A120 Dualling

Bernard Jenkin Excerpts

Tuesday 19th June 2018 Westminster Hall

[Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. The A120 has long been in my heart as something needing improvement since well before I became involved in local or national politics.

Driving from my constituency—where we have wonderful beaches; it is a great tourist venue—and going westbound, as my hon. Friend the Member for Braintree (James Cleverly) said, it becomes completely blocked up at the section between Marks Tey and what we call cholesterol corner. I am sorry that I have to iterate that. Going from my constituency along the A120 has been a regular commute of mine. It sort of peters out beyond Bishop’s Stortford, where it goes back to being a two-way road, and then it peters out altogether in the middle of the countryside. The section between Stansted and Harwich is an absolute nightmare and has been for years.

We are now celebrating the decision on a preferred route, in which the A120 will be dualled between Braintree and Marks Tey—or south of Kelvedon, I should say. That is not ideal for me, but it is light years ahead of what we have to put up with now. I commend the application for RIS2 funding for this and I hope the Minister will take it further. It also should not be forgotten, as my hon. Friend mentioned, that the A120 is trans-European network route. It is a curious thing—all the major cities are supposed to be linked, east to west, from Moscow to Dublin. This section of the A120 is part of that, and it is a two-way road. It is nonsense. This is a major step towards realising that ambition.

I take this opportunity to call for further work, further down the line, to complete the A120 in an area that does not go through my constituency but that affects it hugely. My hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin) knows all about it. It was built in the ’70s and it is now crumbling and beginning to fall apart. It needs a renewal, so why not get the whole thing done, from Harwich all the way to Stansted, and finish the job?

[Sir Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

I am most grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that part of the A120—from Horsley Cross to Parkeston— which is vital for the economy of north Essex and is crumbling, as he says. However, I believe the Government should be able to say something this afternoon about the Highways Agency activity on that bit of the road and the resources that will be committed to it in the short term, if not the long term.

[Giles Watling]

My hon. Friend is right. I am delighted to hear that the Government can say something about that section, because it is still holding us up. Cars can still bowl along it at about 55 mph most of the time, but it is still a single lane on either side. It takes forever.

I look forward to our delivering a new, world-beating infrastructure across Britain, east to west, which we need now more than ever. We have not had that over the years. The A14 was improved many years ago, and it is about time the A120 was brought into line, so let us get that infrastructure in place. While I am standing here, I might as well mention that we ought to improve the railways in our area, too.

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[Rachael Maskell]

I fully understand the scheme; I have read it in much detail. That is why I am making the case that it is so important that we give people real choice.

In my closing remarks—

[Sir Bernard Jenkin]

Will the hon. Lady give way very briefly?

[Rachael Maskell]

Very briefly, then.

[Sir Bernard Jenkin]

I am extremely grateful to the hon. Lady. Will she just give an assurance that the Labour party supports the dualling of the A120 all the way from Colchester to Parkeston, which is a stretch of road that is long overdue for dualling?

[Rachael Maskell]

I think I have made myself perfectly clear in today’s debate, with all due respect. What I have said is that we believe that we should have a fully integrated, intermodal approach to transportation, which, as I have—

European Affairs

Bernard Jenkin Excerpts

Thursday 15th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mel Stride]

Whether it is a transition period, an implementation period or whatever period one seeks to term it, the important thing is to understand what the period is about, and we have always been clear about that. It is a period in which we will remain closely involved—similar to how we are at the moment—so that when we move into the post-transition or implementation period we have undergone just one set of changes and that we have certainty in the interim for British businesses, which is exactly what they have been telling us they would like.

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

I repeat these words:

“I propose that we aim for a trade agreement covering all sectors and with zero tariffs on goods. Like other free trade agreements, it should address services.”

Those are the words used by President Tusk in introducing the guidelines, which seem to accept the principle that there should be a comprehensive free trade agreement between the United Kingdom and the EU.

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[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

I shall proceed as quickly as possible. The hon. Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) rather marred his speech by playing the man and not the ball. It is much better if we deal with the arguments, instead of imputing motives or sentiments that were at that very moment being disowned by my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (John Redwood). That was rather unfortunate.

I wish to point out that the agenda is not being set by a small group of MPs; it is being set by the British people—more than 52% of the electorate. Those who argue against leaving the customs union or for staying in the single market are arguing against the right of the British people to take control of their own affairs. Let us make no bones about this: the Labour party has now adopted a position in favour of some kind of weaselly half-Brexit, which is not what the British people voted for. The Prime Minister said that she does not recognise any distinction between hard or soft Brexit; there is leaving the European Union or somehow staying in, which seems to be the position the Labour party has now adopted.

Let me set out two contexts. First, many who supported remain seem to believe that people who voted leave in the referendum were voting to turn their back on the world. They claim that the UK’s decision was driven by isolationist and xenophobic undercurrents and see the leave vote as representing intolerance, prejudice and a call for protectionism. Vote Leave did not campaign for that. We deliberately left the Vote Leave website up—Members can take a look if they like. Vote Leave did not argue for isolation, intolerance or economic protectionism. Those may be the views of a vociferous minority, but the Ashcroft polling that was undertaken at the time of the referendum found that for nearly half of leave voters, the biggest single reason for wanting to vote leave was

“the principle that decisions about the UK should be taken in the UK”.

Lest we forget, that is the first context. The debate was about taking back control—about democratic self-government and our country’s right to make its own laws, to decide its own taxation and spending and to choose how it engages with other countries on matters such as trade, foreign affairs and defence. It was about leaving a bloc that is not only in relative economic decline but increasingly in a state of economic and political crisis.

[Sir William Cash]

I very much agree with my hon. Friend. Had the speeches by Mr Juncker and President Macron about moving towards a more integrated Europe—a sovereign Europe, as President Macron says—been put to the British people before the referendum, we would have had a proportion of the vote vastly greater than 52%.

[Mr Jenkin]

I was going to make that point later in my speech, but shall no longer do so, for the sake of brevity.

The EU undermines democracy, prosperity and international co-operation. It is plagued by high unemployment, high debts, an ageing population that is much too dependent on state welfare, a dysfunctional euro, unaccountable political institutions and a democratic crisis. It puts up barriers to the combination of world-class universities, technological innovation and venture capital that is fundamental to the technological innovation on which the future of our economy depends.

Since the referendum, we have seen the landmark statements to which the Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash), referred. In fact, Martin Schulz, the former President of the European Parliament, wants a full united states of Europe by 2025. The formation of the euro, which was always a political project, transformed the EU, making full integration an imperative to try to prevent the eurozone from breaking up. In the end, the euro will fail anyway, because there is no political consent for the scale of fiscal transfers necessary to compensate for the huge internal trade imbalances.

The second context is economic. Shortly before the referendum, the Treasury forecast that a leave vote would inflict an economic shock on the UK, leading to reduced trade and foreign direct investment, recession, and the loss of 500,000 jobs. I am sorry to disappoint the hon. Member for Sheffield Central, but the Treasury’s analysis has proved to be manifestly wrong. It also ignored the long-term future of global trade and economic growth. Between 2016 and 2017, UK GDP increased by 1.7%, and economic growth continues to surpass expectations. Tax receipts are higher than expected, and the UK is running a current budget surplus for the first time since the year leading up to July 2002—long before the crash, and two years earlier than anticipated just last year. UK unemployment has continued to fall from 8.5% in late 2011 to 4.4% in late 2017, and the unemployment rate was recently at its lowest point since 1975.

Although some businesses are moving parts of their operations to other EU countries, the number of jobs being moved is significantly lower than expected. Foreign direct investment has continued to grow and, since the referendum vote, there has been a string of major inward investment decisions. In fact, the year of the referendum, 2016, turned out to be another record year for inward investment. We have seen Wells Fargo committing to a new £300 million London headquarters and Nissan announcing its new Qashqai and X-Trail models to be built in Sunderland, making Sunderland a super plant of 600,000 vehicles a year. In December 2017, GlaxoSmithKline revealed its plans to invest £40 million in the UK’s life sciences sector. At the beginning of this month, Siemens committed to building a £200 million train manufacturing plant in the UK if it wins orders for new rolling stock, and, just last week, Toyota announced that it will build the next generation of its Auris hatchback at its Burnaston plant in Derbyshire, including a £240 million upgrade of the plant.

That is not a matter for gloating or complacency, but it shows that inward investment is not dependent on membership of the EU. What about the longer-term prospects for trade and economic growth? In recent years, UK trade has shown a well-established trend, as the proportion of UK exports sent to the EU has been declining. It peaked at 54% of UK exports in 2006. By 2016, that had fallen to 43%. That decline in the importance of our EU trade has set in despite the UK being in the EU, in a customs union and in the single market. Conversely, over the same period, the non-EU share of UK exports has increased. For example, China’s share of UK exports grew from 1.6% in 2006, worth a mere £5.4 billion, to 3.3%, worth £16.8 billion, in 2016.

Trade has also grown significantly with the Commonwealth. UK exports to Commonwealth countries have increased from 8.8% of our exports, worth £21.5 billion, in 1999 to 8.9%, worth £48.5 billion, in 2016. The Commonwealth is a fast-growing market, reflecting much of our language, values and administrative and constitutional heritage, and therefore has great potential for the UK.

The EU is still the UK’s largest trading partner if taken as a bloc, but if we consider individual countries, the UK’s largest trading partner is the United States of America. It seems to have passed the hon. Member for Sheffield Central by that, while the UK has had a trade deficit with the EU every year since 1999—worth £82 billion in 2016—we achieved a £39 billion trade surplus with non-EU countries in 2016. Outside the EU and the customs union, the UK will be able to develop new trading relationships with many of these countries, but not under his party’s policy. Some of these opportunities, including the possibility of joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the strong prospects of a comprehensive free trade agreement with the US, including financial services, more than match the potential of our existing relationships with the EU.

The 11 TPP countries have a population of almost 500 million people and represent more than $10 trillion in economic output, which is 13.5% of the global total. The Commonwealth has a population of 2.3 billion people. A comprehensive trade deal with the US, which includes services, would give UK firms better access to its population of more than 320 million and to the world’s largest single economy. With the UK accounting for 7% of world service exports and the USA 15%, they would together account for over a fifth of the global total—a market of huge significance.

