Leaving the EU: Sectoral Impact Assessments

David Lammy Excerpts

Tuesday 28th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Walker]

My hon. Friend raises a very interesting point. Of course, all leaks should be taken extremely seriously.

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

The Minister will understand that it is important that the Executive get on with policy, but there is a fundamental role in our constitution for Parliament to hold the Executive to account and to scrutinise this hugely important decision. The Secretary of State said that the information existed “in excruciating detail” and that the Prime Minister had seen the summaries. For that reason, it is hard to understand why we cannot see the entirety of the information —if so, with redaction. Can the Minister explain why that is not the case?

[Mr Walker]

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right about the balance we need to strike. We do need to get on with this role, but we also absolutely respect the role of parliamentary scrutiny in this process, which is why the information that has been provided to the Committee is comprehensive and in great detail. It goes beyond the type of summaries that he refers to and, indeed, that the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras suggested might be an answer to this. We have actually provided much more information than just summarising reports could have done.

Exiting the EU: Sectoral Analysis

David Lammy Excerpts

Tuesday 7th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Baker]

No, I am not aware of any such request.

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

The Minister confirmed in a response to me on 13 September that the Department had the analyses. He has confirmed today that he has seen the analyses. He then said that there is no quantitative work that casts its eye into the future. The question in response to that is: why has that work on such a critical issue not been done by his Department? He has not explained that. Surely he is in contempt of the House and we should repurpose the Tower to accommodate him and his Department heads.

[Mr Baker]

I refer the right hon. Gentleman to a range of answers that I have already given.

Exiting the EU: Sectoral Impact Assessments

David Lammy Excerpts

Wednesday 1st November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

I am very grateful to have the opportunity to speak in this debate. I have always believed in the ability of our country to pool sovereignty with the European Union. I have listened to the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin) over many, many years trying to persuade me about the sovereignty of this Parliament. It is great to participate in a debate that is demonstrating the sovereignty of this Parliament.

I first started asking questions on this issue on 4 September, using that sovereignty and my role as an MP to raise these issues. My hon. Friend the Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra) made a freedom of information request, again using her ability as an elected Member to get to the truth. We now see my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) assert the sovereignty of this House by dragging the Government to the House to raise these issues. We have heard from Select Committee Chairs, an important institution in this House, that they could well consider this information. They understand that some of it may be redacted, but it all goes to the issue of a sovereign Parliament: we cannot argue for taking back control and then seek to thwart the will of this Parliament, its Select Committees and hon. Members, to get to the heart of the truth.

I want to see the impact assessments, because there are things in them that I expect to read. I expect to read that the health service is going to do a lot with the £350 million. I look forward to seeing it. I expect to read, as we heard during the referendum campaign, that we do not need to worry about a skills gap because there are lots of people in our country who are going to step into those roles. I look forward to seeing what the Department for Work and Pensions makes of the assessment on skills, along with its colleagues in the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. I look forward to hearing what assessment has been made by the Home Office of whether, when we have limited free movement and we ask the Indians for a trade deal, they will ask whether they can have visas. For all those reasons, it is important to understand whether the arguments that have been put forward by many Conservative Members are actually made in those impact assessments.

However, the real reason this is important is the seriousness of this debate. As night follows day, it will mostly not be us in this Chamber who suffer or struggle as a consequence of any shift in our economy. It is people’s jobs and livelihoods and how they feed their children that matters, and for that reason, we must see those impact assessments. It is a crying shame that this process began because of parliamentary questions and freedom of information requests, and not because the Government felt able to be open.

European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

David Lammy Excerpts

Committee: 2nd sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 7th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry]

I agree with much of what the hon. Gentleman says, but I am also reminded of what was said by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield. As he rightly asked, who knows where we may be in two years’ time? No one seems to have thought about the issue in those terms. God forbid, but we may not have our Prime Minister then: we may have another Prime Minister, for whatever reasons. We may not have the same Secretary of State, or, indeed, the same Minister of State. Those circumstances could change, and other circumstances could change, such as the economy or the mood in Europe.

There may indeed be circumstances—and the hardline Brexiteers have surely missed this point—from which they may want to protect themselves. They may then want that debate. It is also possible that WTO tariffs and the other developments that the hon. Gentleman and I fear would be in our best interests. That is the whole point: we do not know where we shall be in two years’ time. It is right for us to keep our options open, and it is right for us to have a debate and a vote.

