Taxation (Cross-border Trade) Bill

Alex Cunningham Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Monday 8th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mel Stride]

As my right hon. and learned Friend will know, article 50 was invoked—the decision was taken to invoke that particular article—with the consequences that we will exit the European Union on 29 March 2019, and therefore leave the European Union customs union. However, clause 31 does indeed facilitate our future ability to enter into customs union arrangements with other customs unions or territories, subject to the express will of Parliament, as I detailed with reference to the affirmative resolution that would have to be passed by the House.

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

The Manufacturing Trade Remedies Alliance tells me that 7,000 manufacturing jobs, including 2,500 in the chemicals industry, will be at risk in my constituency if the UK does not establish effective trade remedies. If there is no customs union, how will the Government guarantee that manufacturing workers will not be negatively affected by unfairly priced or subsidised imports?

[Mel Stride]

The hon. Gentleman raises the extremely important matter of protecting our UK producers from dumped goods in this country, goods that have been subject to excessive subsidy, and indeed import surges that arise for other reasons. That is why this Bill and the Trade Bill, which will have its Second Reading tomorrow, make provision to set up a Trade Remedies Authority with the ability and powers to investigate appropriately the kinds of issues to which the hon. Gentleman alludes, and to ensure that we are able to take remedial action, in terms of additional duties and so on, to ensure that we properly address those particular threats as and when they occur.

--- Later in debate ---

[Peter Dowd]

We will get as much scrutiny as possible on this Bill.

Having completely failed to create a strong and stable Government at the last election, the Prime Minister seems to be ignoring the will of the electorate and grabbing power by any means necessary. That is particularly the case with this Bill, where Ministers are being handed powers to set import and export duties, preferential rates and quotas across any good or service sector in our economy. This Bill will give the Government the power fundamentally to reshape the environment in which our economy operates with a few strokes of a pen.

[Alex Cunningham]

As my hon. Friend says, it is critical that Parliament has a say. CF Fertilisers on Teesside is worried about the dumping of cheap goods, particularly from Russia, if we do not get the anti-dumping legislation right. The Minister says that will be addressed by this Bill and by the Trade Bill, which will have its Second Reading tomorrow, but I cannot see anything that says so. Does my hon. Friend agree that that is all the more reason why we need much more time in Committee to ensure that such guards are put in place?

[Peter Dowd]

My hon. Friend makes a good point that we need to have absolute scrutiny of the Government’s proposals.

We know what the Government would do with the powers contained in this Bill. They would tear up protections for British producers and consumers, throw workers’ rights on to the bonfire and create a free-market offshore tax haven—a miserable pound-shop economy. The Government know the price of everything and the value of nothing.

The Government do not have the authority to act in that way. The referendum and the recent election show a country divided, and it is Parliament’s job to reflect the country’s will and to develop a workable consensus. This Government, much like the disastrous Major Administration, have no mandate to implement such far-reaching changes, which is why the Labour party’s reasoned amendment would deny the Bill a Second Reading. We demand that the Government return with a Bill that sets out a clear path to our mutual objective of creating a functioning institutional framework for the handling of customs once we leave the European Union, one that provides the proper powers of scrutiny to Parliament, as promised by the leave campaign and as determined by the citizens of the UK in the recent election. Anything less is an affront to our democratic process and will only spell disaster for our country as this weak Prime Minister becomes prey to the worst instincts of many Conservative Members.