Outside the EU, the UK will also be better placed to develop trading opportunities with countries in Asia and Africa, where the most rapid growth is expected to occur in the future. When concluding free trade agreements, we can set our own negotiating priorities that best match our economic interests. The EU has historically represented the UK’s interests poorly not just because it is incredibly slow, but because, inevitably, the EU cannot prioritise UK trading interests such as access for services, which is, of course, of prime importance to our economy. EU negotiators have to take account of 28 states’ interests, which can be very different from our own, and to reflect the protectionist priorities of producer interests, such as the Italian shoe industry, French agriculture and the German chemicals manufacturers.

[Vicky Ford]

I am very much enjoying listening to my hon. Friend’s speech and hearing him talk about opportunities for trade outside the EU, but, bearing in mind that nearly half our trade is with the EU, that 40% of that is in services, and that services growth has been increasing year on year, does he not agree that we should try to do both? The EU economy is growing at the moment. We can grow our trade with the EU and with other parts of the world if we strike an amicable trading relationship with the EU as we leave.

[Mr Jenkin]

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. We are on exactly the same page, and we can both support the Prime Minister’s negotiating objectives on that basis.

Returning to the UK the power to negotiate and sign trade deals will not only speed up trade negotiation for the UK, but enable the Government to negotiate in the UK national interest. The hon. Member for Glenrothes (Peter Grant) asked which countries we were talking about. The Department for International Trade is pursuing opportunities in countries around the world, and Australia and Brazil, to name just two, have already expressed an interest in concluding free trade agreements with the UK.

[Peter Grant]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way on that point. As a matter of accuracy, may I point out to him that I asked not what countries we hoped to do deals with, but for one country that has said that it will give the United Kingdom a better deal than it would give us as part of the European Union? To date, I have not received a single answer to that question. If he can he tell us now of one country that has said that it will give an isolated Britain on its own a better trade deal than a Britain that is part of the European Union, I am quite sure that his colleagues in the Department for International Trade would be delighted to speak to him.

[Mr Jenkin]

I think the hon. Gentleman is somewhat playing with words, because nobody will say what kind of deal they will give us until we are actually in the negotiations and making progress. He is asking a question to which he well knows the answer for his own political reasons.

In relation to our trade with the EU, the Prime Minister in her recent speech called for trade at the UK-EU border to be as frictionless as possible. The EU has agreed, as I mentioned earlier, that tariffs and quotas should be avoided and, in the draft negotiating guidelines published earlier this month, it also agreed to the principle of an EU-UK trade deal. Perhaps that is the answer to the hon. Gentleman’s question. There should also be mutual recognition of products and standards, which is no more than the kind of standard agreement that the UK has with many other countries with which it does not have a free trade agreement—incidentally, I think that that is what is meant by a customs arrangement. It means goods need approval in only one country to meet the required regulatory standards in other countries in normal circumstances.

Although we recognise that certain aspects of trade in services are intrinsically linked to the single market, we should note that services trade has nothing whatsoever to do with being in or out of a customs union, because tariffs are not charged on services. The Prime Minister is right to insist that barriers should be introduced only where absolutely necessary. There is no reason for the EU to prevent UK firms from setting up in the EU as we will continue to allow EU firms to set up here. We should agree on an appropriate labour mobility framework and on the recognition of qualifications to provide for the mobility of skilled labour. The Prime Minister also called for the UK and EU economies to remain closely linked in areas including energy, transport, digital, law, and science and innovation. That is perfectly achievable if there is good will on both sides.

The UK is committed to remaining a close friend and neighbour of the EU, and the Prime Minister has made that perfectly clear with a comprehensive economic partnership.

Trade is, of course, of great importance to the economy. In the UK, about 28% of what we produce is sold abroad, and this business activity supports millions of jobs. We also import much of what we consume, and trade allows consumers to access a wider variety of goods, at competitive prices, but the volume of trade is only marginally affected by agreements between countries. Neither the EU nor the UK has a trade agreement with the US, but the US is nevertheless our largest trading partner.

When discussing trade, we must remember that trade agreements are only one factor upon which our economic future depends. How we educate our people, how we regulate our economy, the flexibility of our labour market, and investment in infrastructure, science and technology are far more important to our prosperity than trade agreements. Domestic Government policies have a much bigger impact on economic performance than whether the UK is inside or outside a customs union with the EU. As the hon. Member for Sheffield Central himself pointed out, Germany exports to the rest of the world from within the EU, but with many countries, it does not even have a trade agreement, let alone a customs union agreement.

Let us get all this in proportion. It is far more significant that the UK’s departure from the EU will give us greater flexibility, more responsibility, more accountability and more control over how we manage our economy as we regain: the ability to set our own tariff schedules; the ability to set our own regulatory standards and decide how they should be applied; the unencumbered freedom to set VAT rates; the freedom to relax restrictions placed on UK public procurement; and policy flexibility over things like fishing and farming.

[Vicky Ford]

I think that my hon. Friend just said that he did not think that there was value in having trade agreements with other third countries. I would like to clarify that, for example, our trade with South Korea has more than doubled—increased by 100%, as the Foreign Secretary said—since the signing of a trade agreement between South Korea and the EU, of which we are a party.

[Mr Jenkin]

I am not discounting the value of free trade agreements. I am asking that we dispose of some prevalent misconceptions that our prosperity depends only on free trade agreements and being part of the customs union. It is actually relatively at the margins of the overall prosperity of our economy.

It is not necessary to be a very large country or part of a large trade bloc in order to be prosperous. Many very small states export a far higher proportion of their GDP across customs frontiers. For example, Switzerland’s exports are worth 66% of its GDP, and South Korea’s are worth 42%—far higher than the UK’s. Neither of these countries are in any kind of customs union, so they achieve this across traditional customs frontiers and their people have very high living standards. In fact, the EU is Switzerland’s main trading partner, and it is not even a member. Other small trading countries include Singapore, whose exports are actually far bigger, at 172% of GDP, and Hong Kong, whose exports are 187%, because it imports and exports such large volumes. But neither is part of a customs union or of any kind of single market; they just get on with it.

Control over our own laws offers far greater opportunities to develop our economy and export than the removal of customs checks when trading with other countries. The cost of customs processes is low and declining in comparison with other costs, such as anti-competitive regulation, behind-the-border barriers to trade and the reduction of tariff barriers. South Korea had substantial tariff barriers before the free trade agreement. We gain the opportunity to focus on those matters in trade negotiations, alongside investment in science and tech, educating our people, and ensuring flexible labour markets and a competitive tax regime. So much of the debate about leaving the EU lacks this perspective.

Even so, our future opportunities outside the EU are important. Even the European Commission expects 90% of global economic growth over the next 10 to 15 years to be generated outside Europe. The UK can flourish outside the EU, perhaps not with a Corbyn Government—that might be a bit of a problem—but certainly with a sensible Conservative Government. The only question is whether we all work hard to embrace these opportunities or continue trying to hide from them. Outside the EU, instead of pretending that we can insulate ourselves from a rapidly changing world and from the effects of technological and societal change, with a failing model of regulation and centralised power—without all that—we will have the freedom and flexibility to respond, adapt, survive and prosper.

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[Peter Grant]

I got them from Her Majesty’s Government. If the hon. Gentleman wants to tell me that we should never believe anything that Her Majesty’s Government’s civil servants tell us, that is a debate in itself. Those were the figures that were released, with significant protest, by Her Majesty’s Government to the Brexit Committee. I highly recommend the document to him.

Having had the analysis done at significant expense, those who instructed it to be carried out now seem to want to downplay it—to discredit it. I am pleased that we are no longer hearing, certainly from Ministers, any suggestion that there was anything incompetent, unprofessional or negligent in the performance of those who produced the figures. Of course, those who think that the Treasury’s figures are wildly too pessimistic have had the opportunity to produce their own. We might even find somebody who produces figures that give the lie not only to the Treasury but to the Scottish Government and to any number of other professional bodies. Those bodies do not always agree on the exact figures, but few, if any, are producing a scenario that looks anything other than deeply, deeply damaging for our economy and for the social cohesion of our four nations.

During the Minister’s speech, he took an intervention from one of his colleagues about an article in The Times. Interestingly, his answer seemed to suggest that it was only when they read it in The Times that the Government knew that there had been some softening of the attitude in Brussels towards our ability to negotiate trade deals. Perhaps the Minister could clarify that when he winds up. Would it not be typical of the shambolic nature of the Government in conducting these negotiations if they were getting their information from the front pages of Rupert Murdoch’s newspapers rather than from direct face-to-face contact with our European friends and allies?

When the Government were asked to name a single country that is saying that it would give us a better trade deal out of the EU than within the EU, yet again not a single country was named that is willing to do so. There is a lot of ambitious and grand talk of all the countries that want to trade with us—a wish list, a pie-in-the-sky list. There is, as yet, absolutely no reason to believe that any of these countries will give us a better deal than we could get by staying exactly where we are. We need to remember that what the Government ask for ain’t necessarily what they are going to get, because there are 27 other Governments over there who are just as determined and just as entitled to look after the interests of the people they represent.

The hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin) used the tired old argument that we have a trade deficit with the EU and a trade surplus with the rest of the world, and we should therefore concentrate on the rest of the world. I leave aside the fact that some of us do manage to have a trade surplus with the European Union. The logical consequence of that argument is that, if the rest of the world has a huge trade deficit with us, why in the name of goodness would they want to continue trading with us? It is not because Europe is bad at industry and manufacturing that it has a trade surplus with us—it is because it is better at it than we are. The cradle of the industrial revolution has allowed others to overtake us in investment and reinvestment and improving manufacturing efficiency.

[Mr Jenkin]

rose—

[Peter Grant]

I will give way in a moment.

That is why the Germans can manage to have a trade surplus when we cannot. It is not because they are cheating or because the rules are loaded in their favour; it is because they use more of the profits of their industry to invest in it rather than hiving them off to some kind of offshore tax haven where they are never seen again.

[Mr Jenkin]

I am glad that the hon. Gentleman had the opportunity to add his rather more socialist point. The problem with the regulatory regime in the European Union is that the whole system is not geared towards our interests and our economy, not least because Germany enjoys a very artificially depressed currency. The Germans have by far the biggest trade surplus as a consequence, and their currency never appreciates because they are in the euro. That has cemented in a completely unfair disadvantage, institutionalised by the European Union.

[Peter Grant]

So modern industrialised nations that are in the euro do better than those that are not in the euro. That is an interesting argument for the hon. Gentleman to make. I am not saying that I would necessarily agree with its inevitable conclusion, but he does seem to be tying himself in knots very effectively.