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

The right hon. Lady is making her points with her usual eloquence. Does she agree that another context that has clearly changed since 23 June is the geopolitics of the world? We have a new leader in the United States, and some very serious concerns have been raised about Putin in Russia. We certainly do not know where we might be in two years’ time.

[Anna Soubry]

I absolutely agree, and that is exactly the point that many Members across this House are now making.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Temporary Chair (Mr George Howarth)]

Order. There are four hon. Members who still want to contribute and who have given their names to amendments. However, the Government are likely to come back at 6 o’clock. If everyone takes less than five minutes, I might be able to squeeze in at least four more speakers. It is a gentle reminder; there is no time limit. I call David Lammy.

[Mr Lammy]

I will try to be brief.

I am now entering my 17th year in the House. In that time, it is usual to strike up relationships across the House. I want to make a confession: I have a relationship with the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith)—I am sorry that he is not in his place—who has the unusual honour of also being a fan of Tottenham Hotspur. There have been occasions when we have been at White Hart Lane together, talking about his favourite subject: the sovereignty of this Parliament and the European Union. There have been occasions when my eyes have glazed over, because I do not see the issue in the same way.

In the past few months, as I have grown increasingly depressed about the direction of travel on which we are now set, I have looked for a silver lining. The silver lining is, of course that, in the 17 years that I have been an MP, we have been in the European Union—effectively, we had decided to pool some of our sovereignty with Europe, which meant that I had less power. Well, the power is now coming back, and, as a result of all the work of the right hon. Gentleman, the hon. Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) and others, I will be a powerful Member of Parliament. Yet we are now in a situation, in this important time, in which we need that sovereignty, and the very same people who were asking for it now stand up to argue that we should put that power somewhere else.

Many hon. Members who have been Back Benchers for some years argue that we should put the power with the Executive, and that the Prime Minister and her Cabinet should make all the huge decisions about our economy and direction of travel. They argue, perversely, that the power should solely be with the 27 other countries of the European Union, and that they should determine our direction alongside the European Commission, the Council and, ultimately, the European Parliament—power everywhere else except here. And who will suffer as a consequence of this Parliament not acting? Our constituents. That is why this is not the time to play party politics and why I was happy to vote against my party last week. This is absolutely the time to stand up for our constituents.

European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

David Lammy Excerpts

Committee: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Monday 6th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Chris Leslie]

These are the realities we face.

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

Is it not my hon. Friend’s point that we are now a service economy? The service sector accounts for 88% of London’s economy, and the service sector can move. Prior to our joining the EU, we had things in the ground and we were a great manufacturing nation, but that is not the case today.

[Chris Leslie]

That is another issue that deserves a massive amount of consideration, but we just do not have the time to go through it today.

I will move on, then, to new clause 22, on competition policy—another small area of policy! The White Paper says absolutely nothing about what the UK will do, upon our exit from the EU, in respect of competition policy. It is totally silent. Will we change our attitude towards state aid for industry? What will our state aid rules be? If we make a change, will our trading partners baulk at the idea that we might be subsidising products in a particular way? Will we be undercutting their production? Would we not wish to do that? Will we take on the WTO disciplines on subsidies? Will we join the EEA scheme on subsidies? What about state aid rules, competition policy and the European Free Trade Association? This a big deal. I think of subjects that have come up recently such as Hinkley Point, the British investment bank and British steel. These are all questions we have to consider and decide upon. All I am saying in new clause 22 is that the Government should publish a report in one month on their attitude to competition policy. It is a pretty simple measure.



I have tabled other amendments that would require Ministers to set out their aspirations, within one month of Royal Assent, on other questions that will arise as we extract ourselves from some of these European partnerships, alliances and agencies. On law enforcement, for example, what will we do about Europol? New clause 111 touches on the benefits we currently enjoy from cross-border co-operation on cybercrime, terrorism, combating trafficking and other important activities. We deserve to know the Government’s approach to cross-border crime, as we do with respect to the European Police College, Eurojust, our co-operation with prosecuting authorities, the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction and the Agency for Fundamental Rights. The White Paper is totally silent on all those issues. We have no idea what the Government’s plan and negotiating stance will be, and yet we do not have the time to debate these matters properly.

--- Later in debate ---

[Heidi Allen]

I entirely agree. I think that what is most important is for Ministers to listen to organisations such as those in my constituency in order to understand what they need. I am pleased that the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union has visited Cambridge twice since Christmas, because he is clearly listening, but we in the Chamber are not the experts. Those organisations are, and we should listen to what they say.

