European Union Citizenship

Emma Little Pengelly Excerpts

Wednesday 7th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Anna McMorrin]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. He knows my personal feeling, representing Cardiff North, which is a strong remain constituency: most of my constituents would love us to remain in the single market.

[Emma Little Pengelly (Belfast South) (DUP)]

I too represent a university constituency, and I recognise the concerns raised by our young people who want to access the opportunities the EU gives them. We need to fight to ensure that opportunities continue after Brexit, but does the hon. Lady also recognise that this is very much a game of two halves: although many young people, particularly university students, could take up those opportunities, which are very welcome, many other young people from disadvantaged backgrounds would never have the money to be able to travel to Europe and could never take up those options, and their employment prospects were deeply damaged by their being undercut by the free movement of people across the EU?

[Anna McMorrin]

I beg to disagree with the hon. Lady. The best way to retain those opportunities for young people from all types of background—disadvantaged and not—is to keep those opportunities open and to work to be a citizen of the EU, and for the UK Government not to take us on the damaging Brexit course they are currently taking us on.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)]

What a pleasure it is to follow such a fantastic speech from the hon. Member for Cardiff North (Anna McMorrin). I begin by commending and thanking our colleagues in Plaid Cymru for securing this debate. I believe that this is the first time in history that Plaid Cymru has had its own Opposition day debate, and I hope that we will have more of them.

Most people who have taken part in this debate have declared an interest. I look up at the annunciator and see my German surname, and I am incredibly proud to be someone of German descent in this House. I am also incredibly proud to represent Scotland, where 62% of the population voted to remain in the European Union. All 32 local authority areas voted to remain, and my constituency voted remain. However, we see ourselves looking over the cliff-edge of a hard Brexit to which we have been driven by the Back Benchers of the Conservative party, and it is something that Scotland did not vote for.

The points made during the debate, particularly by the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Ben Lake), about the impact on young people really amplify the disaster that Brexit will be. I have questioned the Prime Minister about the Erasmus scheme, and she can give us certain guarantees about the next year or two. However, the reality is that a young person studying at Lochend Community High School in Easterhouse, a deprived area in my constituency, currently has the opportunity to travel and see other parts of Europe through Erasmus. That directly answers the point made by the hon. Member for Belfast South (Emma Little Pengelly) about young people from deprived backgrounds.

[Emma Little Pengelly]

Just to build on that, my point was that, yes, it is fantastic that young people have such opportunities, and we have tried to encourage take-up in Northern Ireland, but I speak to many young people from deprived communities who have said, “We apply for job after job across the European Union.” There are record levels of NEETs—young people not in employment, education or training—and to understand what motivates people we must understand that those opportunities do not apply to everybody. We need to recognise that that was part of the challenges of the single market and free movement of people and part of why people were opposed to it.

[David Linden]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for that intervention. I have been campaigning on apprenticeships during my time in the House, and, as a former modern apprentice, I am glad that we are taking part in National Apprenticeship Week. However, the reality is that this Government have a poor record when it comes to paying young people. Young people are not included in the national living wage, and an apprentice can still, under the law, be paid as little as £3.50 an hour. I am absolutely in favour of ensuring that young people are paid appropriately, but that is not necessarily something for the European Union. I think responsibility for that lies at the door of the UK Government, who have a pretty woeful record on employment rights and pay for young people.

The hon. Member for Nottingham East (Mr Leslie) talked about the importance of staying in the single market and the customs unions—I stress that I mean “the” customs union. I hope that his particular wing of the Labour party grows stronger and can convince his Front-Bench team of the importance of remaining in the single market and the customs union, because failure to do so will result in the sacrifice of 80,000 jobs in Scotland. I represent a constituency with fragile employment prospects. Unemployment in my constituency is double the UK average, which is one reason I am particularly furious that UK Government have just closed two of the three jobcentres in my constituency. Only last week, I was dealing with two companies that have announced the closure of stores in my constituency because they are going into administration. One reason for that were the fluctuations in the pound due to the uncertainty caused by Brexit. We need to be absolutely clear about the need to protect jobs. I agree with the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) about the importance of a jobs-first Brexit, but the only way to achieve that is by ensuring that we stay in the single market and the customs union, so I very much hope that the hon. Member for Nottingham East manages to convince his Front-Bench colleagues.