Civil Service Appointments

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Tuesday 30th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Like me, the right hon. Gentleman is a believer in experimentation, scientific method, empiricism and pragmatism. As we both know, the negotiations with the European Union are accelerating at the moment, as both sides seek to find a conclusion over the course of the next five weeks.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

I am sure the Minister agrees that the incorruptibility and independence of mind of the civil service is one of the key features of our government, but it occurs to me that there may be a bit of hype around this issue. Surely someone who spends decades as a professional diplomat can hardly be accused of not knowing anything about national security, and surely independence is in their DNA. There is also hype about all these advisers—about Dominic Cummings and David Frost. These people just give advice. Can we not rely on the Prime Minister and the Minister to actually run the country? They are quite capable, are they not?

[Michael Gove]

As ever, my right hon. Friend speaks good sense. It is the case that national security advisers, like other advisers, are there to advise, and then Ministers decide.

Covid-19: Strategy

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Monday 11th May 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for getting me to my feet faster.

The hon. Lady raises a very important point. I will try to give the House more details of what we are doing, but I can tell her that so far, in spite of all the difficulties that I know people have experienced with PPE, it is the case that we have had no national stock outs or absolute shortages of any item of PPE. We are continuing to turn the situation round and to get billions of items to where they need to go.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con) [V]]

The phased approach of the Government to protect public safety is obviously correct, but we are now faced with perhaps the biggest recession in hundreds of years and an unparalleled increase in the public sector. Will the Prime Minister ensure that, whereas in the past these increases were often accompanied by waste, fraud and incompetence at the expense of the taxpayer, he puts the most effective public accounts controls in place to protect the taxpayer? To pay for all this, will he ensure that we get Britain back to work and, where it is possible to have social distancing, that people are encouraged to work?

[The Prime Minister]

Yes, and of course we will have effective accounting of the investments that we are making to protect the public—the furloughing scheme and all the many other expenditures we are obliged to make—but I think my right hon. Friend will also understand that the biggest single economic risk we face at the moment is the risk that the virus should surge back again and trigger a second spike. That is why we all need to work together, as I am sure everybody understands, to continue to depress the R, keep the virus under control and stay alert.

Budget Resolutions

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Wednesday 11th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

I have declared my business interests in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, although I am of course not speaking for them.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Ilford South (Sam Tarry) on an excellent maiden speech. He was warm and informative about his predecessor, who was much respected on both sides of the House. He rightly drew attention to injustices and problems which he has a passion to solve. I would just like to reassure him that there is no monopoly on wishing to solve those problems on his side of the House. That is what we are all here to do.

It is a great pleasure, for the first time in about five years, for me to be able to welcome the actions of the Bank of England today. It is a pleasure to see the Bank of England and the Treasury co-ordinating their work, and doing things that are massively in the public interest. For the past five years, it has been my miserable task to be the one voice in this House pointing out that the Bank of England has consistently got its economic forecasts wrong and that it had made a number of very bad decisions. I have been particularly critical of the way it decided to tighten monetary policy and slow the economy from spring 2017 onwards, culminating in the very ill-judged decision it made at the end of last year to increase the counter-cyclical capital buffers, which meant denying loans to businesses that wanted to expand or to solvent people who wanted to buy a new car or a new home. It was a very bad policy and it is wonderful news today that the Bank of England, with its new Governor, has started off on a much better basis and has cancelled those counter-cyclical buffers. It is the single biggest amount of money we are talking about in this debate. As the Bank of England itself calculates, it means up to £190 billion more is now available for good projects, for business requirements and for individuals who want to borrow for big ticket items. Of course, banks must still be prudent and sensible in the way they advance that money, but the previous controls were too tight. Against the background of world downturn, it is very important that that firepower is made available.

Just to reinforce the position and to deal with the special problems that the virus is now likely to create, the Bank of England also put forward a new medium-term lending scheme for the banks, so they can get access to large sums of money—up to £100 billion in total—at the new very low rate of 0.25% to lend on to medium and small-sized enterprises. Again, that was something I was very keen for it to put forward. I am delighted that it has returned to this idea. It is much needed, I fear, because we already see the virus having a very negative impact on certain businesses, most obviously in aviation and other transport, but now also in events and some other tourism-related activities where we see the pinch already being established by the virus. If, as we fear, it spreads more, that is going to get rather worse, so I welcome the double set of actions by the Bank of England. I am not sure that 50 basis points off the interest rate makes very much difference. It is not something I would have done myself, but I can see that it was well intentioned and it sends a very clear signal that borrowing should not only be available but cheap in these very extraordinary times.

I also welcome the fiscal stance the Government have adopted in the Budget. If anything, it is on the prudent side of what one might have expected in the current circumstances. Some of my colleagues will find that curious coming from me, a former hawk, on how much this country can afford to spend and borrow. However, in these circumstances, and against the massive monetary and fiscal tightening we have experienced for some three years and the very noticeable slowdown or faltering of the world economy, it is obviously sensible to have a fiscal stimulus. The £18 billion underlying stimulus is definitely at the bottom end of the kind of range that many people were thinking about.

