Achieving Economic Growth

Debate between Geraint Davies and Bernard Jenkin

Wednesday 18th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sir Bernard Jenkin]

I am most grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention, but we should recognise that these issues of conversion therapy and transsexuality are very important to certain sections of society. They need to be addressed, but we need to be sure that we address them in the right way.

[Geraint Davies]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Sir Bernard Jenkin]

I will, but I do not want to give way too often because we are not time-limited.

[Geraint Davies]

Some years ago, I brought forward a Bill on the regulation of psychotherapists, which recommended banning conversion therapy. There was a conference that 100 conversion therapists attended, so this is a widespread and abhorrent practice. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that those who say that transsexuality should not be included seem to be those who think that people would go through the process of becoming a transwoman in order to rape another woman? There are a lot of male rapists out there. It seems to be a lot of effort for someone to have their head kicked in by other men. Transgender people should be included in the Bill.

[Sir Bernard Jenkin]

I had not intended to make a great speech about this subject. I note the point that the hon. Gentleman has made and I wish to move on.

I welcome the forthcoming legislation to protect the Belfast/Good Friday agreement. I say to the right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn), who spoke a few moments ago, that perhaps we agree a great deal about the future of the Northern Ireland protocol. The question is whether we can make it happen unless we have some legislation coming down the track as well, because the EU has not changed its mandate.

I want to concentrate today on much more immediate challenges. Covid supply chain disruption persists in many parts of the world, notably China, and now we have Russia’s dreadful war against Ukraine, which frankly has shattered the geopolitical order that we have become used to for decades. We all used to believe in what the Germans called, “Wandel durch Handel”—the mistaken faith that nations that trade together would never go to war with each other. President Putin has smashed that confidence.

Business and Governments are reducing their exposure to dependency on all autocratic regimes. That is throwing globalisation into reverse, creating massive price increases and shortages. Poorer nations are acting to keep their food affordable for their own people. For example, India has just banned wheat exports, following Indonesia, which banned palm oil exports. We have an acute, growing and potentially far greater energy supply crisis in Europe. Europe cannot continue to rely on supply from Russia. This crisis requires a vast reorganisation of Europe’s energy supply and trading arrangements, and this massive adjustment will take years and is unprecedented. Only major food and energy producers in the world, such as Canada and the US, will avoid the worst kind of recession.

At least the United Kingdom can produce some of our own gas and oil and can continue to expand renewables, but why are we pumping our surplus gas out to Europe this warm spring to fill EU storage capacity, when we should be filling our own? The Government shut it down, and we need to reopen our gas storage capacity as quickly as possible. I fervently hope that we can achieve net zero by 2050 without excessive cost. The Government are right to see gas as the essential transition fuel, but why import gas when we can produce our own more cheaply?

Meanwhile, we must all recognise the cost of living crisis—yes, crisis. Even before today’s shock rise in CPI to 9%, the Commons Library had given me striking projections for the effect of this crisis on households. The full-year cost of just energy and food prices will rise by well over £1,000 a year for the lowest 20% of households by income and by £1,500 a year for pensioner households. A summer package to rescue the most vulnerable households is needed to avoid real financial distress and personal anguish and to support the economic demand of the most vulnerable households, or we will be creating possibly a worse recession than is already expected.

I welcome the suggestion in The Times today that the Government are considering a package. The spring statement represented peacetime thinking. Like after the unforeseen covid crisis, the Treasury must adapt to this unexpected war in Europe and accept that this new global energy and economic crisis also requires a very substantial policy response. I have to say that is far greater than the £3 billion package that the Labour party has offered us, though I do not subscribe to the rest of its fiscal profligacy.

I suggest that the £20 uplift in universal credit should immediately be restored. The abolition of VAT on domestic fuel would abolish a regressive tax that hurts the poorest households the most. We can do that now we are outside the EU. The Government should abolish the green levies on energy bills and fund them from the Exchequer, as recommended by Professor Dieter Helm. The Government should provide pensioners and poorer families with the confidence they can afford to stay warm. We should double the warm home discount and treble the winter fuel payment.

This package would cost not £3 billion, but £13.5 billion from July in this current tax year, but that is still less than the recent tax increases we have seen, and it is about 0.6% of GDP and affordable. Now or later, we should also consider relief for middle-income households. The lower 40% of households will feel severe stress from energy and food costs alone. We could start reindexing tax thresholds, or more, and that would have the advantage of incentivising work and productivity.