I must come back to the comment with which I challenged the Labour spokesperson, because it is very important. When we are talking about the rights of citizens, whether they have lived here their entire lives, come here from other countries, or gone from here to other countries, we should be absolutely uncompromising in celebrating immigration as a good thing. Yes, it sometimes means that bad people come here, but thousands, millions, tens of millions of times more often it means that good people can come here and that our people can go to other places. The exchange of ideas, for example, is something that we cannot put a price on. As well as talking about free movement of people, I want us to be talking about free movement of ideas, because that is what is at stake more than anything else.

To suggest that immigration is responsible for the low-paid, insecure jobs on these islands lets the Government off the hook. Last week, the Leader of the Opposition told an audience—not a very big audience, admittedly—in Dundee:

“We cannot be held back—inside or outside the EU—from …preventing employers being able to import cheap agency labour, to undercut existing pay and conditions in the name of free market orthodoxy.”

I am disappointed that Labour Front Benchers have not apologised for that and invited their leader to withdraw, as a lot of their Back Benchers have. It is not the European Union that is responsible for low pay on these islands; it is successive Governments who eventually introduced a minimum wage but left us with one that is still not enough for people to live on. It is not the European Union that allows employers and agencies to exploit vulnerable, desperate workers; it is domestic legislation. Coming out of the protection of EU employment law is not going to make it easier for vulnerable employees to speak up for themselves. The gig economy—the low-pay economy—is not going to improve by our coming out of the European Union. Indeed, I worry that it will get significantly worse. If anybody thinks that the Conservatives want to come out of EU employment legislation to improve workers’ rights, they really need to look back at the past 100 years of employment law history on these islands.

As I said, it is unfortunate that Brexit has become an all-consuming obsession for the Government, and now for this Parliament, but it is inevitable, because if we get it wrong, as the Government seem determined to do, generation after generation will be paying the price socially and economically. We discovered that we have moved on from the previous Government policy—that the EU can “go whistle” for any payment—to talking about payment for part of the deal of about £37 billion, which we will still be paying if and when I am 104 years old. Possibly some right hon. and hon. Members here will not be around to see that. That is how long it will take simply to pay for a bad deal.

I have hardly even mentioned the potential catastrophe in Ireland. I am deeply concerned that Ministers still seem quite taken with the “Smart Border 2.0” proposal that was published a few weeks ago. “Smart Border 2.0” explicitly says that it relies on automatic barriers, infrastructure, surveillance cameras and staffed checkpoints at the border of Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. If the Minister says nothing else in summing up, I hope he will say clearly—and in such a way that none of his Back Benchers can try again—that the “Smart Border 2.0” proposals are so inconsistent with the Government’s commitments and so incompatible with the Northern Ireland peace process and the Good Friday agreement that, although an interesting idea, they will go no further, that the Government will take them no further and certainly that the EU will take them no further when it is listening to the Government of the Republic of Ireland.

Article 50: Parliamentary Approval

Bernard Jenkin Excerpts

Monday 11th July 2016 Commons Chamber

[John Penrose]

With the greatest possible respect to the right hon. Gentleman, who is extremely experienced, he may be right on strict constitutional legalities but democratically he is fundamentally wrong. We have had a referendum, the people have spoken and it would be unconscionable—it would be impossible—for us collectively to turn around and thumb our noses at the British people and ignore that democratic verdict.

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

May I point out that it would be extremely odd, for the first time in this Parliament’s history, to start taking instructions on how to conduct our decision making from the administrative court, as seems to be implied by the case before it? Were legislative consent actually required for the exercise of article 50, that legislative consent was effectively given when we passed the European Union Referendum Act 2015, which established the referendum and put the question before the British people.

[John Penrose]

I will endeavour to tread carefully because, as I have mentioned, there are cases either in train or planned. I think that the fundamental political and democratic point must be this: the people have spoken, and whichever side of the argument Members of this House or those out in the rest of the country were on, it is now up to all of us to come together, to unite as a country and to make sure that we respect the democratic decision and the democratic will that have been clearly expressed.

UK Economy: Post-Referendum Assessment

Bernard Jenkin Excerpts

Monday 23rd May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

(Urgent Question:) To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer to set out his latest assessment of the UK economy following the result of the EU referendum, which he has published today; and if he will make a statement.

[The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr David Gauke)]

Last month, the Treasury published a detailed report on the long-term impact of EU membership on our economy. Today, the Treasury has published a full assessment of the immediate impact of leaving the EU. It provides yet further evidence to support the Government’s firm belief that it is in Britain’s best interest to remain in the European Union. The analysis makes it clear that a vote to leave would cause a profound economic shock, creating instability and uncertainty that would only be compounded by the complex and interdependent negotiations that would follow. The central conclusion of the analysis is that the effect of this profound shock would be to push the UK into recession and lead to a sharp rise in unemployment.

Two scenarios have been modelled to provide analysis of the adverse impact on the economy: a shock, and a severe shock. In the shock scenario, a vote to leave would result in a year-long recession, a spike in inflation and a rise in unemployment. After two years, our economy would be about 3.6% smaller than if we remain a member. The value of the pound would fall by about 12%, house prices would sink by about 10% and unemployment would rise by about half a million, affecting people in all regions of the United Kingdom.

Under the severe shock scenario, the effects would be even starker, with GDP 6% lower than it would otherwise be, a fall of 15% in the value of sterling and unemployment up by more than 800,000. If negotiations with the EU were to take longer than two years to conclude, or if the outcome were to be less favourable than expected, the UK economy could be subject to further instability, which would depress UK economic prospects further. That would undermine the hard work of the British people in forging an economic recovery since the crash of 2008.

As I set out at the start, today’s paper forms part of the case that the Government are making that Britain will be stronger, safer and better off if we stay in the European Union. It is based on serious, evidence-based analysis, and I commend it to the House.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. In fairness to the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin), he is at least here, which is more than can be said for the Chancellor of the Exchequer, to whom the question was directed. It appears that, as has happened on many occasions, the Chancellor has chosen to uncork the Gauke. We will now hear from Mr Bernard Jenkin.

[Mr Jenkin]

I reflect on the fact that obesity was rather less of a crisis for the House this afternoon than I imagined it would be, Mr Speaker.

May I first say to the Minister that we all know that these forecasts are just rubbish being produced by a Government who are now obsessed with producing propaganda to try to get their way in the vote rather than enlightening the public? Has this report been signed off by the same Professor Sir Charles Bean who has previously said that models of economic shocks are based on “gross simplifications”? Will the Minister confirm that the so-called shock scenario suggests nothing more serious than that the economy will remain the same size as it was just last year? Does that not demonstrate how Ministers have become preoccupied with dishonestly talking down Britain’s economic prospects, which is highly irresponsible?

Why do the Government not agree with the chair of the remain campaign, Lord Rose? He has been reassuring in saying:

“Nothing is going to happen if we come out of Europe in the first five years…There will be absolutely no change.”

What about my right hon. Friend the Business Secretary? He said in February last year:

“As I’ve said before, a vote to leave the EU is not something I’m afraid of. I’d embrace the opportunities such a move would create and I have no doubt that, after leaving, Britain would be able to secure trade agreements not just with the EU, but with many others too”.

What does the Minister say in response to his Conservative predecessor, my noble Friend Lord Lamont? He said this morning:

“A lot of the Government’s so-called forecast depends on business confidence, which the Government is doing its best to undermine. Economists are no better than anyone else in predicting shifts in confidence…We have nothing to fear but fear itself—which the Government is doing its best to stir up.”

The Government say that wages will fall, so why did Lord Rose tell the Treasury Committee that wages would rise if we left the EU? Is this report produced by the same Treasury that failed to foresee the banking crisis and the great recession that followed?

Why do none of the Government’s post-referendum economic assessments look at the risks of remaining in the EU? Given that in 2014 the UK contributed £10 billion net to support other, failing EU economies rather than our voters’ own priorities, what effect will the continuing collapse of the eurozone economies have on the EU budget as a whole, and particularly on the UK’s net contribution?

Does not the Government’s entire campaign reinforce the unfortunate impression that today’s political leaders will say anything they think will help them get what they want, whether it is true or not? Does the Minister not realise that my right hon. Friends the Chancellor and the Prime Minister are contributing to cynicism about politics and a sense that voters should not trust their rulers but should make their own choice and judgment, which is why they will vote leave on 23 June?

[Mr Gauke]

The economy is a key issue in the debate and in the choice that the British people will make on 23 June. Today’s analysis is an attempt to assist the British people in making an informed decision, based on the likely consequences of the United Kingdom leaving the European Union. Indeed, many supporters of the leave campaign have been prepared to acknowledge that leaving the EU would at the very least have a short-term impact on our economy and create a shock.

As my hon. Friend said, the analysis produced by the Treasury has been signed off by Sir Charles Bean, the former Deputy Governor of the Bank of England and a distinguished macroeconomist. He said that

“this comprehensive analysis by HM Treasury, which employs best-practice techniques, provides reasonable estimates of the likely size of the short-term impact of a vote to leave on the UK economy.”

It is not only the UK Government who are highlighting the risks of leaving the European Union; the International Monetary Fund, the OECD, the leadership of pretty much every ally we have, business groups, and many respected independent economists have all made it clear that this country would lose out from leaving the EU. However one looks at this debate, we cannot get away from that central fact.

Short Money

Bernard Jenkin Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd February 2016 Commons Chamber

[John Penrose]

I was hoping for a more constructive response. I was hoping for a more balanced response. I was hoping for a set of proposals I could use as a response to the request for views. I am afraid that that is not what we have had, and I deeply regret that. I hope there is still time for us to move forward in a more constructive fashion.

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend for launching a consultation, which, I have to confess, seemed to be lacking earlier in the process, so that is obviously a step forward. It is legitimate to ask whether it costs more or less to run an Opposition depending on how big the Government’s majority is. The official Opposition have a function that should be carried out regardless of the number of seats they have. I assure my hon. Friend that the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee will continue to take an interest in this matter, although I hope it can be resolved rather more consensually than in today’s exchanges.

[John Penrose]

I thank my hon. Friend for those comments and particularly for his final point about trying to resolve these issues more consensually. I look forward to any conclusions his Committee arrives at. I completely agree that it must make sense at least to ask, and to request views about, what the proper cost of running an Opposition—the official Opposition or, indeed, some of the other opposition parties—should be. That does not necessarily vary depending on the number of votes cast at an election, which is something the current system requires, for example.

