European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Deidre Brock Excerpts

Monday 14th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

The UK Government seem to be repeating on a loop cycle after cycle of inane attempts to pacify their own party and satisfy some rabid newspaper owners, with no consideration given to the best interests of the people the Government are supposed to represent. There has been trip after trip to Brussels to tell the other member states what the UK wants out of its resignation from the EU; return after return, trying to explain why there has been no advance made, no advantage gained, no real progress at all; statement after statement made in this Chamber, blaming the other states for having the audacity to stand up for their collective and individual best interests and for the interests of their people.

Time after time, we have been treated to demonstrations of just how little understanding of the EU there is in the Government ranks. The last trips have been shining examples of just how impotent the UK has become, how out of touch with reality the Government have become and how much influence has been lost in the past couple of years. A Prime Minister went looking for help with domestic problems to find that there were no longer helpful faces around the table. Her inability to articulate an argument in favour of clarification of terms already agreed on is the dirty mirror to the long and pointless succession of meetings held by her Ministers who also managed to walk out of the room with nothing.

It is just a few weeks before the UK leaves the EU and the new imperialists of Brexit are having to face up to the uncomfortable truth that the UK is now, at best, a middling power in the world. No longer does Britannia rule the waves; these days she is queuing up for a ticket for the ferry. Shorn of the muscle of the EU, there will be some serious reckonings to come, not least of which will be the WTO shocks. It is repeated so often that it has become a political meme: we can trade on WTO rules and all will be well in the world. There is a fond imagination that WTO rules are like the rules of a club. They are rules that everyone obeys, like gentlemen should, and no one would think of going outside the letter and the spirit of those rules.

The truth is that the WTO is a bear pit of contrasting interests and competing economies. The sacred rules are little more than guidelines for the battles in the WTO panels, dispute settlement body and appeals process. It is economic muscle that matters in these consultations and political muscle that counts in the dispute resolution. We are losing both by leaving the EU, so the WTO will become a far less welcoming place for us to take trade disputes. It will become a place where we will learn to take defeat, a place where the Brexiteers’ dreams of adequacy will come crashing down.

Let me just illustrate that with an example: hormone-treated beef that the United States wanted to sell into the EU. The US complained in 1996 and the WTO ruling was in its favour, but horse-trading of quotas and tariffs between the EU and the US has meant that we have been able to keep our food chain free of that adulterated beef. The UK simply does not have the strength to resist that ruling. It has no way to offer the quota for high-quality beef without harming our own farmers and it does not have the economic resilience to soak up the tariffs.

The WTO is the dystopia of free trade, a baleful and distorted place where profit is king. Yet there we head, this ramshackle handcart gathering speed, driven by a Prime Minister who cannot control her own Government, far less her own party, egged on by a Labour party leader who has a similar lack of control over events on his side. A Tory Prime Minister deferring defeat for a month and a bit in the hope of finding some magic beans over Christmas was watched by a Labour Opposition leader frightened to bring her down in case he has to face up to some of those issues.

Oral Answers to Questions

Deidre Brock Excerpts

Thursday 17th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Atkins]

Mentoring is just one way, and there is a lot of evidence to suggest that sponsorship is very successful in driving women up the career ladder. That is precisely why the Hampton-Alexander review has given help through the Women’s Business Council and the toolkit. We have encouraged businesses to sponsor women within their organisation and to engage CEOs and other senior business leaders as change agents in championing the change required.

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

The Scottish Government have delivered a returners programme to assist women to re-enter the workforce following a career break. Will the UK Government consider doing something similar to ensure that women in England and Wales continue their career progression towards the highest levels of business?

[Victoria Atkins]

Indeed. We have a scheme for exactly that. At the moment, we are looking at how best to spend that money, and I have a particular focus on teachers and social care workers to see if we can encourage them back into their professions. There is a much bigger challenge here for the private sector to make sure that women who have taken a break for caring reasons are encouraged back into the workforce, because we know that financial independence is a critical factor in making sure women have successful lives.

Exiting the European Union and Global Trade

Deidre Brock Excerpts

Thursday 6th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

The Secretary of State talks about the interdependent global world. The British Ports Association warned that a hard Brexit could hurt small and medium ports, which rely on short sea trade. Its members, including Forth Ports in my constituency, are very worried about the hurdles of new customs requirements and costly tariff regimes. Given that 95% of international trade by tonnage goes through our ports, what action is being taken to address those concerns and ensure that Brexit will not damage vital industries trading through them?

[Dr Fox]

The first service we can do is not to add adjectives to the word Brexit, because what the Government intend to achieve is as open a trading relationship as possible. If we think about it, the free trade agreement that we will go on to negotiate with the European Union ought to be the easiest FTA in global history. We are starting in a zero-tariff environment and from absolute 100% regulatory and legal equivalence. The only way we would not reach a free and open trading environment would be if the politics of the process took precedence over the economics, prosperity and wellbeing of the people. That is the challenge.

