guidance on their implementation. The environmental principles will be used by Ministers and policy makers to ensure that policy and legal frameworks help minimise the ill effects of human activity on the environment. Given the Government’s strong commitment already to meeting their ambitious climate targets, and the frameworks established under the Climate Change Act and proposed under the Environment Bill, I do not think that it is necessary to put such a legislative requirement in this Bill.

[Alan Brown]

Will the Minister give way?

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This is a very good Bill for Scottish people, for Scottish businesses, for Scottish consumers and for the entire United Kingdom. [Interruption.] Maybe if the hon. Gentleman stopped engaging in a conversation with Government Front Benchers, he might listen to the reasons why this Bill is good for his constituents and good for the entirety of Scotland. If he really cared about the Scottish economy, the lives of his constituents and the life of every Scot, he would not move his amendments today but vote with the Government to ensure that this Bill passes and that we cement our most important market in statute, as set out in the Bill.

[Alan Brown]

It is a kind of pleasure to follow the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Andrew Bowie). He strikes a conciliatory tone and he sounds reasonable, but the bottom line is that he talks complete tosh. Nobody in the SNP is arguing against preserving the UK internal market, but this Bill does not preserve the internal market; it actually undermines Scotland’s position, because it means we can be forced to accept conditions imposed on us by Westminster. It undermines devolution for the very same reason.

The hon. Gentleman says that the Bill allows the UK Government to spend more money in Scotland. That is bypassing the devolution settlement. There is nothing to stop the UK Government working with the Scottish Government at the moment to give the Scottish Government more money to spend on infrastructure and to discuss with them our needs in Scotland.

The hon. Gentleman supports a Prime Minister who in the past has said:

“A pound spent in Croydon is of far more value to the country than a pound spent in Strathclyde.”

A Prime Minister who wanted the Barnett formula scrapped. A Prime Minister who said:

“I do think it is pretty monstrous that you have free care for the elderly in Scotland and no tuition fees…when you still get considerable subsidies from the rest of the UK”.

Where is the respect for devolution and for the Scottish Government making their own policy decisions in Scotland? It is non-existent.

As we have heard, clause 46 is the biggest power grab ever, allowing the UK Government to impose spending decisions on Scotland, bypassing the elected Government of Scotland. We have heard that it will be additional money, but where is the proof? This allows the Tory Government to cut the Scottish block grant and then spend that money for its own political gain, pretending that it is top-up money when it is not. It is a con trick.

The first sentence of clause 46 includes the provision:

“A Minister of the Crown may….provide financial assistance to any person”.

Given the Tory track record—as we have heard, they have awarded a ferry contract to a company with no ferries, awarded PPE contracts to their cronies and outsourced the track and trace scheme, for example—how can we trust their spending judgments and their integrity to spend money in Scotland, supposedly for our benefit?

Scotland previously relied on EU structural funds to help to plug shortfalls from Westminster, and now we are supposed to trust the UK prosperity fund, which sits in the Department of English communities and local government, managed by a Secretary of State who ploughed the English towns fund money into Tory marginal seats and who made an unlawful planning decision to save a Tory donor millions of pounds. There is no way we can trust him to look after the needs of Scotland. We cannot trust the Tory Government with clause 46 and, to rub salt in the wounds, clause 47 allows returns and punitive interest to be applied to any spending that comes through clause 46.

Clause 48 allows Westminster to decide what is and is not allowed with state aid. Let us look at farming, for example. The Scottish Government may wish to pay headage figures for lamb and beef production, but the UK Government could overrule that if they do not support English farmers in the same way. If we get to the stage where the free marketeers have their way and UK Government state subsidy is eliminated for certain sectors, by default, the Scottish sectors will also have their rug pulled from under them because of state aid rules. How does that respect devolution? When it comes to farming, the UK Government have form, previously having stolen the common agricultural policy convergence uplift money from the EU.

We know the risk of imports of chlorinated chicken and hormone-injected beef. However, Argentinian beef could come in and undercut the market. Genetically modified crops could be imposed in Scotland. We have more robust climate change targets that could now be overruled by Westminster. The Government might impose this Bill on the Scottish Parliament against its will, but they are going to lose the independence argument.

[Marco Longhi (Dudley North) (Con)]

I rise to speak in support of the Government’s Bill and their amendments. This Bill exposes an inherent weakness in the withdrawal agreement—namely, that while the EU and UK Government must use best endeavours and act in good faith to reach an agreement, it does not spell out a clear course of action if either or both of those criteria are not met. We all know that the EU has become accustomed to a United Kingdom that repeatedly comes back to the table asking for an extension, and maybe this is why the EU’s format of negotiation is a sequencing one, meaning that it agrees to move forward only once an agreement has been reached on a previous matter. This has the effect of incurring huge delays, and the EU’s unwillingness to multitask must have a purpose—namely, continuous delays desirable to the EU and damaging to the UK’s prospects of a good deal.

Is the sequencing approach to negotiating a demonstration of using best endeavours or negotiating in good faith? I submit that it is not. It is now clear to most objective observers that the EU’s current interpretation of the Northern Ireland protocol is to use it as a lever in the negotiations. How is that a demonstration of negotiating in good faith? This Bill will ensure that Northern Ireland remains part of the UK’s customs territory and that Northern Ireland businesses retain unfettered access to GB markets. I must, however, place on record that more needs to be done in relation to Northern Ireland, having heard very powerful and compelling speeches from Unionist colleagues today and previously.

