United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Debate between James Daly and David Simmonds

Tuesday 22nd September 2020 Commons Chamber

[James Daly]

Many, many things could happen in life, but the point remains that not one Opposition Member has been able to point to one action of the Government—they have not pointed to literally anything—that would indicate that they are derogating from the highest possible standards and the standards that we enjoy at this moment in time and that we have under the European Union.

This is a good Bill and this is a positive Bill. Rather than dwelling on the legal argument, which would be somewhat going off the point in respect of where we are today and which I am tempted to do, I will say that this is a Bill to strengthen our United Kingdom, to invest moneys in every part of it, to ensure that we have free unfettered access and to ensure that all parts of the United Kingdom are within the UK internal market, as set out in the withdrawal agreement and the Northern Ireland protocol. I congratulate Ministers on this Bill as it will only do good for our fellow citizens in all parts of the United Kingdom.

[David Simmonds]

At this stage in the debate, my challenge is to try to say something original on the various different topics that we are considering. Today’s business concerns mutual recognition and non-discrimination. Having spent many happy days of my life in the Centre Borschette on the rue Froissart in Brussels, alongside very good colleagues from Scotland, Ireland, Wales, the United Kingdom and the other composite states of the European Union, debating these issues in respect of, in my case, education, while committees alongside us debated those issues around financial services, veterinary products, fish and every possible type of goods and services, it is clear that the United Kingdom has long played a key role in writing these rules.

I welcome the commitment that was alluded to by my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (James Daly) that, at the end of the transition period and as part of the process of withdrawal, the United Kingdom’s commitment is that all those standards are written into the law of the United Kingdom, so the minimum standards that apply to us as a member of the European Union that already prohibit chlorinated chicken and hormone-fed beef will become the law of the land.

Let me try to concentrate on three points that have not been covered in sufficient detail yet. The first is the importance of the integrity of the UK single market and why this matters in the context of the trade deal that we are seeking to achieve. In 2018, the United Kingdom was fined £2.4 billion for failing to uphold its treaty obligations as a member of the EU to enforce the standards that we are committed to apply at our borders.

Having spent so much time in Brussels, I do understand that the UK is a little notorious with our friends and allies, and the risk they fear is that the United Kingdom, with our global reach in terms of our international maritime trade, will become a backdoor into the European single market for goods that do not meet the minimum standards that we need to uphold. That is a legitimate concern, especially as Brussels expects to receive significant amounts of trade tariffs on those goods that are coming into the UK single market and, potentially, with an open border on the island of Ireland, would then be re-exported. We need to respect the fact that that is a genuine concern on the part of the European Union, we need to pay the attention that Ministers have referred to to ensuring we uphold rigorous standards on our own borders, and we need to ensure that our voters and the wider public recognise the commitment that the United Kingdom single market will continue to uphold the high standards that we have in the European Union, and in future, where we seek to diverge, it will be in an upward direction, with higher standards, rather than lower.

The second issue I would like to touch on is devolution. I do have some sympathy with the concerns of Members from devolved nations about the power grab point. Many colleagues—Tony Buchanan and Stewart Maxwell from Scotland, Arnold Hatch and Jonathan Bell from Ireland and many others from across the United Kingdom, and other Members of this House, including the hon. Member for Leicester East (Claudia Webbe) and my hon. Friends the Members for Northampton South (Andrew Lewer) and for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill)—have played a role in exercising UK local and regional government powers in Brussels over the way in which we, as part of that wider single market, both regulate and choose to spend the funds that we are part of, like the European structural fund and the European social fund.

I note that those issues have already been exhaustively debated, but a point that has not been aired very much in the debate is that, following the ending of the arrangements whereby we participated in those bodies, we have a range of UK Joint Committees, including ones that are there to exercise a similar scrutiny and oversight role around how that regulation is undertaken and how those funds are expended. It should be of concern to us that with an agreement already in place—I know Scotland has nominated SNP Members to the Joint Committee, with the Committee of the Regions to supervise and provide oversight of the run-out period of the European structural funds—we still need to hear a little more about how we are all committed to making those arrangements, which were committed to by Ministers on the Floor of the House, work effectively in the interests of our UK single market in future.

We are seeing many parts of our constitution—our local authorities, our regional authorities—stepping up to the plate, and our businesses being a part of that. It is very sad not to hear that debated and aired in this place, especially when in the case of structural funds there is £730 million unspent that the UK has already contributed, which will be returned to Brussels if Members across the House do not put pressure on our Front-Bench team to make sure it is spent by the end of this year.

Finally, I would like to touch on the point about legality. I am not a lawyer by background, but it is very clear to me that this debate has been something of a lawyers’ delight. We have had advice from those with eminent legal qualifications about whether things do or do not contravene international law and what triggers those decisions, and opinions given by people with immense political experience about the impact that that will have on the UK’s reputation. It strikes me, however, that what is being proposed by the Government is quite similar to what is common practice when sending our armed forces to places where there is a high degree of tension, when the rules of engagement say that people will not fire unless fired upon. What I am hearing from the Government is that these arrangements are there in the backstop so that unless the negotiations— which, as the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland indicated, are proceeding in good faith—break down irretrievably, they will not come into play, but it is a fact that, whether they are in the Bill or not, the UK would have recourse to those provisions if we needed them, and it is an appropriate precaution for the Government to take to bring those forward now.

These kinds of conflicts are not unusual. On 5 May, the German federal court handed down a judgment in respect of Germany’s signing up to the European Central Bank’s buying of bonds in order to enable a European recovery from coronavirus, and said that that was not lawful and conflicted with the domestic law of Germany. While there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth in the Government there, I understand that that is one of many judgments that have been handed down over the years demonstrating that there will be these conflicts between domestic and international law and that they need to be resolved not as a matter of taking down a legal textbook, but as a matter of negotiation in good faith between partners and allies. I have every confidence that that is what will be achieved.

I understand the fury and frustration of many of our colleagues who have given so much of their political lives in seeking to reach a deal. To me it is very clear that both sides are seeking to negotiate in good faith and the more that we can respect that, the better. The European Union is our largest, our most valuable, and, importantly, our most mature single market partner that we engage with. It is crucial to our economy and enormously valuable to their economy that we get a deal. I can see that behind the scenes Ministers and negotiators on all sides have been putting the mechanisms and structures in place to deliver that. I support the Government in seeking to ensure that the deal is in place for the good of the United Kingdom and our allies by the end of the year.