Short Money and Policy Development Grant

Bernard Jenkin Excerpts

Thursday 11th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[John Penrose]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. To finish my point, the country will not understand why politicians should be exempt from having to deal with the effects of the financial deficit that we were bequeathed by the last Labour Government. The reason why we have to tighten our belts as a nation is that whopping financial deficit. It cannot be right for politicians to argue that they should be in some way exempt—a special class—and not have to do their bit. Short money has gone up by 50% so far, and it will continue to rise if we do nothing. I think that the country expects us as politicians to set an example and to do our bit.

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

I have great sympathy for my hon. Friend the Minister who has been sent here to be shouted at by the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) because I doubt whether he is the author of this policy or that he is responsible for determining the outcome. If the policy is as reasonable as the Minister insists, however, it is quite clear from these exchanges that the Government have handled the matter in a clumsy manner so that the Opposition feel they have not been consulted. On the other hand, could there be an agenda behind this change, which is rather more political in its intent?

I would like to inform Members that my Select Committee has already received correspondence from another Conservative Chair of a Select Committee expressing concern about this matter. We are looking into it and will be holding an inquiry. All sides should have a fair hearing so that these matters can be agreed by consensus.

[John Penrose]

I welcome the Select Committee Chairman’s pledge of a further consultation. That will provide further opportunities to air the issues around this matter in addition to—and possibly in parallel with, depending on the timing—the consultation I mentioned in my earlier remarks.

EU Referendum: Timing

Bernard Jenkin Excerpts

Tuesday 9th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Dodds]

My hon. Friend reinforces the point strongly. I look forward to reading the Select Committee’s report when it comes out. It will provide a very useful contribution to the debate in Northern Ireland and indeed more widely.

We have provided for a body to administer these things. The Electoral Commission is not wholly without fault or flaw, but it has been consistently clear on how this referendum should best be conducted. It has said that administrative necessity, the needs of the other elections in the first half of this year and fairness all combine to suggest that the referendum should not, in my view, be on 23 June. Of course, the Electoral Commission is not in charge of the process—the Government are. Indeed, they took to themselves additional powers to determine how this very referendum should be run.

It is interesting that the designation process for lead campaigners is still murky and uncertain, and I wonder who benefits from that. By way of contrast, long before the regulated campaign began in Scotland, both Yes Scotland and Better Together had been designated lead campaigners for their respective sides on the ballot paper. What is the point and what is the reason for the Government to flout for the very first time their own guidelines, as issued by the Electoral Commission? To do so is very telling—and not in a good way.

The Electoral Commission has said:

“We currently do not know when we will be able to run the process to appoint lead campaigners.”

It is now February, and the Government are planning to hold this referendum in June. Frankly, this is not fair play, but foolish game playing. Having taken to themselves the power to set both the date of the referendum and the date of designation for lead campaigners, this puts in front of the Government the temptation, in some people’s eyes, to rig the process. They would be very foolish to succumb to that temptation. Let me say to the Government that the Prime Minister and his successors will sorely regret any perceived fixing of this referendum. We have already debated some of the issues surrounding purdah and so forth, and I think the Government should learn from that debate, as well as from the 40 years of debate within the Conservative party on this issue.

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

On the advice of the Electoral Commission and the timing of designation, there is a growing concern that the designation process will finish up overlapping the referendum period. In a letter to me, the chair of the Electoral Commission, Jenny Watson noted that the commission had

“recommended that the statutory six week process for the designation of lead campaigners should take place shortly before, rather than during the first weeks of the referendum period. This ‘early’ designation would provide clarity earlier for voters and campaigners about the status of campaigners.”

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that it would be unforgivable if the Government were to allow, by sleight of hand, what amounts, frankly, to corruption of the designation process?

[Mr Dodds]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. The Government really need to get on with this and get the matter resolved. Frankly, it would be scandalous if matters were allowed to drift and to drag. Again, that would call into question the Government’s handling of the referendum and its fairness. It would give cause for people to question whether they have made the final decision on this matter. If the Government were wise, they would want to ensure that once the people had spoken on this matter in a referendum, everyone would accept—from whatever side and whatever the outcome—that the decision had been properly taken by this country under the proper rules and that everybody will respect it for the foreseeable future. To do otherwise is short-term opportunism.

In conclusion, we need to face up to this crucial issue of the timing of the referendum. We need to ensure that the Government respect the Electoral Commission and that they respect the devolved Administrations in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. On an issue of such import, we must put the national interest above every other consideration. We must respect the rights of the people who go to the polls in May. We must allow for the fullest possible debate on the biggest decision to be made by this country for generations. For those reasons, I commend the motion to the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[John Penrose]

I am just referring back to my notes, because I do not think I said that we did anything in that regard. I said that “both those dates are expressly excluded in the primary legislation that we passed last year”—that is, the legislation that this Parliament passed last year. I will leave it to Kremlinologists and others to decide whether that was done under pressure, with grace or in any other way. None the less, I hope the right hon. Gentleman will agree that the will of Parliament was expressed and that it was listened to extremely carefully.

[Mr Jenkin]

I am sure the Minister will know that the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee, of which I am Chairman, is taking an interest in the matter of the date. I also declare my interest as a director of Vote Leave, one of the potentially designated campaigns. May I press him on an assurance that he gave the House in September last year? He said that

“it is important that the designation process means that the decision on who are the lead campaign groups for the in and the out campaigns is properly arrived at that and those groups are clearly designated before the start of the 10-week campaign”.—[Official Report, 7 September 2015; Vol. 599, c. 157.]

Does the Minister stand by that assurance, or is this going to be fudged?

[John Penrose]

I remember that moment clearly. In fact, I think I was responding to a question from my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) in making that point. What I was trying to put across was that I had what I thought was a brilliant solution to the potential problem of any compressed timetable, should there be one, in order to find enough time for both the designation and the full referendum timescale. The original point I was making at that point in our discussions—I think it was during the Bill’s Committee stage, but I could be wrong—was that we could have dealt with the designation process through a negative statutory instrument, which could be made when it was laid, thus allowing the designation process to start early and finish before the beginning of the referendum period. I think that that is what everyone was driving at, at that time.

However, the equivalent of the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments in the Lords felt that a negative statutory instrument was inappropriate and said that a positive statutory instrument should be used. That has made it rather more difficult, as my hon. Friend will appreciate, for me to achieve the aims that we were discussing at that point. If I may, I will take his earnest and strongly made point, and the point that he made earlier to the right hon. Member for Belfast North, to indicate a strong preference for starting the designation process as early as possible, should there be a compressed timetable. I am sure that the various campaigns are already working on their designation submissions and that, were it to be necessary, my hon. Friend would be able to aim for a shorter and very efficient designation process in order to avoid an overlap between the end of the designation and the start of the referendum process.

[Mr Jenkin]

rose—

[John Penrose]

Does my hon. Friend want to come back to me, perhaps to assure me that I have understood him correctly?

[Mr Jenkin]

I am most grateful to the Minister for that explanation. However, I believe that he will be bound by his commitment unless the Government put on record before the House agrees to that affirmative resolution procedure that the consequence of agreeing to that procedure might be that the campaigns may not be designated until the referendum campaigns had already started. If there is going to be a referendum on 23 June, which seems to be a possibility, either the regulations will have to be expedited in order to foreshorten the period and allow us to start the designation process earlier or the Minister must put back the date. I am as keen as anybody to get on with this referendum, but not on the basis of undesignated campaigns going into the referendum process without the necessary resources and authority and without being able to plan what they are going to do.

[John Penrose]

It is helpful for my hon. Friend to remind me of the point that I made last year. We are all subject to the will of Parliament, and because the Lords—in this case—decided in their wisdom to change the process that I was laying out at that point, it is now difficult for me to be bound by anything other than the later expressed will of Parliament. However, I appreciate his point that it would be a superior outcome if we could possibly avoid any overlap between the two processes. I think he is saying that he would prefer to see a rapid process for designation, and to start it as promptly and efficiently as possible, should that be necessary. I will take his strongly expressed point back and ensure that we strain every sinew to accommodate him if we can.

I am conscious that other Members want to speak in the debate, so I shall omit my further comments about the other aspects of the Electoral Commission’s advice that we have either been following or not. I want to make it clear that the process from here on is clearly laid out by Parliament in the European Union Referendum Act. The Act requires the Government to bring forward a number of statutory instruments that are subject to the affirmative process—as we have just been hearing—before a poll can be held. They will cover the conduct rules—the detailed plumbing of how the poll will be held—which are already laid before the House and which I hope are uncontroversial, plus regulations setting the date of the referendum period and the start date of the designation period. Those regulations have not yet been laid, but when they are, this debate will be able to move, at last, out of the conditional tense and into action.

--- Later in debate ---

[Pat Glass]

I, too, hope that we will be able to make a positive case for remaining, but there are clearly risks to business of delay, and they get greater the longer the delay goes on. There are very good arguments to support the view that, as soon as the Government’s European renegotiations are complete, they should get on with having the referendum and ending the uncertainty, which is bad for the whole UK—for jobs, growth, investment and working people.

The motion says that a

“needlessly premature date risks contaminating the result”.

In what way would a referendum five months from now contaminate the result? If there is evidence that holding the referendum on a specific date, whether in June 2016, September 2016 or April 2017, would in any way contaminate the result or lead to greater or lesser risk of electoral fraud, let us see it. I have not seen any such evidence, so I can only assume that what is meant by that statement is that a shorter campaign is more likely to lead to a remain vote. Given that we have had more than 40 years of hearing one side of the argument, are we really being told that the leave campaign arguments are so lacking in substance that four months of campaigning from the other side will devastate its arguments and campaign?

The motion goes on to say that

“a subject as fundamental as EU membership should be decisively settled after a full and comprehensive debate”.

I absolutely agree, but I say again that we have already had 40 years of debating the UK’s place in Europe, so this is not a surprise and it is not happening quickly. It has been 40 years in the making.

[Mr Jenkin]

The hon. Lady’s party set up the Electoral Commission when it introduced the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, presumably, so that the commission would give advice that the Government would generally accept. The Electoral Commission argues that there should be a six-month period between the regulations and the referendum date, but the Government are set to ignore that. Like her, I am enthusiastic to get on with this, but what consideration has she and her party given to the designation being compressed with the referendum period? Has her party expressed a view on that matter, or does she believe that she and I should discuss it, with a view to when this referendum should be?

[Pat Glass]

The hon. Gentleman has made that point several times, and in many respects I think this is down to those campaigns. This is not a surprise, so they need to get on and get designated. What is the delay? Why are they delaying? They need to get on and do it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alex Salmond]

Another scare story set to rest, as my hon. Friend points out.

