Health

Debate between Anna Soubry and Geraint Davies

Tuesday 14th May 2019 Commons Chamber

[Geraint Davies]

rose—

[Anna Soubry]

rose—

Government’s EU Exit Analysis

Debate between Anna Soubry and Geraint Davies

Wednesday 31st January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Glenrothes (Peter Grant), although obviously I did not agree with much of what he said at the end of his speech.

I am delighted that the Government have had the good sense to agree to the motion. I am concerned about the circumstances in which these documents will now be made available, in some sort of secrecy, despite the fact that they can clearly be read on the internet. Why we are going through that farce, I do not know.

May I gently say to my Government, this madness has to stop. If we were in the middle of the summer, I might say that it was overexposure to a hot sun that seems to have caused a collective outbreak in the Government of a form of madness. Their inability to grasp Brexit and do the right thing, frankly, is now at a point where, as I say, it has got to stop. We have to start to do the right thing; and the right thing is to get this Brexit sorted out, to form a consensus in this place and within the country, and deliver—deliver not just on the referendum result, but on the hopes and aspirations of our people that we will have an economic future out of the European Union that will be safe and secure for generations to come.

[Geraint Davies]

Will the right hon. Lady give way?

[Anna Soubry]

In a moment.

The reality of these documents, of course, is that finally it seems that our Government have decided they are actually going to make some choices; they are actually going to form a view in Cabinet. It has only taken 19 months since the referendum to work out what they want from Brexit.

The Prime Minister told us, in her Lancaster House speech, what she did not want, but what nobody in the Government—in the Cabinet—has told us is what this Government do want by way of Brexit. And if I am agitated—and I am—I can assure the Front Bench that whilst I think most of the people of this country are just fed up to the back teeth, the people of this country are also agitated, because they are worried and they are nervous. And being blunt, there are millions and millions of people in this country who do not believe that either of the two political parties in this country represent their views, and indeed will forward their views.

I see it in these terms. I think there is a group of people—the hard Brexiteers—and you are not going to change them. In my party, my Government believe that somehow they can “manage” the 35 hard Brexiteers, who for decades have been banging on about Europe in a way that I think is not, at times, particularly good for their mental health—and they think they can “manage” them. They cannot be managed. Even if they were given what they wanted today, they would complain that it had not been done yesterday. For many of them it is a battle to the death, and they will not hesitate to destroy this party or our Prime Minister to get what they want. They can see the prize and they will be damned if anybody is going to get in their way. The Government need to wake up to that reality. So we have that problem to cope with, and that is the way to deal with it: see it off, build a consensus, and jump into the middle ground and put this country’s interests before anything else. As the CBI said, “Goodbye ideology; wake up to the interests of our country.”

Over on the other side is a group of people who still want to fight the battle of the referendum—they are remainers, they are angry and they cannot and will not accept that we are leaving the European Union—but here in the middle is the majority of people. They are like corks, bobbing around in a sea. They feel queasy and uneasy, and they are worried about their own futures and their children and grandchildren’s futures, yet there is nobody for them—no thing, no vehicle coming along upon which they can jump; a big, warm ship that says to them, “Come on board. You’ve got a great captain at the wheel and we can see the land of our destination over there.” It might be Norway; it could be the European Free Trade Association—actually, I would like it to be the single market and the customs union, but hell, I will compromise. I will take EFTA. Why? Because I want to form a consensus to get the best thing for our country.

That is there, but at the moment there is nothing for people to get into that will save them from what, unless this madness stops, will undoubtedly be a catastrophe. Call it what you will—“walking off a plank” is how I think a noble Lord quite properly described it yesterday. Others have described it as “sleepwalking to a Brexit disaster” or “jumping over the cliff”. Whatever metaphor one wants to use, if this Government—and it can only be this Government—do not get a grip on the situation at the top, we will indeed walk into a Brexit nightmare.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anna Soubry]

This is an astonishing idea. The right hon. Gentleman—he is definitely my Friend today—seems to be saying that if there was a report saying that going off the cliff or some other madness would be beneficial to our economy, the Government might publish it, because it would help in their dealings with the hard Brexiteers. Of course, the right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right.

What the Government have done, to their credit, is to ask the objective analysts to go away and look at the options, albeit apparently not their preferred option—although we have made that point, so I will move swiftly on—and they have come back, having no doubt done their job, as they always do, thoroughly, openly, honestly and exceptionally well. We now know that these reports were prepared, and apparently some Ministers have already seen them. According to reports, I think in The Times, Cabinet Ministers were to go and see them under lock and key. They were to read them, they were not to take in their phones and most certainly not to make any notes, and they were to inform themselves, so that finally our Cabinet could perhaps come to a conclusion about what we want from Brexit. Yet apparently these very same reports are so useless and flawed—they are based on weird modelling and cannot be trusted—that they have to remain top secret. They were not good enough—or were they?—to inform Cabinet members. It is nonsense.