On top of that, there is the £12 billion package which the Government have wisely put forward. They stated that if the virus problem gets worse there will be more. I hope it will be the case that the virus problem does not get that bad and we do not need to spend the £12 billion or anything like it, but I am pleased the £12 billion is there by way of additional resource for the health service should the need arise and as additional money available particularly for the business sector, which, in certain circumstances, if we have anything like the experiences of some other countries abroad have now had, would need cash injections. I am very pleased that thanks to the Bank of England it will not just be a question of lending at cheap rates through the commercial banks, but that in some cases, particularly in hospitality and tourism-related areas that are already being fairly badly hit, it will be a reduction in their bills.

I listened carefully to the very long address by the SNP spokesman, the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford). I cannot see how that party’s VAT proposal would help, because VAT is turnover-driven and we are talking about businesses that lose much or all of their turnover, so it would not deal with the problem. The Government have a much better answer: to take a cost that businesses cannot get out of quickly or avoid—their property cost—and say that the Government should not be charging them for using property when no money is coming in, because there is no turnover as they have lost their customers. I agree with the Government.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

I was not allowed to intervene on the leader of the SNP, but surely any sensible person would come to the conclusion that when faced with an existential threat to our country, such as the coronavirus, we are much better dealing with this together, as a United Kingdom, than as separate nations.

[John Redwood]

My right hon. Friend and I think that, but more importantly, that is what the Scottish people voted for just a few years ago, when we very wisely and democratically said, “Yes, let the Scottish people decide.” They did decide and I wish their elected representatives here would understand the result of the referendum and remember that their colleagues told us at the time, when asking for it, that it would be a once-in-a-generation matter. While I am a democrat who thinks that these things occasionally need exploring, we cannot explore them every five years. These are fundamental things that are very disruptive if we keep going into them. I had to wait many years to get an EU referendum—rather longer than I wanted—but I do not think we should have one every five years. That would be quite inappropriate.

To go back to the Budget judgment, I was interested to see that quite substantial increases in spending, which we need in health, education and police, for example, have been relatively easily accommodated. It is good to see already in the first-year figures—for 2020-21— £4.6 billion of Brexit savings coming through. It is very good to see that there will be another £10 billion on top of that by the end of the forecast period, so the Brexit bonus is available and is beginning to come into these figures.

It was also good to see the £6.6 billion of interest cost reduction, thanks to the quite substantial falls in interest rates that had occurred before this month. The point that I was making to my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Sajid Javid) is that those savings would be considerably bigger if we forecast them at today’s interest rates, because interest rates for Government borrowing have fallen even further. He countered and said, “Yes, but you still have to be very careful because you can’t necessarily assume that that will go on into the future.” The bad news is that interest rates are going to stay low for a bit, but the good news is that the Government can borrow for 30 years for practically nothing, so now is surely a very good time to lock those interest rates in so that the future interest rate programme is very cheap, as well as the present one. It is something the Government need to think about. I know they have issues about how long they fund, but this is surely a time to move in the direction of longer funding so that we lock the very low rates in.

--- Later in debate ---

[Liam Byrne (Birmingham, Hodge Hill) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to speak in this Budget debate. I am only sorry that the former Chancellor and the former Prime Minister are not in their places, because I wanted to tell them how much I enjoyed the comedy of their remarks. I wanted to underline how extraordinary it sounded to Opposition Members that the Conservative party was now boasting about its credentials for fiscal management.

We have had a £174 billion fiscal loosening to deliver a rate of growth over the forecast period that is well below the trend rate of growth that we are used to in this country. As the OBR made crystal clear in its publications earlier today, the Chancellor was on course last year to achieve a balanced budget in the medium term. Now in the medium term, the deficit is forecast to stretch to £60 billion. We therefore have this massive, great fiscal loosening—before the impact of coronavirus is factored in—to deliver a trend rate of growth that is anaemic.

As the Government somehow managed to avoid saying, this Budget is also not only unsustainable but deeply unfair. That is not my analysis; that is the Treasury’s analysis. When we look at the decile analysis of how this Budget actually affects our constituents—surprise, surprise—the richest 10% are hit by about 150 quid a head, but the bottom deciles are hit by between £250 and £350 a head. Even as the Government give away £174 billion, they find a way to ensure that the bulk of the burdens, such as there are, is actually paid by the poorest in our society. What that means in constituencies like mine is that when I go into the Kingfisher food bank in Shard End or when I talk to the teams running the Aston and Nechells food bank, they tell me that demand is going through the roof yet again. Well before the summer holidays, we now have food banks running out of food once more. That is why it is so disappointing to see a Budget that not only punishes the poor but does nothing to remedy the terrible injustices of the universal credit regime that is greatly punishing the poorest people in our country. The Government really should have taken the time to address that.