I have watched Governments—and Oppositions, I think we saw it today—blindsided by their own commitment to outdated thinking and policies of the past. There is no excuse for another such episode. My right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary is right to sound cautious, but we can see what is coming, and I am confident that this Government will act as they must.

Relationship with Russia and China

Debate between Geraint Davies and Bernard Jenkin

Thursday 24th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sir Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael), who stands out as the only Scottish Member of Parliament who voted for the renewal of Trident in 2016. That is a great credit to him and to his prescience, because, as my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox) said, if there was ever a demonstration of the futility of nuclear disarmament, it is the position that Ukraine finds itself in now. Yet that is the policy of the SNP and of a great number of Labour MPs, and they are a threat to our national security.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight (Bob Seely) on securing this debate. As the dark shadow of war once again falls across our entire continent, I reflect on the adage attributed to Leon Trotsky:

“You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you.”

Everyone who loathes war and wants peace should reflect on that. If other people are determined to foment war, we have to take an interest.

The question in this debate is how we should now see Russia and China and the relationship between them. In the UK, we see Russia as an immediate threat, but China as perhaps the much greater long-term challenge. In the US, it is different. All US presidents since Obama have seen China as the existential threat and today’s Russia as yesterday’s problem, Europe’s problem, and a regional rather than a global threat. There are, to be sure, specialists in the US who understand that, like China, Russia is a long-term opponent, but their voices must compete with those who are effectively advocating appeasement for Russia—resets, normalisation, and the overlooking of previous illegal incursions, overseas assassinations, cyber-attacks on NATO allies and so on.

In Europe, Germany understands the existential nature of the Russian threat, but has until very recently pursued a policy of engagement with Russia. This now looks to have been deeply unwise. It has created serious vulnerability for Germany and for Europe as a whole. France, historically anti-American, must now accept that Russia presents the threat. Even this week, the French were, understandably, trying to use this to their advantage to prove their global influence and to try to secure peace. But all of Europe must now be united.

Nor is the United Kingdom beyond criticism. We have a firm understanding of the Russia problem in our analytical community, and of China, but until recently successive Prime Ministers chose to turn a blind eye to both problems. This is now changing, but the UK finds itself without the necessary tools to tackle the Russia threat and the China challenge. Our military has lost its ability to fight a peer enemy. Our legal system allows Russians and Chinese agents to exploit the vulnerabilities inherent in democracy. Our own blind reliance on spot markets to obtain cheaper gas has undermined our energy security. I have spoken before about how the UK Government lack the capacity for deep continuous strategic thinking to match the strategy and planning of our enemies, and I will return to that point.

Putin and President Xi have observed years of western failure to react to Russian encroachments and Chinese anti-democratic influence. We have encouraged them to join together in thinking that, despite our bluster, Putin’s taking Ukraine and China’s expanding influence are in their mutual interests and will remain largely unchallenged. That must now change, and it is changing. Until recently, it seemed that Putin might succeed, as he did in Georgia and Crimea, but Putin has miscalculated. His bullying has mobilised Ukraine’s resistance, is galvanizing support for NATO in previously neutral nations such as Sweden and Finland, and is rekindling Washington’s concern about Russia’s threat to global peace.

[Geraint Davies]

The hon. Gentleman will have seen a map drawn by Putin of Ukraine, where a lump is given to Ukraine by Stalin, another lump by Lenin and another lump by Brezhnev. Does he agree that the implicit plan is to take all that bit, to leave a little bit, like a doughnut, for the Ukrainians to be corralled in, to have them like the Uyghur population, to Russify the rest, to finish off Ukraine and to take the large majority of it?

[Sir Bernard Jenkin]

What is completely clear is that President Putin has repudiated his own words and security guarantees that were given to Ukraine on its existing borders.

Last night’s strikes by Russia on Ukraine’s military infrastructure and border guard units, and the incursions of military vehicles, show that there can be no compromise with Putin. We will only find peace through strength. What is there to negotiate? Putin is now seized by an irrational obsession to crush Ukraine by one means or another. His performance on Russian TV addressing his security council underlined how Putin is now acting out his emotions—his frustration, wounded pride and lust for revenge. According to him, only great powers count, and if you cannot bully your smaller neighbours into submission, you are not really a great power.

