European Council

Angus Robertson Excerpts

Monday 21st March 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

First, my hon. Friend is right to say that the conclusions mentioned the importance of commitment to democracy, to freedom of speech, and to a free press. At the earlier EU-Turkey Council that was spelt out in even more detail, with the mention even of the name of the newspaper that has faced difficulties. All European countries, including this one, raise this issue at every available opportunity. The point I would make is that for Syrians seeking refuge Turkey has been a safe place, and we should pay tribute to Turkey for looking after 2.6 million of those people. But we should also make the point that anyone who does genuinely face a fear of persecution in Turkey will be able to take that claim through their asylum claim.

[Angus Robertson (Moray) (SNP)]

May I, too, thank the Prime Minister for advance sight of the first half of his statement? As this is a statement on the European Union summit, may I begin by discussing the EU-Turkey joint action plan? The statement had much to say about Turkey, Greece, refugees from Syria and elsewhere, and the impact and management of migration to the Schengen zone countries. In the Prime Minister’s statement, I counted a record 12 things the UK is not going to do, so given the projection of refugee numbers for this year, what will it take for the UK to review its 20,000 limit on accepting refugees? With the attempts to close the West Balkan route for refugees, will the Prime Minister update us on what that will mean for attempted crossings from Libya? Last week, in Prime Minister’s questions, I asked about UK plans to send troops to Libya. The Prime Minister chose his words very carefully. He said that he had no plans to send “conventional” forces to Libya. Will the Prime Minister acknowledge that he has a policy of neither confirming nor denying the presence of special forces? Will he also confirm that operations conducted by special forces are not subject to parliamentary oversight by either the Intelligence and Security Committee or the Defence Committee?

We very much welcome the agreement on VAT on sanitary products. It would be gracious of the Prime Minister to thank my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) who was the first Member of this House to table amendments to the Finance Bill, and tributes should be paid to Members across all parties who campaigned for that welcome change.

In the second half of the Prime Minister’s statement on the civil war within the Government, will he confirm that he, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Secretary of State for Scotland and his whole Cabinet agreed last week to cut support for the disabled by £4.3 billion while at the same time handing a tax cut to the very wealthy? I have repeatedly asked the Prime Minister about the devastating impact of benefit cuts to the most vulnerable, including the disabled and ill, many of whom will go on, sadly and tragically, to take their own lives. Does the Prime Minister understand that people watching the ongoing fall-out in the Conservative party are totally horrified that more time is spent talking about the jobs of Tory Ministers than about the impact of his damaging policies on the weakest in society?

[The Prime Minister]

First, on the 20,000, let me say to the right hon. Gentleman that what we have said—I will repeat this again—is that we are looking at the issue of child migrants and those whom we can help more of. We took in 3,000 last year. Of the 20,000, we expect many to be children. We have said that we are working with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees on that, but again we are looking at children in the region, and we have talked about potentially taking in hundreds rather than thousands, and my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is examining that.

On the West Balkan route, I am not surprised that countries have decided to erect borders, as they have been very concerned about the huge flow of people through that route, but, obviously, everything that the Schengen countries and Europe as a whole can do to secure the external borders of Europe the better, and that is what we are helping with. I do not think that it has particular implications for Libya. Most of those migrants have been coming through Malta and Italy, and we do need to address that.

On special forces, let me confirm the long-standing policy, which is that all Governments have exactly the same approach, and we have not changed that at all. On sanitary products, I am very happy to pay tribute to the hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) and apologise for missing her out.

On disability, we are not going ahead with the changes that were put forward, but let me say what we are going ahead with. When I became Prime Minister we were spending £42 billion on disability benefits, and by the end of this Parliament, we are forecast to be spending more than £46 billion, which is a real-terms increase of more than £4 billion. What we did in that Budget was help to take low paid people out of tax and assist in many, many ways, which is why it was a good Budget and we have taken the right decisions.