I will give the hon. Member for Edinburgh North and Leith (Deidre Brock) a second challenge, as this is not just about Europe. The decisions we take will reverberate through the global economy. If we put trade and investment impediments into the European economy that do not exist today, that will cause ripples across the global economy that will be felt well beyond our borders.

Commonwealth: Trade

Deidre Brock Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd February 2017 Westminster Hall

[Jake Berry]

I will come to that point. We cannot offer enough plaudits to my right hon. Friend the Member for East Devon (Sir Hugo Swire)—he is sitting here on my right—and our noble Friend Lord Marland for all the work that they have done to ensure that that first Commonwealth Trade Ministers meeting takes place next month.

In 2010 when I became a Member of Parliament, I was given a fantastic opportunity by the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association to visit the Commonwealth parliamentary conference in Nairobi. I was delighted to attend, largely because I have always been a supporter of the Commonwealth, which is a unique family of nations, and all that it stands for and represents. In that meeting in Kenya, I was struck by an overwhelming message from parliamentarians from other Commonwealth countries: they had begun to believe that the Commonwealth did not matter to Britain anymore and that it had become of dwindling importance since Britain joined the EU. Notwithstanding the comments made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field), successive Governments of all political hues have neglected the Commonwealth and its tremendous potential.

Despite the neglect, it is at the time of our greatest national need that these countries have stood shoulder to shoulder with Britain. They have stood by us when, as a nation, we have faced our darkest hours. Commonwealth soldiers have left home to fight and die alongside British troops on far-flung battlefields half a world away from their home, in Europe, Africa, the middle east and south-east Asia. They have not forgotten our bond of shared culture and history that binds the Commonwealth together. It is now time for Britain to remember its old alliances. We must celebrate the Commonwealth and all that it represents.

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that one of the best ways to tackle poverty in Commonwealth countries is through renegotiating the many exploitative trade treaties that were signed in the bad old days of colonial rule, as advocated by my hon. Friend the Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Roger Mullin)?

[Jake Berry]

The best way for us to tackle poverty in the Commonwealth is for us to start trading freely and to make every single citizen of the Commonwealth richer. In truth, that is the best way of tackling it, along with other measures to which she referred.

I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for East Devon and our noble Friend Lord Marland. Together with the Maltese and the Commonwealth Enterprise and Investment Council, they have driven the issue of Commonwealth trade by organising the first ever Commonwealth heads of trade meeting, which takes place in London next month. That meeting has the sole purpose of increasing co-operation and trade between Commonwealth Governments and businesses. I hope it will put Commonwealth trade at the top of our Government’s agenda. Not only is it an exceptional meeting of Trade Ministers, but it is the perfect springboard for a successful meeting of Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting next year. I hope the Minister discusses next month’s meeting in his contribution to this debate, and takes the opportunity to put on record his commitment and that of our Government and his Department to expanding trade with our Commonwealth partners.

Oral Answers to Questions

Deidre Brock Excerpts

Thursday 15th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

The sector is going from strength to strength. I strongly support it in doing so. We will continue our support for Channel 4, for appointments based on merit and for the great British TV sector.

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

6. What assessment she has made of the potential effect on the UK’s creative industries of the UK leaving the EU.

[The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Karen Bradley)]

The Government want to ensure the best possible deal for Britain on leaving the European Union. The creative industries are one of the UK’s greatest success stories, contributing more than £87 billion to the economy and more than £19 billion in exports. We are working closely with the industry to assess both the impacts and the opportunities that our departure presents, and I am hosting a series of round-tables with industry about that.

[Deidre Brock]

The Secretary of State is, I hope, aware of the concerns of the world’s biggest festival of the arts that Brexit and hostile immigration policies pose a serious threat to its ongoing success. What assurances can she give the Edinburgh festivals that they will remain truly international in a post-Brexit Britain?

[Karen Bradley]

I visited the Edinburgh festival this summer. It was a fantastic experience, and I loved the big signs of welcome, which were very clear that it was a global festival. The Edinburgh festival existed before the United Kingdom joined the European Union, and I want to make sure that it continues going from strength to strength in its anniversary year next year.

Royal Yacht Britannia: International Trade

Deidre Brock Excerpts

Tuesday 11th October 2016 Westminster Hall

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Chope. I declare an interest of sorts: Britannia is moored in my constituency. It is not going anywhere, partly because one of its propellers has been melted down and is now in the form of a statue of a yottie, or royal yachtsman, and partly because it is owned privately by a trust; it is not in public hands.

[Mr James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con)]

The hon. Lady might show true respect to the royal yacht Britannia if she described it not as “it” but as “she”.

--- Later in debate ---

[Deidre Brock]

That semantic point is appreciated.