We know that the withdrawal agreement provided for the Joint Committee to set out heads of terms of a future deal, but the prospect of there being a timely and full agreement now appears unlikely. Why does the EU fail to agree at the Joint Committee on a single exemption from controls and tariffs for any goods flowing between GB and Northern Ireland? Is that behaviour consistent with best endeavours and good faith? Again, I submit that it is not. Why is it failing to agree exemptions at the Joint Committee on food checks for food moving between GB and Northern Ireland when we have been a member of the EU for 40 years and set standards ourselves? However, more fundamentally, what country and what Government in their right mind would devolve such fundamental sovereign powers to a foreign entity so that it would have the right to decide whether we can move our own food around our own Union of nations, as we have done for centuries? If we do not deliver this Bill, the EU will also have jurisdiction over how state aid decisions are made, for example on bail-outs related to covid or any future crisis.

For all those reasons, the Bill is about the delivery of Brexit and about sovereignty. It puts into law the ability for the Government to take action if a deal is not agreed. It delivers on an instruction that the good people of Dudley, and across our Union, gave this place not only in the 2016 referendum but at the last general election. We should, and must, press on with this.

United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Alan Brown Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments & Ping Pong & Ping Pong: House of Commons
Monday 7th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Paul Scully]

This Bill has generated a lot of debate in both Houses, and rightly so. It is a Bill that is vital in providing certainty for businesses and for protecting the Union. It is a Bill that allows the continuing smooth functioning of our UK internal market at the end of the transition period. Our approach will give businesses regulatory clarity and certainty and ensure that the cost of doing business in the UK stays as low as possible, and it will do so without damaging and costly regulatory barriers emerging between the nations of the United Kingdom.

In the other place, the Government and peers had good discussions and debates on the principle behind the Bill, and they have come to very reasonable proposals in some areas. It is right that both Houses work constructively to scrutinise and improve legislation, and the Government are therefore accepting a number of Lords amendments. That is why the Government are disappointed that in some cases amendments put forward by the other place would do the opposite and generate more ambiguity and uncertainty. Other amendments put forward go further, in hampering the Government’s ability to protect the Union and our internal market, to level up the country and to take advantage of the opportunities afforded by the end of the transition period. That is why today the Government are disagreeing with a series of amendments, to which I will now turn.

Regarding Lords amendments 1, 19 and 34, the other place and Her Majesty’s Opposition in this House have been clear about their strong support for common frameworks. I am pleased to hear that, because the UK Government are strongly committed to them as well. Joint work with the devolved Administrations to develop common frameworks is progressing well, and the first three frameworks are currently undergoing parliamentary scrutiny. The common frameworks programme represents successful joint working, ensuring that our shared objectives of making coherent policy, upholding high standards and supporting the distinct needs of each part of the UK can advance as one. They are evidence of our mutual respect for devolution.

I am pleased that work is well under way on the 33 frameworks that we expect to conclude jointly with the devolved Administrations. Thirty of those will be provisionally agreed by the end of 2020 and will then be scrutinised by Parliament and the devolved legislatures. A small number are likely to clear scrutiny by the end of the transition period, at which point they will become full frameworks.

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

It is good that the Minister recognises the importance of common frameworks. All four nations of the United Kingdom have agreed a common framework on an emissions trading system, so why is the Treasury now considering imposing a carbon emissions tax instead, against the wishes of the devolved Administrations? Surely that does not respect common frameworks.

[Paul Scully]

Discussions on that are ongoing and it is right that we have them. On the common frameworks, the devolved Administrations and representatives of England in the UK Parliament have made their views well known.

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[Paul Scully]

The right hon. Gentleman puts it correctly. When I have spoken to businesses in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, they have agreed with businesses in England. The main market for so many of these businesses is within the United Kingdom. We talk about global Britain, but we have to make sure that we have our internal market right. The opportunities for business, including those in Northern Ireland, are absolutely at the heart of this Bill, and I appreciate his intervention.

Removing the powers that I have outlined would make it difficult for the Government to respond to businesses and the wider stakeholder feedback and act rapidly to respond to changes in the UK internal market due to the shifting economic landscape. The other place also added in conflicting, inconsistent amendments accepting our consultation offer, but also adding consent mechanisms.

Moreover, the other place’s three amendments 12, 13 and 56 introduce a new system for excluding requirements from market access principles, based on a long list of legitimate aims. This new clause would render the protections in part 1 almost meaningless. The regulator or legislator could justify a very wide variety of discriminatory measures using the justifications in the new clause. It would result in uncertainty as to what is in scope and leave little protection from regulatory barriers for businesses operating across the whole of the UK. However, the door remains open to the other place to reconsider, and we have kept our offer on the table.

I will turn now to Lords amendments 48 and 49. Clauses 48 and 49 support the Government’s determination to deliver the commitments on which we were elected—levelling up and delivering prosperity for the whole United Kingdom and strengthening the ties that bind our Union together. They provide for a unified power that operates consistently UK-wide.

[Alan Brown]

Will the Minister give way?

[Paul Scully]

I will just make progress for a minute.

The power will allow for strategic investment throughout the UK, underpinning the United Kingdom Government’s determination to see all parts of the UK flourish. It will make sure that we can deliver UK-wide replacements for EU funds, including meeting our manifesto commitment to replace EU structural funds, and allowing the UK Government to invest directly to support communities and businesses across all four parts of the UK.

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There has been no consultation. The consultation apparently ended—I do not know—12 months ago or so. We do not know what this shared prosperity fund is going to look like. There has not been proper consultation with the devolved nations on it. There is a really important point here for the House. “Take back control” was an effective slogan, I think we can agree, though I did not support the cause, but I think voters throughout the United Kingdom—in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland—will worry that taking back control is starting to look like taking back control to the Westminster Parliament. That is an issue not just in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, but in England as well. How these funds work and whether it all gets decided from the centre is a really key point.

[Alan Brown]

On that point, the national infrastructure strategy has just been published, and under the heading,

“changing how decisions are taken”,

it says:

“Increasing the UK government’s ability to invest directly in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland through the UK Internal Market Bill”.

Does that not just smack of, “We’ll spend the money and we’ll make the decisions, and it won’t be collaborative at all.”?