President Xi is very different from the usurper Putin. While Russia represents great culture and history, Putin’s rogue regime is fundamentally weak, trying to prove its power despite Russia’s internal dysfunctionality and economic failure. China, however, represents a far older, more consistent and altogether more considered philosophical tradition. Putin acts impetuously; President Xi demonstrates strategic patience. Russia is trying to distract from its failures; China is building upon its success. The task of the west is not only to deal effectively with Putin, but to give a clear message to China and to other countries that might consider endorsing or imitating Putin’s aggression.

To his credit, President Xi has now backed off from his earlier strong support for Putin, as he came to realise that a full-scale invasion of Ukraine will mobilise the west and enable the west to strengthen its defences and have a more competitive stance, against not only Russia, but China. China should reflect on the questions now being asked in Washington and Europe, as raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset. Why should we not formally recognise Taiwan’s sovereignty and its right to self-determination, if China is to co-operate so easily with Putin in Ukraine? China can use this moment to build trust with the west. The west will continue to have great differences with China, but we want to work together with China for global peace and security and for a sustainable planet. We cannot begin to do so if China aligns itself with the now rogue regime in Moscow.

Exiting the European Union: Meaningful Vote

Debate between Geraint Davies and Bernard Jenkin

Tuesday 11th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Geraint Davies (Swansea West) (Lab/Co-op)]

We are in a painfully predictable situation. We all knew, when article 50 was triggered, that there was a time limit. That is why I voted against it. We all knew that there would be French and German elections that would get in the way of negotiations, and then the Prime Minister called her own election, so there was less and less time. The then Brexit Secretary said that everything would be fine and that we would easily negotiate a deal that would give us exactly the same benefits as we have.

Here we are, two and a half years after the referendum and the deal is not yet cooked, so we are putting it back in the oven for a few more days, with a bit of salt and sugar, hoping it will come out and everyone will eat it. However, the reality is that some people want more salt and others want more sugar. The deal, whatever it is, will not be agreed in this place. The hard Brexiters—the loony-tunes, let’s-Brexit-without-a-deal people—will never agree it. The hardcore remainers will not agree it, saying that we are better off with what we have.

I believe that Brexit is a betrayal of Conservatism because it gets rid of the best trading model in the world. It also gets rid of the United Kingdom Union because if we exit without a deal, there will necessarily be a hard border, otherwise there will be nothing to prevent migration. It will simply not work.

Brexit is a betrayal of socialism because, inherently, it will mean a smaller economy—a smaller cake to be divided more equally by a future Labour Government. It will mean that a subsequent Tory Government could reduce workers’ rights and environmental rights beneath EU standards, and socialists should oppose it.

[Sir Bernard Jenkin]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Geraint Davies]

No, I will not. Other people want to speak.

The Prime Minister is trying to kick this into the long grass, but the area of long grass is getting smaller and smaller because the lawn mower of article 50 means there are only a few weeks left. The reality is that any Brexit will mean we have less money. We will not have the £350 million a week. We will have to pay the divorce bill. We will have less trade. We will have fewer jobs. We will have less control because of Henry VIII powers and because we will have to obey EU rules. There will be just as much immigration but from different places.

The ECJ has decided that we can now revoke article 50. If we do not have a deal by 21 January and we face no deal, we should revoke article 50 and stay in the EU. If we have a deal, any sort of deal, we should put it to the people by deferring article 50 so that they can decide whether they want the deal on the table that the EU will accept, because we will not agree it here. If they do not want it, and if they find it better to stay in the EU, we should stay in the EU. I very much hope we stay in the EU, as we would be stronger, fairer and more united, and there would be a better future for all our children.

Exiting the EU: Higher Education

Debate between Geraint Davies and Bernard Jenkin

Wednesday 23rd November 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Ealing Central and Acton (Dr Huq) on securing this debate. The issues that she raises, and the questions that universities are raising, are of course legitimate matters of concern, but the language that she used—“we are all jumping off a cliff without a parachute”—is the kind of negative language we should try to avoid. In my dealings with vice-chancellors —I represent Essex University in this Parliament, I am a graduate of Cambridge University and I deal with other universities; I am shortly to be appointed a visiting fellow of another university—I do not find universities are using this alarmist language. They want to make a success of the opportunities they have in the world.

It is important to understand the tremendous strength that our universities now have as a result of the progression towards fees and loans. They have been liberated from the constraints that Governments used to put upon them, have grown dramatically and are financially stronger than they have ever been in my lifetime. It is an extraordinarily good position to be in when approaching the present situation.