I will speak briefly today, because there is so little in the Budget for the people of the west midlands. As you know, Mr Deputy Speaker, we have a Tory Mayor in our region who has boasted for some time of his special influence in No. 11 and No. 10 Downing Street. If only we saw any evidence for that. We already have the second- worst funding deal of any metro Mayor, and this is a Mayor who promised that we would be the fastest-growing region of the country. In fact, we are the slowest. He promised that youth unemployment would be wiped out. In fact, unemployment is going up. He promised that we would be building homes, which is something the Prime Minister celebrated today. In fact, the number of homes for social rent built last year fell by 19%, and is down by 80% since 2010. This is a Mayor who is not delivering for the people of the west midlands. We should have had a Budget that made good his failures, but we did not get the Budget we need.

Officials in my region tell me that our Mayor has made some £2 billion-worth of promises. The only problem is that there is a £1.2 billion black hole in his budget. On top of that, there is a £900 million hole in funding for the transport schemes we have been promised. There are also question marks about the £4.6 billion-worth of programmes and projects that are now rated by the combined authority as either amber or red. This is an absolute shambles. The Chancellor boasts of his intention to level up. We should have had a Budget from him that actually fills the black hole in the budget of our Tory Mayor in the west midlands, and we did not get it.

Let me give some simple examples. The levelling up fund promises £4.2 billion over five years, but it does not start until 2022 and it has to be shared by at least eight different mayoralties. That means our share may be, at best, something like £100 million, which comes nowhere near the £1.9 billion black hole that still exists in the budget of the west midlands after today’s transport announcements on new bus routes and, indeed, the metro line that I have campaigned for in my constituency for some years.

Only 20% of the tramline is funded. It is literally a tram to nowhere, because our Mayor failed to persuade his colleagues in No. 10 and No. 11 to sign the cheques that were promised.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Liam Byrne]

I will in a moment.

We cannot build the new homes we need unless we start investing in remedial work on brownfield land, but the £400 million, at best, has to be spread between eight mayoralties. That means we might have about £50 million coming into the west midlands, but our brownfield fund is £100 million short. The money we may get tomorrow, the day after or in the coming years will not come close to remedying the budget gaps we have today.

This Government have sought today to persuade us of their fiscal credentials, while avoiding the blunt truth that, by the end of the forecast period, they will have doubled the national debt, failed to deliver the growth we had in the past and failed to deliver for regions like mine in the west midlands.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

There have been some fine maiden speeches, and I particularly congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Grantham and Stamford (Gareth Davies). He is a fellow Lincolnshire MP and he spoke without notes—a worthy successor to Mrs Thatcher from the birthplace of our great former leader.

Although we have had a fine victory, it is important that we maintain our sense of momentum as Conservatives, so I will now do what I usually do—I know this is deeply unfashionable in these debates—and give a Thatcherite speech, as I happen to believe that that is the best way of creating wealth in our country. I will start by drawing attention to three items of public expenditure, as examples of waste in public spending. I have just completed 18 years on the Public Accounts Commission and Committee, and I am convinced that we have a lot more to do to root out waste in public spending. Unless we do that, it is neither advisable nor prudent to go on increasing public spending at the current rate.

I will begin with one example that is close to home, because expenditure on decant from our own parliamentary building is now set to rise to more than £10 billion. The incompetence of that project does not bear any scrutiny whatsoever. First, the Joint Committee on the Draft Parliamentary Buildings Bill was told that Parliament could decant because there was room to build a temporary Chamber in a courtyard of Richmond House. Once it produced its report, however, it was told that the measurements were wrong, and that the Chamber could not fit in it. We are now told that we will have to demolish Richmond House, which will produce 25,000 tonnes of carbon. Costs are rising all the time—we have seen the exponential rise in the cost of refurbishing and renewing Elizabeth Tower. Where will it all end?

I have been working with SAVE Britain’s Heritage, the architectural heritage association, and we have proven that far from it being necessary to demolish Richmond House, we could build, at much cheaper cost, a perfectly satisfactory temporary Chamber in one of its courtyards. Even better, we could do what they did in the war—this House could decant to the House of Lords, and we could take services in from outside. That is one example. It is very close to home, and involves expenditure of up to £20 billion in London. We do not need to be spending that much money on ourselves in London; we should be a one-nation Government, and there is a much cheaper solution with which we can save public money.

[Chris Evans]

rose—

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I cannot give way; I have less than eight minutes to speak.

Secondly, there is High Speed 2. I will not go through all the arguments, but I do not think anybody would begin that project now if they knew that costs would increase to at least £100 billion. Again, the incompetence of the project defies belief. As was said earlier, the original justification for HS2 was speed, but that has now been dropped and we are told that it is all about capacity. We could have solved so many of those problems with better digital signalling, or by laying down lines with existing technology, but instead we are now trapped in this project.

