Covid-19: Future UK-EU Relationship

Alyn Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 15th July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Douglas Ross (Moray) (Con)]

It is always a pleasure to speak in SNP Opposition-day debates, because we get the opportunity to play Blackford bingo. We heard the regular things from the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford) who must, at some point—today twice—show full outrage at Conservative Members for daring to make any sort of noise when he is speaking during the debate, totally ignoring, of course, the chirling nature of his colleagues behind him, when Government Members choose to make points on behalf of the people of Scotland.

We also had, as we always do during Blackford bingo, the words “power grab”, yet I have never heard a single SNP Member be able to articulate what powers are being grabbed. If it is a power grab, there must be powers that are currently held by the Scottish Parliament, and enacted by the Scottish Government on behalf of the people of Scotland, that we, the UK Government, are taking away.

[Alyn Smith (Stirling) (SNP)]

rose—

[Douglas Ross]

I will give way to the hon. Gentleman, because he will be the first SNP Member ever who is able to explain a power held by Holyrood that the UK Government are going to grab away. I look forward to it.

[Alyn Smith]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. The shared prosperity fund has been mentioned by every SNP Member who has spoken thus far. For those present who do not know, that is the successor to the EU funding mechanism that the Scottish Government, and local government, have used productively for 20-odd years to encourage economic growth. The current proposal is for the UK to take over that funding and control it from London, via the Scotland Office. That is a power grab, surely, in any objective sense of the word.

[Douglas Ross]

The search goes on, so I will keep asking. What the hon. Gentleman has just described is a power currently held by the EU that the UK is going to get back, because we chose in a referendum to leave the EU, which the SNP would want to give back to the EU.

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[Alyn Smith (Stirling) (SNP)]

I am struck, as ever, following the hon. Member for Moray (Douglas Ross), that PG Wodehouse really did get it right when he said that a Scotsman is rarely confused with a ray of sunshine. I have to say, though, that we do not need to make a performance art out of it. I will endeavour to strike a sunnier, more consensual note in this discussion, because I am very proudly centrist in my politics. On the centre ground is where I will be found. That is where most people of Scotland are and where most people of Stirling are, That is where we all need to tend towards in order to find solutions to this debate today.

This debate is not about stopping Brexit. We accept and we regret the fact that it has happened. It is about extending the transition period to avert a self-imposed economic disaster. There are solutions to be found. At its heart, we all need to take a step back and reboot this conversation. There are several conflicting world views at play in this discussion—all of them legitimate. Scotland voted to remain. Northern Ireland voted by a nuanced vote to remain also. Two of the four home nations voted to remain. Two out of the four home nations voted to leave. The UK-wide leave vote was 52% to 48%. All of these are facts—simultaneously correct and simultaneously legitimate. We have a conundrum that we need to try to find solutions to. Surely those numbers, those facts, suggest that we should have a more nuanced, respectful approach than we have seen from successive Governments since 2016.

There are solutions to be found. I respect England’s vote. I particularly respect what the hon. Member for Leigh (James Grundy) said about his constituency and how every ward voted to leave. I respect that. I do not believe that Scotland had a right at any point in the process to stop England leaving the European Union, much as we disagreed with it, so why the hell does not that go the other way round? Respect must be reciprocal if it is to exist at all. The Scottish Government have endeavoured at every stage of this process to engage with the discussion and the conundrum. I was involved intricately with that at the Brussels end of operations. We tried to find nuanced solutions that would have recognised the conundrum that we all faced: we published “Scotland’s Place in Europe”; we put forward the idea of a Scotland-Northern Ireland backstop; and we put forward the idea that the UK could leave the European Union but remain within the single market, which would have been a compromise that most people could have lived with. All of those proposals were shot down, ignored and belittled by a Government who were so busy trying to negotiate with themselves that they could not spend any time thinking about Edinburgh, Cardiff or Northern Ireland. It is a poor show, and it is a poor show that we are here now, facing into a very negative situation for all the citizens that we serve, however they voted. We need to save the situation and it is not too late to change course. It is not too late to dig up the tram tracks that the UK Government have set for themselves.

All of our suggestions were dismissed, but our party is left with fewer and fewer options. We will work within the law. We will work within the constitution. We will work within Scotland and the UK’s democracy. We will work within the settlements that we have, but we will not meekly comply because of a vote that happened in another country. We will not meekly go along with it, because we are told to by a party that has only recently found a common purpose—for the moment. It will not last long.