[Edward Miliband]

I think there is a very legitimate anxiety, which I hope the Minister will reflect on. Again, it was expressed in the Lords. Yes, the Government were defeated in the Lords—all Governments get defeated in the Lords at some point—but we are talking about unprecedented margins, because of the depth and breadth of concern among their lordships about the Bill, including on devolution. In a sense, because the Bill went through so quickly here, there was less time for us to discuss the devolution issues, and the focus was more on international law, but there is deep concern about this.

It is the same on state aid. We support a UK-wide state aid regime, but once again there was no mechanism in the Bill to engage with the devolved nations on setting out this regime. Again, the best that can be said is that maybe the Government have blundered in; the worst would be that they simply do not believe in giving power away when it comes to it in practice; they believe in holding it here. We cannot overestimate the seriousness of this collection of devolution issues. I believe deeply in the United Kingdom; the way we uphold it is by upholding the settlements of the last 20 years, and recognising that commitment to shared governance, but that is not what this Bill does.

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[Stephen Farry]

I want to focus largely on the Lords amendments to part 5 of the Bill and to speak in support of them. I am conscious that we may well be part of a charade this evening, in the light of discussions that are happening elsewhere, but it is surely self-evident that no deal with the European Union can be concluded, let alone ratified, if the offending clauses remain part of the Bill. If we end up with a no-deal situation—I very much hope that we do not—the UK will face huge economic damage and will be forced back to the negotiating table. I think most people privately would recognise that that is the reality. Once again, these issues will have to be addressed and overcome.

Since this House last debated the Bill, we have had the very welcome election of Joe Biden as President of the United States. It is clear that there is no prospect whatsoever of a trade deal with United States if there is any threat to the Good Friday agreement, in particular from this Bill or, indeed, the subsequent taxation Bill that may well follow. Obviously, that is of fundamental importance to the UK going forward. I think that the Biden Administration will be very much open to a deal with the United Kingdom, but that will not come at the price of undermining the Good Friday agreement, which Americans of both parties are extremely proud of in terms of their role in and contribution to. The internal market Bill is not helping those negotiations at all. At best it is a distraction from them, and certainly not a source of leverage, but at worst it gives the indication that the UK cannot be trusted with regard to agreements. In particular, if there is a sudden deadlock around issues of governance, the European Union will be very reluctant to give too much in that respect, given the very sad precedent that has been set. Again, the UK is shooting itself in the foot in terms of crucial negotiations.

I want to stress that the majority of the people of Northern Ireland, the majority of Members of the Northern Ireland Assembly and the majority of businesses in Northern Ireland do not want the UK breaking, or threatening to break, international law on their behalf. The outcomes from this Bill are of course very seductive, but they represent a false solution. The only way to address these issues is via the withdrawal agreement and the Joint Committee on the Withdrawal Agreement. To achieve these flexibilities and derogations, we must again look to that word “trust”, which is again being undermined by these actions. That will make it more difficult to reach a conclusion through the Joint Committee processes.

Breaking international law may give some short-term relief to businesses, but it actually ends up hurting them because it puts them in the situation of not having a secure legal environment in which to do business going forward. That is of fundamental importance to businesses. It also potentially risks the return of a border on the island of Ireland. I know that some people want to dismiss that, but the difficulty comes from the fact that if there is not a guaranteed alternative system via the protocol, the pressure from the EU to protect the integrity of its customs union and single market falls back on the island of Ireland. That is one of the key concerns in terms of how the Good Friday agreement may well be breached through this Bill.

Some people seem to think that everything can stay the same as regards how things operate across these islands. The difficulty is that this reflects the choices made by the UK and its Government around Brexit and the nature of Brexit. Northern Ireland is a different place, and because of those choices special arrangements have to be put in place. The backstop was a better alternative, but the protocol is where we have landed, warts and all in terms of the negative consequences from that.

[Alan Brown]

Yet again we have been reliant on the Lords to try to remedy matters in this Bill, which from the outset has shown a complete disregard both for the rule of law and for devolution. The fact that the Government are going to overrule the Lords amendments tonight prompts the question: what is the point of the Lords even when it is doing good work?

In this Chamber, right from the outset of the debates on the internal market Bill, we have been treated to Back-Bench Tories standing up and telling us that they are proud Unionists. However, saying that they are proud Unionists wedded to the idea of the United Kingdom and the Union jack while supporting a Bill that rides roughshod over devolution shows that they do not really care about the Union, and they do not care about Scotland, or understand Scotland. That goes for the Prime Minister, in particular. We know that the Lords has Unionists, and the Lords has told the Government that this Bill puts the Union at risk. Are the Government and their sycophants wilfully stupid or just naturally stupid, because they are certainly not listening?

I want to focus on Lords amendments 48 and 49, which aim to delete the clauses with the same numbers. This is the real power grab about spending in Scotland. Lord Hope summarised the debate:

“It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that this Government regard devolution as an inconvenience”.—[Official Report, House of Lords, 18 November 2020; Vol. 807, c. 1468.]

As a matter of balance, I will quote Lord Forsyth, who reckoned:

“The…Act of Union…has brought about more than 300 years of prosperity.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 19 October 2020; Vol. 806, c. 1323.]

If the Union has been so successful and brought so much prosperity, why are this Government having to embark on a levelling-up agenda? Why do Scotland and other regions around the UK have to rely on EU structural funds to plug the gaps from Westminster over the years? Incidentally, the EU has never imposed a single project on Scotland against its will, whereas this Bill allows the Government to create projects and spend money against Scotland’s will. Where is the shared prosperity fund anyway? Sadly, it is missing in action.

If the Union was so successful, why are this Government legislating for support for cultural activities, projects and events that Ministers consider benefit the UK and devolved nations? The same goes for sport, education and training activities. What kind of education projects do they want to impose in Scotland? Why do they think that that should be in the Bill in the first place? It is clear that they want to subject us to a Union jack fest, but I can tell the Minister that that will not go down well in Scotland either; actually, it will help our cause.

