Scotland Bill

Debate between Alex Salmond and Rob Marris

Monday 29th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Alex Salmond]

I am never knowingly undersold. I accept what the hon. Gentleman has said. I was trying to moderate the figures slightly, in case the Committee found them incredible. However, they do tell us where we should be turning in the context of “distortion of competition”.

I am delighted that Members from the north of England have accepted that this tax should be devolved, and I am delighted that they have accepted the economic argument behind the direction in which the Scottish Government are moving. I think that the tax should be reduced at airports in the north of England as well, because they have substantial capacity that would increase revenue for us all. I am glad that their amendment did not become the basis of this conversation, because if the Scottish Government had opposed the devolution of part of APD to Northern Ireland, no progress would have been made. We are now on the verge of having APD devolved to Scotland, and I say to Members representing north of England constituencies that they should take the attitude that this should be the example for further devolution of a sensible policy which not only benefits one part of the country but looks at the economic opportunities in all parts of the country.

Unfortunately, I arrived for this debate at the end of the VAT fiddle discussion. I hope when the Minister replies on APD that, instead of his wholly disappointing and negative attitude to the embezzlement of VAT from the Scottish police service, he will return to the style of grace and imagination with which he usually so adorns the Dispatch Box, and this time recognise the opportunity for Scotland, and indeed the north of England, of making sure that this disgraceful tax is reduced and economic activity is increased.

[Rob Marris (Wolverhampton South West) (Lab)]

I do not share this cosy consensus. The hon. Member for Dundee East (Stewart Hosie) made it very clear in his usual honourable way—I have sparred with him many times—that if APD is devolved, the Scottish Government, if controlled by the SNP, will cut it markedly and have the goal of abolishing it. He helped the Committee by quoting the Prime Minister to the effect that there would be—these are my words, not the Prime Minister’s—a “beggar my neighbour” attitude downwards on APD. Call me old-fashioned, but I think environmental laws should be state-wide and international, and I consider APD to be an environmental law, which is why I voted for it years ago.

As ever, the SNP has been totally open with the House: it wants to see the number of airline passengers increase throughout the UK. That is an environmental step backwards. Fortunately, we have environmental laws internationally through the EU, for example on waste disposal and air quality, something on which the UK is, to coin a phrase, falling foul at present.

--- Later in debate ---

[Rob Marris]

Yes, I would increase the rate of APD.

I was a Member of the House when the Climate Change Act 2008 was debated—there are several other such Members present, although we are a minority. There is in that Act a target which I think is UK-wide—I stand to be corrected on that—for an 80% cut in the UK’s CO₂ emissions by 2050. I did not vote for that because I thought it was, to coin a phrase, hot air and, sadly, in the years since that Act has been passed, I have been proved right, as we see tonight.

[Alex Salmond]

The hon. Gentleman is not correct. Climate change legislation is devolved and the Scottish Parliament has its own Act in which the targets are even more ambitious and well on the way to being met.

[Rob Marris]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for that. Can he inform the Committee how on earth Scotland and the Scotland Parliament are going to meet those figures if they are intent on increasing the number of airline passengers?

[Alex Salmond]

Because, as one of the hon. Gentleman’s hon. Friends alluded to, one direct flight is better than two indirect flights.

[Rob Marris]

The right hon. Gentleman will know that the whole history of airline travel hitherto has been that it increases exponentially. It has done so, and if allowed to do so, will continue.

So I do not share this cosy consensus. I am not part of the airline and airport love-ins. As Members will know, airlines and their passengers already get a huge subsidy because of the low price they pay for airline fuel—kerosene. Members ought to bear this in mind when debating APD: no doubt the figures are lower in Scotland, but across the UK in any given year half the population do not fly. I believe that hon. Members have a completely distorted view of this matter. I suspect that I am one of the very few Members of this House who does not fly; I have not flown for years. I suspect that every other Member has a distorted view, based on self-interest. [Interruption.] It is not me who is causing a huge amount of environmental degradation through flying. The greenhouse gases emitted by aeroplanes at high altitude are far more damaging than the same amount of greenhouse gases emitted at sea level. Air travel is the most polluting form of mass travel.

In that context, I regret that the Government are devolving air passenger duty. Yes, I would increase it. The UK Government will live to regret this measure, because we are clearly heading towards the abolition of air passenger duty in Scotland and, eventually, through a process of “beggar my neighbour” downwards, across the rest of the United Kingdom. That will be another nail in the coffin of the doomed and uneconomic HS2 railway line. People will continue to fly south from Scotland and the north of England, and vice versa, rather than using the HS2 line. It is already uneconomic and, with the abolition of air passenger duty, it will become even more so.