[Mr Lammy]

Does the hon. Lady agree that one of the problems that universities are experiencing is that PhD students and other academics are choosing not to come to Britain now? That means that our global universities are losing out to Harvard, Yale and Berkeley, and universities in other countries.

[Heidi Allen]

I regularly speak to members of the University of Cambridge, because a couple of its colleges are in my constituency. Although numbers have not fallen so far, I know that they are very worried about what will happen in a couple of years. Universities are a fundamental part of what is great about this country, and they deserve our protection. That is why we need to look fully at the implications for them, and the Government need to listen.

The debate on new clause 57 is probably one of the most important debates that we shall have, because it concerns the continuing rights of EU citizens lawfully residing here before or on 23 June last year. I recognise that the Prime Minister has said that seeking reciprocal rights will be her earliest negotiation priority, and I also recognise that many EU citizens already have an automatic right to remain. However, the issue will continue to keep many of my constituents awake at night until it is resolved.

European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

David Lammy Excerpts

Tuesday 31st January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

Many hon. Members have long believed that the United Kingdom’s interests would be best served outside the European Union. They campaigned passionately for what they believed in, and their view is that we must now leave the European Union. The Prime Minister says that she wants to deliver a Brexit that works for all and that unites our divided country. I, too, want to bring the country back together. Members right across the House will have experienced just how divided the country became in the months leading up to last June and how divided it has become since, but we cannot bring the country back together if we pretend that it has spoken with one united voice.

People who voted to leave did so for all sorts of reasons, many of which have absolutely nothing to do with the European Union, so when the Prime Minister speaks of the will of the people, her interpretation is frankly no clearer or more precise than anyone else’s. Let us not pretend that the people have spoken, because not all of them have. In fact, only 27% of people of the country voted to leave. Some 13 million did not vote, another 7 million eligible voters were not registered and 1 million British ex-pats were not allowed to vote. Even though the futures of 16-year-olds were on the ballot paper, they were denied a say. Only two of the four nations that make up the United Kingdom voted to leave, and there was no quadruple lock. There was no two-thirds supermajority, which is common in all other countries making major constitutional change. Even so, we are told that the people have spoken.

Look at what we have been allowed to become. In a matter of months, our public discourse has been consumed by vitriol and abuse. Hate crimes rose by 40% in the aftermath of the referendum, and we do not yet know what forces will be unleashed on our departure.

[Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

Like a number of colleagues including, I am sure, my right hon. Friend, I have been subject to the most orchestrated abuse that I have seen in the past 16 years in this House. Does he agree that there is a danger that the debate is corrupted by a small minority who feel that they are the masters now and that, therefore, any dissent is unacceptable?

[Mr Lammy]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. It is easy to dismiss views with which you disagree if you never listen to them and just dismiss the people who hold them as villains or enemies of the people.

Yet it is on these terms that we are being asked to rubber-stamp a blank cheque for the Government to deliver the most extreme version of Brexit imaginable. We are being asked to ignore the fact that leaving the European Union will saddle us with a £60 billion divorce bill. We are not going to get tariff-free access to EU customers while rejecting free movement; that is not on the table. We are not going to get a more favourable trading agreement with Europe from outside the single market; that is a paradox. We are not going to come to a full agreement with Europe within two years; believing otherwise completely flies in the face of precedent and all evidence.

Exiting without a deal and falling back on the World Trade Organisation rules is being talked about as though that is a good option. That is totally wrong—it would be an absolute disaster for this country. Even on the optimistic assumption that we can sign trade agreements all over the world, this does not even come close to making up for the loss of the single market. We are facing a return to a hard border in Northern Ireland and a breakdown of the Union with Scotland. We are not reclaiming sovereignty, another promise that falls apart under any scrutiny: we are transferring it to a negotiation behind closed doors.

Doctors are against it, scientists are against it, the financial services sector is against it, and manufacturers are against it because of their exports, but these people are dismissed—and why? Because these days we do not listen to experts. Yes, we are leaving, but it is the EU nations that decide how we leave and what we end up with. Where will this end in 2019? We do not know. Outside the single market, for sure, and outside the customs union, with no trade deal with Europe or anywhere else, our only friend President Trump—a man who has demonstrated why we should worry greatly about a free trade agreement that will probably lead to Kaiser Permanente running the NHS.