We have also been told that infrastructure spending will mean additional money coming to Scotland, yet when we look at the spending review we can see that we have just suffered a 5% cut to our capital budget. It is quite clear that that the Government will top-slice the Scottish budget, take some money off and then recirculate it in Scotland with a Union jack. It is so transparent, and the fact that the national infrastructure policy says that the Bill allows the Government to spend directly in the devolved nations tells us that it has been planned all along.

The consequential clause 49 remains a complete affront. Basically, the UK Government can interfere and spend money in Scotland on projects that might not be wanted by the Scottish Government, and clause 49 then allows them to impose repayment conditions on the taxpayers in Scotland. That is ridiculous—it is a con. Any Scottish Tory who argues that this is not a power grab and who thinks that these conditions are acceptable must be completely devoid of self-respect.

Lord Dunlop, a former Scotland Office Minister, said:

“I hope the Government will think long and hard before overturning in the Commons, on the back of Conservative votes alone, any sensible changes”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 2 November 2020; Vol. 807, c. 585.]

There is no long and hard thinking being done on the Government Benches, but there is by the people of Scotland. Those who voted no in 2014 are changing their minds rapidly, because they know the contempt with which this Government treat Scotland.

[Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown). I am pleased to speak in support of the Lords amendments and thankful to Members in the other place for trying to restore a shred of decency to this legislation. Sadly, the Government seem determined to destroy the rule of law, Britain’s international reputation and the devolution settlement that holds the UK together.

The provisions that were removed in the other place would

“enable ministers to derogate from the United Kingdom's obligations under international law in broad and comprehensive terms and prohibit public bodies from compliance with such obligations”—

not my words, but those of the Law Society of England and Wales. Such a legislative statement would be unprecedented, cutting across the precedent that political and judicial bodies uphold the rule of law.

Turning to devolution, I am deeply troubled to hear that if the Government vote to reintroduce the parts of the Bill that the other place so sensibly removed, the Welsh Government’s proposed ban on single-use plastics would be prevented. That would be another ground-breaking step by the Welsh Government stopped by this Government’s complete disregard for the devolution settlement. If it is plastics first, what next? This legislation will prevent the Welsh Government from standing up for Wales’s interests, legislating to ban chlorinated chicken or hormone-injected beef, or setting higher standards on house-building or the environment. By proposing mutual recognition without legally underpinning minimum standards, the UK Government are proposing that the lowest standards chosen by one Parliament must automatically become the minimum standards across all nations.

There are also significant concerns about the financial aspects of the Bill. By legislating to allow the UK Government to spend in devolved areas, the Bill undermines the devolved Governments’ ability to outline their own spending priorities. Of course none of the devolved Governments would be opposed to having more money to spend on their citizens, but this Government have had numerous opportunities to increase the amount received by each Government or reform the Barnett formula, yet they have chosen not to.

This is not kindness, but a cage. The Welsh Government have said that they are open to negotiating common frameworks, but they must be worked out in common and must contain mutually agreed minimum standards. A UK single market is vital to the continued internal trade of these islands, but if this is how the UK Government go about ensuring it, they will soon be the Government of England only.

The Welsh Government have called the Bill

“an attack on democracy and an affront to the people of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, who have voted in favour of devolution on numerous occasions.”

I implore the UK Government to act as a Government for the whole United Kingdom, not just for themselves.

United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Alan Brown Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Thursday 10th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Paul Scully]

We want to work with the Welsh Senedd. We want to work with the Welsh people. We want to work particularly to ensure that Welsh businesses have certainty, and English, Scottish and Northern Irish businesses as well. That is why we need to work at pace to ensure that we have an internal market that works for all come 1 January.

Let me turn to amendments 48B and 48C. It is right, as we leave the transition period, that the UK Government have the right tools to make sure the whole country can benefit from investment, which strengthens the communities, economies and connectivity within and between all parts of the UK. I emphasise once again that this power is in addition to the devolved Administrations’ existing power. It does not take away responsibilities from the devolved Administrations; rather, the power will enable the UK Government to deliver investment more dynamically and in collaboration with the devolved Administrations and other partners.

The Government will work with the devolved Administrations to ensure we can complement their existing and continuing powers, used to support citizens in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. We will also work collaboratively with other crucial partners, including local authorities and wider public and private sector organisations.

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

If the desire is to work collaboratively, why on earth are the Government rejecting these amendments, which simply ask for consent from the devolved Administrations? That would be collaboration.

[Paul Scully]

I have talked about the fact that we have spoken with the Scottish Government and continue to do so and we are very open to that. What has been frustrating, in terms of collaboration, is that although we have collaborated on common frameworks, the Scottish Government have pulled away from discussions about the internal market, and that started to cause this detachment. But we do want to hold out our hand to make sure we can continue to collaborate in the future to complement, as I said, the existing powers.

I want to touch briefly on the UK shared prosperity fund. This power means that the UK Government can make good on our commitment to the UKSPF. The UK Government intend to work with the devolved Administrations and with local communities to ensure that this power is used to best effect and that the UK shared prosperity fund supports citizens across the UK. Indeed, we have confirmed that the devolved Administrations will be represented on the UK SPF governance structures. The Government will set out further details of the objectives and administration of the shared prosperity fund in the UK-wide investment framework, which will be published in the spring. We will continue to engage the devolved Administrations as we develop the investment framework in advance of its publication.

--- Later in debate ---

How does the Minister intend to safeguard UK sovereignty in that particular case now that he has accepted that the Lords amendments to have those clauses removed are appropriate? From Northern Ireland’s point of view, while we have some of the agreements through the Joint Committee and some of the protocol has been blunted, nevertheless there are still significant intrusions in Northern Ireland. We have to see how, in practice, some of the agreements that were announced yesterday will be applied, but the Minister has to deal with the issue that the EU still has a substantial foot in the door through the Northern Ireland protocol. Indeed, he has opened that door wider by accepting the Lords amendments.