I have told the Government that I will support the project—it now costs £100 billion—if they will release just £1 million to persuade London North Eastern Railway to kickstart a through train to Cleethorpes and Grimsby, via Market Rasen. There are already many good, fast express trains to Birmingham and Manchester, yet a quarter of a million people living in north-east Lincolnshire do not have one through train to London. They have to take a slow service that lasts the best part of three hours, changing trains to get to London.

A third example—I see the Chair of the Defence Committee is in his place—is the farce of the procurement of aircraft carriers. Again, I will not go into all the arguments, but there was a change in specification, the stop-go, and the fact that the Labour Government delayed it for a year when I was Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, which costs us £100 million. There was a whole emphasis on a prestige project for the Royal Navy, rather than on building a smaller specification aircraft carrier, or concentrating on what we really needed the Royal Navy to do, which was to protect our fisheries, and protect our coasts from migrant incursions.

Those are three examples of wasteful public spending. I will not even talk about all the money wasted on huge IT projects, such as Tony Blair’s initiation of the new IT project for GPs that left us £12 billion in the red—we could go on and on. Promising to spend more public money is not the solution, and every Conservative MP should wake up every morning, come to the Chamber, and argue for a smaller state, and for reduced and simpler taxation. We still have, outside India, the longest tax code in the world. We still have a staggering number of tax reliefs. In October 2019, there were 1,190 reliefs, of which 362 were tax expenditures. The sum of the estimated cost of those tax expenditures, in tax that the Government have opted not to collect, was £155 billion. In 2018, the 23 largest tax expenditures had a forecast cost of £143 billion. Some 92% of forecast costs are tax expenditures. We still have a highly complex tax system. We have armies of accountants persuading businesses, large and small, to avoid taxes. If we could just begin to simplify taxes, we would make so much progress.

I have probably sat through 40 Budgets in this Chamber. I do not remember many of them. Once one has got past the next day’s headlines and read the Red Book, one realises that, really, the Government have probably taken back just about the same amount of money that they dished out. However, I do remember one Budget where Nigel Lawson set out to simplify taxation. If one reads Charles Moore’s biography of Margaret Thatcher, one can see that that was a popular Government. Nigel Lawson reduced the top rate of taxation from 60% to 40%. For all but a few months, the Labour Government were prepared to keep that top rate of 40%. That was a dynamic Budget and a Budget of simplification.

That is what I want this Conservative Government and this Chancellor to do as they gear up for the future. I want the Chancellor to look at the far horizon and say, “I am a Conservative. I believe in low taxes and simple taxes.” As Nigel Lawson said, if we reward entrepreneurs we get more entrepreneurship. Let us also learn the lesson of Wandsworth. I understand that a certain person who is now prominent in No. 10 was running Wandsworth Council for many years. Why have we been so successful in Wandsworth? Why do people queue up to vote Conservative in Wandsworth? Because the Conservatives deliver good governance and low taxation. That is what I will continue to argue for.

Election of Speaker

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Monday 4th November 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

What an honour it is to stand for this job. Like all those standing, I love this place and I only wish to serve it. I think that it is pretty good training to be Speaker to have been, as I have been, a Back Bencher for 33 out of the last 36 years—although, to be absolutely honest, nobody asked me to serve any longer on the Front Bench.

One of the reasons many people enjoy their service on the Back Benches is that they love holding the Government to account and being sincere to their beliefs, however unpopular those beliefs are. That is the sort of Back Bencher that I want to encourage.

That is enough of me. I just want to take a moment to talk about what I believe the Speaker should be. I am with Chris and Rosie on this. I think the Speaker should submerge his or her character in the job. The Speaker should be the servant of the House. The Speaker should be a dignified and quiet voice, and I believe that all the candidates standing today can achieve that.

I believe that we in this Parliament should not be contemptuous of what we have achieved over the past three years. Insults have been hurled at us, but Chris mentioned our famous forebear and how he, as our Speaker, made it clear that he was only the servant of the House. We who sit in this House should be proud of what we have achieved over the past three years as the cockpit of the political nation, where every point of view can be heard, debated and thrashed out. I believe that we can make this place even better. It is no accident that the great speeches in history in this place were precisely that: speeches. They were not interminable self-regarding interventions or points of order or statements that go on forever. We should recreate the great debates in this place and allow adequate time and be fair to everybody, so that everybody gets a fair crack of the whip, literally, to put their point of view.

We can go from strength to strength, but this place is not just about words—important as they are—or votes; it is also about a sense of history and a sense of place. I particularly wanted to stand in this election to make this point: we must preserve this world heritage site, but we must preserve it in a way—here I speak as somebody who served for 18 years as Chairman either of the Public Accounts Committee or the Public Accounts Commission—that looks after the interests of our paymasters, the taxpayers. We cannot waste billions of pounds. We have to do the job properly, but we have to do it right. You have all received a letter from SAVE Britain’s Heritage, which proves that we can do the job cheaply and efficiently with the erection of a temporary Chamber, rather by demolishing Richmond house and wasting billions of pounds. I particularly wanted to make that point, because we have a duty of care to our constituents in terms of the money.

