Duties of Customs

Debate between Ian Murray and Gareth Snell

Ways and Means resolution: House of Commons
Monday 20th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Ian Murray]

Indeed, and I will come to more of those arguments later in my speech. The Foreign Affairs Committee, of which I am a member, visited the border regions in Ireland and Northern Ireland just last week, and one of the key concerns we heard from the businesses that employ many thousands of workers on both sides of the border was that they use the UK as the transit route into the European Union. We are the landing strip for all the goods they export through the United Kingdom into the European Union, because it is the fastest way; the alternatives are not suitable for their businesses. It will be exactly the same for businesses in Coventry, in Aberdeen and in Edinburgh South. The hon. Member for Aberdeen South spoke eloquently about the Scotch whisky industry, which we all defend and champion. That industry needs easy access to the markets in which it sells its products, so it too is pushing for as close a deal as possible to the customs union.

[Gareth Snell]

My hon. Friend will be aware that the finest Scotch whisky in the world is sold in ceramic bottles made in my constituency. Exiting the European Union without a proper trade deal will result in not only the price of the whisky but the cost of the bottle going up, which will threaten jobs in my constituency. What does he make of the Government’s proposals so far on market and trade remedies?

[Ian Murray]

I am glad my hon. Friend makes that point because the Scotch whisky industry is not just a Scottish industry. It is a UK-wide industry involving bottling, packaging and delivery companies—a whole UK supply chain. If the main driver of that supply chain, which is the whisky coming out of Scotland, is disturbed, the jobs in my hon. Friend’s constituency are potentially disturbed, too.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian Murray]

I am happy with the intervention—I am delighted with it—because it allows me to say three things: first, the reason the Scotch whisky industry is doing so well is partly because of EU free trade arrangements, particularly with countries such as South Korea; secondly, we are already in 57 free trade agreements; and thirdly, the hon. Gentleman’s Government have failed wholeheartedly to start to negotiate just one free trade agreement, despite all the bluff and bluster about being at the front of the queue, about their happening easily, about our seamlessly entering into these wonderful free trade agreements all over the world.

I say also to the hon. Gentleman that his intervention completely contradicts his first intervention. If he votes against my amendment and we end up trading with WTO rules, and we end up without tariffs with the EU, we will have tariffs with no one and we will ride the waves—rule Britannia—setting up more than 57 free trade agreements with every country banging at our door to trade with us. He is not listening to his Foreign Secretary or Trade Secretary when they say this is becoming much more difficult, if he thinks that free trade agreements with more than 57 countries will just appear as low-hanging fruit from this magic money tree the Government seem always to produce.

[Gareth Snell]

To pick up on the point from the hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh), of course free trade is to be welcomed, but in certain sectors, such as the ceramics industry, what we need is protection against the illegal dumping of tiles and white goods, which affects our industry and puts our jobs at risk. In some sectors, the unilateral free trade and open markets that some talk about would harm employment and make my constituents poorer.

[Ian Murray]

Absolutely. Illegal dumping is something that the House will have to come back to and debate at length, because it is one of the key issues around what might happen when we leave the EU and do not have that bloc to defend us. On my hon. Friend’s point about free trade, I have a great idea for how to advance free trade in this country: we could have a customs union and a single market, and that would certainly advance free trade, would it not? Or we could come out, as the hon. Member for Gainsborough wants, and end up with no free trade agreements, rather than 57.

I wanted to mention a whole list of sectors, but I will not in the interests of time. I will briefly mention two or three of the very big ones that have raised concerns. Pharmaceuticals is a key area bringing a lot of tax and corporation tax into the public purse. The Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry has called for free trade with the EU on terms

“equivalent to those of a full member of the Customs Union”.

I would rather believe the pharmaceuticals industry, an industry that has brought so much economically—in terms of jobs and growth—than the Minister, and it says it wants free trade on terms equivalent to those of a full member of the customs union. Well, the Government will be ruling that out tonight when they pass the motion, so what will he say to the pharmaceuticals industry, which says it needs it to trade as it does now?