Draft European Parliamentary Elections Etc. (Repeal, Revocation, Amendment and Saving Provisions) (United Kingdom and Gibraltar) (EU Exit) (Amendment) Regulations 2019

David Linden Excerpts

Tuesday 8th October 2019 General Committees

[David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. Sadly, it does not give me pleasure to be debating this particular statutory instrument. On the walk in this morning, I was reminded of a tweet from the Better Together campaign in 2014 that said,

“What is process for removing our EU citizenship? Voting yes”,

yet today we find ourselves debating another exiting the European Union statutory instrument. How things have changed over the past five years!

I offer the Committee its regular reminder that Scotland did not vote for this. In the 2016 referendum, we voted to remain a part of the European Union, but once again we find ourselves being dragged out by this British Government. As the hon. Member for City of Chester said, we were told that we would not be having European elections in 2019, yet of course we had European elections because the Government messed things up. I suspect that this week, we will see them mess things up once again when the Prime Minister’s proposal to Michel Barnier is rejected.

When we talk about European elections, we hear these typical arguments from the Conservative Government or Conservative MPs about unelected MEPs and bureaucrats in Brussels. I remind them that in European elections, we directly elect Members of the European Parliament, yet in this place we have the House of Lords, which none of us has elected. In this Committee Room, albeit less frequently now, we also debate the Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill, whereby we are trying to prevent the Government from reducing the number of MPs from 650 to 600. While they are busy putting through legislation like this and saying, “We’re not taking part in the European elections, because all these powers are coming back to the UK Parliament,” the Government are simultaneously trying to reduce the number of MPs in the House of Commons to scrutinise the Government.

In 2019, Scotland elected 50% of its MEPs from the SNP. I end with a prediction that, come the next round of European elections, Scotland will once again send Members to the European Parliament—but this time as an independent state within the European Union.