A lot of the uncertainty arises from confusion, which I have to say extends to Government Departments. I chair the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee; I see a lot of the civil service struggling to catch up with the absence of preparation for the outcome of the referendum, which is one of the lessons that we must take from it. It is unforgiveable for a Government to call a referendum and remain completely unprepared for one of the possible eventualities. There are many officials rapidly trying to get their brains around some difficult and complicated questions, in a scenario that they perhaps are not emotionally attracted to anyway. It is taking some time and the Government are entitled to take that time. I do not remember the Opposition parties telling the Government that they should prepare for Brexit when the referendum was called; I think they should be given the time that they need.

A lot of the uncertainty arises from confusion about what category the problems and concerns should be put in. Some concerns arise simply because of the uncertainty, and the Minister has already addressed some of those concerns. He could address some more and give more definition and assurance about funding streams, the status of students and academic staff joining universities at the moment, and so on.

Most of the debate is about what the Government’s policy will be after we leave the European Union—post-Brexit questions on issues of post-Brexit policy, such as what our immigration policy or our policy towards foreign students will be. There are relatively few issues that have to be included in the article 50 negotiations. In my discussions with universities, I advise them to try to categorise the issues and not to overload the article 50 negotiation process by trying to get everything resolved in that agreement. The less we put into that agreement, the more likely we are to get what we require.

There are three basic overall concerns. The first is about the access that foreign students—particularly EU students—have to the UK. It is interesting to note that only 5% of students in the UK are EU students. Some 10% are non-EU foreign students, who pay full fees, whereas EU students do not. It is actually going to be an advantage to the universities sector if we can charge EU students full fees. At the moment, the British taxpayer helps to fund those students. What is more, we are obliged to offer them loans, and the default rate among EU students is higher than that among UK students. There is talk in the Treasury about universities having to pay the cost of that default. We can resolve that issue by leaving the European Union.

The second concern is about access to EU funds. Table 9.9 of the Pink Book has become famous in the debate about leaving the European Union, but nobody disputes that we are one of the largest net contributors to the European Union. No Government in their right mind would use the pretext of leaving the European Union to cut the funds that universities receive, just because they get some of their money from the European Union. Let us remember that the money universities get from the European Union for research grants comes from us taxpayers. We put money into the European Union and we get only half of it back. We should be able to afford to pay more into our universities to fund more research and support our universities more effectively as a result of leaving the European Union, because we will no longer be forced to pay to subsidise universities elsewhere in the European Union. I acknowledge the concern that universities need certainty now and year on year into the future, but my hon. Friend the Minister should be able to give them a long-term assurance that we will fund research programmes in our universities as generously, if not more generously, in the future.

Finally, the idea that we are no longer going to collaborate with other universities in the EU is about as potty an idea as could be imagined. First, there are non-EU countries that participate in EU schemes. CERN, for example, is an international project. Let us have confidence in our universities. We have the crown jewels of scientific research in the EU in our universities. If I am correct, we have four universities in the world rankings top 10. We have 10 of the top 50 universities in the world—more than any other country outside the US. Two are in London—the same number as are in the entirety of the rest of the EU. It would be perverse if the EU wanted to cut itself off from UK universities, so we should approach the negotiations and future collaboration with universities with confidence. We have what it takes to promote successful collaboration with countries across the whole of Europe, whether they are in the EU or not. Outside the EU, our universities have as great a future, if not a greater future, than they would if we remained in the EU.

[Geraint Davies (in the Chair)]

Talking of cuts, the Front Benchers have nine minutes each.

Scotland Bill

Debate between Geraint Davies and Bernard Jenkin

Monday 8th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jenkin]

I hope that the House noted that the right hon. Gentleman has retreated from full fiscal autonomy to full fiscal responsibility. People do not like politicians playing with words, which is exactly what he is doing. The fact is that he does not want full fiscal autonomy because he knows that it would result in dramatic cuts to public spending in Scotland.

On the question of taxation, the hon. Member for Edinburgh South ought to reflect on the fact that one of the problems identified by his hon. Friend the Member for Swansea West (Geraint Davies) is that Scotland would be setting tax rates and having effects that English voters do not have for their own tax rates, which is exactly the same argument that we made against the Scotland Bill in 1997-98. He might reflect on how we have got into that situation. [Interruption.] Oh yes, because the Scotland Act 1998 allowed the Scots a 3% variation in income tax. They never used it, but it set up the very anomaly that the hon. Member for Swansea West complained about.

[Geraint Davies]

rose—