We should not fool ourselves. This is not, and never has been, a debate about the economy; it has always been about immigration. We are staring down the barrel of a hard Brexit because immigration has been prioritised over everything else: the economy, jobs, and living standards.

[Mr Ben Bradshaw (Exeter) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the whole debate on immigration has been completely dishonest in that it has failed to recognise that like all developed, ageing economies, we are going to need migration in order to thrive in the future? We could stop more than half of the net immigration into this country tomorrow, because it is from outside the EU.

[Mr Lammy]

Absolutely.

We were told during the campaign that we could cut immigration without hitting our economy. We were sold the lie that immigrants come here and take more than they contribute. Between 1995 and 2011, European immigrants made a net contribution of £4.4 billion to our public services. In the same period, our native population cost us £591 billion. Our economy cannot exist without people coming here to do the jobs that people in the country either do not want or do not have the skills to do.

It is almost half a century since a Member of this House, in a very different era, made these same warnings of

“wives unable to obtain hospital beds in childbirth…children unable to obtain school places”

and

“homes and neighbourhoods changed beyond recognition”.

How far we have fallen when a black British Member of Parliament, of African and Caribbean descent, has to stand here quoting Enoch Powell. It is the easy option to blame migrants who come here with skills instead of successive Governments, both Conservative and Labour, who have failed: failed to educate our own to compete, failed to build affordable housing, failed to fund our public services, and failed to ensure that growth is felt outside of London and the south-east. A hard Brexit will not deal with any of the long-standing structural problems highlighted by the Brexit vote—it will make them worse. The real tragedy is that Whitehall and Parliament, so consumed with Brexit for the next decade, will have no capacity to deal with these hard-pressing issues.

There are Conservative Members who have been dreaming of a low-tax, low-wage, low-regulation offshore tax haven for decades, and now they have it in their grasp, they salivate at the thought of us becoming the new Singapore. I am not going to stand with them. If we let the Prime Minister pursue this reckless course—this Brexit at any cost—we know who will suffer. It will be the poorest, many of whom are in my constituency. The referendum was not just about votes from the north; 52% of leave voters lived in the south of England, 59% were middle class and 58% voted Conservative in 2015. I remind my colleagues who are worried about this, and who are thinking of voting with the Government, of those things.

Let me finish by asking one simple question, which was once asked by one of our most celebrated parliamentarians:

“Is it prudent? Is it possible, however we might desire it, to turn our backs upon Europe”?

When Churchill spoke those words, he was talking about appeasement, and he was going very much against the prevailing wind. The same is true today. Patriotism requires more than just blind faith. We must remember our history, our values, what we represent and what we stand for. Most of all, we must remember what we stand against. For all those reasons, and for the sake of this country that I love, I will be voting against triggering article 50.

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[Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

When I was first elected to this House seven years ago, I knew this job would be hard. I anticipated the soul-searching that would accompany, for example, a decision to commit troops to military action, but what I did not anticipate seven years ago were the fundamental questions about our democracy that I have been asking myself since the referendum last year.

We might talk today about the will of the people, the process which has led us here and the process which follows, but ultimately this debate is about how we take decisions in the best interests of our country and how we respect the diverse views of our electorate. I will vote against triggering article 50 tomorrow evening, and I will be called a democracy-denier. “How can you ignore the will of the people?”, some will cry; “You voted for a referendum. How many times do you want to rerun it?” Democracy did not start or end on 23 June; it is a process, not an event, and I see it as my responsibility to say it as I see it.

There were circumstances in which I would have voted to trigger article 50. The Prime Minister killed off that prospect for me when she made her speech in Lancaster House: a speech in which she said she would pull us out of the single market; a speech in which she put her desire to reduce immigration above our country’s economic interest; and a speech in which she threatened the countries closest to us with a trade war if she did not get her way. I was ashamed by the words of the British Prime Minister that day, and I resolved then to vote against the triggering of article 50. How we negotiate with our European neighbours is as important as what we seek to achieve. I disagree with the Prime Minister on her priorities and I disagree with the manner in which she is setting about achieving them.

This is the start of a process that we might not be able to reverse. The Government want to take us out of the single market.

[Mr Lammy]

Did my hon. Friend see some of the headlines in the European papers following that speech, and does she agree that those reactions will make the negotiations much harder in the coming months?

