European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018

Emma Reynolds Excerpts

Tuesday 29th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

First of all, as I have said, we will bring a revised deal back to this House for a second meaningful vote as soon as we possibly can. While we will want the House to support that deal, if it did not, we would—just as before—table an amendable motion for debate the next day. Furthermore, if we have not brought a revised deal back to this House by Wednesday 13 February, we will make a statement and, again, table an amendable motion for debate the next day. So the House will have a further opportunity to revisit this question of leaving without a deal. Today, we can and must instead focus all our efforts on securing a good deal with the EU that enables us to leave in a smooth and orderly way on 29 March.

[Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)]

The Prime Minister is, of course, right that there is more clarity about what the House does not want than about what it does want, but to get that clarity about what the House wants, why will she not agree to a series of indicative votes on all the substantive options before us—not the process but the substance, including a comprehensive customs union?

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Lady and others—indeed, Members on her party’s Front Bench—had the opportunity to table indicative votes. Did they do so? No. They tabled something that said, “Well, what’s the answer? Let’s have a few more votes in the future, possibly, maybe, if we think that it might be useful at some stage.”

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[Rachel Reeves (Leeds West) (Lab)]

I rise to speak to amendment (j), which is in my name and the name of other right hon. and hon. Members, and to express support for the amendments tabled by the Leader of the Opposition, by my right hon. Friends the Members for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) and for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn), by the right hon. Member for Meriden (Dame Caroline Spelman) and by the right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve).

I am motivated to move amendment (j) because I want so much to rule out leaving without a deal on 29 March. If there is just a month before we are due to leave the European Union and we do not have a deal, extending article 50 is the way to achieve ruling that out. I come to this debate with the evidence we have taken on the Select Committee on Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy ringing in my ears. Businesses have many views about where, and with what sort of deal, they want to end up, but what unites them is a determination not to crash out of the European Union without any deal at all, because of the impact that would have on free and frictionless trade, which businesses have grown to rely on through our membership of the European Union over the past decades.

We heard evidence from Honda, which warned our Select Committee that every 15 minutes of delay at the border cost £850,000; from the Food and Drink Federation, which talked about how European businesses could

“hoover up the markets that have previously been well served by UK companies”;

from pharmaceutical companies; and most recently from the British Retail Consortium.

[Emma Reynolds]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the threat of no deal is already having a material effect? Businesses in the west midlands tell me that they are already putting orders on hold and withdrawing or postponing investment decisions because of the threat of no deal.

[Rachel Reeves]

I absolutely agree. Passing my amendment would give the certainty to businesses that we will not crash out and that they do not have to look to offshore more work and potentially lay off more workers to build up their inventory supply. It will give workers certainty. Trade unions are also saying that the very worst thing for our economy and for people working in our economy is to crash out without a deal. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford said, it will also provide assurance to families and pensioners, particularly those on fixed incomes who are incredibly worried about the rising costs of essentials in the shops when they are already struggling with the cost of living.

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[Stephen Barclay]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right: at best they delay Parliament in terms of getting clarity on an agreed plan, and at worst they disguise attempts to stop Brexit. It would be better if those Members who want to go back on their manifestos and indeed stop Brexit were more explicit about their intentions, because, as my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has repeatedly set out, there is only one way to stop no deal and that is to secure a deal or go back on the biggest vote in our democratic history.

In the remaining time, let me turn briefly to the Leader of the Opposition’s amendment because it contradicts what was said by the shadow Trade Secretary who said that a customs policy would give the EU

“power to decide our tariffs & quotas with 3rd countries. We’d be forced to liberalise our market but have no reciprocal access to theirs”,

The Leader of the Opposition’s amendment would leave the door open for a second referendum, which is something his own Front-Bench colleagues have said they oppose.

[Emma Reynolds]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Stephen Barclay]

Of course I will give way.

[Emma Reynolds]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for giving way; he is being very generous. Can he spell out to the House—please do not refer to an article in the political declaration—what are the alternative arrangements to the backstop that the Government want to pursue with the EU?

[Stephen Barclay]

I have five minutes left and will come on to that point—[Interruption.] Unlike my opposite number, I will take interventions and I will come on to the alternative arrangements, because they go to the heart of the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale West.

Before doing so, I want to touch briefly, in the time available, on the amendments tabled by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) and by the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford. I do not for a minute question the principled spirit in which they have been proposed, but the reality is that they would have significant wider implications beyond Brexit. That is not just my view or, indeed, that of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. It is also the view of leading constitutional experts such as Philip Cowley and Vernon Bogdanor, the latter of whom said that

“the proposals…have international as well as domestic implications.”

The House needs to consider carefully the lack of debate and clarity on the amendments’ proposed policy and the lack of certainty as to their intent and consequences. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper), the former Chief Whip, has pointed out, the danger is that they will, in essence, act as a Trojan horse against the stated intention.

I do not for a minute doubt my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Sir Oliver Letwin) when he says that changing Standing Orders has precedence—of course it does—but there has been no debate about that with the Procedure Committee or in this House. The wider constitutional implications, which have been referred to by leading experts in the field, cannot simply be swept away in the short-term convenience of the moment.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Dame Caroline Spelman) tabled a principled amendment, but she spoke of a simple vote on saying no to no deal. That issue was taken head on by the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Nigel Dodds) when he pointed out that the practical effect of taking no deal off the table would not facilitate the amendment’s intention. I absolutely agree with the right hon. Gentleman. It is not just DUP Members who hold that view. On 24 January, Michel Barnier himself said that

“it is not enough to vote against the No Deal…if no positive suggestions are put on the table, then we will be more or less bumpy or heading for the No Deal on March 30, as in an accident.”

The way to address no deal is by backing the deal of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister.

There has been much discussion of the proposal of my hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse). Although it is not the subject of an amendment on today’s Order Paper, it has given us many technical questions to consider and we will seek the experts’ views. We will take forward the spirit of goodwill on which it builds, as part of reaching the common ground the House needs.