Oral Answers to Questions

Gavin Newlands Excerpts

Thursday 4th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

We are on the front foot, and the hon. Lady’s characterisation is entirely wrong. The world looks to the UK as a leader in this field. I talk to counterparts across the world about the Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation, and they are interested in a move that we are making that no one else has yet made. As the hon. Lady knows—she has looked carefully at this issue—the online harms White Paper will deal with a range of issues and produce regulation that is, once again, world leading.

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

4. If he will support the maintenance of free TV licences for the over-75s.

[Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)]

8. If he will make it his policy to maintain free TV licences for the over-75s after 2020.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Jeremy Wright)]

The Government are disappointed with the BBC’s decision on the licence fee concession for the over-75s. Taxpayers want the BBC to use its substantial licence fee income in an appropriate way, to ensure that it delivers for UK audiences. The Government expect the BBC to consider further ways to support older people, and I recently met the BBC management to discuss what more it could do.

[Gavin Newlands]

The BBC is not a benefits agency. Both Tory leadership contenders have condemned the proposal to remove free TV licences from the over-75s, and stated that that must be reversed. The director-general has rightly said that the Government are responsible for the TV licence proposal, and that he would be open to conversations about reversing it. Will the Secretary of State tell the House when further conversations may happen, and when will that benefit cut be reversed?

[Jeremy Wright]

As the hon. Gentleman knows, the decision to transfer that responsibility to the BBC was taken in 2017 by this House in the Digital Economy Act 2017. I assure him that conversations about what more we expect of the BBC will continue, and we expect it to do more.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Attorney General]

Of course, the United Kingdom, in all its jurisdictions, has one of the strongest records for the rule of law in the world. I have no doubt that that will continue.

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

Further to the answer given to my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow East (David Linden), the Institute for Government has noted that if Parliament was prorogued to facilitate no deal, it would not be possible to pass any Bills or the remaining secondary legislation needed to prepare the UK statute book for such an outcome. Does the Attorney General therefore agree that leaving the EU without a deal and with no functioning Parliament would lead the country into a legislative black hole at a time when people throughout the country would be looking to the Government for emergency actions?

[The Attorney General]

The House has been given the opportunity of leaving the European Union with a deal on three separate occasions. I do not recall the SNP ever voting for one of them. The answer is quite simple: we can still pass a withdrawal agreement and leave the European Union in an orderly way, but it is now quite clear that the imperative to leave the European Union is overriding. We must leave, and in my view we must do so this year—on 31 October.