[Heidi Alexander]

I did see some of that commentary. One of the Spanish newspapers described the speech as a mixture of delusion and outdated nationalism.

I can predict the future no better than anyone else in this Chamber, but my instincts tell me that coming out of the single market will do us harm for many years to come. Last June, the British people were asked whether they wished to leave the European Union. They were not asked whether they wanted to leave the single market or the European economic area—those are different things—and the words “customs union” were barely uttered in the run-up to the referendum. Instead, we had a toxic and misleading debate that inflamed rather than informed.

Some people might say, “Get over it,” but I cannot. We had a Conservative manifesto that promised to safeguard British interests in the single market. We had a leave campaigner on the airwaves telling us:

“Only a madman would actually leave the market”.

Even that man of the people, the ex-public school educated ex-stockbroker Nigel Farage, pointed out how countries such as Norway—outside the EU but inside the European economic area—“do pretty well”. And then what happened? A Prime Minister who was crowned her party’s leader without a single vote having to be cast sits in No. 10 and determines what leaving the EU looks like. That might be democracy to some but it is not democracy to me. Parliament or the British people should determine whether we leave the single market. Article 127 of the EEA agreement states that a party to the agreement must notify its intention to leave 12 months in advance. There is a key democratic imperative for more people than just the Prime Minister to have a say.

Some colleagues here today will vote to trigger article 50 when in their heart of hearts they are deeply fearful of the economic and social repercussions for our country. They will do so for good reasons, including the need to reflect in their own minds the broad wish of a majority of those who voted in the referendum. I cannot do that, because as the reality of Brexit Britain emerges over the next few years, I want to have acted in line with my conscience. I fear for our economy. I fear for the livelihoods and living standards of my constituents. I also worry for jobs in Swindon, the town where I grew up and a place with a big Honda plant whose supply chain spans Europe. Yes, we might make some gains as a result of new trade deals elsewhere, but what of the losses we incur from coming out of the single market?

The Government's Plan for Brexit

David Lammy Excerpts

Wednesday 7th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) on forcing the Government to concede ground in committing to publish a plan for leaving the EU before they invoke article 50. However, he will have seen from the debate that it is not at all clear what that means. Does it mean the Government are just going to publish a document saying, “We will seek the best possible Brexit and aim for the best possible access to the single market”? If it does, I am afraid we are not clear at all what we are going to get and what the plan is.

We have had a lot of discussion about whether there should be a White Paper, but we have had no commitment from the Government that we will get one. Will it answer specific points about the Government’s priorities? Will it set out their position on single market membership, free movement, security co-operation with our allies, workers’ rights, consumer protections or environmental protections? Will it set out all the red lines? Will it set out the Government’s position on the customs union? We are not clear yet what the plan will be. It is for that reason that I will certainly not be voting for the motion as it stands.

It is also clear, despite what my hon. and learned Friend said about the need for those in this House to accept the referendum decision and not seek to frustrate the Government—I understand why he said that—that the Government’s amendment (a) makes a commitment to 31 March. That timetable was set by the Prime Minister behind closed doors, with no input from Parliament at all. That is the second reason why I will not be able to support the motion.

A lack of clarity will not help us to get a good deal; in fact, it will do exactly the opposite, and that is the most important point that, I hope, has come across from today’s debate. The absence of any detail about the Government’s plans has created a vacuum, which has been filled by speculation and by hard Brexiteers. However, words have consequences: proposals to force companies to draw up registers of EU workers; threats to crack down on European students; plans to replace European doctors and nurses working in our NHS; refusing to guarantee the rights of EU citizens who reside in the UK; and doing so much to offend our partners in Europe—described as enemies in this House—with whom we have to negotiate.

I represent a constituency that has had two riots in a generation. I represent a constituency that will bear the brunt when we exercise article 50 and, no doubt, the economy turns down as a result. Those OBR forecasts have a bearing on my constituents. I regret that I have had only three minutes to make their case since the referendum decision on 23 June. However, for all the reasons I have outlined, I will not be supporting the motion.

EU Referendum Rules

David Lammy Excerpts

Monday 5th September 2016 Westminster Hall

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[John Penrose]

What a choice. I will happily give way to the right hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake).