[Geraint Davies]

The Minister said that these analyses are provisional, incomplete and not fit for purpose, so is the right hon. Lady as amazed as I am that the Prime Minister should conduct phase 1 of the negotiations with no economic analysis? No wonder we are the laughing stock of Europe.

[Anna Soubry]

Well, no, because I thought the conclusion to phase 1 was actually quite good, so I am certainly not going to undermine it, but the hon. Gentleman makes an important point.

Many hon. Members sat through the many hours of debate during the Committee stage of the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill and, at the end of it, one thing on which those of us who take a sensible approach to this all agreed was that we had had some terrific debates. The dreadful irony was this: if only we had had those bloomin’ debates before the European Union referendum. What is undoubtedly happening is that people are becoming better informed. They understand now the huge complexity that Brexit is. They realise that there are serious consequences to our decision to leave the European Union, and that is why they are darned worried, not just for themselves but for their children and their grandchildren. People have a right to know. My constituents who work at Boots have a right to know the consequences for them and the pharmaceutical sector, based on the different models and choices that are still available to our country. The people who own and run Freshcut Foods have a right to know about the consequences of, say, duties on imported fruit and vegetables from European countries and what those will mean to them, in the real world, doing the job that they do.

That is at the heart of all that is happening now. People want to know, because they are finding out about the promises they were made. The £350 million for the NHS is all gone; they were lied to—they were conned—on that. They were told this was going to be the quickest trade deal—I think I am right in saying they were told it would take a day and a half to do a trade deal.

We are nowhere near doing that trade deal, and we will be nowhere near doing it, because the other Brexit reality is this: we are not going to have a meaningful vote in this place—we are not—because there will not be anything meaningful to vote on. What is going to happen, unless the Government get into the right place, is that, yes, we will have an agreement on the divorce—that will be there in the withdrawal agreement—but in terms of the actual relationship we will have with the European Union once we have left, we will have a few woolly heads of agreement. That will mean pretty much nothing—not even to those of us who have spent what feels like a lifetime now looking at these options. We will have a series of heads of agreement. That is not meaningful; that does not give us the ability to decide whether this is in the interests of our constituents and our country. It will have no meaning whatever. Again, people—my Government and everybody else—have to wake up to the reality of what we are going to get in October.

Exiting the EU and Workers’ Rights

Debate between Anna Soubry and Geraint Davies

Monday 7th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry]

Given the hour, the fact that we are all on a one-line Whip and the fact that the House will rise tomorrow, I suspect that a lot of Members will want to make their speeches by way of a quick intervention. I forgive the hon. Lady for her intervention and hope she does make a speech.

If there are to be further debates, we should consider some of the matters raised by the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan), who seems to have vacated his place. He talked about the detail of how the transfers will take place. Will that happen in a general sense under the great repeal Bill, or will it be done in dribs and drabs by virtue of statutory instruments? The effect will be exactly the same, so I do not have any concern in that regard. His point about how the devolved Administrations will be affected is important.

The hon. Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis) should have raised such matters in his speech, but instead he used the debate as an excuse to launch off a series of slogans based on ideology that were, in many ways, deeply offensive. He then turned his speech, in a rather childlike way, into a tirade against Tories. His hugely unsubstantiated and sweeping statements did nothing to advance the argument for having a proper debate and restoring politics in this country to a much more civilised footing.

I do understand that Labour is in a huge dilemma. The reality is that seven out of 10 Labour MPs represent seats that not only voted remain, but, in most cases, overwhelmingly voted remain—[Hon. Members: “Leave”.] Sorry, I meant to say leave. If only they had voted in the way I said, but sadly they did not. Would that not have been a sweet moment? Would it not have made the position of the Labour party so much easier?

The hon. Member for Ashfield (Gloria De Piero) represents my neighbouring seat. I have a lot of time for her—I hope that that will not be used against her. Such is the current atmosphere, which has been stoked up by people such as the hon. Member for Norwich South, that a Conservative giving praise to a Labour MP can be used against them by the so-called Corbynistas and Momentum. I hope that I cause the hon. Lady no difficulty by paying tribute to her. She is a great MP who has brought much to our House. There was an 80% turnout in her constituency—no disrespect to the good people of Ashfield, but they have never voted in such numbers—and just under 70% of people voted to leave. That means that it is inconceivable that she will not vote for article 50, and she is by no means alone.

