Brexit: Parliamentary Approval of the Outcome of Negotiations with the European Union

Baroness Altmann Excerpts

Monday 28th January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Altmann (Con)]

My Lords, as always, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, who speaks with such wisdom on these matters, and to follow the excellent contributions made by noble Lords from across the House. I concur with the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, that we are indeed the warm-up act for tomorrow. Nevertheless, I hope that the debate this afternoon will produce some interesting insights for the other place.

The Prime Minister’s withdrawal agreement and political declaration were roundly rejected last week by both Houses, but no plan B has been put forward. The current position is a serious threat to the unity of our United Kingdom. The noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford, insists that an invisible solution exists for the Irish border, and the ERG has insisted that technological solutions are available and that this is a manufactured excuse from those who want to stop Brexit. If that is the case, why the fuss over the backstop? Either they do not believe that such a solution exists, or this is merely a delaying tactic to edge the country closer to a no-deal cliff edge.

As the noble Lord, Lord Hain, said, how is it that the EU is drawing a stark red line to protect the border and the Good Friday agreement, while the Conservative and Unionist Party seems willing to sacrifice it? To leave the customs union and single market is, in almost everyone’s opinion, simply incompatible with the Good Friday agreement in practice. Border controls are required. Leaving with no deal likewise abandons the Good Friday agreement. It is essential to rule out no deal; it should have happened long ago. I will therefore be voting, in sadness but in absolute good conscience, in favour of the Motion in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Smith. I join her in encouraging my noble friends on the Front Bench to support it, too.

No deal is an option that no reasonable Government could support. Walking wide-eyed into a course of action while knowing that it will be damaging—and contrary to an international treaty—is against all the principles of representative democracy. As George Orwell said, political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.

My noble friend the Leader of the House said in her opening remarks that the Government have a responsibility to deliver the result of the referendum. Will the Minister, when he winds up, tell us how many of the 17.4 million leave voters actually voted for this withdrawal agreement and political declaration—or indeed how many voted for no deal?

There is a loud, extreme group of Brexiters who believe that the referendum gave carte blanche for any action that delivers the cherished Brexit. This is not democracy. A quarter of the population voted to leave, but we have no idea what each of them expected. The only deal on offer is the Prime Minister’s deal, but that does not command parliamentary support. Equally, it does not provide certainty, and it puts at risk our economy and national security.

The promises of the leave campaign in the EU referendum have not materialised. The “easiest trade deal in history” is nowhere to be seen. Brilliant new trade deals, and even rolling over the existing deals that we have via the EU, are just pipe dreams. Assurances given so confidently by my right honourable friend David Davis in 2017 that the European Medicines Agency would not leave the UK have proved wrong, as we sadly saw yesterday when the agency left the UK. The Brexiters have been wrong about the EU all along, and are still wrong—catastrophically so—when they claim that leaving on WTO terms can be managed reasonably.

We need to know how many people still want to leave the EU, and the only way is to ask them. That is respecting the will of the people. My noble friend Lord Dobbs called this a “loser’s charter”. That misunderstands its purpose. If people confirm that they still want to leave, they have the option and we will honour it—I will accept it. Not even to ask, however, when what is being delivered is so different from what they may well have voted for, is irresponsible.

My noble friend the Leader also suggested that we must command support across the political spectrum. No deal, however, certainly does not do that. Why, therefore, is this kamikaze course still on the table? As the noble Lord, Lord Hain, said, the leave enthusiasts are holding our party hostage and refusing to give up the no-deal threats. Why are they doing so? Is it because this was their one and only plan right from day one? Having watched the actions of the honourable and right honourable colleagues in the other place, I say that this is a wholly consistent explanation. Was their plan, all along, to just keep threatening no deal until 28 March and wait for the EU to surrender to the cake-and-eat-it promises made to voters in the 2016 referendum and the 2017 election? They still refuse to accept that it is simply not possible to leave the EU single market and customs union and protect the Northern Ireland border within the UK.

If this giant game of poker is all that they can offer, it is going to fail. The EU will not cave in to what we want—it has made that clear. The House of Commons Library has produced an excellent report on the full impact of no deal. It was released today, and I strongly commend it to all noble Lords. Indeed, I ask my noble friends on the Front Bench to suggest that both this House and the other place dedicate time to a proper debate about it.

I will quote selectively from the report. The Permanent Secretary of HM Revenue and Customs, Jon Thompson, said:

“We cannot give you or Ministers any assurances whatsoever of what will actually happen in the event that there is no deal ... I cannot say it will all be fine. I absolutely cannot tell you”.


Those who say that many other countries trade on WTO terms and we trade on WTO terms with other countries seem to ignore the fact that the US, Brazil, China and India all have trade agreements with their closest neighbours. Even with the US, the UK already has trade regulated by more than 100 sectoral agreements derived from EU membership that go well beyond WTO provisions.

On medicines, we are told that there is not enough cold-chain warehousing available to build the stockpile that the industry has been asked to hold. Air freight is not an option for medicines that cannot be X-rayed. On Northern Ireland, the WTO rules are clear: there needs to be between two separate customs territories the possibility of checks, and contemporaneous forms need to be filed to ensure that, when goods are passing across the border, the right tariff has been applied.

On security, Cressida Dick, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, has said that no deal would have to replace the mechanisms we currently have with others that are “costly, slower” and potentially put the public at risk.

“There is no doubt about that”,


she said.

On pensions—I declare an interest—there is a promise that overseas residents who are UK citizens will have their pension uprated in the country in which they live as long as there is reciprocity. There are 70,000 British pensioners living in Spain and 62 Spanish pensioners living in the UK. The cost to Spain would be significant. The temptation for it not to offer reciprocity would leave 70,000 British pensioners—and other pensioners in other countries—at risk of no uprating: more frozen pensioners.

As to the managed no deal that we have heard about, we are told that any side deals if we leave with no deal would require the maintenance of goodwill between both sides, which inevitably would require settlement of our financial obligations and the rights of EU citizens, as well as protection of the Northern Ireland border.

The House of Commons has roundly rejected this deal. At the moment we have no agreed way forward. We are approaching the cliff edge. I know that many noble Lords share the concern that the no-deal outcome is unconscionable. I echo the call of the Commons Brexit Select Committee for Article 50 to be extended, as so many other noble Lords have said, because we are simply running out of time.

The British people have been misled about the impact of leaving the EU. Whether we leave with the current agreed deal or with no deal, there will be casualties. In all good conscience, I hope that we can support the words of Benjamin Disraeli:

“Power has only one duty—to secure the social welfare of the people”.