Oral Answers to Questions

Ian Murray Excerpts

Tuesday 15th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Wes Streeting (Ilford North) (Lab)]

2. What progress his Department has made on contingency planning for the UK leaving the EU without a deal.

[Ian Murray (Edinburgh South) (Lab)]

3. What progress his Department has made on contingency planning for the UK leaving the EU without a deal.

[Tommy Sheppard (Edinburgh East) (SNP)]

18. What preparations his Department has made for the UK leaving the EU in March 2019.

--- Later in debate ---

[Matt Hancock]

It is incumbent on me as Health Secretary and on my team to ensure that we prepare for all potential scenarios. Of course, because of the overwhelming vote of the House in favour of the withdrawal Bill, no deal is the law of the land unless the House does anything else. If the hon. Gentleman is so worried, the best thing that he and all his friends can do is vote for the deal tonight.

[Ian Murray]

Would it not have been a better use of taxpayers’ money to have spent hundreds of millions of pounds on frontline patient care rather than on no-deal planning? The Secretary of State has just said to my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting) that the Government have to prepare for all possible scenarios. A responsible Secretary of State would rule out one of those scenarios, which is no deal.

[Matt Hancock]

As I said, thanks to the votes of Members in all parts of the House, no deal is a matter of the law of the land. They can’t get away from it: if they don’t like no deal, they need to join me in the Lobby tonight, and vote for the Prime Minister’s deal.