United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Debate between Ed Miliband and Baroness Winterton of Doncaster

Consideration of Lords amendments
Thursday 10th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I appreciate that the Minister was as brief as he could be, given that he took interventions, but I think we will have to start with a time limit of four minutes rather than five minutes.

[Edward Miliband (Doncaster North) (Lab)]

I will try to be as brief as I can, Madam Deputy Speaker. I want to say to the Minister that we should note the progress made in the removal of the law-breaking clauses from part 5. What has essentially happened here is that the Joint Committee set up to deal with the outstanding issues on the Northern Ireland protocol has dealt with the issues on the Northern Ireland protocol. We are in a slightly through-the-looking-glass world here. The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster this week described Maroš Šefčovič, the Vice President of the Commission, and his team as displaying

“pragmatism, collaborative spirit and determination to get a deal done that would work for both sides.”—[Official Report, 9 December 2020; Vol. 685, c. 847.]

These are the same people the Prime Minister described in his Second Reading speech in September as being

“willing to go to extreme and unreasonable lengths”.—[Official Report, 14 September 2020; Vol. 680, c. 42.]

He also said that they had engaged in an “extraordinary threat” and refused to take the “revolver off the table”.

There are two conclusions we can draw from this sequence of events. The first is that Mr Šefčovič has changed his whole character, attitude and personality in three months; the other is the Prime Minister has a man who will make up any old nonsense for political advantage. I tend to the latter view.

United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Debate between Ed Miliband and Baroness Winterton of Doncaster

Consideration of Lords amendments & Ping Pong & Ping Pong: House of Commons
Monday 7th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

Colleagues will see that there are a large number of right hon. and hon. Members who want to contribute to this debate. If we have any chance of getting them in, I will have to start with an immediate five-minute limit on Back-Bench speeches, but that may well have to go down.

[Edward Miliband (Doncaster North) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to be opposite the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Scully). This big Bill began its life with the Prime Minister, then the Secretary of State and now it is a pleasure to be opposite him. I must say that I have enormous respect for him, but I did feel that I was living in a parallel universe when I heard him this afternoon. This Bill has been absolutely savaged in the other place. It has been absolutely savaged not just on international law, but on devolution as well, not just by Opposition parties, not just by Cross-Benchers, not simply by the former Lord Chief Justice or the Archbishop of Canterbury, but by the heart of the Conservative party—by Lord Howard, Lord Hague, Lord Clarke, Lord Cormack, Lord Lamont, and Lord Barwell, the former chief of staff to the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May). The right hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) laughs from a sedentary position. He may not consider him exactly Conservative, but he is a Conservative peer. Believe it or not, Madam Deputy Speaker, even the Duke of Wellington spoke out against this Bill. I gather that he has recently left the Conservative party—and who can blame him?—but nevertheless, he said this:

“In a single piece of proposed legislation, the Government have managed to antagonise almost everyone, including a multitude of counterparties and international public opinion.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 18 October 2020; Vol. 806, c. 1342.]

The Duke of Wellington is right, and given his family history around our relationship with Europe, he is in a position to know. That is why we saw the largest defeat in a generation on this Bill, including 44 Conservative peers, seven former Conservative Cabinet Ministers and many other former Ministers.

I make that point because I think we heard the beginnings of the grinding wheels of the climbdown in what the Minister was saying. After three months of posturing, undermining our reputation in the world, today, an hour before the debate begins, we perhaps see some preparations for the brakes being applied before we go over the cliff. I am not going to give the Government any credit for that, and I do not take their word for it either. The one thing that this whole sorry saga has shown the world beyond any doubt is that this Government’s word is not their bond—they cannot be trusted, because they are willing to rip up international agreements they made less than a year ago.