European Affairs

Heidi Alexander Excerpts

Thursday 15th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

So here we are again. Another day, another debate on Europe—nearly two years after the referendum and at a time when we face enormous challenges both here and abroad. The inescapable truth about Brexit is that our Government are involved in the biggest exercise of reinventing the wheel that this country has ever seen. When a nerve agent has been used in Salisbury to try to kill a former spy, and when we are expelling the largest number of Russian state personnel from our soil for 30 years, I am sure that I am not the only one who regrets that our first foreign policy objective is our departure from the European Union, but we are where we are. Rather than endlessly raking over the referendum, or making the case as to why the public should have a final say on the deal, we need to focus on finding a way through this that limits the damage to our economy, maintains peace in Northern Ireland, protects opportunities for the next generation, and leaves our alliance with the rest of Europe as strong as possible.

We need to start, though, by being honest. If we go out on to the doorstep, we will struggle to find someone who would vote differently in a referendum today from how they voted two years ago. Yes, there might be an increased willingness to listen to a different point of view and, yes, there is an overwhelming sense that the Prime Minister is making a dog’s breakfast of the negotiations, but for all the talk of bringing people together, our country is still divided.

I do not want to live in a country that is dominated by divisions over Brexit for a decade. I do not want to sit in a Parliament that fails to get to grips with the real problems facing this country—housing; how we care for the elderly; how we upskill our population—simply because we are pursuing fantasy trade deals elsewhere. I do not want to listen to any more interminable speeches from Ministers that leave us none the wiser as to what their policy is and which do nothing to clear the fog that exists in Brussels or in the public consciousness here. We have to make this easier for ourselves. We need to cut the complexity, and that means staying in the single market by staying in the European economic area and staying part of a European customs union. The sooner the Government wake up to that fact, the sooner we might make some proper progress.

The Prime Minister bleats on about her deep and special relationship and about her desire for a bespoke deal but, as the clock ticks on, there is no sign of that. Last year, she admitted that she needed more time to sort out future trading arrangements. She calls it an implementation period and Brussels calls it a transition period, but I call it cutting yourself more slack to work out what on earth to do. There is no guarantee that we will get a transition period, but assuming that we do, and assuming Parliament votes for it as part of a skeleton withdrawal agreement—that is a big if—we will be legally out of the EU next year. Our trading arrangements will stay the same until the end of 2020, but what then?

At the moment, this is like reading a seven-year-old’s letter to Father Christmas. We see an unrealistic wish list combined with tantrum-like demands. The Prime Minister wants a customs partnership, but not a customs union. She wants no tariffs on goods traded between the UK and the EU, but does not want to sign up to the common set of standardised tariffs that apply to goods coming into the EU from outside. She does not want a border in Northern Ireland to check where goods have come from and nor does she want one down the Irish Sea. She wants a special tracking system for goods coming into the UK that would then be onward bound for Europe. She talks about technology and authorised economic operators, but the customs experts and freight handlers remain unconvinced.

On the standards that goods would need to meet in order to be sold to the EU, the Prime Minister wants us to sign up to the rules in some areas, but not all, and she wants to reserve the right to change the arrangements in future. She wants to be in some of the regulatory agencies that supervise and enforce the rules, but only if a UK court rules on related matters. Even then, she is not sure whether she wants to be part of just the European Medicines Agency, the European Chemicals Agency and the European Aviation Safety Agency, or if she wants to be part of others, too. She does not have an answer on services, the area in which we enjoy a trade surplus with the EU, but rather talks about creativity and ambition in finding solutions. There is no trade deal anywhere in the world that gets close to guaranteeing the access we have to Europe for our services industry. Our major export to the EU is financial services; Canada’s is pearls and semi-precious metals. The idea that we base our future trading arrangements on a Canadian-style free trade agreement while ruling out being part of the EEA is absolute madness.

I am a London Labour MP, and I sometimes baulk at the obscene wealth that I see on display in our city. However, I also know that the wealthy bankers, lawyers and hedge fund managers not only have money, but spend it. For every one of them, there are probably four or five jobs in events management, hospitality, retail and security, and those jobs are done by my constituents. I cannot bear the thought of our great city losing out to Paris, Frankfurt or New York, but mark my words: if we do not get a good deal on services, over the next 10 years—this will not happen overnight—jobs and economic activity will drift away.

I cannot see how we can get this magical deal. Even if the EU wanted to offer us a good deal on services, the most favoured nation clauses in the trade agreements that are already in place with other countries would mean that whatever the EU gave to us, it would have to offer to others, too. If we stayed in the European economic area, we could get around that.