[Mr Jenkin]

The right hon. Gentleman talks about how outrageous it would be to have just a six-week referendum period, but if the designation of the two campaigns is delayed some weeks into the 10-week referendum period, that is what we will finish up with. Does he agree that it would be outrageous for the Government to corrupt the process of this referendum by delaying the designation of the in and out campaigns in the way the Minister suggested might be the case?

[Alex Salmond]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. We also agree on another aspect: purdah in referendum periods has not previously been properly observed in this place and by this Government, although it has been observed by the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish Administrations. Having a long purdah period, with a purdah period for the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish elections, and then a further purdah period for a referendum on European issues, would mean that those Administrations had a double purdah period, which cannot be a good thing for governance. I know that that point will not be lost on the hon. Gentleman.

Let me get to the nub of my concern, apart from the patent lack of respect. We have already seen the start of the European referendum campaign, and a thoroughly depressing start it has undoubtedly been. Yesterday’s ludicrous exchange about on which side of the channel there will be a giant refugee camp just about sums up this miserable, irrelevant debate. The truth, of course, is that it does not matter; it will take at least five years to withdraw from the European treaties, and by then we could have 10 times the number of refugees or indeed none at all. No one knows how the bilateral arrangements between Britain and France will be affected. This is a pointless, pathetic, puerile debate, typical of what looks like it will be a depressing campaign—the political equivalent of a no-score draw.

As we anticipated, the lead responsibility for this state of affairs lies with the Prime Minister—this whole mess is of his creation. The time to propose a referendum is when we want to achieve something important, such as Scottish independence, not when we want to achieve nothing at all, as is the case with his sham Euro-negotiations on points of little substance. He has set out the terms for this depressing campaign, which is, to quote the Scottish play,

“full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing.”

The chance of those who are anti-European Union of winning has always been greatest if the campaign is reduced to a competition of scare stories—a war of attrition—to find out who can tell the biggest porkies. That is exactly what is unfolding before our eyes. It is almost as if the Better Together campaign from the Scottish referendum had split in two. We now have two versions of “Project Fear” from opposing sides in the Europe poll. At this rate, the only thing these two campaigns will scare is the voters—away from the polling stations.

The Prime Minister is gambling this country’s entire European future on his sham negotiation and this shame of a campaign—even Jim Hacker would have fought on a more visionary platform on Europe. We need to fight an entirely different campaign in Scotland. People want to hear how we can build a Europe that acts on the environment; faces down multinational power; shows solidarity when faced with a refugee crisis; acts together when faced with austerity; respects the component nations of Europe; co-operates on great projects such as a supergrid across the North sea; and revitalises the concept of a social Europe for all our citizens. That will be a Europe worth voting for, not the Prime Minister’s teeny-weeny vision of nothing much at all.

European Union Referendum Bill

Bernard Jenkin Excerpts

Tuesday 8th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Peter Grant]

I welcome the fact that the hon. Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) is inclined not to press at least one of his amendments. It seems to me that there is, and will be, a need for information about the likely consequences of an in vote and of an out vote. I do not think it is right that that should be left entirely to individual campaigns, because we already know that there are arguments about who runs the campaigns and how they are going to be funded, and by definition they will tell at best one half of the story. It is perfectly in order for the UK Government to publish appropriate information that sets out the background to the referendum. A survey done about a month ago indicated that the EU member state whose citizens are worst informed about what the EU actually means is the EU member state whose citizens are going to have a vote as to whether or not they are going to leave. We cannot allow that to continue; we cannot allow the referendum to come upon us with a significant number of our citizens not really understanding what they are voting for, not because they cannot predict what the future might be if we leave, and not because they cannot predict what the future might be if we stay, but because they do not actually know what the present is. Too many people do not understand what the EU does for good or for bad right now. If we simply leave this to partisan partial campaigns, people are going to end up confused rather than better informed. Incidentally, it is one reason why this might be the time to extend the franchise, because we think that 16 and 17-year-olds do not understand it, but that their lack of understanding probably puts them less far behind adults than in most other election campaigns. That vote has been and gone, however, so we will leave it at that.

I do find it a bit surprising and ironic—I will not go as far as to say hypocritical—that, as we saw when the Bill went through its earlier stages, so many Conservatives express the concern that during a referendum campaign a Government might publish information that was a wee bit one-sided. Most Members would not have received what a number of SNP Members received shortly before the referendum last year, which was a glossy full-colour booklet published by Her Majesty’s Government making sure that we understood the wonderful benefits that accrued to us from membership of the United Kingdom. The UK Government recently advertised for a post, in the Department for International Development of all places, whose main job would be to persuade the Scots how lucky we were to be part of the Union. As long as that kind of stuff goes on, I do not think that we need to take any lessons from anybody on the Government Benches about the dangers of letting Governments get involved in a partial way in a referendum campaign.

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

The Committee I chaired in the last Parliament, the Public Administration Committee, conducted an inquiry into civil service impartiality in referendums in respect of the Scottish referendum. It is one thing if there is a Government in Edinburgh on one side of the argument and a Government in London on the other, each publishing arguments for and against a particular proposition, but where will the balance be in this referendum, given that there is only one United Kingdom Government who will only be on one side of the argument?

[Peter Grant]

It is perfectly in order for the UK Government to take an impartial, neutral stance once we get closer to the referendum. We do not know what stance they will take. There is a question as to whether it was appropriate for somebody else’s Government to interfere in our referendum, but I know that that is not an argument we will win just now. However, that degree of interference probably contributed to the fact that on most days these Benches are significantly more crowded than they were before. If the Government do not produce information, as opposed to campaigning opinion, about how the EU works now, who will produce it? If we are happy for the two opposing camps to produce the information, then they can go ahead and do it, but we know before we start that all that will happen is that people will be drawn to believing statements of fact because of their opinion of the politician or TV personality who has associated their name with them, rather than being presented with a factual, well-researched document that sets out how things are just now.

--- Later in debate ---

[Peter Grant]

My own personal views about how political campaigns and parties are funded probably would not get a huge amount of support here, but that might be something for a ten-minute rule Bill some time over the next four and a half years. The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point. It is important that nobody has the opportunity to buy a referendum any more than anyone should be given the right to buy electoral success. I certainly would not want to see us going the way of America where people need billions of dollars behind them before they can even stand for election.

We are still not addressing the fundamental problem that, no matter how well or badly funded the individual campaigns are, if we are starting from the position of having the least well-informed electorate in Europe on this important issue, someone is going to have to provide the necessary information to bring people up to a better level of understanding of, for example, what “ever closer union” means and does not mean—because it does not mean what it keeps being presented as meaning, even by the Prime Minister.

People need to understand which aspects of immigration to the UK the European Union is involved in and which aspects it is not involved in. They need to understand which aspects of our welcoming of refugees, or our failure to welcome them, involve a European Union decision, and which aspects come under the auspices of the United Nations, for example. These are massively important issues, and the debate in this Chamber over the last months has not always helped to increase public understanding and appreciation of what the European Union does and does not do.

If there are concerns that the Government might not be impartial, or that they might be over-enthusiastic towards one side or the other, I would be quite happy for the Electoral Commission to publish guidance and to require the Government and everyone else to comply with it. It would be inappropriate to ask the Electoral Commission to scrutinise, veto or censor Government documents in the first place, but it would be perfectly in order for it to issue guidance on the conduct of the referendum, including on the kind of information that could and should be funded and published by the Government.

I find myself in the strange position of almost telling Government Back Benchers that they are wrong because the amendment seems to be based on an unwillingness to trust Her Majesty’s Government. I am not the biggest fan of this Government, and I am not the biggest believer that we can trust them, but if they cannot be trusted to present a fair case to the public in this matter, we are in trouble. The media will not present such a case; the print media absolutely will not do so. The political campaigns will not do so because it is not their job to be impartial. It is their job to be partisan, although perhaps not in a party political sense, on the issues that they are campaigning on.

I welcome the fact, if it is confirmed, that the hon. Member for Stone is to withdraw his amendment (a) to Lords amendment 5. I hope that he will not press his amendment to Lords amendment 6 as well. There is a crying need for reliable, well-researched information to be put into the public domain. Let us not forget that, a few yards from here, we have one of the most highly regarded research facilities anywhere in the world. It is highly regarded not only for the quality of its research and the speed with which it is done but, most importantly, for its impartiality. If we cannot rely on the research facilities within this House to provide reliable, well-documented information, who can we rely on?

[Mr Jenkin]

I point out to the hon. Member for Glenrothes (Peter Grant) that, whether he thinks it an irony, an accident or something more sinister, it is the people who are in favour of Britain remaining in the European Union who are championing Lords amendment 6, while those who support the leave campaign regard it as a bit of a Trojan horse that would enable the publication of a lot of subjective judgments loaded in favour of one side and not the other.

I referred to the report published at the end of the last Parliament by the Public Administration Committee entitled “Lessons for Civil Service impartiality from the Scottish independence referendum.” The reason that we produced the report was to look at the question of impartiality. There is a rather modern, corrosive view that the concept of impartiality, when applied to civil servants, means simply that they should be prepared to work for whichever party happens to be in office, that by so doing they are therefore impartial and that their conduct can then be quite partial and loaded under the Armstrong doctrine, which states that they have to support the Government of the day. Actually, I think most people in this country regard impartiality as a rather more imprecise quality, with a higher moral tone. They see it as having something to do with objectivity, with balance and with not being compromised into becoming a mere cheerleader for one point of view or another.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir William Cash]

My hon. Friend should bear in mind that the White Paper that led to the European Communities Act 1972, which went through by only six votes in this House, contained a very precise promise that the use of the veto in our national interest would never be abandoned, because to abandon it would be to endanger the very fabric of the European Community itself. Is that not an example of how unreliable White Papers and other Government reports can be?

[Mr Jenkin]

Indeed, but it is unavoidable that the Government are going to produce information of this kind.

The second duty, in Lords amendment 6, is not something that I expected to see. The Lords amendment asks the Government to produce judgments and opinions on a vast topic, using examples that, by their very nature, will be subjective. I am not at all surprised that the Electoral Commission has decided that it would be far beyond its competence to make a judgment about what such a document might be. The Government have accepted this amendment, but if they are to justify retaining it—as I expect them to do—they will have to answer some questions about it.

