European Council
Chris Leslie Excerpts(5 years, 5 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
It is exactly that further political and legal assurance that we are looking at. There have been very clear statements from the European Union. Those have been reiterated not only in the Council conclusions but after the Council conclusions as well. The best way to stop the backstop coming into place is of course to have a firm date for introducing the future relationship. That is currently the intention and that is currently 31 December 2020. We will continue to discuss what further assurances we can get on this point.
Mr Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
When precisely will the Prime Minister be securing this “Miracle on 34th Street” guarantee from the European Union on the backstop that she will come back with before 7 January? If she does come back with it, will the House be debating it on a fresh Government motion? On her commitment to come back on 7 January to start the debate, is that a promise?
The Prime Minister
First of all, the business motion and the way in which the debate is to be dealt with by the House will of course be discussed through the usual channels. I said we would be starting the debate in the first week, with a vote in the following week. The hon. Gentleman asked me about the timetable. Discussions are continuing with the European Union and I expect them to continue into the new year.
Exiting the European Union
Chris Leslie Excerpts(5 years, 5 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. Those people, many of whom voted for the first time at all or the first time in decades when they voted in the referendum in 2016, will indeed question why they should vote in future if this Parliament does not deliver on that vote. As she says, people across the country, whether they voted leave or remain, are saying, “This was the result: let’s just get on with it; let’s deliver it.”
Mr Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
In the light of this morning’s European Court judgment pursued by the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry), the right hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) and myself, which clarified that all options are available for our country, may I make the Prime Minister a sincere offer in the hope that she will at least keep her options open? If she takes her Brexit proposal back to the British public for a final say, and also allows the public the chance to stay in the European Union, she can be assured of significant support from many Opposition Members.
The Prime Minister
I appreciate the sincerity with which the right hon. Gentleman has put his question and made his point, but I do genuinely feel absolutely that it is important for this House to deliver on the vote that took place in 2016.
European Union (Withdrawal) Act
Chris Leslie Excerpts(5 years, 5 months ago)
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Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Lab)
This is a seminal debate in the history of this House and for the future of our country. I have been in the House since 1983, and this debate and the decision we will take next week is one of the most important we will ever take as Members of this House.
The deal before us would make our country worse off. Taken together with the withdrawal agreement and the future partnership, it represents a huge and damaging failure for Britain. The Prime Minister says this is a good deal, and is so confident of that that she attempted to refuse to publish the Government’s legal advice—she was forced to publish it by votes in this House today.
However, the economic assessments and other assessments that we will see indicate that this is actually a bad deal. These documents are the product of two years of botched negotiations, in which the Government spent more time arguing with itself than it did in negotiating with the European Union. It is not only on Brexit where they have failed. The economy is weak, investment is poor, wage growth is weak, our public services are in crisis and local councils are collapsing because of this Government’s refusal to fund them properly. More people in this country are living in poverty, including half a million more children, since 2010. The Government should be ashamed of themselves for that. Poverty is rising, homelessness is rising and household debt is rising, too.
It is against that backdrop that the Government have produced this botched deal, which even breaches the Prime Minister’s own red lines. Across the House the deal has achieved something—it has united Conservative remainers, Conservative leavers and Members of every Opposition party in an extraordinary coalition against the deal.
Jeremy Corbyn
Mr Speaker—[Hon. Members: “Give way.”] Mr Speaker, it could have all been so different. Following the 2017 election, the Prime Minister—[Interruption.]
Jeremy Corbyn
Mr Speaker, no deal is not a real option, and the Government know that, because they are not seriously prepared for it. Eleven out of the 12 critical infrastructure projects that would need to be in place by the end of March 2019 to manage a no-deal Brexit are at risk of not being completed on time, according to the National Audit Office.
Jeremy Corbyn
I am quite happy to debate with the Prime Minister. I notice she was not very keen to debate with anybody during the general election, but we understand that.
The Government have been forced to publish their full legal advice, as voted for by this House. I hope and assume that that advice will be published tomorrow, because Members ought to be in possession of all the facts. In 2007, the Prime Minister then argued, and I absolutely agreed with her, that the full legal advice should have been made available before the Iraq war. Why did she push it right to wire here and lose two votes in the House in order to try and prevent the publication of the legal advice, which is so necessary to inform us in our debates?
This withdrawal agreement is a leap in the dark. It takes us no closer to understanding what the future of our country post Brexit would look like, and neither does the future partnership, which I will come on to. The Prime Minister states that the transition period ends in December 2020. Article 132 actually says it can be extended for up to two years, to 31 December 2022.
Jeremy Corbyn
I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. The Labour party discussed this issue at great length at party conference and agreed that we would oppose this deal. We said that if the Government cannot govern and cannot command a majority of the House, then the great British tradition is that those Governments resign and we have a general election.
Jeremy Corbyn
My hon. Friend is right, because the deal does not ensure that if there are changes across the EU that improve workers’ rights and conditions, they are necessarily mirrored in this country. When the Prime Minister talks so grandly about workers’ rights in this country, what comes to my mind is a million people on zero-hours contracts; what comes to my mind is people trying to make ends meet by doing two or three jobs just to feed their children.