Those are my priorities, and I want to ensure that once again this place can be the forum of great, determined and sincere speeches. I end by saying that nobody here should worry about what they have done or what they have achieved in recent years. Be of good heart, be of good cheer, be sincere to your beliefs and above all, dear friends, hold the Executive to account whoever they are, because that is what this place is all about.

Brexit Readiness: Operation Yellowhammer

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Wednesday 25th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

My right hon. Friend of course makes a very strong case for a particular approach, but we believe that the approach we are taking is in the interests of the people of Northern Ireland; and of course what will be in the interests of everyone—including the people of Northern Ireland—is for us to secure a deal, so that these mitigations are not required.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

I suspect that my constituents in Gainsborough, who voted 62% to 38% for Brexit, are just fed up with this process carrying on—unless they enjoy root canal treatment every other day—so they are not fussed about what deal we get. They would take any deal—they just want the House to compromise, come together and get a deal. But they tell me that if we cannot get a deal, we have to leave on 31 October. I want an absolute commitment from this Secretary of State at the Dispatch Box that, no matter what, we are leaving on 31 October; otherwise, this Government are dead in the water.

[Michael Gove]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his point. He speaks very effectively and clearly for the people of his constituency. I can confirm that that is Government policy. May I also say that the way in which he shaped his question, in a balanced, thoughtful and reasonable way, recommends him as a successor for your office, Mr Speaker?

Points of Order

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Monday 9th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Thank you.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. So far, we have mainly heard from distinguished Members on the two Front Benches or immediately prior Members, but I speak on behalf of the permanent, or semi-permanent, Back Benchers, who either by their own wish, or in my case because nobody has ever asked me, have not joined the Front Bench team in recent years. Although I have not followed you in your political journey and on many occasions you have absolutely infuriated me, I have to say, on behalf of Back Benchers, that there is one thing that nobody can ever take away from you: you have been determined to give a voice to those people in this place who want to ask real questions of the Executive. For this, we will always be grateful.

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. He was, of course, a talented Minister but I have always thought, because I know that his career came to a premature end, that he suffered from the notable disadvantage, as a member of the Government, of not only holding opinions, but feeling inclined, with notable frequency—whether wanted or not—to express them. That seemed to me why he was removed from the Government, but the Executive’s loss was Parliament’s gain.

G7 Summit

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

In the Prime Minister’s discussions with the German Chancellor and the French President, was there discussion on the need for compromise? After all, the issue of the backstop is resolvable with compromise on all sides and there are many people in this House—moderate Brexiteers and remainers—who want to compromise. When it comes to a solution, if the EU will not change the deal and if this House will not pass the present deal, will the Prime Minister reflect on the Vienna convention and the conditional unilateral declaration, which would allow us to unilaterally state our determination to exit from the backstop?

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend, who has pursued this line of thinking for many months. I must say that I think there is a better and more elegant way of doing this. We can excise the offending bits of the treaty. We can make a great deal of progress. We can have a new treaty. It will be a vast improvement. I think that Opposition Members should look forward to that and should be encouraging and supportive of this Government’s efforts in getting us out of the EU in a way that they voted for time and time and time again.

Priorities for Government

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Thursday 25th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his suggestion. I should point out that the people of this country have voted in 2015, 2016 and 2017, and what they want to see is this Parliament delivering on the mandate that they gave us, including him. I take no criticism of my election from the party whose leader, Nicola Sturgeon, replaced Alex Salmond without a vote, as far as I know. Did she not?

The right hon. Gentleman is completely wrong in his analysis and his defeatism and pessimism about our wonderful United Kingdom, which he seeks to break up, because if we can deliver a fantastic, sensible and progressive Brexit, which I believe we can, and the whole United Kingdom comes out, as I know that it will, what happens then to the arguments of the Scottish nationalist party? Will they seriously continue to say that Scotland must join the euro independently? Will they seriously suggest that Scotland must submit to the entire panoply of EU law? Will they join Schengen? Is it really their commitment to hand back control of Scottish fisheries to Brussels, just after this country—this great United Kingdom—has taken back that fantastic resource? Is that really the policy of the Scottish nationalist party? I respectfully suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that that is not the basis on which to seek election in Scotland. We will win on a manifesto for the whole United Kingdom.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

Our history is littered with Prime Ministers being dealt an extraordinarily difficult hand but, by pluck and determination, finally winning through in Europe. To make it possible, though, every MP has to realise that this is no longer a conscience issue. We have to learn to compromise and vote for something that may not be the perfect solution for us personally but is best for our nation.