The yacht is promoted as the museum piece that she is, harking back to a time that cannot be recaptured: a piece from the days of steamships, polished and gleaming from bow to stern, beautifully cared for as a floating curiosity, but not a working ship, so recommissioning is out of the question. I assume Members have had a look at the YouGov poll and seen that the building of a new royal yacht is not supported. In fact, only among Conservative voters, by 41% to 39%, are there more people in favour of building it than not, and when we ask about whether the money to build and run a new ship could be justified, even Conservative voters turn against it.

It is notable, too, that Scotland has a more solid opposition to the idea than anywhere else: 60% against recommissioning, 66% against buying a new one and 68% think the costs cannot be justified. The costs, which are important at a time when working families have joined benefit claimants in the queues at food banks, are simply unjustifiable. We have heard there are lots of ways in which the yacht could be funded, but we have heard no firm proposals. As usual, the burden would fall on the long-suffering taxpayer. Like PFI and PPP and every other cunning plan that Governments come up with, it would cost the public purse, not private finance.

As has been mentioned, the old yacht had a crew of 250 and 21 officers drawn from the Navy. On royal duty it had a platoon of marines on board and warships accompanying it. I am guessing the Navy’s top brass do not have a new royal yacht as their dearest ambition, given the current state of their resources. Then we get to the capital costs. Are they to come from a defence budget already groaning under the pressure of carrying Trident, or are they to come from another part of the public purse? Given what we hear repeatedly about the shortages of equipment that armed forces personnel face, can anyone justify adding another capital spend to that burden?

[Jake Berry]

I thank the hon. Lady for her contribution to the debate. I think she is arguing that the public should not pay for the royal yacht, but would she support a royal yacht if it was funded privately?

[Deidre Brock]

The public say they are not supportive of the recommissioning of the yacht. That does not take into the account the running costs, which it has been suggested will come from several Departments, including the Department for International Trade. If the intent is to take the capital spend and running costs from elsewhere in the public purse, where will that blow fall? Given the austerity fetish that the former Chancellor inflicted on all of us and the reported comments of the current Chancellor that he intends to deliver on all of the already planned cuts, where exactly is the spare cash to come from? And how exactly does anyone square the fact that benefit sanctions mean that the poorest, weakest and most disadvantaged people are left to go cold and hungry, but we will all be paying for what must seem to them a new pleasure cruiser for the royal family? This is just a wistful throwback to the days of the Raj, a pleading with history to run backwards and ignore the dodgy bits on the way. This is a rosy-tinted fiction of a time that never was, a fond imagining that empire was a good thing and that fine gentlemen rise to the occasion upon demand.

It is reminiscent of John Major’s thoughts when he said,

“Fifty years from now Britain will still be the country of long shadows on county grounds, warm beer, invincible green suburbs, dog lovers and pools fillers and—as George Orwell said—‘old maids bicycling to Holy Communion through the morning mist’ and if we get our way—Shakespeare still read even in school. Britain will survive unamendable in all essentials.”

He was actually talking about why the UK should remain in the European Union. The current fantasy is a fairy story from the imagination of Brexiteers who imagine the UK has only to denounce the EU to rise again to great heights.

The sad and sorry Britannia plan sounds like the regrets of someone who has missed their chance drawing the tattered remnants of their dreams around them for whatever warmth they can offer while the world rushes by uncaringly. Flash-boat democracy has no place in the modern world, which has changed utterly from the day in 1997 that Britannia was decommissioned. We have emails, electronic trading, smartphones with more computing power than the moon landing craft, and entire businesses that exist only online. This is a different world from the world in which the yacht was decommissioned, never mind the world in which it was commissioned in the first place.

[Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)]

The hon. Lady is obviously having a lot of fun with her caricature. She may have noticed that both Mr Letts and Mr Hope are scribbling down furiously everything she says. None the less, did she not hear what my hon. Friend the Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Jake Berry) said about the possibilities of the new royal yacht for creating more business opportunities, more revenue, ultimately more tax revenue and therefore more money for the Government for nurses and teachers?

[Deidre Brock]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. I also heard that Blair Force One is still current. I cannot see why that is not being used, as apparently it should be, for trade throughout the world.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Deidre Brock]

I am almost finished. I do not see why we need to commission another yacht at a cost of £60 million in 1997, allegedly £100 million now, and then running costs unknown. The running costs were £66 million between 1990 and 1997. What are those costs today? We have no idea.

As I said, this is a different world. If Members want economic revival they should ask for austerity to be eased, and spending resumed. If they really want international trade to improve, they will petition for UK embassies to be retooled as permanent trade missions. If they want to get on their feet and build an economy they should dump the daft ideas and get on with the serious hard work that is needed. It is what their constituents deserve. They can hang a new bauble on the jacket of the UK as it shuffles down the road, but that does nothing to feed a hungry child, support a struggling industry or boost a flagging economy. Dump the bauble. Get wise about what we have to do now.