As I said, the Prime Minister states that the transition period ends in 2020. Article 132 actually says that it can be extended for up to two years, to December 2022. The Business Secretary is already clear that it is likely to be extended to that period, and under this bad deal we would have to pay whatever the EU demands to extend it for those two years.
Jeremy Corbyn
Under this deal, in December 2020 we will be faced with a choice: either pay more and extend the transition period, or fall into the backstop. At that point, Britain would be over a barrel. We would have left the EU, have no UK rebate and be forced to pay whatever was demanded. Alternatively, article 185, on the Northern Ireland protocol—the backstop—would apply. Not only would that mean that Northern Ireland would be subject to significantly different regulations from the rest of the UK, but the EU would have a right of veto—a right of veto—over the UK’s exit from the backstop arrangement. Far from taking back control, that is actually handing control to somebody else. That is what the Prime Minister is asking us to support. Whether in a backstop or an extended transition, the UK would have no say over the rules. By that time, we could have already given up our seat on the Council of Ministers, our commissioner and our MEPs, without having negotiated any alternative say in our future. This Government are not taking back control; they are losing control.
Jeremy Corbyn
Well, if the House rejects this deal, as I hope it will, it is then up to the Government to go back and negotiate something, like a new comprehensive customs union, which would be backed by both the TUC and the CBI, and which is necessary to defend jobs and also have access to a strong single market. We cannot be told that this is the only thing we can do. The process of negotiation is to be accountable. The Government will be held to account. I hope this deal is rejected, in which case we will force the Government to go back and negotiate.
Mr Speaker
Order. I want to hear the intervention. There is a lot of noise.
Leaving the EU
Chris Leslie Excerpts(5 years, 5 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
As my right hon. Friend will know, there are clauses in the withdrawal agreement in relation to the endeavours that both sides will make to reach agreement by the end of the implementation period in December 2020 which make it clear that action can be taken if either side drags its feet in the way that he is talking about.
Mr Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
The Prime Minister is not suggesting that, compared with staying in the European Union, her Brexit proposals would mean that our country would be economically better off, is she?
The Prime Minister
The question of our future—[Interruption.] No. I believe that we can be economically better off outside the European Union. The problem is that there are those who think the only factor that determines how well off we are in the future is whether or not we are a member of the European Union. I differ. Our future is in our hands. It will be our decisions, in many areas, that will determine our prosperity for the future.
Progress on EU Negotiations
Chris Leslie Excerpts(5 years, 5 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
As my right hon. Friend knows, we have already said that, in looking at a future treaty, it is important to do a couple of things. He talks about being able to bring a treaty to an end, but it is also important, because we accept that over the years trade relationships will develop and change and that administrative arrangements will change, to have a regular review mechanism in place, so that as those changes take place, it is possible to make changes to the agreement.
Mr Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
Was not the Prime Minister’s fundamental mistake triggering article 50 without getting a commitment to conclude a future trade agreement before exit day? As a result, is she not asking the country to trust her—to take a leap in the dark—entirely on the basis of this flimsy, unenforceable set of political words? We face year after year of further negotiations. Or can she now tell us when the negotiations on the future trade arrangement will conclude?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Gentleman has heard me mention in response to other questions the determination and commitment of both sides to ensuring that those negotiations take place such that the future framework is in place at the end of December 2020. He complains that we triggered article 50 when we did. I remind him that the Leader of the Opposition wanted to trigger article 50 the day after the referendum.
EU Exit Negotiations
Chris Leslie Excerpts(5 years, 6 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
My right hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe (Anna Soubry) has already raised that issue, as have Opposition Members, but this House chose to ask the people of the United Kingdom whether they wished to remain in or leave the European Union. There was an overwhelming vote in Parliament to do that—[Interruption.] There was an overwhelming vote in Parliament: it was about 6:1, so anybody who says that it was not overwhelming is wrong. The British people exercised their vote in numbers that we have never seen before, and the result was that we should leave the European Union. With other European issues, I have seen other countries and member states of the European Union taking matters back to their populace and holding a referendum, and when the vote has gone against what the European Union wanted, there has then effectively been a second vote—a sort of “go back and think again” vote—but I do not think it is right that we should do that in this country. We gave people the choice; we should deliver on the decision they took.
Mr Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
We have been going for about an hour now and it is quite clear that not a single right hon. or hon. Member has supported the plans that the Prime Minister has set out. It is clear that she cannot command the House of Commons on these proposals. In fact, I am almost tempted to ask Conservative Members to put their hands up if they actually support the Prime Minister on this set of proposals. [Interruption.] Not one. In that case, she says that remaining in the European Union is an option, so how can the British people fulfil that choice, if that is what they choose?
The Prime Minister
I apologise, because I did not quite hear the question, but I think the hon. Gentleman said that staying in the European Union was an option—
The Prime Minister
No, I said that there was a risk of no Brexit at all, but the Government are determined to deliver on the vote that the British people took to leave the European Union.