What do the Government mean by the word “publish” in the amendment? It would be one thing to place a learned, detailed and technical paper in the Library of the House of Commons in order to present the depth of analysis that the hon. Member for Glenrothes believes would be justified, but would the Government produce such a subjective document in a form that could be circulated to every household? How would we feel about that, 10 weeks before a referendum? It is reasonable for the Government to explain the outcome of their negotiations, but it would not be reasonable for them to use public money to present their entire world view on European Union membership as part of a campaign to remain in the EU.

[Mrs Main]

Is my hon. Friend clear about what is meant by the Government’s response? Does it refer to a response achieved through collective responsibility? What would happen if there were dissenting members of the Government who did not agree with that response?

[Mr Jenkin]

That is a good question. We all expect that, before long, there will be agreement among Ministers that some will not be toeing the Government line on this question. It is too big a question for it to be otherwise. The reason that we have referendums is that the questions split parties. We could not have a general election on a question that split the parties on both sides of the House. It would be impossible to decide on the issue in that way.

It would be absurd to have a referendum and then try to corral all the Ministers into one point of view. The precedent in 1975 was that collective responsibility was abandoned, although that does not mean there is not still a Government view—there is a Government view and a dissenting view. That is how it will work in this case, assuming that a vast number of Ministers do not leave the Government’s view too isolated to be any longer credible as being that of a Government.

[Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend not agree that the country at large still has trust in “the Government”—in the governance of this country— whether or not we think it is right to hold that view? Our electorate would therefore find it strange if, during a referendum campaign, they could not point to what the Government’s view was. The Government of the day would continue after the referendum, and people will want to know what the Government, whether collective or otherwise, think about the issue.

[Mr Jenkin]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his intervention. I have already said that the first publication is perfectly justified, as the Government are entitled to explain what they have negotiated and to give their opinion on that. If he would like to do so, he might explain how they are going to give

“information about rights, and obligations, that arise under European Union law as a result of the United Kingdom’s membership of the European Union”

in a concise and simple fashion which is not loaded. Perhaps he could tell us which countries should be used as

“examples of countries that do not have membership of the European Union”

in order to explain the consequences of leaving the European Union. We are talking about very subjective judgments, and of course that is what the debate between the yes and the no campaigns will be about.

My hon. Friend is right to say that people trust what the Government say, which is exactly why what they say should be curtailed and limited: it has a disproportionate effect on the voters. There is absolutely no doubt about that. If a leader of a party says something, that has less of an effect than if the Prime Minister says something. That is why we have a purdah period, and the House has forced the Government to accept that there will be a proper purdah period. Otherwise, if we have what we had in 1975, whereby the Government can carry on regardless, being the Government and yet expressing partisan views on one side of the argument and not the other, an unfair referendum would be created. That is why all referendums throughout the world have systems to try to contain what Governments do during the final phases of the referendum, in order to try to create some fairness.

[Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)]

I wonder whether my hon. Friend has seen, as I have, the poster produced by the pro-EU BSE—Britain Stronger in Europe—campaign which co-opts the Governor of the Bank of England under the headline “Think UK’s economy is stronger in Europe”. BSE has also co-opted the President of the United States and the Prime Minister of India. Does my hon. Friend share my concern that it appears that the campaign to remain in is willing to co-opt public officials, who ought not to be dragged into one side of such a campaign?

[Mr Jenkin]

I have to be mindful about whether that is taking us beyond the scope of what we are discussing, but it reminds me of a very controversial element of the Government’s conduct of the Scottish referendum, and I have some sympathy with arguments that have been made on this point. I refer to the use of a permanent secretary to give a speech on behalf of the Government’s view while this was purporting to be the publication of advice to Ministers. Such advice should never be published. On any orthodox analysis, the opinions of civil servants in the form of advice to Ministers should never be published, but this was used as part of the propaganda. Many Scottish National party Members would regard that as a gross misuse of civil servants during a referendum period, and we need to try to avoid that.

I leave two questions for the Minister as he responds to this debate on Lords amendments 5 and 6. First, what does “publish” actually mean? What do the Government intend to do by way of the publication of these two reports? Are they just to be White Papers or are they to be propaganda circulated by the Government in some way much more widely? Secondly, how will he ensure that this is done in the highest spirit of impartiality, using that word in the way most people would expect it to be used? How is he going to ensure that these publications are genuinely objective and not just a means of advancing one side of the argument against the other?

[Mr George Howarth (Knowsley) (Lab)]

Does the hon. Gentleman not accept that the Governor of the Bank of England giving advice, for example, with the Monetary Policy Committee on interest rates, is in a very different position from other public officials, because his advice is often made public? It is perfectly clear that if he has any advice on this, it should be a matter of public interest.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Jenkin]

The Governor of the Bank of England is a different case. He is not a civil servant, so he is not bound by the civil service code and he does not advise Ministers as a private civil servant—he gives his advice very publicly. Although I was prompted by that example, I think it is reasonable for the Governor, judiciously, soberly and carefully to proffer his advice. I think his advice on the currency question in the Scottish referendum was very germane, but I do not think it was necessary for the permanent secretary at the Treasury to give similar advice. On the speech that the Governor made on the European Union, the remarkable thing about it was how little he was prepared to say which supported the Government’s view. He did not put himself out on a limb. It was an incredible damp squib of a speech as far as the remain campaign was concerned, and it had extraordinarily little impact, because he was very careful about what he said. That might be because he sees that both business and the country are divided on whether we should remain in the EU and that the arguments are much more finely divided than on the currency question in the Scottish referendum.

I wish to deal with Lords amendment 13 and amendment (a) proposed thereto, which stands in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Stone and other colleagues. This relates to another startling change made in the other place on the designation of organisations to campaign for or against the particular proposition. I should declare an interest here—it is not a remunerated interest. I am a director of the company Vote Leave, which will be applying for designation

The Lords amendment added a provision that suggests that it is perfectly okay for the Electoral Commission to designate one campaign supporting one proposition but not another campaign supporting the opposite proposition. The reason why that has been put into the Bill is perfectly understandable; in the 2011 referendum in Wales there was no application from a no campaign and therefore it was impossible for the Electoral Commission to designate a yes campaign, even though there was a very respectable yes campaign. It was suspected that there was an element of sabotage by the no campaign, because it wanted to prevent the yes campaign from getting designation as the no campaign was going to be incredibly weak, whether or not it was designated.

The result of this provision, which was included in the Scottish legislation passed by the Scottish Parliament in order to prevent the same thing from recurring, is extraordinary. It offers the possibility that the Electoral Commission “may” designate one campaign and not another without any restraining factors. In good faith, I do not think we should question the bona fides of the Electoral Commission as to whether it would ever do such a thing, but this is what the Lords amendment actually contemplates. It would be unconscionable, in this of all referendums, for there to be only one designated campaign. It would be intolerable if Parliament let this go on to the statute book without even a discussion about what the consequence would be. It would completely invalidate the result, it would destroy the purpose of having a referendum and it would mean that this issue was not settled in a fair manner at all. We have framed an amendment to the new clause, which I hope will at least draw the Minister out to explain how everything might work.

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

Let me thank my hon. Friend for giving way, and say that I am enjoying listening to his observations. Does he agree that, if the Electoral Commission was to take the bizarre decision to designate only one campaign when there was clearly a coherent and legitimate campaign for the other side, it would be clearly open to judicial review on that point?

[Mr Jenkin]

I am waiting to hear what the Minister has to say on that point. The proposed amendment changes the wording. It now says that it should be allowed to make that decision only if

“no permitted participant makes an application to be designated under section 109 as representing those campaigning for that outcome except for a permitted participant whose application the Commission states is, in its opinion, vexatious or frivolous.”

That would mean that, provided there are two legitimate applications for designation, the obligation would be clear in the Bill that the commission has to designate two campaigns. That is not clear in the Bill at the moment. If one such campaign was “vexatious or frivolous” and was clearly just there to spoil in some respects, the Electoral Commission would have to justify its action. I hope the Minister will tell us that he can accept our amendment. If he cannot do so, I hope that he will make it clear that the substance of the amendment should be understood, and that it would be unconscionable to have only one campaign designated in this referendum. If an application is made in such a way as to be construed as vexatious or frivolous, such an application would have to be considered. We should be in no doubt that there will be an application in respect of both sides of this campaign.

[Sir William Cash]

I endorse what my hon. Friend has just said. Let me repeat for the sake of clarity that these amendments are the result of ping-pong between the Commons and the Lords, which is not the best way for them to be considered. We have not had enough time to have a really good look at this matter, and I hope that the Minister will take that into account when he gives us the very full explanation on amendments 5, 6 and 13.

[Mr Jenkin]

In closing, let me add that in all three amendments we have been discussing the potential role of the Electoral Commission. In respect of amendments 5 and 6, the Electoral Commission has shrunk from the possibility of being given an obligation for which it is not fit. It is worth reminding ourselves that we have already developed one new role for the commission during the passage of this Bill, which is that it will give its advice about possible new regulations on the restriction of section 125 of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 in respect of purdah. It did not want that obligation, but we gave it to it. Electoral commissions in countries such as Ireland or Denmark have a very much more active policing role in respect of fair referendums, and that is a role that we, in this country, have not set up the Electoral Commission to undertake.

[Sir William Cash]

With both amendments 5 and 6, we need to bear in mind that a duty would be imposed. That duty would imply and carry with it the potential for judicial review. If there were any failure in carrying out that duty in the manner that was expected under all the precepts of administrative law, the Minister should accept that there is more than a high probability of a challenge in the courts. That challenge could arise not only because of the manner in which a report arose, but if any of the information were misleading in any way.

[Mr Jenkin]

I agree with my hon. Friend, and will add that, where the Electoral Commission clearly has a duty, its decision can be judiciously reviewed. In respect of the designation of only one campaign, I have absolutely no doubt that there would instantly be a judicial review, and I speak with knowledge aforethought.

In the absence of the duties on the Electoral Commission —for example, to provide for impartial and objective information from the Government—it is a moral imperative on Ministers to ensure that they undertake their obligations in the spirit of a fair referendum, and not to abuse the trust that this legislation places on them with regard to the publication of that information.

[Mr Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

On 9 June, I began my parliamentary career with a maiden speech on this very Bill. I am incredibly grateful to be given the opportunity to speak again on this matter as the Bill makes its way through this House.

Deciding on whether we should continue to be a member of the European Union is one of the most important issues of our generation. We should be thankful about some elements of our relationship, particularly our access to the single market, and our non-involvement in Schengen and in the euro. There are other areas in which we are not getting a good deal, and the Prime Minister is right to renegotiate our relationship to request a better deal. He and the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, along with other Members, have said that we should not be afraid to leave if we find that the deal is not good enough for our country and our future.

