Exiting the EU and Workers’ Rights

Debate between Anna Soubry and Kevin Foster

Monday 7th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[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.

[Kevin Foster]

My right hon. Friend may take some solace from knowing that I am in a similar position, having voted in remain in the referendum, while the majority in my constituency voted leave. Does she agree that all the way through the campaign it was clear that if people voted leave, we would leave the EU, but it was never disputed that Parliament would deal with the details of how we did so?

[Anna Soubry]

Indeed. It is right that we in this place should assist the Government in determining our objectives—our underlying principles. I want our Government to go into the negotiations wanting us to stay a member of the single market, with all that that entails. They might not be able to achieve that, but they need some guiding principles and I want that to be one of them.

This Government have a proud record of defending the rights of workers. It is the Conservative party that has restored our economy, which is the foundation of everything else that we do. This is the party that is seeing employment going upwards and the number of people on jobseeker’s allowance going down. It is this party that could claim responsibility—effectively, by virtue of our economic policies—for that huge rise in employment, which means more jobs. If we really want to help workers in our country, we should make sure that they have good, safe, sustainable employment. I am also proud that it is this party that not only introduced the national living wage, but has taken so many millions of low-paid workers out of taxation.

There is far more that can be done to protect the rights of workers. I completely agree that conditions in places such as Sports Direct are totally unacceptable. I wish the local Member of Parliament had raised the matter in this place considerably sooner. I am delighted that our Prime Minister has made it clear that she takes the firm view that among her priorities are workers’ rights, and responsibility among businesses for how they employ people and protect their rights. For what it is worth, I agree that we should have workers on the boards of businesses.

It is important to talk about British people’s rights to free movement and travel so that they may go to other countries in the EU and work. Immigration—migration of labour—is a two-way process. Undoubtedly, our economy benefits greatly from the fact that people come here, whether they are low-skilled, no-skilled, middling skilled or high-skilled. We benefit from them coming to our country and working in our businesses and industry. We would be lost without them. When constituents of mine say, “We want less immigration. We want to send these people home”—that is the tone of the debate that is breaking out in our country—I say to them in quite robust tones, as the House may imagine, “Who is going to do the jobs? Who is going to do the work?” If we look at those areas with the highest rates of employment, that is where there are more migrant workers, because they do the jobs that need to be done. This is a two-way process.

I hope that the Government will think carefully before they rush down a route that leads to over-reducing and over-curtailing the number of migrants coming into our country, for all the reasons that are not the subject of this debate. Many hundreds of thousands of British people have the right to go and work freely in the EU. I think that that right is worthy of being protected.

This debate is not the most important of all those that we shall have when we consider and, more importantly, decide how we leave the European Union. I do not know who chooses the topics—[Interruption.] It is the Government. May I gently suggest to the Government that we should have real debates about the real difficulties, the real dilemmas and the need to make sure that we get the right guiding principles as we leave the European Union?

There is one last thing, which is very important. We talk about the 17 million people who voted leave, but we are in real danger in our country if we forget the more than 16 million people who did not vote to leave. At the moment, they feel forgotten and marginalised. Some of them feel bullied, threatened and intimidated on Twitter and other social media, and that is not acceptable. The job of all of us now is to bring people together and to move forward, not to reheat and rehash all the arguments we have had. We must come together, respect all points of view and move forward as we leave the EU.

BHS

Debate between Anna Soubry and Kevin Foster

Monday 25th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

This is a worrying time for staff at the BHS store on Union Street, Torquay. Will the Minister confirm that, as well as planning to support the company, we should offer support to councils faced with having to find new tenants for major anchor stores on their high streets?

[Anna Soubry]

In such circumstances, there is a role for everybody, and my hon. Friend makes a good point about councils, which are invariably concerned about the future of their high streets. Good councils are already doing considerable work to make sure that their high streets are good, healthy places—in a business sense—and this should be a continuation of that. I would urge councils immediately to contact the local management to see what help, if any, they can provide. Some landlords, however, have already been engaged in a period of rent reduction, or of no rent at all. Despite much effort, this business is still in dire straits, but we are positive about the fact that a new buyer might well come along, which is what we want.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Anna Soubry and Kevin Foster

Tuesday 10th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry]

I understand from the Secretary of State that that is an excellent company. I agree that these things are really important. It is also incredibly important that we encourage small businesses to consider alternative sources of funding. That is why the FinTech sector is doing so well. We need to get out information about crowdfunding, peer-to-peer, angels and so on, especially at a local level.

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

The Minister will be aware that in my constituency, many people go into self-employment and start a small business as one of their first steps into employment. That means that they are unlikely to be familiar with the system. What steps will she take to ensure that people are aware of the options open to them, particularly once the review of self-employment funding finance is completed?

Redcar Coke Ovens

Debate between Anna Soubry and Kevin Foster

Tuesday 13th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry]

I am more than happy to meet the hon. Lady to explain to her the state aid rules and to bust some myths. She must be assured that the problem is one of over-consumption across the world. These are harsh economic realities, and although I wish I had a magic wand, no Government can set the price of steel. The price of slab has almost halved in 12 months. Hardly anybody is making a profit, and no Government can solve that. She can be assured that the Government are doing everything they can to support the steel industry in this country. Where we cannot support it—as we have unfortunately found in Redcar—we support those workers into new jobs.

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

The Minister referred several times to the global steel market, and we know that the dumping of certain Chinese steel products has played a part in the situation at Redcar and set a worrying precedent for all other manufacturing industries, including high-tech. Will she confirm that the Government will look to use anti-dumping measures in other situations, just as they have supported their use in this instance?

[Anna Soubry]

It was, I think, a first when a clear ministerial direction was given that we should vote in favour of anti-dumping measures in the European Commission, and we did that. Last week we abstained from another vote, and I am more than happy to explain to my hon. Friend in more detail why we did that—Mr Speaker, quite rightly, wants me to keep my remarks short. There was a good reason for that abstention, because by doing so we were actually voting in favour of supporting the British steel industry.