Leaving the EU: Wales

David T C Davies Excerpts

Tuesday 25th October 2016 Westminster Hall

[Geraint Davies (Swansea West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Britain has been terrorised by clowns, and we now know that their ringleader is a peroxide blonde with a German name and a red nose masquerading as the Foreign Secretary. He promised a mixture of lower costs, market access and lower migration, but we are obviously going to get higher costs, which is why the deficit reduction plan has been torn up, no market access—it sounds like it will be a hard Brexit—and increasing migration, as ever. Boris said that we could have our EU cake and eat it, but Donald Tusk has said that all we will get is salt and vinegar.

The referendum took place immediately after the Welsh Assembly elections, so the Welsh people did not have time to contemplate all the ramifications of Brexit on their grants, and 16-year-olds and people living abroad were not allowed to vote. It is now coming home to us that we face the triple whammy that I mentioned earlier. Wales starts from a position of having something like 70% of UK GDP per head. As the hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards) said, 200,000 people who rely on EU trade—25,000 of them are in Swansea bay—face tariffs.

There is enormous uncertainty. We hear today that the promised electrification to Swansea may not proceed, and we do not know what is happening about the lagoon or the Swansea city deal. Tariffs are going up, and companies such as Nissan want compensation. It is like someone going to a shop and buying a mobile phone that they are told has a colour picture, but when they get home they find it is black and white. In other words, if the promises that were made were not a reasonable representation of the future—the falling pound, the loss of investment and the loss of jobs—the British and Welsh people deserve a referendum on the exit package before we trigger article 50. Article 50 should not be triggered until something like next October.

[David T. C. Davies (Monmouth) (Con)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the fall in the pound has been excellent for exporters?

[Geraint Davies]

I assume that the fall in the pound to a 30-year low was designed to make Polish workers better off when moving abroad. The weak pound is a nightmare that will generate huge inflation in Britain. People will not be able to go on holiday, except on the £14 visa. If the hon. Gentleman thinks that, he should have said before the referendum, “We are fighting for a lower pound and less investment, and we are ripping up our deficit strategy.” In fact, the hon. Member for Cardiff North (Craig Williams), who has now left the Chamber, seems to think that we should have £1 billion less, because we are wasting our money—so much for representing Wales. Last week when I asked the Minister in Question Time about the “body blow” of Brexit, he said simply that Swansea had voted for it, as if to say, “Well, it’s their own fault—like it or lump it.”

In reality, we need support where it is most necessary, and we need promises from the Minister to ensure that funding is sustained and that we still have the city deal, the lagoon and the electrification. We need a helping hand to succeed in difficult days. If possible, we should also have another crack at this with an exit package referendum, so that people can have a say on what they get and whether they want to go ahead. They have said that they want to go ahead in principle, but in practice is a hard Brexit what they wanted? No.