As the country makes its decision, and as the referendum period begins, I am mindful that the public will need information about the offer on the table. They will need factual and speculative information about what “in” and “out” mean, and about what our future might be under a different arrangement. The public will also need legal, political, financial and economic information. Above all, they will need a well-run and well-administered referendum, and therein lies a key role for the Electoral Commission. The public will also need information on what the Swiss and Norwegian models look like to see which would be a good fit for this country, and whether we are better off staying in a reformed European Union.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Jenkin]

Who tabled amendment 6?

[Mr Lidington]

Amendment 6, as it currently stands, was tabled by my noble Friend Baroness Anelay, following debate in the Lords, as a way to try to build consensus in that House to enable it to give passage to the Bill.

Perhaps it would be useful for me to explain, in response to comments made in this debate, how the Government interpret the obligation imposed on us by the amendments and how we would propose to see those obligations implemented. By “rights”, as set out in amendment 6, we mean rights that the United Kingdom has as a member state of the European Union, and also the rights granted to individuals and businesses as a result of our membership, such as access to the single market. By “obligations”, we mean the things that our membership of the European Union commits us or obliges us to do. Most obviously, this is at member state level, but there would also be implications for businesses or individuals. An obvious example is our obligation as a member state to transpose EU law in particular areas and to accept the primacy of the EU so long as we are a member of the European Union. The duty written into amendment 6 does not require the Government to set out information about every single right and obligation. Such a report would not be meaningful, and the purpose of the duties is to provide useful and relevant factual information to allow for greater public understanding.

Amendment 6 requires the Government to describe some of the existing arrangements that other countries that are not EU members already have with the EU.

Finance Bill

Bernard Jenkin Excerpts

Monday 26th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Alison Thewliss]

As I suspect the hon. Gentleman well knows, the Scottish Parliament does not have jurisdiction over this matter, but the SNP feels sufficiently strongly about it that we put it in our party manifesto for this place, and the First Minister has been vocal in speaking out in support of zero rating for sanitary products. We would very much like this to happen, and we will give any support that we can in the Scottish Parliament as well as from our Benches here.

This issue has been very protracted over many years, and this House cannot resolve it alone, but we can make a start. VAT has already been reduced by a previous Labour Government, and we have a good deal of cross-party support here tonight. I think that we can do much better than the Prime Minister, who, during the election campaign, described this as a “difficult” issue and said that he “can’t remember the answer”. The answer, of course, is that we can take a lead on this. In June 2015, the European Commission, which is yet to have a female President—perhaps that would make a difference on such issues—gave an answer that was not entirely positive. It set out the background to its reasons why this cannot be done, but it also said:

“As part of its upcoming work on a definitive VAT regime based on the destination principle, the Commission will assess the functioning and possible improvements to the system of reduced rates.”

So we have an opportunity to get involved in this debate to say that this is an important issue for us as a nation and for women across Europe.

We have an opportunity and an obligation to try again to resolve this issue. Members may not know this, but the Republic of Ireland entered the European Union at the time of a 0% rating on sanitary products that it was able to retain in much the same way as we have derogations in different areas, so there is already a precedent within the EU of a zero rating in a European member state. I urge the Government to take a lead on this for women across these islands and across the EU. Let us end this bloody unfairness.

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

This debate is like history coming back to me, because not only does the hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) now represent the constituency that I stood for in 1987, but I was first made aware of this issue by the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy), who, when she was an A-level student in my constituency, berated me for the inequality of this tax. Ever since, I have been convinced that it is an unjust tax. Indeed, on that occasion I raised the matter in the shadow Cabinet, which was then under the leadership of William Hague. I got a very frosty and uncomfortable reception for raising such a matter in a semi-public meeting, including from some of our right hon. and hon. Friends who are female and hold extremely senior positions in Government to this day.

That demonstrates an important point about how attitudes change. Whatever we might have agreed to in our original agreements with the European Union that lock this tax in place, albeit reduced by the previous Labour Government to the minimum of 5%—I celebrate that—we are now, within the European Union, operating in a system based on a different principle—the principle that taxes should be harmonised as part of the single market. I refer the House to article 113 of the treaty on the functioning of the European Union, which says:

“The Council shall, acting unanimously…adopt provisions for the harmonisation of legislation concerning turnover taxes, excise duties and other forms of indirect taxation to the extent that such harmonisation is necessary to ensure the establishment and the functioning of the internal market and to avoid distortion of competition.”

So taxation has crept into the idea of being part of the single market. At the point at which this country signed up to the Common Market, or even at the stage of the Single European Act or of the Maastricht treaty, this principle crept into the acquis communautaire of the European Union rather than being something that was expressly agreed by this House.

I very much hope that the Government will negotiate something fundamental on this particular tax, and I am looking forward to what the Minister has to say about it. However, I make no apology for raising the far more general principle that different taxation regimes in different countries represent different social settlements and the development of our societies in different ways at different paces. That is why we are separate nations and separate peoples with separate democracies.

The attempt to use the pretext of the single market to harmonise taxes is one of the most democratically regressive manoeuvres the European Union could adopt. France puts VAT on food and children’s clothes, but this country would not put VAT on such items. Ever since we adopted the cheap food policy following the abolition of the corn laws in the 1840s, that has been part of the fabric of our social settlement. It is the right of an individual nation state to continue to evolve its social settlement, and the conduct of Government and the imposition of taxes are inseparable from that democratic social settlement.

The treaties as currently formulated are a denial of national democracy. This House should not have to go and beg 27 other member states in order to change a rate of tax on an issue that we think is socially important. This is a matter of national democracy, and that is why the treaties are unfit for purpose.

[Mrs Main]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful speech. If we were to negotiate and were met with an immovable force, we would be forced to enshrine this unfairness because the European Union dictates that we should do so. We are not allowed to remedy it.

[Mr Jenkin]

That is absolutely correct. Having observed the history of 40 years of membership of the European Union, as it is now called, we know that it is not going to stay like this. The European Union will continue to develop. The trend of taking more taxation powers away from the member states, in the name of the single market, is enshrined in article 113, so it will continue to do so. Yes, we have a veto, but the European Court of Justice tends to accelerate the pace of tax harmonisation just when we do not expect it to do so. It is the ECJ that extended VAT to certain items and categories of goods when we did not expect it to do so.

The group of amendments also addresses the renewables obligation incentives and seeks to adjust the feed-in tariff regime. Why are we able to reduce taxation on renewable energy products to only 5%? It is because of the European Union. Why could the previous Labour Government not abolish VAT on fuel, which they said they wanted to do after it had been applied by the Major Administration? It is because of the European Union.

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

I agree with everything my hon. Friend is saying, although I am slightly alarmed by his statement that the shadow Cabinet is a semi-public meeting.

Surely the harmonisation of tax fails on two fronts. First, different countries treat these products at the higher rate, the lower rate or at no rate. Secondly, on equality of treatment, is my hon. Friend able to think of any other product that is taxed so discriminately that it affects only one half of the population of the European Union, who just happen to be women? Is that not the most discriminatory and iniquitous measure that the EU has come up with?

[Mr Jenkin]

My hon. Friend makes an interesting point and raises the spectre of a case to bring before the courts—perhaps even the European Court of Justice—on the basis of discrimination. Perhaps that would be one way of resolving this particular problem.

I am shamelessly using this example as an opportunity to make a far broader and more important constitutional point.

[Hannah Bardell (Livingston) (SNP)]

I am glad the hon. Gentleman has admitted to his own shame, because it seems somewhat shameful to fudge the issue. We may not have all the powers to change the situation, but this House has an opportunity to send a clear message to Europe on something that is very wrong and about which so many people feel strongly. I cannot believe that the hon. Gentleman is using that as an excuse to not support us on an issue for which there is clear cross-party support.

[Mr Jenkin]

I point out to the hon. Lady that my name is on new clause 7. I support it, but I will wait to hear what the Minister has to say before deciding whether to vote against my own Administration. I am sure she will understand that. There have not been many rebellions among the SNP yet. The point about being a political party in this House is that we are all individuals and we are all allowed to do what we choose. In fact, that is our responsibility.

[Sir William Cash]

Surely what this really boils down to is that the European institutions intend to—and actually do—tax women on these products in order to get the money to run the very system that is discriminatory.

[Mr Jenkin]

Our problem with the EU’s VAT directives is that they are a one-way street. Once the EU has adopted powers to regulate a particular tax, that power cannot be taken back by the member states. We are then left begging the EU as to whether we can set the tax rates for which the British people vote, as opposed to setting them ourselves. It strikes me as ironic that the Scottish National party wants independence from the United Kingdom in order to do its own thing, but it is happy to go on giving up more and more power to the European Union, so it will have even less freedom and less voice than it has in the UK.

The problem is that once VAT rates on any product are set above 5%, the European Union does not allow any member state to reduce them to below 5% again. We therefore have an anomaly whereby there is a zero VAT rate on sanitary products in the Republic of Ireland because it has never charged VAT on them. Had we started from the principle of charging no VAT on sanitary products, we would be in the same position as Ireland, but because we already charged it we cannot take it away. What a mess.

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab)]

I wonder whether the hon. Gentleman recognises all the good things the European Union has done for women. As somebody who has had to suffer periods and pay this unfair tax, I was also afforded maternity rights that I would never have had if it had not been for some of the pressures exerted by the European Union.

[Mr Jenkin]

I certainly acknowledge that what has happened in other member states has influenced what has happened in this country, but the hon. Lady enjoys no rights in this country that we could not have afforded ourselves through our own political processes. The question of the possibility of leaving the European Union is about taking back control over those policies, not deciding them in a different way from that which she would like. Long may we continue to agree on the importance of equal rights for women in as many areas as possible—in fact, in every area that we can possibly legislate on.

[Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that this tax is very unfair because it is not about the equality of sexes? The tax is not equal because men do not need any of these products. If we had thought at the very beginning that this would impact on women only, I am sure people would have thought much harder about putting tax on sanitary products, which every woman, mainly, needs for a long period in their life. It is not fair.

[Mr Jenkin]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. It is a deeply discriminatory and unfair tax.

[Wes Streeting]

rose—

[Mr Jenkin]

I am not going to give way again.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Paula Sherriff) on tabling new clause 7. She may be a little surprised at how many Members support it, but, sadly, we have to have this debate not because it is the British Government’s policy to levy the tax, but because it is the EU’s policy to do so. That is a fundamental freedom and control that we should bring back to this House in the future.