[Alan Brown]

We all know the Prime Minister does not believe in devolution, and neither does the Leader of the House, who made more derogatory comments about it this morning. In fact, over the years, the Prime Minister’s comments are nothing less than anti-Scottish. I accept that the Government do believe in an abstract of the Union, but more important to them is Westminster sovereignty and the fact that we in the devolved nations should do what we are told and be grateful. It is quite clear that there is a huge resentment that the people of Scotland and the people of Wales vote for Governments who are non-Tory.

If this Government have any scintilla of respect for the Union and for devolution, they would accept these regional amendments that have come back from the House of Lords. Instead, what we have heard from the Minister is platitudes about collaboration and working with the Government, but in actual fact the Government will not allow the devolved Administrations to have consent. They will ignore the legislative consent motion votes in other Parliaments, so, actually, that is Westminster imposing its will on the devolved nations yet again.

Amendment 48 seeks to ensure that any Westminster spend in devolved areas is undertaken with the consent of the devolved Governments. What is there to argue about that? If we are talking collaboration, the Government should just accept this simple, reasonable amendment. The Scottish Tories always tell us that they want both Governments of Scotland to work together—as they call it. We were promised the best of both worlds in 2014. Well, this simple amendment would make a statement about the fact that the Tory Government are willing to work in collaboration with the devolved Administrations and show them the respect that they deserve.

If the Scottish and Welsh Tory MPs vote to strike out the amendment, they should hang their heads in shame, and it would show that it is all bluff and bluster when it comes to respecting devolution. In fact, doing so is confirmation of the Lords assessment that devolution is simply an inconvenience to the Tories and they are ignoring the advice from Lord Dunlop not to use their own votes to overturn these Lords amendments. It is absolutely disgraceful that we still do not know what the shared prosperity fund will look like. Again, the word “shared” seems a bit of a misnomer, given the attitude of the Tory Government. Why are we moving into a consultation phase after all these years? It is a disgrace that they have mucked about and mucked about, and nobody knows what will replace these vital European funds—funds that have helped many regions in Scotland to make up for a lack of spending from Westminster over the years.

If the Government do not agree to the formalisation of common frameworks, once again, that shows there is no real intent to work collaboratively with the devolved Administrations. What is wrong with formalising common frameworks? The Minister saying that it will cause uncertainty beggars belief. It does the opposite of cause uncertainty—it provides a clear way forward for us to work together. It seems to me that, yet again, this is another way for Westminster to impose its will on the devolved Administrations.

We know that there are too many free marketeers in the Government, and the fact that they will not allow state aid to be devolved or to be part of common frameworks suggests to me that there will be a race to the bottom in the future, when this Tory Government pull subsidies. There is a pretence at the moment that the argument with the EU is about how the Government want to provide more state aid—who’s kidding who? We know that in the long run, free marketeer rules will win, so it has nothing to do with supporting industry.

We have had 313 years of the Union and Westminster rule. We have only had 20 years of devolution. It is now clear to more and more people what has had the biggest impact on inequality and holding Scotland back, and it is not the 20 years of devolution. We look forward to independence, because more and more people realise that it is the only way forward.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown). I rise to support the Lords amendments in respect of devolution. Northern Ireland is allegedly sorted out now, and the international lawbreaking parts of the Bill have gone, but what of Scotland? According to the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, businesses in Northern Ireland will enjoy “the best of both worlds”: access to the single market and, at the same time, unfettered access to the rest of the UK market. Presumably this means that when Scotland becomes independent and a member of the European Union, Scotland too could have the best of both worlds: access to the single market and to the rest of the UK market, with no hard border and no infrastructure on the border. We shall see, but one thing is for sure: the Conservative party can never again be allowed to get away with claiming that Scottish independence means that a hard border with England is inevitable.

Scotland has yet to vote for independence, but that is only a matter of time. In the meantime, we want to protect what we have. Scotland did not vote for Brexit, but Scotland did vote for devolution in very significant numbers in 1997. This House should not use Brexit, which Scotland did not vote for, to undermine devolution, which we did vote for. The Lords amendments are designed to protect some of the essentials of the devolved settlement. It is very telling that Lord Hope, who I count as a friend and who is a former Lord President of the Court of Session, former Deputy President of the UK Supreme Court and also a Unionist, said that initially, when he heard SNP politicians talking about a power grab, he thought it was an exaggeration, but after reading the Bill, he agreed with us. That is not a nationalist—that is a Unionist, so Government Members would be wise to listen up.

Others in the Lords did not fall for the Government’s sleight of hand in the Bill either. As my hon. Friend the Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Drew Hendry) said, Lord Thomas said yesterday:

“the clause without my amendments would enable the UK Government to spend in devolved fields and bypass the devolved Governments and Parliaments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland who have been elected to be responsible for those fields. It would, in effect, hollow out the devolution settlements.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 9 December 2020; Vol. 808, c. 1294.]

Lord Adonis warned:

“This Bill is deliberately intended to cut across and undermine the devolution settlements because the Prime Minister does not agree with them”.—[Official Report, House of Lords, 9 December 2020; Vol. 808, c. 1294.]

The game’s up, and Government Members should realise that the heads of voters in Scotland do not zip up the back. Devolution is very popular in Scotland across parties. It is supported by the vast majority of voters in Scotland. Even some Scottish Conservatives—some, not all—support the current devolved settlement. Donald Dewar set it out carefully, making a delineation between reserved and devolved powers, and that is what this Bill is driving a coach and horses through. We must not forget today that Scotland’s Parliament—the democratically elected voice of Scotland’s people—has voted against the Bill by a margin of 90 to 28 MSPs.