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

Several right hon. and hon. Members of the House have long believed, as we have heard—or not as we have heard, but I know some Members believe this—that Britain’s interests would be best served outside the European Union. Those Members campaigned passionately for Brexit and ardently believe that the result delivered on 23 June means that Brexit should be delivered immediately—no ifs, no buts and, frankly, no questions asked. It would be churlish not to congratulate them on the referendum result and acknowledge, as has been said, that 52% of the country or thereabouts voted to exit the European Union.

I listened to the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union speaking on the Floor of the House just before this debate about what Brexit means, and he said that Brexit means that we will exit the European Union, but we must all concede—I really hope that this Chamber does—that, two and a half months down the line, we do not know what Brexit actually means in reality. We are living in uncertain times and that is why we are considering this petition today. We do not know what form Brexit will take or when it might happen. We do not know whether our future lies within the single market or outside of it.

When we talk about access to the single market after Brexit, what do we mean by that? Of course we will have access—North Korea has access. That is not what we are talking about. The question is on what terms the UK will obtain that access and at what cost? We also do not know what our trading relationships with the rest of the world will look like, and millions of European Union citizens who have made this country their home are living in uncertainty now and do not know what their status is. Many of the 4 million people who signed the petition are understandably very anxious about their future. That is why we are here in this Chamber.

There are many legitimate arguments. Many believe—I will come back to this—that there should be a vote in this House on Brexit when we are much clearer about what the Government plan. Some believe that the best way forward is a general election, where political parties can put their position to the electorate, and others quite rightly say, “No, we need a second referendum on a plan when we have seen it.” That is the nature of the debate we are having, even though some might muddy the waters.

[James Cleverly (Braintree) (Con)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Lammy]

I will give way, but I am conscious that there are many others who must get into the debate.

[James Cleverly]

I appreciate the right hon. Gentleman’s generosity. With regard to a second referendum on specifics of a renegotiated position, if the outcome of that was a rejection of the status quo, should the British people then be presented with a different negotiated position for Brexit, the removal of Brexit or another referendum? What would be the proposed question in that referendum?

[Mr Lammy]

The hon. Gentleman does not seem to see this as I do. I believe that the country is already in the midst of a constitutional crisis. That is why there is currently a case in the High Court in both this country and Northern Ireland in relation to this topic. All I have outlined is that some people legitimately believe that one way out of the constitutional crisis is to put a plan to the people. The determinants of that plan are not a matter for today, but the principle requires debate. It is concerning that, given the decision we have made, which affects generations of young people, so many people who believe in sovereignty seem to want to limit debate in this House. We have spent minimal hours on Europe since 23 June, given the seriousness of the decision we are about to take.

Many people on both sides of the referendum debate would accept that the public were totally misled and lied to during the referendum. No one would accept that there is a clear plan for where to go from here and what we will do next, so there is a legitimate argument that, whatever the forthcoming Brexit plan looks like, it should be put to the people in a referendum, or it should be debated and voted on in Parliament, or there should be a general election on the issue. All three options have been ruled out by the Government, by the way. Yet there is still a vacuum. There is division and uncertainty, and that is the reason we are discussing the mechanism that we are debating today.

[Mr Chuka Umunna (Streatham) (Lab)]

I want to add two points, and to ask my right hon. Friend whether he agrees with them. One is that, whatever one’s view about whether there should be a vote in the House on triggering article 50, there should at least be a debate. The second is that whether to vote on article 50 is in a sense academic, because we will have to repeal the European Communities Act 1972 to give effect to our leaving the European Union. That will involve multiple votes, which will have knock-on impacts on existing legislation, which will need to be changed.

[Mr Lammy]

My hon. Friend is right. That is the case, which is why it was breathtaking to hear that Britain will not be discussing Europe for much longer. If we exit the European Union, this House is about to be consumed with legislation that will probably be with us for more than a decade. One Whitehall Department alone, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, has 1,200 pieces of legislation that would need to be repealed. The task ahead for the nation is gargantuan. We are perhaps talking about the sort of effort involved in reconstruction after the war, or something comparable to the birth or the loss of empire.

[Kwasi Kwarteng]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Lammy]

I am not going to give way, because I think I should make progress.

I have described the scale of the challenge for Parliament, and the truth is that if we are doing that we will not be doing other things.

[Tom Brake]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Lammy]

I have said that I should make some progress. Others have got to get in to make important contributions.