I do not think that anyone really appreciates the extent to which our country depends on EU labour. It speaks volumes that two years after the referendum, the Government have no answer to what the post-Brexit immigration system will look like. Last week, I met the HR director of a major restaurant group. It has about 300 restaurants in the UK, and I discovered that 61% of its chefs are from the EU. When I walk from Lewisham to Catford, I see huge signs outside small domiciliary care agencies that are desperate for staff, and that is before we even talk about the recruitment and retention crisis in the NHS. I do not know how many times I have to say this, but we have an ageing population. We control immigration from countries that account for 90% of the world’s population. We need people to come here to work. Fewer EU migrants means fewer taxpayers and fewer people spending money in our shops.

I have reflected quite a lot recently on why I care so much about Europe. If I am honest, it is intensely personal. We seem to forget that freedom of movement works two ways. People can come here, but we can also go and live in other European countries. I grew up in a working-class family. My dad is an electrician and my mum is a dinner lady, and I was the first person in my family to go to university. I dreamed of travelling the world when I was young, but I knew that the bank of mum and dad was not an option. I lived for a year in Austria and worked as a holiday rep. I fell in love with the country and ended up married to someone who is half Austrian.

I genuinely feel that the ease with which I could go and live in another European country allowed me to live my dreams. It gave me opportunities, and I do not want the next generation to be denied those opportunities. Anyone listening to Nigel Farage would think that the EU was the preoccupation of the middle classes—it is not. I think that we need to stay in a customs union and in the single market to maintain a close relationship with Europe. We should be prepared to preserve the principle of freedom of movement within that, even if we administer the process slightly differently.

We have to dial down the rhetoric on all this because I worry about where it will all end. Just think of the newspaper front pages that we have seen in the last year. Where do the bellicose language, blame and brinkmanship get us? My grandfather and my husband’s grandfather fought on opposing sides in the second world war. Mine walked across Europe after he was liberated from a prisoner of war camp, and my husband’s absconded from Scandinavia and made his way home to Austria. The borders that criss-cross my family’s history should not go back up, and we should not take opportunities away from the next generation.

We should not fool ourselves into believing that there is a golden economic future without a close relationship with the EU, and the Government need to be honest about that. They need to be honest about the fact that the political choices they have made in the past two years are not automatic consequences of the referendum. They need to rub out their red lines and do the right thing for the economy, the next generation and our place in the world. I believe that that means remaining part of the single market and a customs union.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Baker]

I listened carefully to the words my right hon. Friend used and I am sure the record will show that she referred to EFTA, but I am glad she has clarified that, in saying she supports EFTA, she means EFTA as an EEA member. But I stand by the remarks I just made. I hope she will not mind my saying to her gently that from the perspective of many who want to leave the EU, saying that we want to solve the problems of leaving the EU by staying in the EU’s internal market, with all that that entails for non-member states, and staying within the EU’s customs union, so that we have to accept the EU’s common commercial policy, appears to suggest that we must solve the problems of the EU by, de facto, staying within it. That is how it comes across to many people who wish sincerely to leave the EU. I did listen carefully to her—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Nottingham East (Mr Leslie) mentions transition, and of course we have set out the case for the implementation period.

I must press on, because I want particularly to pick up a point relating to borders and migration.

[Heidi Alexander]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Baker]

I want to make this point, but if I have time, I will give way to the hon. Lady. Remaining in the EEA agreement would mean having to continue to accept all four freedoms of the single market, including freedom of movement. Although it is true that Liechtenstein has unique arrangements on the movement of people, the UK is in many respects different from Liechtenstein, a country whose population is less than almost every UK constituency. We can safely anticipate that this exemption afforded to a micro-state would not be afforded to the UK.

I very much regret that, with only two minutes to go, I will have dramatically to shorten my speech. On the customs union, Turkey’s customs union with the UK does not cover certain sectors that would be vital to the UK economy and it does not guarantee frictionless trade across the whole economy, because of course a customs union alone does not solve some of the—[Interruption.] Opposition Front Benchers are saying that this is not what they are looking for. They are looking to be in the customs union and remain harmonised with the regulations of the EU—that is the implication of their position. The implication of their position is that they do not wish to leave the EU. They want the EU to control our tariffs. They would be happy for it to control our laws. They would be happy to accept free movement. This is not what people voted for.

We must not lose sight of our ultimate aim to build a new comprehensive partnership that sees us stay the closest of friends and allies. As the Prime Minister has set out, our vision is of a UK that is a champion of free trade, based on a high standard, thriving as a global Britain which forges a bold and ambitious comprehensive economic partnership with our neighbours in the EU and reaches out beyond to foster trade agreements with nations across the globe. As we approach this March Economic Council, both sides in these negotiations have agreed that we want a common fight against terrorism and crime; we want participation and co-operation on research, innovation, culture and education; we want to avoid the absurdities of the interruption of flights; and we want a trade agreement covering all sectors, with zero tariffs on goods and addressing services. We shall succeed.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered European Affairs.