Leaving aside the democratic deficit of the United Kingdom, which is clear for everyone in Scotland to see, let us look at the project that is actually being imposed on us against our will and against our democratic vote. Brexit is proceeding on a flawed premise. There were a series of interlocking promises that have not been respected, that have been forgotten about and dismissed. There were the promises on the side of a bus and an oven-ready deal that is neither ready nor anywhere near an oven. We have a deal that is falling apart. In my first speech in this place, I described the withdrawal agreement as a grubby, shabby document and we were proven right, because within seconds of that vote being passed, the governing party walked away from the commitments, which were being viewed in Brussels as solemn commitments —to a level playing field, to a non-competitive aspect, and to various mechanisms. Those were all being treated as solemn commitments from a UK Government who now do not look very solemn, or serious, or at all credible in the eyes of our wider European colleagues.

Brexit has already made the people of these islands poorer on any objective analysis of the economics. All of that pain is perhaps necessary, I am willing to accept, if the benefits are there to see and to be explained, but —I believe in intellectual honesty in my politics—all of those benefits, surely we must accept, are at best hypothetical, and absolutely none of them has been delivered in the real world in any sense. Conservative Members wonder why we are sceptical on these Benches about this project. It is because we have not seen any advantages spelled out after four years of looking for one.

[Tom Hunt (Ipswich) (Con)]

rose—

[Alyn Smith]

Do tell, Sir, please.

[Tom Hunt]

Thank you very much for giving way. You said at the start of your speech that this was not about stopping Brexit; it was just about extending the transition period. So why now are you making the case for why we should not leave, and don’t you think it is uncanny how everybody who is arguing—

[Tom Hunt]

Following on from what I said, does the hon. Gentleman find it uncanny that everybody who seems to be arguing for an extension are those people who were previously on the barricades trying to block Brexit completely, full stop?

[Alyn Smith]

I am grateful for the opportunity to perhaps correct if I was unclear. I accept that Brexit has happened. I gave up my seat in the European Parliament because of it; I wanted to come here to fight for Scotland’s place in Europe. There was a point in the December election where we could have had that argument. In the halcyon days, we were thinking about a hung Parliament—with a Labour Administration, with SNP support, and a second EU referendum—but I won Stirling with 51% of the vote and my party won Scotland with a massive vote, to a Parliament we do not want to be in, on a pro-EU platform. Because of events elsewhere, it was clear that Brexit was going to happen anyway. I accepted Brexit has happened in my first speech, so I have made that point. I accept the hon. Gentleman’s point. What I am trying to do is extend the transition period to avoid a disaster that Conservative Members are going to inflict on this House out of bone-headed ideology, and when the chickens come home to roost, I do hope they will be as accountable as we have been to the people of Scotland on those points.

I again urge the Minister, whom I have much respect for, on the shared prosperity fund. There has been much talk about the power grab. I see the eyes rolling on the Conservative Benches now, but it is a very concrete example. This was not a power that rested in Brussels. The European frameworks exist in order to empower national and local governments. This was a power that was entirely with the Scottish authorities. The proposal on the table now from the UK Government is to put those powers in the hands of the Scotland Office—a part of the UK Government—removing that budget and removing that competence from the Scottish authorities. If that is not a power grab, I will need to have a look at the dictionary the Conservative Members are working with because, in any objective sense, it is. The Minister can assure us now that I am wrong. I will happily be proven wrong. I will happily engage with what we can do with the shared prosperity fund in Scotland, but it must be as a matter of respect for devolution under the competence of the Scottish authorities. If it is not, it is a breach of trust, it is a breach of faith and it is a power grab.

As I say, the pain of Brexit or the pain that Brexit is causing could be worth it if the benefits were there to be seen, but beyond warm words and sentiment, and beyond slogans that do not stand analysis, we have not seen that. Let us be generous—I do try to be generous—and say that the one-year negotiating period was heroically ambitious. That was before covid. Covid has intervened and has taken the focus of all of our Governments and all of our public officials away, rightly, to a health emergency. Extending the transition period is not about fighting old battles. I am not in the business of fighting old battles. Extending the transition period can be done and will give us breathing space and certainty to allow our economy to recover from a health emergency that is turning into an economic emergency. To add a covid-inflicted disaster upon that because of Brexit would be flat lunacy.

I was struck by the Paymaster General’s previous comments. She is now not in her place, but I was struck when she used the phrase that we are now past the point whereby a request can be made. She said that some might argue it is impossible to apply for an extension. She is not here now, but I would happily give way to anyone on the Conservative Benches who can name anybody in Brussels who is of that view. Anyone—Berlin, Paris, Ljubljana? It is a matter of straightforward principle and pragmatism in Brussels that, if the UK applies for an extension, it will be granted. The EU has, at every stage of the process, accepted with regret the democratic choices of the United Kingdom. It will not engage in our internal discussion, so it is with regret that it accepts that an extension will probably not be applied for.