I very much hope that that vote takes place in this House. I do not want to go too far into that debate, Madam Deputy Speaker, because you would rightly admonish me, as we are meant to be talking about workers’ rights as well as about these other much bigger problems, but it is the sort of debate that we really should be having in this place. I want debates after which we have votes that actually mean something. Labour is in a real dilemma. As I say, if we have that vote on article 50, it is inconceivable that Labour Members to a man and a woman will not vote to leave the EU, not least because many of them, like me, understand that we went to the nation saying clearly that if people voted leave, that was what they would get.

I will be quite honest: I have struggled with this ever since June. It has been my long-held belief that our country—our nation—is considerably better off as a member of the European Union. I have spoken about that at length. I am a firm remainer. If there was a scale from one to 100 showing how firm a remainer someone was, I would put my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke) at 100 and myself at about 95. I have grappled with my own long-held views, which I hold passionately, and with the fact that when I stood up and addressed my constituents, wrote my email newsletter or went out into the streets of Broxtowe and beyond, I said, “If you vote leave, you will get leave.” One colleague—it might have been my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (John Redwood)— said that we in the remain camp were very clear about that.

Although I will find it extremely difficult, because it will be against everything I have ever believed in, I cannot see how I have any alternative but to be true to what I said I would do and true to my party’s manifesto—I never demurred from any of this at any time. Therefore, with huge regret, I would have to vote in favour of article 50 being triggered when the mater comes to this place—and it should come to this place; the learned judges are absolutely right. I say to the Government with some gentleness that it would be very good if having read the judgment, as I and many others have done, and understanding the law of this land, they said that they were not going to appeal. Three of the most senior judges took part in that judgment. The Government should not appeal it, but should bring legislation before this House.

Already right hon. and hon. Members have heard not only my views but those of colleagues such as my right hon. Friend the Member for Loughborough (Nicky Morgan). It is clear that those of us who now sit in the corner from which I am speaking would vote in favour of triggering article 50.

[Geraint Davies]

I am amazed that the right hon. Lady thinks that everybody who voted to leave was voting unconditionally to leave. Many of the voters in my constituency believed what they were told: their jobs were secure, they would save money and all the rest of it. In fact, the deficit plan has been ripped up. In Swansea bay 25,000 jobs depend on EU exports, many of which will be at risk. If people wake up and find that they have lost their jobs, they will think, “This is not what we were promised,” and they will be very angry. It is ridiculous to give unconditional support, as if everything that was said was true and there will not be problems.

[Anna Soubry]

I am sort of grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. I have never given up on anything, but I have to understand, as he must, that we were very clear. We said to people that the referendum was their decision and that if they voted leave, they would get leave. However, that does not mean that I would not fight tooth and nail to make sure that the Government go into the negotiations seeking to make sure that we stay a member of the single market, for example.

The hon. Gentleman knows my views on the free movement of labour and people. Along with the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy), I am the most liberally minded—with a small l—Member of this House on immigration. Labour Members have the huge problem that they find themselves looking over their shoulders at the vote in their own constituency knowing, as I hope they do, why their constituents voted as they did. In many constituencies, people voted to leave because they wanted to reduce the number of people coming into our country. We should be clear about that. Labour Members have far more of a dilemma than I have as we leave the EU and try to work out the best deal for our country. I have no difficulty in making the case for us to stay in the single market, and I certainly have no difficulty in making the case for the free movement of people.

Boulby Potash and Teesside Unemployment

Debate between Anna Soubry and Geraint Davies

Wednesday 2nd December 2015 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Small Business, Industry and Enterprise (Anna Soubry)]

I do not know whether the hon. Member for Redcar (Anna Turley) wanted to speak too, Mr Davies, but if she does, I will take as many interventions as she would like to make. That is never a problem.

[Geraint Davies (in the Chair)]

In the 10 minutes available.

[Anna Soubry]

I know—I only have 10 minutes.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland (Tom Blenkinsop) on securing the debate. Obviously, we do not agree politically, but I would be the first to pay tribute to the continuing work that he does on behalf of his constituents. He has come here with a list of demands, and quite properly so—there is nothing wrong with that. As far as I am concerned, the usual rules will apply: if I do not answer any of the questions that he has asked, my officials will of course answer them later, and the same goes for interventions that other hon. Members have made.

The announcement that Cleveland Potash plans to shed 220 direct jobs along with another 140 contractor jobs is extremely bad news. I would be the first to concede that, and as the hon. Gentleman said, it comes at a particularly difficult time for this part of our country in the wake of the closure of the SSI plant at Redcar. The impact is not lost on this Minister, nor on the Government: it is bad news for those workers and their families. The hon. Gentleman is right that there is something about the run-up to Christmas that makes these things all the worse.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Anna Soubry and Geraint Davies

Tuesday 11th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry]

Screening is one of the most important aspects of the work of Public Health England and we are keen to make sure that it is addressed both nationally and locally. Great work can be done by local authorities in making sure that women have this vital screening.