The other point is that uncertainty is bad for business and our economy. Last week a survey by Lloyds found that business confidence has dropped to its lowest level since December 2011. Uncertainty in Government is also bad news. If the whole of Whitehall is focused on trying to work out Brexit and then on trying to deliver it, where will the capacity be to tackle many other urgent issues that the country faces—the crisis in the NHS, youth unemployment, infrastructure and the rebalancing of the economy? Last week massive cuts to apprenticeships were announced. We need working-class young people to move into apprenticeships. How are we going to achieve those things when every Department is consumed with the subject of Brexit?

I am here on behalf of my constituents, and that is why I am very clear about the issue. Ordinary working people on low incomes will suffer the most in the man-made recession to come. As always, people who are living pay cheque to pay cheque, just about keeping their heads above water and making ends meet in insecure jobs will bear the brunt of any economic downturn. When unemployment rises tax receipts will fall. NHS spending, wages and investment will fall, and after years of austerity the Government will not have the money for a fiscal stimulus, or to provide a proper welfare safety net. People have been talking about agricultural areas. In counties such as Norfolk, which relied on EU subsidies, some people have been asking “Are we still going to get the EU subsidies?”

[Mr James Gray (in the Chair)]

Order. Having been firm with our colleague from the Scottish National party, I should also be firm with the right hon. Gentleman. He has been very much in order so far, but he might like now to return to the subject of the debate.

[Mr Lammy]

You are absolutely right, Mr Gray. I was simply making the case that those EU subsidies will no longer be there. They will have gone and tax receipts will have fallen. It is for that reason that the way we resolve the constitutional crisis we are in is so important. The mechanism in the petition is of course but one way of doing that.

There has recently been a lot of talk about the gap between the rich and the poor, and the growing divide in society between the asset class and the underclass. Indeed, the fact that so many people voted for Brexit related to that. What I am worried about, and my reason for being here on behalf of my constituents, is the fact that the debate about inequality is likely, if funds are less, to turn into the old debate about absolute poverty. Absolute poverty is much worse, in any economy. That is why it is important that we have debates on the Floor of the House, as we are—something that we have not been able to do since 23 June.

I have already said that many British people, and certainly those who signed the petition—there are more out there; they email all the time—are understandably trying to do something on their own, individual, behalf. However, they of course recognise that linked to that democratic exercise another legitimate debate is going on—about sovereignty and the nature of Parliament, and whether Parliament should have a vote on the issue. It seems to me that the most fundamental tenet of our democracy is parliamentary sovereignty, and a decision of such significance must be debated and approved by Parliament. The Prime Minister says she wants to bring the country back together, and the best way to do that is to have its representative democracy look at the issues and debate them. With that conclusion we might begin to bring the country back together. Simply exercising a prerogative power, which is more akin to James II, is very unlikely to bring people back together. It will leave a huge division, not seen for many years, running through the country. It must be up to individual Members of Parliament to decide how they vote when the Government present a plan for what Brexit will look like, and the plan must be fully considered.

It is important to note that it has been said that the referendum

“does not have constitutional provisions which would require the results of a referendum to be implemented”.

Those are not the words of a bitter remain campaigner, but of the House of Commons Library briefing on the European Union Referendum Bill. It is important to think hard about the fact that when we voted on the referendum it was described to the House as advisory and non-binding. It was advice—to hear what the people had to say; but it was not binding. It was not two thirds. It was not a quadruple lock—all nations agreeing, so that we can move forward in a straightforward constitution. It was a non-binding advisory referendum. As such we need further mechanisms to hear that advice and really think about the detail of how we now move forward. What are hon. Members scared of? Why are they so scared of Parliament looking at it? Is it because the Government of the day are divided on the issue? Is that why they are scared about having such debate? I suspect it is.

We must also remember that 63% of the electorate did not vote for Brexit at all; that more than 2 million British expats were denied a vote, and 13 million more decided not even to cast their vote.

[Kwasi Kwarteng]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Lammy]

I will not give way. There was no two-thirds threshold as is required in other nations to validate a major constitutional change of this nature. There was no quadruple lock to ensure that the majority in each of the constituent nations of the United Kingdom agreed with the change. Our nation is more divided than ever in my lifetime and we are living through an unprecedented period of uncertainty. There is no clarity on what lies ahead and no easy way to heal the divisions. While colleagues may disagree with me when it comes to Brexit, I cannot see a way out of this other than for the Government to present their plan for Brexit to Parliament so Members can approve or reject it on behalf of their constituents, or to present their plan to the people so they can have their say in either a second vote or in a general election. [Interruption.]