October EU Council
Chris Leslie Excerpts(5 years, 6 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
We have said right from the beginning that we would not be looking to extend article 50. This refers back to an earlier question from one of our right hon. Friends about people actually wanting to see that we are leaving the European Union. I think we owe it to people to deliver on this. What we want now is to have the decisions that finalise the negotiations to ensure that we get that good deal.
Mr Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
Would it not be more honest for the Prime Minister, rather than spinning that this is 95% done—I understand why she wants to do that—to explain that, actually, the divorce terms are merely the clearing of the throat before a five-year, or perhaps a seven-year, legal treaty arrangement on our future trading relationship? Would that not be a more honest representation? If people want to end it soon, give the people a final say so that they can decide what to do.
The Prime Minister
No, the reference to the 95% is a factual description of where we are in relation to the withdrawal agreement. Neither side in this negotiation wants to be negotiating for the period of time that the hon. Gentleman has suggested, which is why both sides will be working to ensure that we have that future relationship agreed by December 2020. I suggest that if he looks at the average time that it takes to conduct trade deals, he will see that many trade deals are done in precisely the sort of time that we are talking about.
EU Exit Negotiations
Chris Leslie Excerpts(5 years, 7 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
No, I am afraid I do not agree with my right hon. Friend on the definition she has set out, precisely because the proposal that we have put forward involves a parliamentary lock. It will be this Parliament that will decide on those rules—whether we adopt those rules and whether we adopt any further changes to those rules.
Mr Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
Is not the Prime Minister’s problem that she is dancing to the tune of the hard Brexiteers—the duo from Uxbridge and Somerset—and we should not therefore be surprised that she is taking the country towards an inferior, low-grade, hard-Brexit FTA deal? Will she give an undertaking that, when this House—when Members of Parliament—look at that deal and decide that, actually, it is not right for the country and we decide a different course, she will respect the decision of Members of Parliament to put this question to a people’s vote?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Gentleman will know full well that it is very clearly set out what the process would be—what the procedure would be—were it to be the case that this Government were to bring a proposal back to this House and the meaningful vote were not to support that particular proposal.
Salisbury Update
Chris Leslie Excerpts(5 years, 8 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. I would also say that this confirms that those of our allies who stood by us and took action after March were right to do so. There were those who were sceptical, internationally as well as within this Chamber, about the role of the Russian state at the time, but the evidence that has now been produced shows absolutely the culpability of the Russian state. I hope that in the international arena we will now see countries that have exercised a degree of restraint in their approach recognising the role that Russia has played in this and acting accordingly.
Mr Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
Given the extraordinary trail of evidence that the Prime Minister has shared with the House today, and the number of communities affected, is it not all the more important that everyone in all corners of the Chamber should express their total faith and confidence in the police and the security forces? We do not do that simply so that we can pay lip service to them or thank them; expressing that confidence is important so that communities or witnesses with evidence can come forward and feel that it is legitimate to provide that evidence to the security services. May I urge the Prime Minister to ignore the cranks and ideological extremists whose first instinct seems to be to sow mistrust in our security professionals?
The Prime Minister
I absolutely support what the hon. Gentleman has said. Our security professionals do an amazing job for us on a daily basis. We have seen the painstaking professionalism that they have shown in this particular investigation, which has led us to the position where we can make the statements that the Metropolitan police and I have made today in relation to these two individuals and to what happened in Salisbury. It is incumbent on all of us across the whole House unequivocally to give our support to the security services in the job that they do. We face a range of threats in this country, and the people of this country need the reassurance of knowing that their politicians are giving the necessary support to the security services.
Electoral Commission Investigation: Vote Leave
Chris Leslie Excerpts(5 years, 10 months ago)
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Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
Each Urgent Question requires a Government Minister to give a response on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Chloe Smith
I welcome that as a policy consideration that ought to be looked at in the round alongside the results of a number of ongoing investigations. I would just return to the core point, which is that we have these rules in place. It is these rules that buttress our democracy and that mean that we have an independent democracy where sanctions follow misdemeanours, and that is what the report tells us today.
Mr Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)
If the Minister will not talk about the specifics of this case, will she address a very simple general question? Can she envisage any level of corruption so gross that it would ever invalidate any referendum?
Chloe Smith
I am really not in a position to answer the question. The hon. Gentleman tries to tempt me with a yes or a no or a very simple question, but this is not a simple matter. There are a number of reports across a number of different investigations with a number of elements that are still ongoing. It is for that reason that I have come here and tried to be very clear, in a way I hope is understood by parliamentarians, that I cannot prejudge the investigations of independent bodies. [Interruption.] If you would bear with me for one second, Mr Speaker, I will offer a thought to the House. Those who have looked at election regulation over time—including many Members of this House who served here for some decades—have not seen fit to place in those election rules the idea that a result can be invalidated. I am simply stating the current law. That concept does not yet exist in our law. It would be a new concept, as it has not yet been seen fit to be put in place by Parliament.