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my right hon. Friend very much for his remarks and for the spirit in which he made them. He speaks for many of us in saying that we need to get this done, we can get it done and we will get it done.

G20 and Leadership of EU Institutions

Edward Leigh Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd July 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The right hon. Gentleman is right to focus attention on the important dispute resolution mechanism at the WTO. That plays an important part in enforcing the rules the WTO has. Obviously, if appellate body member appointments continue to be blocked, that risks the effective operation of the dispute settlement system. That would not be in our interests and it would not be in the interests of any of the members of the WTO, so we are strongly supporting an informal process that has been launched by the general council at the WTO to seek a resolution to this issue of the appellate body. Proposals put forward so far by WTO members bring the right ingredients to many of the concerns raised and we are urging all members to engage constructively in those ongoing discussions.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Ah yes, a Lincolnshire knight in a cheerful suit—Sir Edward Leigh.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

It sets off your black gown, Mr Speaker.

After having to negotiate with these people for so many dreary months, the Prime Minister must be mightily relieved that she will no longer have to go to Brussels, but what advice would she give her successor about dealing with these people? Would she recommend, for instance, the injunction that no deal is better than a bad deal?

[The Prime Minister]

I have always believed that no deal was better than a bad deal, but I believe we negotiated a good deal. The advice I would give my successor is to act at all times in the best interests of this country. I believe it is in our best interests to be able to leave the European Union with a good deal, but it is up to my successor to find a majority in this House to enable us to leave the European Union.

Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Bill

Edward Leigh Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Wednesday 19th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Tim Loughton]

Quite.

I think that mine is a reasonable amendment. I think it is an oversight that it has not been included in the Bill, and I hope that the Minister will come to his senses, agree with the amendment, and add it.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

I do not disagree with anything that my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) has just said. If his amendment were incorporated in the Bill, I would have no worries about it. However, I am not sure that he should have as many worries as he has articulated. I served on the pre-legislative scrutiny Committee. Those who are involved in this project or have taken an interest in it may disagree on many things, but one thing on which they are absolutely agreed is that we must preserve, 100%, the historical and architectural integrity of this building. Indeed, my approach to the renewal and restoration of Parliament is based on that premise. I hope that when we return to this place after the work has been done, we will notice hardly any difference. No doubt there will be better disabled access and no doubt computer systems and lighting systems will all work much better, but in the architectural significance to which my hon. Friend refers, we should notice no difference.

[Mark Tami]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that our ignoring the need for this work and putting it off for 70 or 100 years has led to the loss of important stonework and so forth? It has been allowed to go to rack and ruin.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

That is a valid point and I think we all agree with it.

My hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham is wrong on one point, however. It is possible at the moment to get a wheelchair into the Crypt chapel and into that cupboard he was talking about through the Cloisters. Incidentally, the Cloisters have lain empty for a long time. They were used just as offices, but they are an extraordinarily interesting part of this building. That area is not on the line of route; the public are totally unaware of it. It is a medieval remnant; it should be open to the public, and should be used as public open space. We could have done that years ago; instead, the Cloisters have been empty since—I think—Conservative or Labour researchers moved out.

[Tim Loughton]

I would have mentioned that. The Cloisters are rather interesting because of the bomb damage during the war. The Labour research unit was there, and in one office—I doubt its occupants realised this—is the medieval altar of one of the early Plantagenet kings from when this was a royal palace. Nobody ever sees it; it is not appreciated, and it is not in the guidebooks at all. That sort of thing needs to be flagged up and made accessible.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

My hon. Friend has done a service in flagging up these historical vignettes, because they are extraordinarily interesting. I think everybody agrees with him that this place is not a museum; the whole point is that it is a living building. History is being made at the moment in our debates, at a most interesting political time, and all these little historical facts need to be incorporated into the restoration and made available to the public. I am perfectly happy with the amendment. I suspect that the Minister might say that it is not necessary, but this issue has been flagged up and it will be an important part of the debate.

You, Mr Deputy Speaker, will not want me to engage in past controversies about whether we should decant or associated issues, but—this is particularly relevant to new clause 1, and I refer to my days on the Public Accounts Committee—I have long thought that this will be the biggest feeding frenzy in the Exchequer for years and that there is a real risk it will get out of control. This is where the SNP has a valid point. The public will not forgive us if we allow this work to become a feast for the architects, surveyors and all the rest. Without getting into all the controversy over whether we should decant or not—I accept that we have to decant for a time—what has worried me is that once we leave this building and we lose control, it will be possible for the Delivery Authority to become a sort of self-perpetuating institution, spending taxpayers’ money without our having any adequate control, as guardians of the taxpayer. We should always spend this money not as if it is somebody else’s money but as if it is our money. We should always think, “What would we do if it was our money? Would we do this work in this way?” The SNP has a perfectly valid point.