[Geraint Davies (Swansea West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Is the Secretary of State aware of the alcohol treatment centre in the middle of Cardiff, which treats people who are drunk on Friday and Saturday nights and therefore takes pressure off A and E, ambulance services and the police? Will he look at this model, as we are in Swansea, and pilot it elsewhere?

Defendant Anonymity

Debate between Anna Soubry and Geraint Davies

Thursday 8th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Geraint Davies]

We must maximise our impact on injustice against victims and the wrongly accused. Ultimately, however, there is a trade-off, because if we push forward with anonymity, there will be more rape, more rapists and more rape victims. A few innocent people might get accused because of the culture and environment we create, but it is obvious where I stand in that trade-off.

The chief constable of Cheshire gave the example of a vicar who used to be a teacher. There was a media revelation about him being accused, and immediately eight more victims came forward, as a result of which he was convicted. We have heard about the 12 women who came forward about the black-cab driver; suddenly, after photos were published, 81 more women came forward. In the case of the paedophile running a teenage football team, publicity led to 14 more victims coming forward. Under the anonymity proposal, that would not have happened, and we would not be protecting the victims, including children.

There is a prisoner’s dilemma whereby we rely on the brave victim coming forward and encouraging other people to have the confidence to do so. With anonymity, the risk is that that person will stand alone, and that in the time between the accusation and the court case, she will be open to harassment through texting and phone calls saying, “You haven’t got a chance. You know you’re going to lose.” Then, when she does lose, other people will look at her and say, “I’m not ending up like Mary. She was harassed for ages, and now she is regarded as a liar.” Anonymity changes fundamentally the power relationship between victim and accused. The accused will realise that, it will reduce the risk to serial rapists who use drugs or alcohol to carry out their crimes, and it will increase rapist confidence.

Under the proposal, the balance could tip even further against the victim. The statistics already suggest that 0.5% of women are raped each year—about 140,000 women a year. Of those, about 100,000 do not report the rape. Why is that? Obviously, there is a systemic problem with the justice system. About 5% of women in the population—1.4 million—have been raped. Despite that horrendous figure, we are discussing measures to deter people from coming forward.

The chief constable of Cheshire gave a snapshot of statistics in the year to March 2010. He reported that 155 crimes had been recorded as rape, 33 of which were prosecuted, with 23 convictions. Nobody was found to have put forward a malicious, false accusation, although 13 cases were regarded as non-criminal. His evidence suggested that, occasionally, accusations are dismissed. I do not pretend that there are not malicious, false allegations, but there are few of them. Obviously, false allegations are serious, because when people are found to have made them they are punished by, for instance, as has been mentioned, two years in jail, which is fair enough. However, we should not change legislation because of a small number of people, when a large number of people are suffering very serious consequences, against a backdrop of a massive amount of rape. We should not rush a change through before the summer recess as has been suggested.

Women, in particular, will see the proposal in the wider context of a new Government suggesting that there should be less closed circuit television and less use of DNA, and now they are suggesting that there should be anonymity. Plus they are cutting £125 million from the police grant. When all that is put together, it does not look good to the victim, or suspected victim, of rape. To those watching this debate, I point out that 1.4 million women have been raped. Again, that is against a long-term cultural backdrop of endemic sexism in the judicial system. I see men on the Government Benches raising their eyebrows, but we have all heard about contributory negligence: “She was drunk”; “She had a short skirt on”; “He couldn’t help himself”; “He was a former boyfriend”; “And what about her sexual history?”; “What about his military career?”—all irrelevant, erroneous considerations. Consent is consent.

[Anna Soubry]

rose—

[Geraint Davies]

I consent to the intervention.

[Anna Soubry]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that those days are long past? Raising the sexual history of a complainant is specifically prohibited, apart from in extremely rare circumstances, under section 41 of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999. Does he agree that that is a long time ago? We have moved on greatly in the past 15 to 20 years.

[Geraint Davies]

No, I would not agree. I heard of a recent case where such suggestions were made about clothing and all the rest of it by the barrister in putting the defendant’s case. That is still the backdrop. We can all pretend that we do not live in the environment in which we do. The environmental context is pulled in when such cases are considered, and that is another reason why people do not want to come forward. They say, “Oh no, I was out on a Saturday night and I’d had a few drinks, so it’s an I-was-asking-for-it type of thing.”