I say to the Minister that we are sick to the back teeth of the Government’s disingenuous words, saying that they listen to the Scottish Government. Listening is not enough; they have to have respect for the democratic voice of Scotland, which is expressed through our Parliament. Our Parliament has said it does not want this Bill, and if the Government do not listen, then a vote for independence is inevitable. I say, “Bring it on.”

United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Alan Brown Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Tuesday 15th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Paul Scully]

The purpose of the Bill has been from the start and remains to give businesses certainty as we leave the transition phase—to have one single internal market.

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

The Minister spoke about certainty for business. Can he give an example of something that he thinks would fall in these exclusions that would cause widespread panic in businesses in the UK?

[Paul Scully]

The hon. Gentleman needs to speak to Scottish businesses more to see that they are concerned. They want to have the Bill in place to have the certainty, with 17 days to go until the end of the transition phase.

It is important to reiterate that the common frameworks are processes, not outcomes, and therefore broad exclusions are not suitable in this legislation. That leads me to amendments 1F, 1G, 1H, 1J, 1K and 1L. The common frameworks programme facilitates a conversation about a common approach and thus provides for consensus-based decision making in sectoral areas of the economy. However, it is neither the purpose nor in the purview of common frameworks to determine whether matters should or should not be in the scope of the market access principles. It is only right that the UK Parliament and parliamentarians from across the UK have the final say on this matter.

The Government also believe that the system that they have designed creates a proper balance between the independent operation of devolved powers and the automatic application of the principles that protect the market and give certainty.

--- Later in debate ---

The Lords amendments bring some—just some—semblance of decency to the Bill, some recognition of the political landscape across these islands, and some indication that there are differing politics in the different nations. They allow a mechanism for divergence from the centralised control of market forces and the lowest common denominator approach that the Government have taken. The institution of a framework for agreeing divergence of standards would at least allow some hope of protection being maintained and of avoiding bleached chicken and GM crops. I suspect that will be a weak protection, but any protection against the vagaries of a windblown Prime Minister and Government would be a step in the right direction.

[Alan Brown]

The Lords have tried to improve the Bill, but it has been subject to only minor improvements. I wish that, during ping-pong, the Lords had done double insistence and brought down the whole rotten Bill. That is what is really needed—for it to go away and be brought back in a completely different form.

It is no wonder that the Government have been so pig-headed about rejecting these amendments. As we have heard, last night in the Lords, Labour—the self-styled party of devolution—gave up the key fundamentals and principles of devolution. It gave up on direct spending and on state aid, which drives a coach and horses through the whole devolution settlement. It gives Westminster carte blanche to do what it wants in Scotland and Wales, where there is a Welsh Labour Government. Labour has given up on its own Government in Wales.

When summing up in last night’s debate, Lord Thomas said that the one thing he was holding on to was the thought of

“the catastrophic result for our union if the Government did not adhere to the principles that have been explained”.—[Official Report, House of Lords, 14 December 2020; Vol. 808, c. 1480.]

Basically, he hopes that the Tory Government will do the right thing. If not, that will bring down his precious Union. It seems that Labour is now relying on this right-wing Tory Government to do the right thing with the precious Union—good luck there.

On Lords amendment 1F, the Government have already refused to adhere to the common frameworks principle and enshrine that in the Bill as a way for the devolved nations to co-operate. The amendment massively waters down that principle, but it would prevent divergence on harmonised rules that have been agreed through the common frameworks. Why do the Government want to reject that? If there is agreement between the nations, and common frameworks with agreed rules and regulations, why do the Government reject that that is something to be protected? That tells us everything we need to know about what they think of devolution.

It has been said many times, but it is worth repeating. The Prime Minister has said:

“A pound spent in Croydon is of far more value to the country than a pound spent in Strathclyde.”

Who is kidding who if we think that this Tory Government, under that Prime Minister, are suddenly going to spend lots of money in Scotland and Wales for our benefit? It is a joke and it undermines their whole attitude to devolution.

On state aid and Lords amendment 8M, why do the Government want to reject protection of environmental standards and of public health? Why should those things be excluded from the simple protection of state aid? Again, that tells us all we need to know about what they think of devolution. What Lord Thomas says is going to happen: the Union will end.

[Joanna Cherry]

I support the Lords amendments because they seek to protect the devolved settlements and also policy divergence across the United Kingdom. Lord Hope’s amendment attempts to salvage the common frameworks process and to prevent this UK Government from giving themselves the power to override policy divergence in devolved areas. As Lord Hope himself said:

“It was because of devolution that the common frameworks process, and the opportunity for policy divergence, was instituted with the encouragement of the UK Government in the first place. Their support for that process must involve support for policy divergence too.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 14 December 2020; Vol. 808, c. 1446.]

He is quite right. Lord Stevenson’s amendment exempts environmental standards and public health from market access principles. In so doing, it also seeks to protect policy divergence. As Baroness Bennett pointed out in the Lords, the smaller nations of the United Kingdom have often led the way on environmental policy divergence and it would be a shame if that was to stop.

I am speaking with a sense of weariness and inevitability because we have all been here before and we all know what is going to happen today. We know that these amendments will be defeated by a Tory majority that does not represent the political reality on the ground in Scotland, or indeed Wales. Once more, the Minister will get to his feet and mouth meaningless platitudes about speaking to the devolved Administrations. Scotland did not vote for Brexit. Scotland did vote for devolution. It is anti-democratic that Brexit is being used to undermine devolution, and it is happening in breach of all the promises that were made to no voters in 2014, including the infamous vow, which included a promise from all three parties that the Scottish Parliament, as well as getting extensive new powers, would have the final say on spending in all devolved matters.

