European Union (Referendum) Bill

Debate between Chris Williamson and Phil Wilson

Friday 22nd November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Phil Wilson]

I agree with my hon. Friend. In a moment, I shall come on to the importance of Nissan. It is not just important to the north-east: 81% of Nissan’s cars are exported and 56%, or 279,000 vehicles, are exported to Europe. Nissan’s exports are worth £4.3 billion. It spends £1.4 billion on local suppliers and its wage bill is £331 million, money that goes into the north-east economy.

[Chris Williamson (Derby North) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful point about the impact on the automotive industry. Did he see “Channel 4 News” last night? It is not just the automotive industry that would be affected by the decision and is being affected by the debate. A senior representative from Goldman Sachs—from the banking industry in which the Conservative party places so much faith—talked about the prospect of that company pulling out of London altogether if there is a referendum to exit the EU.

[Phil Wilson]

None of the issues being raised by my hon. Friends should be considered lightly. They are important issues for the future of the economy and over the next four years, if the Bill is passed, it will create nothing but uncertainty for those people who want to see jobs for their constituents.

--- Later in debate ---

[Phil Wilson]

I thought that the hon. Gentleman would make an intervention during my speech, so I looked at the number of jobs in Stone that are reliant on Europe. The number is nearly 6,000, so he should think carefully about supporting the Bill.

The hon. Member for Stockton South should also have consulted Steve Elliott, the chief executive of the Chemical Industries Association. That industry is very important in Teesside, and Mr Elliott said:

“With 50% of our exports destined for continental Europe, the UK’s largest manufacturing exporter—the chemical industry—has every reason for the country to remain as part of the European Union. It is earlier and smarter engagement at all levels—member state, the Commission and the Parliament—that will address our sector’s chief concerns around energy and regulation and strengthen Britain’s chances when competing globally for sustained economic growth and jobs.”

I shall finish by saying this—[Hon. Members: “Hooray!”] Conservative Members obviously do not want to hear the facts of how the Bill would impact on the north-east of England and the UK economy. I honestly do not know how the hon. Gentleman will be able to explain to his constituents the need to extend the age of uncertainty that he intends to thrust on them through the Bill, but I believe that they will pay him back at the ballot box in 2015 by returning a Labour MP for Stockton South.

[Chris Williamson]

I rise to speak to amendment 62 and new schedule 1, which I tabled, and to support a range of other measures, including new schedule 2. As has been clear from the debate so far, this contentious matter is dividing the House and, to an extent, the country at large, so getting the date of a referendum right is crucial, which was why I tabled my amendment and new schedule. I am worried about the uncertainty that is being generated by the Conservative party as a result of this debate, yet that uncertainty is added to by the question of the date. If there is to be a referendum, it is crucial that it is held on a date when it will cause the minimum amount of disruption and difficulty, and the least uncertainty for the business community on which many millions of people rely for their livelihoods and on which the strength of the British economy depends.

I therefore propose establishing a Speaker’s Committee, because there could be no better way of providing reassurance than for such a Committee to determine the referendum date. That process would offer some comfort to those who are alarmed by the current debate, because they would understand that there would not be an arbitrary date, with all the ramifications that flow from that. A Speaker’s Committee would be able to consider the matter in the cold, calm light of day, instead of it being determined in the cockpit that is the Floor of the House.

It might be helpful if I illustrate my point by quoting George Cowcher, the chief executive of the Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire chamber of commence, who says:

“As the world’s largest single market, Europe will always be a key trading partner for the UK. Being successful there remains central to the future growth and development of a significant majority of companies in Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire. Business hates uncertainty and that’s what will be caused by this.”

There is no justification for adding to that uncertainty, so surely it would be better to minimise it by establishing a Speaker’s Committee to address that real concern.

HEALTH

Debate between Chris Williamson and Phil Wilson

Thursday 20th December 2012 Commons Chamber

Phil Wilson (Sedgefield) (Lab)

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I want to take this opportunity to raise an issue that is helping to fill my postbag at the moment: the state of rural bus services in County Durham and Darlington. I know that that is a concern for many MPs, especially those in County Durham. Only yesterday, I received a petition from Aycliffe village signed by 300 people, which complains about the state of rural bus services in the area and the lack of buses, especially in the evening.

