Barry Gardiner
Main Page: Barry Gardiner (Labour - Brent West)Department Debates - View all Barry Gardiner's debates with the Department for International Trade
(4 years, 10 months ago)
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Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)
The system of rules that has been at the core of world trade for the past 70 years is at breaking point. Corporations such as Google, Amazon and Huawei have arrogated to themselves enormous power. They are able to stand up to sovereign Governments, if not always their own, and to undermine fiscal and public policy. Countries such as China are emerging from non-market economy status with labour and utility costs that enable them to dump subsidised products on to western markets that undercut our domestic producers. The response from the USA has been increased protectionism, imposing arbitrary tariffs on aircraft, steel, aluminium and—my personal non-favourite—Scotch whisky, the impacts of which colleagues will be debating later today in Westminster Hall. At the end of last year, the American President made good on his promise to undermine the WTO by refusing to ratify the appointments to the appellate court. These actions go to the heart of the multilateral rules-based order.
None of this is meant as a criticism of Government. It is merely to set out the context against which the prudence of Government action must be assessed, because it is against this background that our country is tomorrow pulling out of the largest and most powerful free trade grouping in the world and, paradoxically, doing so in the name of free trade itself. It has therefore never been more important for this Parliament to articulate its support for an open and fair rules-based global trading system that creates wealth and jobs in a way that protects workplace rights and environmental standards and ensures that vital sectors of our national economy are protected from unfair external competition.
Sir John Hayes
The hon. Gentleman knows that I share his distaste for monolithic multinational companies that do not play by the rules, but the EU has been singularly ineffective at dealing with them, as he illustrated in his opening remarks. Why, then, does he think our departure will not give us a better opportunity to deal with exactly the problems he outlines?
Barry Gardiner
The right hon. Gentleman mistakes me. I am not seeking to reopen the debate about the EU. We are leaving the EU tomorrow, and we must forge a positive and constructive future.
Madam Deputy Speaker, if you feel any sense of déjà vu in what I believe is the fifth debate entitled “Global Britain” in the past two years, then for my part it will only be in asking the Government to set out a coherent strategy as to what that phrase is going to mean in practice. In previous debates, I heard calls from Government Members to bring back the royal yacht and talk of something called empire 2.0, but that does not constitute a strategy. To ask the Government for their strategy is not to talk Britain down or to act against the national interest; it is simply to ask that we work together as grown-ups to devise a new relationship with our closest trading partners and to agree a set of priorities for our country’s future relations with others in an increasingly fraught geopolitical context.
Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)
I represent a city that still has a big steel industry, and 75% of our steel exports go to the EU. Does my hon. Friend agree that securing a good trading partnership with the EU is imperative if we are to protect the UK steel industry at an extremely challenging time?
Barry Gardiner
My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. She will know about America’s imposition of section 232 to impose tariffs, with the excuse being that its steel industry was necessary for national security. However, I accept that the Government say they want to negotiate a zero-tariff, zero-quota free trade agreement with the EU. We need to do that, and we certainly need to do it for the steel industry, which my hon. Friend represents.
Perhaps those who have the audacity to ask for a plan ought to be prepared to provide suggestions, so in that spirit, let me be clear that the Opposition will champion the United Kingdom as a leader on the world stage that uses its position to tackle injustice and the imminent climate catastrophe. That means that we want to invest in future technologies and next generation industries, foster innovation and grow jobs in the economy, and to do so in a way that helps our trade partners to do the same. We do not see trade as a zero-sum game of winners and losers. We see open and fair trade as a way of increasing global wealth, along with global justice and equality.
At a time of global turmoil and escalating trade wars, it is imperative to have a strategy that ensures that the UK is not helpless against a triple assault: the dumping of subsidised products into our markets, which undercuts our producers; punitive protectionist tariffs imposed upon our exports by our would-be partners; and potential disruption to our trade with the EU, which is still by far our largest trading partner. To that end, our relationship with the European Union must be the priority. We need a free trade agreement that not only protects our existing trade with zero tariffs and zero quotas, but ensures minimum future disruption in both goods and services. We cannot and must not allow a situation to arise whereby our businesses face tariffs on their goods to the EU, alongside onerous and complex administrative burdens, border inspections or delays to the supply chain.
Will the Minister address whether the Government intend to remain part of the pan-Euro-Mediterranean cumulation regime? If not, what is their assessment of the impact that that might have on UK industries and of how it might affect third countries with which we have concluded roll-over agreements and that have already included cumulation regimes in their own subsequent treaties? Producers must not be doubly impacted by a surge of cheaper imports from overseas, particularly where they are manufactured to standards lower than our own or in markets that are distorted by unfair or illegal practices.