We have not heard any indication today that the UK Government will change course, but they should, and this is a plea from us to do so, because we can still change course. We must change course. This is not about old battles. I asked whether anybody in Brussels, Berlin or anywhere else shared the Minister’s view. How about Dublin? Speaking of Dublin, Ireland is an independent state in north-west Europe that has done quite well lately. With Norway, it was voted on to the UN Security Council. It has the EU Commissioner for Trade in the inestimable Phil Hogan, who is a very strong negotiator in trade deals—Government Members will want to watch that one. It also has the president of the Eurogroup in Paschal Donohoe. The international accolades just keep coming for Ireland, and that is all based on the solidarity, support and encouragement of 26 other EU member states that have its back against the former colonial power.

[Paul Holmes (Eastleigh) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman mentioned the fact that Ireland managed to get itself on to the UN Security Council, but Scotland is a permanent member of the UN Security Council through being part of one of the most successful unions. Does his attitude not show that he actually wants to downgrade Scotland’s place in the world by making it a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council?

[Alyn Smith]

I am happy to engage with that point. I have spent a number of years on the European Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, and I am now foreign affairs spokesman for my party. The UK is, of course, a P5 member, and Scotland is represented by virtue of that mechanism. I think that it could serve us better if we were an independent member of the UN and an independent member of the EU, working in concert with 27 of our closest neighbours, because I do not have any faith or trust in where the UK is going under the Conservative party. The Brexit process has proven us to be right.

I heard the point made earlier about the 2014 referendum. We do accept that that vote happened—we do accept that arithmetic reality. But a number of people voted no to independence on the basis of specific promises—promises that they cannot risk their European status, that we are a family of equals and a partnership of nations, that the UK is the only way to guarantee economic stability. All those promises and all that airy sentiment now look an awful lot more threadbare than they did, and no amount of bluster from Government Members will disprove that point.

Look at the recent results of votes in Scotland. Under a system where we do not make the rules, we won massively the majority of seats from Scotland in this House. Scotland is represented in this discussion by nobody from the Labour party and by a Minister who represents Milton Keynes. We have no territorial ambitions on Milton Keynes—the Minister can rest easy—but to say that it is part of Scotland is something of a stretch.

The legitimacy of this Government in the eyes of the people of Scotland is really something that Government Members need to have higher up their consciousness, because the people of Scotland are watching. The people of Scotland will have a choice at some point on whether independence in Europe is a better option than being stuck on an island run by the Conservative party. Ireland has shown us what independence in Europe actually looks like, and the Government are showing us what the UK will continue to offer Scotland. I think we have a better choice, and I believe that independence in Europe is coming.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lee Anderson (Ashfield) (Con)]

This debate has nothing to do with covid or the negotiations with the EU. It has more to do with the Opposition once again refusing to accept democracy. Of course, Opposition parties have form in refusing to accept the democratic will of the people. Let us remind ourselves that we voted to leave as the United Kingdom—not as Northern Ireland, not as Scotland, not as Wales, not as England. Look at the Conservatives—we are the 109s, and we are here because of the Opposition’s reluctance to accept democracy. Most of us are from leave constituencies, and we were voted in because of the Opposition. That is a fact.

On 23 June 2016, my phone did not stop ringing. People all over Ashfield were ringing to ask where they could go to vote. They were people who had never voted before; people of all ages who wanted their voice to be heard. When the results came in the next day, the same people called me again to say that their vote really did count. The referendum result went a long way towards restoring confidence in democracy in left-behind areas like mine—the same areas that the Opposition told us would suffer if we left the EU. In Ashfield, our pits, factories and swathes of manufacturing industry have vanished over the past 40-odd years, and during the same period we have been part of the wonderful EU. People in Ashfield cannot see the benefits of being in the EU, and no one has ever explained it to them—I wonder why? Perhaps the Opposition do not realise that in places like Ashfield they cannot threaten us any longer.

[Alyn Smith]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Lee Anderson]

No, I will not. The Opposition cannot tell us that we will suffer, lose our jobs and homes if we do not listen to them. We have suffered in the past, we have lost jobs, seen our area decline and be ignored, but we are fighters in Ashfield and we are coming back stronger. For the first time in decades we have hope, we know we can make a success of things, and we know that Ashfield can once again become a force to be reckoned with in a UK that is not controlled by the EU. But four years later, the Brexit blockers—