I do not agree with the SNP plan to make this place a museum, however. Even if it became a museum, we would still have to do all the work, because this is a world heritage site. We have to make this building safe from fire and flood and to repair the general dereliction that comes with time. We as parliamentarians should not worry too much about whether we should decant; we should worry instead about the taxpayers and about doing a good job. We are repairing this building and not trying to create anything new and fantastic. I am very happy to improve disabled access and so forth, but that is where we should start, and we should constantly take control of costs, which is where new clause 1 comes in.

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[Craig Mackinlay]

I hear what my right hon. Friend says about the Comptroller and Auditor General having access to the records under new clause 1, but I am concerned that there is not a sufficient value-for-money assessment and that we might be, to put it in general language, taken for a ride with this project.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

Value for money is what the PAC and the NAO are about. That was a very good intervention.

I hope the Minister can convince us that his No. 1 concern is safety—this is a world heritage site and we do not want it burning down or flooding—but the No. 2 consideration must be value for money. That is what worries me—again, without going into past grief—about many of the present plans. We have heard about architectural significance from my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham, and I am worried about the proposal to demolish Richmond House. It is an important modern building that has won architectural awards, but I am worried not just that we might be knocking down a listed building but that this would again create an opportunity for waste. I will always look for the cheapest option, and I have been arguing that if we have to leave the Chamber—I accept the decision of the House that we will leave for a time—we should use the courtyards to build a temporary Chamber rather than knocking down large parts of Richmond House.

Unfortunately, we have told the Delivery Authority that there has to be an exact replica of where we are standing, with the same size Chamber, the same height and the same width in the Division Lobbies. I am not sure that that is entirely necessary—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) is shaking his head. If I am wrong, I am wrong, but I am saying that if we can have a cheaper option with a narrower temporary Chamber that can be used for other purposes afterwards, and if we have to have electronic voting and not go through wide Division Lobbies, we should consider all those options. This is not a matter for today, but it all comes down to value for money, and it is important that we highlight these matters in these debates.

[John Redwood]

New clause 1 seems to imply, in answer to a question I was asking earlier, that the Comptroller and Auditor General would have a duty to examine policy value for money with regard to how much work is done, the timing of the work, whether we need to move, and so forth. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is absolutely fundamental that that should be part of the process, because the way in which the most money is likely to be wasted is through policy error rather than through contractors slightly overdoing a contract?

[Sir Edward Leigh]

Yes; my right hon. Friend has made a worthwhile intervention, and perhaps I have been too unfair on contractors. My experience of public sector contracts over the years is not so much the importance of those in the private sector who work for us, as that it is our fault for treating these projects like a Christmas tree. We have our own prejudices and policies, we constantly change personnel, and we add things on to the Christmas tree. The private sector—either correctly or incorrectly, depending on the way we feel—then takes the opportunity to charge us more and more. We have to grip this now.

I am slightly worried about amendment 9, and perhaps the Minister, and my right hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire Dales (Sir Patrick McLoughlin) who tabled the amendment, can reassure me that there is nothing in it that takes away the democratic right of us in this Chamber to elect the members of the Sponsor Body and to dismiss them if necessary.

[Mark Tami]

The intention is to avoid a cliff edge, because we could lose their experience at a crucial time. That is why it was felt that we really need those people to carry on and then have a system where they are subject to elections and are replaced. We did not want to have a cliff edge at the start of the project.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I take some reassurance from that. I was trying to understand the amendment. I have no problem with my right hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire Dales, who is doing a good job, but I do not want us to give away our democratic right to elect the people we think should be on the body.

[The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Kevin Foster)]

Just to clarify, the amendments cover only the external members, not the parliamentary members, so parliamentary members will be appointed in the usual way and will not transfer in that way.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I do apologise. I am glad that I raised this matter, however, because that has reassured me that we will constantly have control over who we send on to this body. I think I can end there. I hope the Minister will reassure me that even if he cannot accept new clause 1—I accept that that is often the default position of Ministers—he will be able to argue that the Comptroller and Auditor General really can drill down into all these contracts, because that will be absolutely vital.

[Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)]

I rise to speak to the amendments standing in my name on the Order Paper, and with your permission, Mr Deputy Speaker, I would also like to talk briefly about some of the other amendments. Before I do that, I thank the Minister for the way in which he has conducted himself during this process. I accept that this has not necessarily been a party political process, but he has sought to engage with me and colleagues on my side of the House at every stage of the process. We have not always agreed, but he has always been there to consult, and I am most grateful for the way in which he has conducted himself.

I want to speak briefly to amendment 5, to which the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) spoke so admirably that it has the support of my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz), the shadow Leader of the House. I also want to speak to amendments 8 and 9, tabled by the right hon. Member for Derbyshire Dales (Sir Patrick McLoughlin), to which the right hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) has just referred.

We believe that these amendments are self-explanatory and straightforward. As the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham mentioned, this is a world heritage site, and the intrinsic value and history of the site must be in our minds throughout the lengthy process. We therefore believe that amendments 8 and 9 are common sense, and I will certainly be supporting them.