Sedgefield covers part of south Durham and all the rural parts of Darlington borough. It covers about 150 square miles and, for people without a car, travelling from A to B can be a big problem. Car ownership in County Durham is below the national average. Almost 30% of households are without a car, compared with about 25% nationally. For those on low wages, the elderly, young people and disabled people, getting around the constituency can be a chore. The Government’s approach to cutting bus subsidies and their more general cuts to local government are making the situation worse.

I could spend the rest of my speech talking about the severity of the Government’s cuts, but the Government would just say that the problem is the way in which the local authority is introducing the cuts. We could go on in that vein, but it would not resolve anything. When a constituent comes to my office—as constituents do from time to time—and says that he cannot get to work because the buses have changed, he wants a solution. He does not want to hear what will happen in the future or an argument about who is to blame; he wants me to tell him how he can get to work in the morning. I want to say a little about what some of my local communities are doing to provide community transport, because what people are looking for—the elderly and the low-paid—is a solution to the problems.

People in communities such as Hurworth, Middleton St George, Sadberge and Brafferton in the Darlington part of my constituency are working with the Community Transport Association and Darlington borough council to assemble a workable community transport service for the area to help people who are suffering because of the lack of an adequate bus service. I hope that the Minister can offer his support and encouragement to the stakeholders of that scheme to ensure that it is a success.

Durham county council already runs a community transport service called Link2, which provides a community service in areas where commercial bus services do not want to go. I congratulate the county council on providing that service. It has seen its budget for bus services reduced by about £1.3 million. The rural bus subsidy grant for the county has been cut by about 40%. Companies such as Arriva are therefore not receiving the subsidy that they received in the past, so they are pulling buses off routes, which is making it difficult for my constituents to get around. I have constituents who are having difficulties in getting to work, whose journeys have been lengthened and who cannot take up jobs that they want because they are unable to get to the place of work. Does the Minister agree that although cuts to bus subsidies might make savings in some areas, they create costs elsewhere? Will he say whose responsibility it is when vulnerable people fall through the transport net because of the cuts?

To give an example, I have an elderly constituent who does not want to be named, but who wants me to relay her story because she believes that what is happening to her is also happening to others. My constituent is a 75-year-old pensioner who looks after her 50-year-old daughter who has Down’s syndrome and serious medical conditions. They often rely on friends and family to get to a doctor’s appointment, but one day family and friends were not available, there were no taxis, and buses no longer ran a convenient distance from their home. The doctor’s surgery was about a mile away so my constituent decided to walk there with her daughter. Such a journey might take a fit person about 15 minutes, but it took my constituents considerably longer and on the way back they had to stop at the community centre and ask someone for a lift to get back home. Such things are happening day in, day out, not just in County Durham but all over the country. The Government may argue that this level of cuts is necessary. That is fair enough, but surely someone must take responsibility for the consequences of those cuts.

Another constituent of mine, 16-year-old Lauren Peters, attends New College Durham. A few weeks ago she was stranded at Durham bus station. The bus service had been cut due to inclement weather, but the bus company did not alert local colleges about the difficulties. My constituent was stranded without any money and the battery on her phone was about to run out. She had to wait in the cold, damp, bad weather for three hours before her father could come to pick her up.

We understand that bad weather can cause disruption, but where was the customer care from companies such as Arriva, one of the biggest bus companies in Europe? There was no phone call to local colleges or major employers. I have written to Arriva and the county council, and although I have received a reply from the county council I have yet to hear anything from Arriva. Mrs Peters contacted me the next day to raise the issue and complain. If bus companies are now running merely commercial routes—I believe the route in question was commercial—surely we need better alert systems when there is disruption to help people to get home. There seems to be no customer care.

Lauren was not the only vulnerable person affected by the disruption that day. I want solutions to the issues I have raised. I want to work with community groups to establish community bus services where possible, and available funding to be used to that effect where subsidies to existing bus services have been withdrawn.

I know that Durham county council has gained about £374,000 from the rural sustainable community transport initiative, but that is a one-off grant; it does not happen every year. These are austere times and we should be all in this together. My question to the Minister is this: if this level of cuts is necessary, who is taking responsibility for those who fall through the net? Although I will help local authorities and communities as best I can to establish community bus services, does the Minister agree that there is only so much that the local community can do?

