United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Debate between Ben Bradley and Anna McMorrin

Wednesday 16th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Anna McMorrin]

If the hon. Member thinks that this Bill is so great, can he explain why the Prime Minister has just announced a climbdown, saying that he will bring it back and try to get his own disgruntled Back Benchers onside?

[Ben Bradley]

I think it is right that the Prime Minister is willing to have a conversation and be pragmatic in how we approach delivering Brexit. If that means having constructive conversations about this Bill and the best way to take our country forward, that is the right thing to do. Perhaps Opposition Members could learn from those constructive conversations about how we get things done in this place. That might be helpful to them.

This week the Labour party voted against the Bill, which will ensure unfettered trading access within the United Kingdom. A party that is supposedly pro-Union voted to risk our ability to trade freely throughout the UK. This is a strange new world, although by this point we are used to the Opposition having a totally incomprehensible policy on Brexit. They would instead give the European Union a free hand, allowing it to threaten us and negotiate in bad faith, and they think we should do nothing at all.

I have been reading a book this week—amazing, I know. There will be colleagues here who are not convinced that I read books, but I do. It is called “Beyond the Red Wall” and is by a former Labour strategist, Deborah Mattinson. It highlights how the feeling of patriotism and pride felt by residents in my community and the importance of UK sovereignty, and specifically the control of borders, are defining problems that mean that voters in my part of the world do not trust the Labour party anymore. It seems from this week that Labour has learned absolutely nothing from its crushing defeat in December.

It is quite right that this Bill ensures that the people and businesses of Northern Ireland cannot become the political football that the EU would like them to be. If anything could serve to strengthen the feelings of my constituents in Mansfield about wanting to leave this bureaucratic and self-serving institution that is the European Union—bearing in mind that they voted 71% to leave back in 2016—then this is surely it. It must be clear to everybody in this place that the withdrawal agreement rests on reasonable interpretations of what is an acceptable outcome for both sides, and nobody could reasonably suggest that carving up the internal market of the United Kingdom in the way that has been suggested is reasonable.

My constituents have been contacting me this week to express their overwhelming support for the Prime Minister. While the media focus on negative commentary from here in the Westminster bubble, my constituents have been overwhelmingly supportive of the fact that he is putting our best interests as a country first and doing what needs to be done to deliver on his promises. He has my full support in doing that.

I turn to today’s amendments, which focus on the relationship between the UK and devolved Governments. Throughout today’s debate we have heard a number of times from the Opposition Benches about this nonsensical idea of a supposed power grab. It is simply wrong. The powers that are currently in control of the European Union are coming back to the United Kingdom. This is no power grab; it is what Brexit is all about. It is about bringing those powers closer to home, here in the United Kingdom. As my hon. Friend the Member for Moray (Douglas Ross) exposed in the House so effectively a few weeks ago, nobody can actually name a power that is being grabbed from the devolved nations. They do not exist.

[Anna McMorrin]

The hon. Gentleman may have missed it, but during my speech I listed all the powers that are being grabbed. Currently the Welsh Government and Parliament currently have powers in an array of areas that the Government are seeking to take away.

[Ben Bradley]

I did miss the hon. Lady’s speech, but colleagues around me are looking slightly non-plussed as to what those powers were. They do not seem to remember, despite their having been listed. However, I remember very well the debate from a few weeks ago, when my hon. Friend the Member for Moray, the leader of the Scottish Conservatives, had a lengthy conversation with the SNP across the House. It was pretty clear then that nobody could name a single one, and that remains the case as far as I am aware.

This is what my constituents voted for: a strong internal market, which provides the opportunity for the UK Government to invest in all parts of the United Kingdom, and a strong United Kingdom. By tabling these amendments to clauses 46 and 47, and supporting rejoining the European Union, the SNP and Plaid Cymru have become the only nationalist political parties in the world that I have ever heard of that would prefer powers to be held in a different time zone far away from their own country. It is frankly nonsensical.

Of course, the UK Government already invest directly in projects in Scotland; that is not new. The fact that the UK Government are once again committing to funding projects through the shared prosperity fund should be welcomed by everybody, as it has great potential for all corners of the United Kingdom. As my hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Tom Hunt) noted, Opposition Members might invest their energies in constructive decision making in this place, using the powers that we hold here and the platform that they have in this House to discuss where that money might best be spent.