Future Relationship with the EU: Negotiations Debate
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Alistair Carmichael
Main Page: Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrat - Orkney and Shetland)Department Debates - View all Alistair Carmichael's debates with the Cabinet Office
Future Relationship with the EU: Negotiations
Alistair Carmichael Excerpts(4 years, 7 months ago)
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Michael Gove
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Access to our waters will be on our terms, and the beneficiaries of that will be our fisherman in Cornwall and elsewhere.
Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD) [V]
This morning’s figures for the claimant count show an alarming rise in the number of people in receipt of out-of-work benefits, and we expect that future figures will be still worse. What estimates have the Government made of the likely further rise in those figures if at the end of this year we are tackling not just covid-19 but a no-deal Brexit?
Michael Gove
I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his question. As he knows, it is a source of sadness to all of us to see people who want to be at work, not at work. Of course, we need to protect the fragile economy of the island communities that he represents, and we do so strongly through the power of the Exchequer across this United Kingdom. We believe that, outside the European Union, we will have more freedom to protect people in employment, and we will also save some of the money that we would have spent on EU membership.