Chris Williamson (Derby North) (Lab)

- Hansard -

I will start by telling the Minister that there is great concern in my Derby constituency about the possibility of a pre-Christmas betrayal of the Bombardier work force in the city. In March 2011, the Prime Minister brought the Cabinet to Derby because he felt it was an excellent backdrop that would give credibility to his assertion that he wanted to rebalance the economy. Derby provided a perfect illustration of the sort of economy that the Government—who at the time were relatively new—wanted to create. Within a few weeks, however, that rhetoric sounded hollow. It was followed up in the Budget statement when the Chancellor spoke about the march of the makers:

“We are only going to raise the living standards of families if we have an economy that can compete in the modern age. So this is our plan for growth. We want the words: ‘Made in Britain’, ‘Created in Britain’, ‘Designed in Britain’ and ‘Invented in Britain’ to drive our nation forward—a Britain carried aloft by the march of the makers. That is how we will create jobs and support families.”—[Official Report, 23 March 2011; Vol. 525, c. 966.]

However, just a few months later, when the Government could have done something positive to show that they meant those words, they awarded preferred bidder status for the Thameslink contract to Siemens rather than to Bombardier in Derby.

Ministers seem to have ignored the provisions within the invitation to tender documentation. The ITT states that the successful bidder must demonstrate that it can exploit advances in technology and have a world-class proven solution in one package, but Siemens did not have that. It had not developed a lightweight bogie; indeed, plans were still on the draughtsman’s board and had not even been tested or put into any form of production. In spite of that, however, Ministers decided to appoint Siemens as the preferred bidder.

That decision has already led to 1,400 job losses in Derby at Bombardier, and considerably more jobs have been lost in the supply chain. The Department for Transport seems not to be acting in the national interest and to be completely out of control. We saw the fiasco of the franchise for the west coast main line and, as we know, that process was suspended. The same civil servants who gave rise to concern over that franchise also worked on the Thameslink contract, yet Ministers seem to draw a veil over that.

Ministers have also tried to blame EU regulations for the decision to award preferred bidder status to Siemens. However, that simply will not wash because, when convenient, Ministers have ignored EU regulations on the issue. EU regulations are enshrined in English law. Regulation 4 is apposite and states:

“A contracting authority shall (in accordance with Article 2 of the Public Sector Directive)…treat economic operators equally and in a non-discriminatory way.”

That did not happen. At the fourth stage of the evaluation process, the DFT adopted a complex methodology involving the use of discount rates as shown in the Treasury Green Book, which is complicated for a layperson like myself. When the Transport Committee took expert evidence, Professor Karel Williams from the Manchester business school stated that there was a

“bias in favour of Siemens because they had a superior credit rating and that gave them an advantage of maybe several hundred million pounds”.

It therefore seems clear that the Government are in breach of their obligations under regulation 4.

The Business Secretary reportedly said that the end result of the evaluation process was inevitable. The ITT makes it clear that the Secretary of State will let the contract. In my view, that makes the Thameslink contract a Government contract. Regulation 23(b) of the public contract regulations makes it clear that, where a bidder has been found guilty of corruption, it should be excluded from the process. We know that Siemens falls into that category, yet the Government have proceeded regardless.

When the matter has been raised with Ministers, they have claimed that Siemens should not be excluded from the bidding process, and to some extent I agree. Siemens plc is not part of the special purpose company—Cross London Trains—which has been created to take forward the Thameslink contract. Siemens Project Ventures GmbH, which is a division of Siemens AG, is part of that special purpose company. Siemens AG has been convicted of corruption which, in my view, makes it ineligible for the contract unless there is an overriding requirement “in the general interest” to include it—that is what the regulations state.

As I have said, Ministers say there are no grounds to eliminate Siemens but they are applying the wrong test. They should have been looking at whether it was right to include the special purpose company that includes Siemens AG as part of the consortium. I therefore hope that when he sums up the Minister will give a commitment to look at the issue again. I believe that the Government are in breach of regulations 4 and 23. We will not get value for money, although Ministers claim we will—they are adopting a very expensive model to procure the trains and there are less expensive ways of pursuing that.

The industry is in great shape and the market is expanding, and we have huge potential and a massive opportunity, so I urge the Minister to ensure that he does not allow the industry in this country to slip through his fingers. He has the power to stop the contract—the invitation to tender makes that extremely clear—to do the right thing and to look at it again. Hopefully, he will give Bombardier in Derby the opportunity to continue to deliver a train manufacturing industry—