European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Gareth Snell Excerpts

Tuesday 12th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

In the proposals the Government themselves put forward, we have set out a way of ensuring that we maintain a very close economic partnership and a close security partnership with the European Union in the future, but that we also have the benefit of acting as an independent country, of being a sovereign state and of having our own trade deals with other countries around the world.

[Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

I welcome the Prime Minister’s commitment to potentially legislating for the political declaration, but doing so in the withdrawal agreement Bill only once we have voted to endorse the political declaration may be slightly convoluted, so may I suggest a third option? If the deal is not passed this evening, the Prime Minister could independently legislate for the political declaration now, setting out in statute what the end point will be and what role Parliament will have before we are asked to vote again on a further deal. That would give people like me the confidence to understand that, by voting for the withdrawal agreement, we would have certainty about the political declaration and where we are going.

[The Prime Minister]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his proposal. One of the issues is that there are elements of the political declaration that remain to be negotiated and on which there is not the certainty that I think he is searching for with his proposal, but I certainly give him credit for inventiveness and for thinking carefully about these issues.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (Ind)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Andrea Jenkyns). We do not agree on Brexit, but tonight we will certainly be in the same Lobby voting against this deal—although of course for different reasons, but on this we are absolutely agreed. It is not a deal; it is a withdrawal agreement. It does not provide the certainty and does not deliver the deal that the hon. Lady and unfortunately many others in the leave campaign promised to the Great British people back in 2016 when we had the European referendum.

But the reason why I will not be voting for this deal is not just because of a blindfold Brexit, which is effectively what this is about—the fact that we do not have the certainty that British business is absolutely demanding. What we do know, however, is that the deal as it stands in the political declaration would make my constituents, and indeed all the constituents of every right hon. and hon. Member, less well off, and I did not come into this place to vote for something in the full knowledge that it would make people less well off. [Interruption.] I would be very grateful if the heckling from a Bench near me turned into an intervention, which I would happily take.

[Gareth Snell]

As the right hon. Lady is talking about voting to make constituents poorer, she may want to remember her time on the Government Benches as a Tory MP, when my constituents suffered at the hands of decisions she supported.

[Anna Soubry]

Well, that was a really helpful and relevant intervention, wasn’t it? Of course, it is absolute tosh. The most important—[Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman’s heckling is very tedious and could end up with me thwacking him with my Order Paper.

Let us address the real issues that face this House tonight. Let us look at the failings of the withdrawal agreement, and let us look now at a way out of it, as it seems likely that yet again this agreement will fail to pass in this House.

The Independent Group tabled an amendment; I am sorry it was not selected, Mr Speaker, but of course I understand why. However, at least it set out a timetable and provided a coherent alternative, and I believe that is what the people of this country are now crying out for. They want clarity, they want certainty, and they want a way forward.

I also believe that the only way out of this mess is to take the matter back to the British people, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) as ever beautifully and eloquently explained in the arguments he advanced. Now we know what Brexit is like, it is perfectly right and acceptable that it should be able to go back to the British people. People are entitled to change their mind, and of course the young people who would bear the heaviest burden of Brexit are entitled, I would argue, to have a say.

What I say to former colleagues on the Government Benches is this: they will be voting—those of them who are doing so—for a withdrawal agreement in absolute knowledge and certainty of the following. As outlined by this Brexit Government—because that is what they are, a Brexit Government—who have done the assessments into all the various ways of delivering Brexit, whatever way we do it will leave this country less prosperous and our constituents less well off. Being a Brexit Government, and the party of Brexit, will not be a badge of honour to be worn next to the blue rosette; it will end up being a badge of shame.

At some stage, people are going to have to make good the huge deficit that will exist. I shall give the House an example. Almost every Saturday, I am proud to go out with the Nottingham people’s vote campaigners, mainly in Nottingham but also in other parts of the county. I recently met a woman who explained why she had voted for Brexit. I understood her complaint about a system that she thought was not working for her when it came to housing. She thought it was the fault of immigrants. I explained that her complaint was nothing to do with immigration, and that immigrants had benefited our country in many ways over many centuries. Nevertheless, in her mind she somehow thought that Brexit was going to make good the problems in her life. If we do leave the European Union—God forbid that we should leave without a deal, the most irresponsible of all the options; the Business Secretary was right to say that it would be “ruinous”—how is that woman going to see her life transformed? She will not be better off economically. How is she going to benefit from the sovereignty that is suddenly going to be recaptured by our country? How is her life going to be improved? And who is going to make good the deficit and disappointment that she will undoubtedly face?

I think that is why so many right hon. and hon. Members on the Labour Benches, especially on the Back Benches, have come round to the view that the only way through this mess is to take it back with honesty and conviction to the people. I pay tribute to Labour Members such as those in Sunderland and the hon. Member for Redcar (Anna Turley) who represent leave constituencies but who have had the courage go out and speak to the people they represent, in all weathers, to make their case and to lead them, and to convince them that the best way through this mess is now to go back to the people.

People understand that they were lied to. They were tricked and conned by the leaders of leave, some of whom sit in this place. Those leaders will not lose their jobs. They will not find themselves worse off. They will not bear the burden. The people who will bear the burden are the people in this country who voted leave, and especially those who work in the manufacturing sector. They will see their jobs put at risk. They will see the future of their children and grandchildren blighted. It is the leaders of leave who should take responsibility, yet almost every one of them has walked away from their ministerial position while still scooping up all the benefits that they get outside this House through the articles they write, through their inherited wealth and through their gold-plated pensions. They will never be held responsible, but it should be to their eternal shame that they have caused such damage and deep divisions in this country. They should speak to people, just as I speak to my own constituents whose skin is brown and who find themselves being told to go home and being spat at and abused. That did not happen before this appalling referendum.

When we talk about Brexit, the one thing we now need to do is find a way to heal these terrible divisions. Somebody needs to address that, but it will not be done through more dishonesty. We will do it with honesty and with courage. We must say to the British people, “We have made a mistake. Let us bring this back to you so that you can make good the harm that we have done.”