The Secretary of State knows that she is introducing what has been called the
“weakest trade remedies regime in the world”,
and industry confidence was knocked still further by interim most favoured nation tariff measures that propose to abolish tariffs on up to 87% of imports. The EU and US are introducing safeguard measures that could see tariffs on our exports and increased diversion of dumped goods on to our market, wiping out foundation industries and the thousands of jobs that they account for in steel, as my hon. Friend the Member for Newport East (Jessica Morden) said, in ceramics, which the Secretary of State talked about, and in major producers such as the automotive sector. I ask the Minister of State, Department for International Trade, the right hon. Member for Bournemouth West (Conor Burns), to set out in his reply to the debate out how the Government will protect our manufacturers, producers and farmers from a flurry of such imports under future trade agreements.
Barry Gardiner
The hon. Gentleman tempts me, and I have a great deal of sympathy with his position. I believe that the decision that the Government have reached on Huawei is already a risk too far, so I share that view with him. Of course, he is right to point out that the Chinese Government’s subsidy to Huawei is just as damaging in that sector as subsidies for steel or aluminium.
Future trade agreements could undermine rights and standards, could change the nature of work and the protections offered to workers, such as leave arrangements and parental leave, could reverse environmental protections, and could compromise data privacy and our capacity to regulate in the public interest. Trade agreements could also see our public services being locked into greater privatisation and different pricing models. I say “could” because I am trying to be generous, since Government Members have sought to assure us that no such thing will happen on their watch, but that takes us to the heart of things: if that is so, why are they refusing to allow any degree of scrutiny or engagement in the process?
The trade Bill was supposed to be one of the flagship Bills underpinning global Britain. The Government boasted that it would set out the framework under which future trade agreements would be concluded, but it has been delayed. It has been kicked into the long grass. In fact, it actually came out of its eighth and supposedly final Committee debate two years ago tomorrow. In Committee, we made every effort to legislate for proper democratic oversight of trade agreements. How unreasonable we were! We asked for consultation with industry, a published mandate agreed by Parliament, transparency of agreed texts, scrutiny, debate and positive ratification, but we were blocked.
In the other place, their lordships valiantly reinstated the democratic safeguards and, despite all the Government’s attempts at obfuscation and frustration, their lordships actually managed to introduce significant amendments to the Bill. No wonder it has now languished down the other end of the building for almost a year. In the meantime, the Government have signed a raft of trade agreements—not the 40 originally promised for a minute after midnight on 29 March last year—many of which try to mirror the existing terms of the third-party agreements with the EU. Those trade agreements have been subject to little public scrutiny, with the Government taking advantage of the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010 process to ratify treaties without giving Parliament the opportunity to debate them.
New Members may be unaware of the vagaries of CRAGA, under which an international treaty is automatically ratified after it has been published and laid before Parliament for 21 sitting days, so long as neither House has resolved against it. How do we resolve against it? The Government have to make time or provide an Opposition day for such a vote, but they have no compulsion to do either. That means Parliament can be presented with a fait accompli—so much for the return of sovereignty. International treaties are possibly the most binding law we pass in this place. They commit our successors in international law and cannot simply be repealed by a future Parliament in the way primary legislation normally can.
Let us examine what is happening under CRAGA. One such agreement currently pending ratification, having been laid before Parliament on 20 December 2019, is the UK-Morocco association agreement, which purports to cover Western Sahara. Western Sahara is categorised as a non self-governing territory under chapter 11 of the UN charter, and it has been under military occupation by Morocco since 1975 after Spain surrendered the colony. The Sahrawi people have been denied the referendum that would allow them to exercise their right to self-determination.
The European Court of Justice has twice ruled, in 2016 and 2018, that Western Sahara is a “separate and distinct” territory from Morocco under international law, and that no agreement with Morocco can be applied to the territory of Western Sahara without the consent of the Sahrawi people. The group internationally recognised as the legitimate representative of the Sahrawi people has rejected every proposal that the EU’s trade agreement with Morocco should apply to them. In fact, a coalition of 93 Sahrawi civil society groups has confirmed that the people of Western Sahara reject the inclusion of their territory in any agreement concluded by Morocco.