[Jess Phillips]

I feel the need to make all sorts of declarations of interest in this debate, having used sanitary products pretty much all my life.

I wish to pay credit to a number of women who have brought this subject to the House over the years. Without women in this place, I am certain that this issue would never have been raised, although I am delighted that so many men interested in Europe are in the Chamber to talk about it. Dawn Primarolo, a working-class woman brave enough to dare to speak up in Parliament about the taboo subject of women’s periods back in the year 2000, should be commended.

Today, when such topics are far easier for us to discuss, I have already received a number of sideways glances from colleagues around the estate on speaking about the subject and there is a certain desire among Conservative Members to say the word “products” instead of tampons. I know from speaking to my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman) today that, at the time, it was considered vulgar and even shameful that Ms Primarolo brought forward the subject. She was brave. Today, our brave woman prize goes to my hon. Friend the Member for Dewsbury (Paula Sherriff). Regardless of what has been said on the other side of the House, doing nothing achieves nothing.

It is completely ridiculous that women are taxed, even at a 5% rate, for a product which, in my experience, is more than essential. The fact that we still have the tax is probably down in no small part to the fact that most of the people in the House and in our sister Parliaments all across the EU do not have wombs. The reason why we must force the Government to have a conversation with our European partners is that, without force, I fear that they will be too squeamish to talk about women’s periods. But they should not be: every person in the House exists only because their mother had a period. Today, with half term, Parliament has been teeming with children—my own have been on the slides in Portcullis House—who all exist only because their mothers had periods. It is nothing to be scared of, and nor should any man or woman ever feel that we should not talk about periods.

Such a revision in taxation may seem a marginal change, but it would make a huge difference to the women in this country. Having worked in a women’s refuge, I know that the things we had to stock up on the most—because they presented a challenge to the budgets of the women in our care—were nappies, tampons and sanitary towels.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stella Creasy]

I will come on to issues of gender and equality on an international level, but I give the hon. Gentleman warning that I will not take any more interventions from him unless he uses the terms “sanitary towels” and “tampons”. It is important to use appropriate wording in the House.

The inequality that women have faced in having to pay this tax has existed for generations. The question for us all is what we can do to change that, which is why I add my name to those who have congratulated the former Member for Bristol South, Dame Dawn Primarolo. She is a hero to many of us for her persistence in fighting to reduce the rate of VAT on sanitary towels and tampons in the European Union in 2000. I have talked to her at first hand about those negotiations—she had to use the appropriate terms and explain that if we did not resolve this issue, men and women could be sitting next to each other, with women experiencing their periods and the difficulties that can come from that, but without that same protection because of the cost of these products. Her work was visionary.

Talking to Dame Dawn Primarolo, it became clear that this is not about VAT rates but about VAT descriptions. I am looking forward to hearing what the Minister has to say about this, because there is common agreement that we wish to resolve this issue and a recognition that in 2015, a tax on women—a femitax, a vagina tax, or whatever we want to call it—is unfair. The issue can be resolved not necessarily by considering VAT rates, but by considering the way that VAT is described and ascribed to certain products. That is where the inequality has come from—the concept of what is a necessity.

[Mr Jenkin]

rose—

[Stella Creasy]

I will of course give way to the hon. Gentleman. It is like 20 years ago.

[Mr Jenkin]

I do not remember the hon. Lady giving way 20 years ago. She was at the very fine Colchester county high school for girls, which is a grammar school. In parenthesis, I am delighted that, through the reforms we are pursuing, this Government are doing more for educational opportunities for the least advantaged than any Government in living memory.

Why does the hon. Lady think that Dame Dawn Primarolo was unable to remove the 5% VAT on tampons and sanitary towels when she succeeded in reducing the things that we had discretion over? Why did she not take this initiative to the European Union? It was because she found that the Government of the day felt that they had other, more important fish to fry in their negotiations with the European Union. We should get away from such an unsatisfactory give and take to national interests by leaving the European Union.

[Stella Creasy]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for mentioning the school that I attended. I was incredibly lucky to get there, having failed the 11-plus the first time I took it. I shall always be against selection because I recognise the benefits that I received from being able to take that exam a second time and get that education. That school taught me to do my homework, which is why I know that one of the rules and challenges of this issue is that zero-rated VAT is different from reduced rate VAT. At the time, Dawn Primarolo found that the issue was not about unwillingness but about the way that the rules on what a zero-rating—as opposed to a reduced rating—could be applied to had been changed. That is why she was able to secure a reduction in VAT to 5% from 17.5%—I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will agree that that was progress—but this issue is about the way that products are described.

I am sure that the Minister knows his history of value added tax, how a product is described and what is described as a “necessity”. It is important to have a concept of what is currently described as a “necessity” and is therefore zero-rated. I wonder whether Conservative Members will agree that when we change these definitions, progress can be made.

For example, Jaffa Cakes are zero-rated. I am not a fan of Jaffa Cakes—let it be known that if I am offered a Jaffa Cake, I will refuse. I do not consider them to be essential to my life; I can give or take them. I recognise that razors are zero-rated, and judging by many Conservative Members the opportunity to shave every day is a human right. They are cleanly shaven, and I am sure they would be concerned to be charged a higher rate of VAT. Pitta bread is zero-rated—we can probably all agree that that is a necessity. What is the kebab without a good pitta bread around it? It is a necessity. When we start looking at what is described as a “necessity” and what is a “luxury”, we see the inequalities in this debate. As I said earlier, those inequalities existed long before we joined the European Union and long before we started to work on value added tax.

The question for all of us is not how to have similar rates of taxation, but how to recognise the similar descriptions. That is the way that this issue can be resolved in the European Union. It is also why working with our colleagues in other countries matters to us. I come back to the concern expressed by the hon. Member for Stone about gender inequality, because he is absolutely right: our sisters in France are paying 20% on their tampons and sanitary towels because they do not have the reduced rate. This is therefore not about sanitary towels and the rate of taxation across the European Union; it is about the way in which different countries have interpreted the concept of necessity and essentials.

--- Later in debate ---

[Craig Mackinlay]

I certainly hope his visits around various European capitals have an awful lot on their agenda. Following today’s debate, I hope this issue will be one such item. The issue is one of exclusivity in setting VAT rates on products important to us in this place, not elsewhere.

[Mr Jenkin]

In response to the hon. Lady’s intervention, is not the point that there are so many issues we want our Prime Minister to raise in the European Union? There is an increasing number of myriad issues, such as how much contribution we make, the free movement of people and how we control our borders. It is these little things—I say “little” mistakenly, because of course it looms large as an equality item in our minds—that get set aside in favour of other things. This is a rotten way of running a continent.

[Craig Mackinlay]

I agree with my hon. Friend. I hope progress can be made on very many areas, not least on this one.

We should not be like a colony pleading with an empire power. This is clearly a rate that should be set here. I thank again the hon. Member for Dewsbury for raising this issue, which, important in itself, has opened a Pandora’s box on who governs this country.

--- Later in debate ---

[Wes Streeting]

In this as in other respects, I have always favoured a woman’s right to choose. It is, of course, for women to decide which is the appropriate form of sanitary product. My hon. Friend is quite right that the moon cup does indeed have the environmental benefits that she mentions. I was glad to add my name in support of new clause 7 proposed by my hon. Friend the Member for Dewsbury (Paula Sherriff), which would tackle this issue. I am glad to see so much cross-party support, but I am disappointed to hear some of the language used this evening about our partners in Europe.

Apparently, according to the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin), this is the most iniquitous measure that the European Union has put in place. No wonder there is such representation in the Chamber. I hope that the Out campaign is not going to be predicated on VAT on sanitary products, as proponents are likely to find it a struggle to get wider traction. I find it objectionable that so many Conservative Members talk about negotiating with our European partners as “begging”. It is no different from our constituents coming to lobby us and having a reasonable conversation with us. If this is how the renegotiation strategy is going to work, we really are in trouble as a country.

[Mr Jenkin]

I do not know about the hon. Gentleman, but I am here because I had to stand in an election and my constituents have the right to vote me out. How can people vote out the European Union except by voting to leave in a referendum?

[Wes Streeting]

Well, we have the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers, which are accountable to their respective Governments and, of course, the Commission itself is in many ways accountable. I would like to see reforms to some of the accountability mechanisms, but as the old saying goes, “you’ve got to be in it to win it”. On Europe, as on climate change, inheritance tax and the debate taking place in the other place on tax credits, we have seen in virtually every clause debated this evening that this is not the new modernised Conservative party; it is the same old right-wing Tories. They have hung their Chancellor and Prime Minister out to dry, and I hope that the Opposition’s reasonable, centre-ground amendments will be supported by Members from all parts of the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Gauke]

It does require a proposal from the Commission and the support of all 28 member states. Just to be clear, this is not a formality.

[Mr Jenkin]

rose—

[Mr Gauke]

I will take one more intervention, but I am conscious that I should allow the hon. Member for Wolverhampton South West to respond.

[Mr Jenkin]

Why is it the policy of the Government to argue that it is necessary to have any tax harmonisation in the EU in order for us to have trade with the EU?

[Mr Gauke]

Doing full justice to that question in the five minutes available for me and for the hon. Member for Wolverhampton South West would be a challenge. This has been part of the VAT regime since 1973, but on this specific area, as we have heard, time has moved on and it is right that we look again at it.

Greece

Bernard Jenkin Excerpts

Monday 29th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

I make the broad observation that ultimately countries have to live within their means; we see what happens if they do not. On the Greek debt situation and the burden of Greek debt, eurozone members were in discussions about the terms of debt repayments and the like, but those negotiations were broken off on Saturday because of the unexpected announcement by the Greek Prime Minister on Friday.

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

Does not the eurozone states effectively endorsing a plan for fiscal and banking union, as proposed by the five eurozone Presidents, regardless of the treaty that the Prime Minister vetoed in December 2012, underline the urgency for the Chancellor to deliver on the dilemma that he outlined in a speech on 15 January 2014, when he said:

“The…Treaties are not fit for purpose.”

He also said:

“If we cannot protect the collective interests of non-eurozone member states then they”—

meaning we—

“will have to choose between joining the euro, which the UK will not do, or leaving the EU.”

Can he explain why those words have been taken down from the Downing Street website?

[Mr Osborne]

I have absolutely no idea; I thought it was one of the better speeches I gave over the past five years. My hon. Friend will be glad to know that I repeated exactly those arguments, including the phrase about the challenge of Britain having to choose, in the Mansion House speech that I gave just a couple of weeks ago. That is certainly up on the Treasury website.