It is therefore a really sad state of affairs that the official Opposition could not field a single Back Bencher to speak up for devolution today. I know that they only have one hon. Member in Scotland, but they are not always averse to putting forward MPs from other parts of these islands to opine on Scottish affairs. Their no-show here today is not surprising, though, given that their colleagues in the Lords sat on their hands yesterday with regard to amendments seeking to keep state aid a devolved matter and Lord Thomas’s amendment challenging the Government’s clauses on direct spending in devolved areas. This is happening in direct breach of the vow that the then leader of the Labour party signed. But Labour does not care. It is happy to wheel out Gordon Brown to talk about federalism when independence is riding high, but when it comes to defending the existing devolved settlement, it is missing in action. This is a shameful state of affairs, and it falls to the SNP to defend devolution. We are doomed to fail, but that will simply further reinforce the case for independence.

United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Alan Brown Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Wednesday 16th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Paul Scully)]

I beg to move,

That this House agrees with Lords amendments 8P, 8Q, 8R, 8S, 8T and 8U.

I am delighted to be able to come back to the House today with positive news for business and for our constituents. As I have said before, I am immensely grateful to colleagues across both Houses for their constructive discussions with Government, and I would like to extend my thanks to all colleagues in both Houses for working with the Government to reach agreement on how we can best ensure that the frictionless intra-UK trade we enjoy today can continue into the future, especially as we recover together from covid-19. As we have made clear, this Bill is about protecting businesses and livelihoods—real people and real jobs—and I am pleased that both Houses have worked constructively to do that. I want to again extend my thanks to colleagues on the Opposition Benches in this place, and in the other place in particular, for their engagement.

As I set out to the House yesterday, the Government are committed to the common frameworks programme. We attach enormous value to the fora that they provide for collaborative working with the devolved Administrations. The Government have also been clear that the market access principles will work in tandem with common frameworks. We have been asked to provide as much clarity as possible on our continuing commitment to the programme, and we have thought long and hard about this over recent weeks. It is important that we respect the flexibility, and also the commonality, of common frameworks, paying close attention to the interests of all parts of the UK involved in the common frameworks programme and protecting the voluntary and consensus-driven nature of the programme. Indeed, these aspects are key to the effectiveness of the processes. The Government have listened carefully and reflected on the points put forward in both Houses about putting common frameworks on the face of the Bill, and we have now done so through these Lords amendments.

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

Obviously we welcome some sort of concession on common frameworks, but the Minister said yesterday that enshrining common frameworks in the Bill would create uncertainty for business, so what has changed from last night to today?

[Paul Scully]

What has changed from last night to today is the convivial and constructive discussions we have had to allow for amendments that are worded to the satisfaction of, certainly, the other place and I hope this place, that will allow us to progress with both the common frameworks as a voluntary process and the certainty of the internal market.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

Well here we are again—groundhog day. Early on, I dubbed this Bill the infernal market Bill, and it has certainly lived up to that name. It is good to see the hon. Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) in his seat again. I am not sure what he is going to do in a few weeks’ time after all his doughty energies tackling issues around Brexit. I am not sure whose fault it is all going to be in a few weeks’ time. Perhaps Ministers should watch their backs; they might find it is their fault once Brexit can no longer be blamed for all his ills.

Let me start by thanking Ministers and their officials for the discussions that we have had in recent days about how we can make the best of this bad Bill. Let us be honest: when it first saw the light of day, it was clear for all to see what a terrible Bill this was. It was wrong in seeking to break international law, and it was wrong in disrespecting the devolution settlement and failing to understand the way the UK now works through power sharing. That is why we have been so vociferously opposed to it in this House.

We led the way on that, starting, as you will remember, Madam Deputy Speaker, with my right hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband) taking down every single argument of the Prime Minister, who was here himself on Second Reading. Through the Bill’s many stages in this House, we have been clear in our opposition to some of its serious flaws. It has been a long and difficult process.

[Alan Brown]

If Labour has really led the way, why did it back down in the votes in the other place on protecting devolution in respect of Westminster’s ability to spend and meddle in devolved affairs?

[Lucy Powell]

The hon. Gentleman knows that that is not the case. That is not what happened in the other place. It is thanks to the Labour leadership in the other place that we have seen improvements to the Bill, and I will say a bit more about that in a minute.

The Bill is now in much better shape than it was. It is far from good, let alone perfect, but it is better. That is thanks to the leadership shown by Labour colleagues in the other place, who built alliances and worked with guile and tenacity to get us to where we are. The Government, by the way, have a majority in the other place; despite that, we managed to inflict a number of Government defeats. As a result, the Government dropped most of part 5, which was the international lawbreaking part of the Bill originally and now upholds the Northern Ireland protocol.

After Labour worked cross-party with colleagues and others to ensure successive Government defeats in the other place, and after several rounds of ping-pong— I have lost count of how many—the Bill has been improved in a number of ways. We have the one-month mechanism for the devolved Administrations’ consent on regulations; the operation of the internal market in the interest of consumers; the consent and involvement of the devolved Administrations on the make-up and operation of the Office for the Internal Market, and the removal and review of the Henry VIII powers.

Today, we welcome the Government’s concessions on common frameworks in response to Lord Hope and Lord Stevenson’s amendments. In particular, amendments to clauses 10 and 17 allow for agreements arising from common frameworks to be excluded from the application of market principles. They also include in the Bill a definition of a common framework agreement, something that we have been seeking from the beginning. We also welcome the amendment to clause 31 that provides for the Competition and Markets Authority and the Office for the Internal Market to include in their five-year reporting details of the interaction between market access principles and common framework agreements, and of the impact of common framework agreements on the operation and development of the internal market.

We have fought long and hard to ensure that the Bill does not undermine devolution, because we believe in devolution. These are important safeguards that really do strengthen the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[Deidre Brock]

I do not want to be rude to the hon. Gentleman, but he presents us with a glorious example of exactly why many on the SNP Benches want to get away from this House of Commons.

Scotland faces the same situation as we did in the last quarter of the last century: a UK Government of a hue that we did not vote for and would not support are riding roughshod over the interests of the Scottish people and will ignore them if they can. This Bill will pass today, but the debate will continue, and we have not yet begun to fight.