Our own High Court ruled just last year that the territory of Western Sahara is separate from Morocco under international law and that the UK Government are acting unlawfully by failing to distinguish between the territory of Morocco and the occupied territory of Western Sahara.
The proposed UK-Morocco association agreement is thus contrary to international law and our own law, and it should not be ratified by Parliament until all references to Western Sahara are removed. This is what happens when there is no process of prior consultation, mandate-setting, scrutiny, transparency or debate as part of the ratification process.
Other recent treaties that replicate economic partnership agreements concluded between the EU and countries in central and southern Africa, for example, force market liberalisation measures without allowing for any modernisation or incubation capacity for industry in those partner nations. That effectively locks in economic dependency and prevents the broadening of their economic and industrial base, which is essential to achieving their development goals.
The impact on chicken farming in Ghana, Cameroon and Senegal has been well documented. Dumped chicken products from the EU, farmed with subsidy support under the common agricultural policy, have decimated local chicken production, raising genuine food security questions for these least developed countries.
Is this the global Britain that Conservative Members aspire to be: compounding economic hardship, legitimising oppression and actively supporting regimes that flagrantly abuse human rights and international humanitarian law? I do not think so, but it is what will happen unless the Government openly and frankly outline a detailed strategy for global Britain, and unless Parliament is allowed to fulfil its constitutional role of holding the Government to account.
Mr Marcus Fysh (Yeovil) (Con)
What is the Opposition’s policy? The hon. Gentleman is outlining a policy of the European Union. The Labour party wanted to join the customs union, which would have implemented exactly that policy. Is that protectionist and slightly weird policy towards the rest of the world still the Labour party’s policy?
Barry Gardiner
I will try to take the hon. Gentleman’s question seriously, because it has a serious core. We have moved on from the debate about the European Union, and we must move on, so it is now about setting the right course for global Britain. That is what this debate is about, and we should not simply roll over the bad things in the EU’s trade agreements and economic partnership agreements. We should set out a new way to engage with such countries that is not exploitative in the same way as the previous treaties. I hope that answers his question.
Barry Gardiner
We cannot forget that this Government have continued to support the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia with arms sales, despite the humanitarian crisis in Yemen and despite the Court of Appeal ruling that such exports must cease. The Secretary of State had to come before this House to apologise for breaching the Government’s undertakings to the Court of Appeal and to the House of Commons. Perhaps she might be able to tell us the outcome of the Department’s inquiry into how many breaches of those undertakings there were and how they came about. I will happily give way to her if she can. If she cannot, can the Minister of State, Department for International Trade, the right hon. Member for Bournemouth West (Conor Burns), when he sums up, at least inform the House of when we might expect the outcome of that report?
I am reminded that we are also waiting for further information on the Department’s investigation into bribery and corrupt practices involving British companies overseas, especially those supported by taxpayers’ funds through UK Export Finance. Can we have an update on that investigation, too?
Earlier this week, it was revealed that Airbus has entered a deferred prosecution agreement in relation to allegations of corrupt practices overseas. This is not the global Britain that we should be projecting: a nation willing to sell arms and equipment to countries with a track record of violating international humanitarian law, where they may be used against innocent civilians, deployed in efforts to oppress citizens or exported through corrupt practices.
It is not just in the arena of international trade that the global order is under threat. NATO, too, is coming under increased strain. There are wrangles on costs and burden sharing, and member states are purchasing weapons systems outside the alliance.
Later this year, the UK will host the crucial United Nations framework convention on climate change—COP26—in Glasgow. This is a truly global responsibility but, sadly, it will also be the moment when America finally pulls out of the Paris agreement, in accordance with the notification it gave two years ago. It will also coincide with the result of the US presidential election. Many countries that have been earnestly engaging in the Paris process, seeking to reduce their own emissions, may come to question their engagement if America continues to be absent from the process.
The pattern of global power is shifting dramatically and swiftly. It is turbocharged by big data, the fourth industrial revolution, artificial intelligence, robotics and the internet of things. Above all, geopolitics will be affected by the energy transformation as the world moves towards a net-zero carbon economy.
From coal and whale oil to crude and shale, the geopolitical map has been moulded by the need to control energy supplies. Distribution pinch points such as the Suez canal and the strait of Hormuz have been flash points for conflict, and the projection of global power has relied on the ability to maintain security of energy supply. The inevitability of this shift is not simply due to the rapidly declining cost of renewables, or even the health and climate problems associated with fossil fuels.