Moving on to new clause 1, I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier)—I am unsure whether my right hon. Friend the Member for Alyn and Deeside (Mark Tami) said this while moving the amendment, but I believe that she is currently chairing the Public Accounts Committee and is therefore unable to be in the Chamber—for her work. In basic terms, the new clause aims to ensure that this multibillion-pound taxpayer-funded project gets the most effective scrutiny possible. The hope is to highlight to the public that the utmost efforts have been made to ensure that the strongest possible audit of the project’s value for money has been carried out. Given the value of the contracts involved—we have heard suggestions of a total project spend of between £5 billion and £10 billion—it is particularly important that we set up the necessary scrutiny.

The new clause would ensure that effective access arrangements were in place to allow the Comptroller and Auditor General to scrutinise the relevant information held by contractors, subcontractors and grant recipients of the bodies. To date, there has been no clear commitment that the CAG will be granted value for money access. The current uncertainty could be overcome through the provision in the Bill of a suitable right of access for the CAG, which would be helpful and not at all detrimental

New clause 1 is not prescriptive in defining what the CAG would do, because that would undermine his independence; it simply ensures that appropriate scrutiny is recognised in statute. By writing the new clause into primary legislation, companies would know that the eyes of the CAG were on them and that all their work would be available. That level of audit is vital to ensure true value for money and to keep a lid on overspending.

Amendment 7, which is in my name, relates to the provision of the education centre. Again, the Minister has shown an interest in that particular area. The amendment focuses on securing the future and developing the capacity of our fantastic education centre in the renewed Palace. The Minister made some important points in Committee about allowing a degree of flexibility within the Bill to prevent prescriptive legislation from hindering the creation of future innovative facilities. Indeed, as he stated, facilities that

“we might have considered sensible 30 years ago may not necessarily be the other facilities that we consider sensible today.”––[Official Report, Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Public Bill Committee, 4 June 2019; c. 27.]

The same logic could be applied to the creation of future facilities, so the amendment is intentionally open, allowing for future ideas to develop with the renewed Palace.

However, there is no question but that the creation of an education centre must be unambiguously defined within the Bill. Let us not forget that the current education centre is a temporary building that will no doubt be removed during the restoration works. The education team does a brilliant job of engaging young people in Parliament and politics, and that success must continue on the renewed parliamentary estate. It is therefore crucial that a concrete commitment is made to guarantee the refurbishment of our vital education services. The education centre cannot be an optional extra. It plays a vital role in helping schoolchildren to develop a political understanding and in engaging the politicians and public servants of the future.

Indeed, as we have already heard, the intrinsic value of the Palace of Westminster stems from the history that has been made within its walls. The educational opportunities of experiencing the history created in this place at first hand are invaluable, so education facilities must take centre stage in the planning of the restoration works. We have been presented with a unique opportunity to enhance the education centre and to allow for wider engagement, particularly with younger audiences.

I am sure that Members throughout the House will agree that awareness of and political engagement with Parliament is a vital part of encouraging people to become politically active and politically engaged. The education centre should be part of the legacy of this programme of restoration and renewal, to encourage greater awareness and involvement in Parliament. Such engagement with parliamentary politics is more important now than ever.

The restoration and renewal process is a project of national significance, and it would be a mistake to overlook the opportunity to create an innovative new education or learning centre at the heart of Parliament. While the cost of renewal will be high, the benefits will be great. We could create a newly refurbished education centre with accessible, modern resources for those wishing to visit the building and engage with the work of both Houses.

Amendment 7 would secure the creation of an education centre while allowing flexibility within the Bill, which the Minister called for in Committee, for the creation of future unforeseen facilities. Such flexibility would keep the door open to new ideas and changing technologies leading to new demands on facilities. Again, I thank the Minister for his positive engagement in this area.

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch for her work on amendment 6 and to the hon. Member for Airdrie and Shotts (Neil Gray) for his work on amendment 4. Both amendments cover the important area of spreading work around the United Kingdom, and I moved a similar amendment in Committee.

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[Christian Matheson]

The hon. Gentleman is right that this could be a bonus for the whole nation. That is covered by amendment 4, but if the Sponsor Body, the Delivery Authority and the main contractors know they will be audited and under scrutiny, I hope that will help to focus and concentrate their minds on where they give the contracts.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

This is an important point. Of course we must not tell the Comptroller and Auditor General what to do, but in recent years we have tried with the National Audit Office not just to do this post hoc, as we did in the past when, years after the event, we would look at some scandal or waste of public money. The Comptroller and Auditor General now tries to look at these contracts as they come on stream. He started to do that with the Olympics and, although we cannot tell him what to do, I hope we can encourage him to look at this as it goes through.

[Christian Matheson]

As a distinguished former Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, the right hon. Gentleman is able to give the House that guidance, for which I thank him.