[Alan Brown]

I would like to briefly add to what my colleagues have said. We welcome some sort of recognition of the common frameworks. There is a lot still to be teased out in terms of how that will work. We know that Westminster’s sovereignty will overrule things, and that is still a big concern, but we welcome that measure. I still do not understand how the Minister stood at the Dispatch Box yesterday and said that common frameworks could not be enshrined in the Bill, because it would be so bad and would cause businesses uncertainty, and now he says, “We’ve listened to the Lords, and everything’s okay.” It would be good if he could clarify that when he sums up.

Despite what the hon. Member for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell) said, Labour did not lead the way on this. Labour gave up on devolution, and it gave up in the other place. Labour did not even back my hon. Friend the Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Drew Hendry) in the Reasons Committee. Labour sat on its hands in the vote in that Committee. Lord Stevenson said, “We will not divide the House.” That is giving up. Labour gave up in the Lords.

Let us look at clause 48 and what Labour gave up on. Westminster is now allowed to provide infrastructure at places in the United Kingdom, including infrastructure connected with any of the other purposes mentioned. That infrastructure includes water, which is still publicly owned in Scotland, electricity, gas, telecoms, sewerage—also publicly owned in Scotland—railway facilities and roads or other transport facilities. As the hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain) said, that paves the way for the glorious Union bridge or Union tunnel that we do not want and do not need, because we can invest better in transport infrastructure ourselves.

There is no doubt that the greatest improvements in Scotland’s infrastructure have come since the introduction of the Scottish Parliament, making decisions for the people of Scotland on behalf of the people of Scotland and representing the people who elected them. [Interruption.] Does the hon. Member for Manchester Central want to intervene? No. As I was saying, the greatest improvements in Scotland’s infrastructure have come since the introduction of the Scottish Parliament. MSPs are answerable to the people who elected them. Unfortunately, we have a right- wing Tory Government who Scotland did not elect, and now they are free to overrule us. Labour backed down. It does not matter what the hon. Member for Manchester Central said; Labour backed down and gave up.

The Bill allows Westminster to spend not only in Scotland but in Wales, overruling the Welsh Labour Government on health, education, culture, sports facilities, court or prison facilities and housing. We are leading the way in building social housing in Scotland. We ended the right to buy. The Tories obviously still think that the right to buy is a good thing, forcing councils to get rid of their housing stock. How dare Westminster legislate to provide housing in Scotland—we have done very well without your help, thank you very much.

State aid is something else that Labour gave up on. It has been stated clearly that state aid was never a reserved function, and therefore it was devolved to the four nations, so why is Westminster taking it back? Does it think that that sends out a good message?

People are watching. Studies in Scotland have shown time and again that people in Scotland trust the Scottish Parliament to legislate and invest in these matters over Westminster, so why Westminster thinks it can do a better job is beyond me. As my hon. Friend the Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey said, it looks like independence is the only way that we can protect the powers of the Scottish Parliament. Bring it on.

[Paul Scully]

Let me quickly answer a few points. My hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) asked for a bit more detail on the amendments. In the small number of cases in which the market access principles apply to divergence agreed under a common framework, clauses 10 and 17 could be used to exclude the agreement from the market access principles. The Secretary of State would be able to do so following a consensus agreement that that was appropriate under the common framework. That is the appropriate way to ensure that the market access principles in the Bill can ensure certainty and a seamlessly functioning internal market while still respecting agreed limited divergence under the common frameworks programme.

Originally, Lord Hope’s amendments would have required the Secretary of State to exclude any divergence agreed under the common frameworks process from market access principles; by contrast, the Government’s amendment makes it clear that this is an option open to the Secretary of State, thereby giving the Secretary of State the discretion to ensure that the disapplication of the market access principles would never lead to the emergence of unacceptable trade barriers within the United Kingdom.

The hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain) talked about the CMA, the OIM and what would happen with international players. The CMA and the OIM have the flexibility to investigate and report on any issues that they choose, but they are not themselves decision makers on market access principles. Throughout the Bill’s passage, we have made sure that both the OIM and the Bill itself will apply rules to each part of the UK—to England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland—equally.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Scully]

No, this is about spreading. I readily accept that the discussions on common frameworks continue, and I very much welcome that. As I say, common frameworks go wider than just trade and the measures covered in the Bill. None the less, to walk away from discussions on the internal market a full year or 18 months before we reached this position is really to walk away from the responsibility to help to shape the discussions, as we have seen in the more fruitful conversations with the Welsh Senedd, including in recent days.

We heard the hon. Member for Edinburgh North and Leith (Deidre Brock) talk about pre-written barbs, but time and again when we have come back to this place it has just been a rehearsal of the arguments not about the devolution settlement or the Bill itself, but about independence. It has been the same debate time and again, instead of Members involving themselves in the detail of the Bill and giving certainty to business.

[Alan Brown]

Will the Minister give way?

[Paul Scully]

I will not give way.

I finish by thanking everyone who spoke in the debate, and by once again thanking all hon. and right hon. Members and noble Lords who have engaged with the Bill over the last few weeks. I thank the Public Bill Office for its support to all Members and officials across Government. I pay tribute to the entire ministerial team across both Houses and all Departments, who have worked jointly to deliver the Bill—in particular, Lord Callanan, Lord True and the Minister for the Constitution and Devolution, my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Chloe Smith), and the Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office, my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester (Mr Walker). I also pay tribute to Yasmin Kalhori and the team of the Leader of the House of Lords.

I welcome the contributions and the constructive discussions that we have had in recent days with Opposition Members in both Houses that have got us to this place. We have had some passionate debates on the Bill, because of the importance of the issues. However, the Bill will ensure that UK businesses can trade across the four parts of the UK in a way that helps them to invest and create jobs, just as they have for hundreds of years. I am therefore delighted to ask the House to agree to the amendments, and to complete our scrutiny and consideration of the Bill.