Renewables, in many forms, are widely dispersed in most countries, promoting domestic self-sufficiency. They are not stocks that are used and then depleted; they are flows that are constantly recharged and so require less transportation and have no choke points. They lend themselves to decentralisation of production and consumption, and they can more easily be deployed at a local community scale. They also have marginal costs that approach to zero. So just as the geographic concentration of coal, oil and gas moulded our political landscape since the industrial revolution, the dispersed nature of renewable energy will erode those traditional patterns in a new global world. It is not clear that the Government have thought through the geopolitical implications of this energy transformation: which countries are likely to forge ahead and leapfrog the old technology; and which will fail to transform their subsoil assets of oil and gas into surface assets of human social and political capital quickly enough. It is often said that the stone age did not end because of a lack of stone, and nor will the fossil fuel age end because of a lack of oil, gas or coal. It will end with a lot of stranded assets that could pose severe financial risks that a global Britain must guard against.
The Government have sought to congratulate themselves repeatedly on our domestic progress towards net zero, but this has been achieved through the systematic exporting of our carbon emissions and an explicit policy of supporting activities overseas that we no longer support at home. I therefore welcome what the Prime Minister said:
“there’s no point in the UK reducing the amount of coal we burn if we then trundle over to Africa and line our pockets by encouraging African states to use more of it.”
He is right, and that is why we stopped UK Export Finance funding for coal back in 2002 and why we stopped official development assistance finance for coal back in 2012. What I want to hear from the Minister is an update, the logical corollary of what the Prime Minister said, which is that there is no point in the UK reducing the amount of fossil fuels we burn if we then trundle over to Brazil or Africa or India or anywhere and line our pockets by encouraging those countries to use more oil and gas.
UKEF has helped to finance oil and gas projects that, when complete, will emit 69 million tonnes of carbon a year. That is nearly a sixth of the total annual carbon emissions of the UK itself. Global Britain cannot be Janus-faced, with domestic virtue masking the international promotion of the very policies we say we want to prevent, freeing ourselves to embrace a net-zero future while locking other developing countries into fossil fuel dependency.
Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)
In the past 25 minutes, we have heard a lot of virtuous noises about renewable energy which we can all agree with. We know that the hon. Gentleman is against defence and security exports, against the US and against Saudi Arabia. He is against a whole number of things, and global Britain in terms of trade seems to mean for the Labour party “lining our pockets”. What is the Labour party’s vision of the role of the UK in the world? Does he not see enormous opportunities for us in working with continents such as Africa and Asia?
Barry Gardiner
I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman has sought to intervene in that way, because that quote about lining pockets is from his own Prime Minister, so I not think he does himself any credit. The fact that he has not listened to the positive things that I have been saying is his problem, not mine.
UK Export Finance plays a significant role in enabling fossil fuel projects by removing risk and sending safe signals to investors—these are the wrong signals. The Government’s dangerous approach risks leaving the UK taxpayer on the hook, financing stranded assets as the world rapidly moves away from fossil fuels. That is the point: this is a problem for us and for our economic security in the future. That is precisely what Mark Carney, Bloomberg and many others in the financial taskforce have tried to point out.
Two years ago, I called for the UK to end all fossil fuel projects supported by UKEF and to focus on our renewable technologies instead. Will the Government recognise that that is what a confident, outward-facing, global Britain needs to do? The UK has not yet depleted entirely its stock of fossil fuels, but its future does not lie so much in their further exploitation as in our capacity to use digital technology, smart grids and big data to place ourselves at the vanguard of this energy transition.
Global Britain cannot be backward looking. We must look forward to new opportunities and the repositioning of global powers. We must harness our unique skills and capabilities, and leverage them to take advantage of emerging economies and emergent technological solutions. We need a coherent industrial strategy that ensures a diverse economic base and a skilled workforce capable of meeting the emergent opportunities of a very different but precarious world. We need a proper, robust, independent, trade defence measure, and we need a Government that defend British interests and stand up against unfair practices overseas, including tariffs imposed on the likes of ceramics, which the Secretary of State has talked about. We need a democratic approach to trade agreements that have the early buy-in of affected stakeholders, businesses, trade unions, civil society, devolved Administrations and the elected representatives of the British people.
We cannot seek to make progress on the new issues affecting trade, digital economies and cross-border data flows, the treatment of bundled goods and services, the enforcement of intellectual property rights and so forth until we move forward. We must demonstrate the effectiveness of the rules-based system, work to progress and re-establish the appellate body of the World Trade Organisation, but we must also reform its structures to deliver the global order that is more just and more equitable.