Early Parliamentary General Election Bill

Debate between Jeremy Corbyn and Stewart Malcolm McDonald

2nd reading: House of Commons
Tuesday 29th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Corbyn]

I hope my friend will join in the campaign to defeat this Government and to bring in a Government who will end injustice, poverty and inequality in this country. That is why I joined the Labour party all those years ago, and I will be very proud to take that as our message to the people of this country. I want to give our public services the funding they need and to end the threat of privatisation that hangs over so many public service workers; to stop the grotesque poverty and inequality in our country; to rebuild the economy in every region and every nation of this country; to tackle the climate emergency with a green new deal, a green industrial revolution that will bring good quality jobs to many areas of the country that have been denied them by this Government and their Liberal Democrat accomplices during the coalition years; and, after three years of Conservative failure, to get Brexit sorted—the only party that is doing so—by giving people the final say on what happens over Brexit.

We will launch the most ambitious radical campaign for real change in this country, and I look forward to campaigning in a general election all over the country, including in Uxbridge if the Prime Minister is still the Conservative candidate there at that time.

[Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Glasgow South) (SNP)]

I am extremely grateful to the Leader of the Opposition for giving way. May I say to him that, in the upcoming election, the right of the Scottish people to choose their own future will be at the front and centre? If the Scottish National party wins a majority of seats in Scotland, will he respect that result?

[Jeremy Corbyn]

I am looking forward to campaigning all over Scotland to support Labour candidates to be elected in Scotland. Indeed, I was there last weekend, and the enthusiasm of Scottish Labour to get out there and campaign was palpable everywhere. I am delighted to support Scottish Labour in its campaign to bring £70 billion of public investment to Scotland under a Labour Government, which is something that the SNP cannot offer.

European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Debate between Jeremy Corbyn and Stewart Malcolm McDonald

Tuesday 12th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Corbyn]

I am going to make some progress, if I may.

Yet in her statement last night, the Prime Minister said that the joint instrument guaranteed that the EU could not act with the intent of applying the backstop indefinitely. The EU has never expressed that intent, and the Prime Minister has never accused them of having it. The Prime Minister has constructed one enormous great big gigantic attractive paper tiger, and then slain it. However, the substance already existed through article 178(5) of the withdrawal agreement, agreed in November. Truly, nothing has changed.

The Prime Minister also claims that the joint instrument entrenches the January exchange of letters in legally binding form. On 14 January, from the Dispatch Box, the Prime Minister told the House that those letters had “legal standing”, and would have

“legal force in international law".—[Official Report, 14 January 2019; Vol. 652, c. 833.]

We are back with smoke and mirrors—the illusion of change, when the reality is that nothing has changed. It is all is spin and no substance from the Prime Minister.

[Stewart Malcolm McDonald]

The right hon. Gentleman adumbrates perfectly the miasma of chaos that is eating away at this place, but does he not agree that, given the chaos that is about to hit the people of Scotland—who voted overwhelmingly to stay in the European Union—should they request an order under section 30 of the Scotland Act 1998 to hold a referendum on Scotland’s independence, it would be undemocratic in the extreme for the Government to refuse it?

[Jeremy Corbyn]

That intervention has no relevance to the debate that we are having today. This debate is about the Government’s proposals in relation to leaving the European Union.

The statement in the Attorney General’s legal advice still holds. He said that the backstop would endure indefinitely until a superseding agreement took its place. That was the case in January, and it is the case today. I reiterate the view of the Attorney General: despite the theatre of the Prime Minister’s late-night declaration in Strasbourg, nothing has changed.

Human Rights (Saudi Arabia)

Debate between Jeremy Corbyn and Stewart Malcolm McDonald

Tuesday 21st July 2015 Westminster Hall

[Jeremy Corbyn]

Absolutely; I thank the hon. Lady for drawing the House’s attention to that. The abuse of all human rights in Saudi Arabia is very serious, but the treatment of lesbian and gay people there is particularly appalling. In the UN Human Rights Council, the UK routinely takes up issues of systemic discrimination in many countries all over the world, but there seems to be an unfortunate silence where Saudi Arabia is concerned, and I do not believe that that is the way to act.

[Stewart McDonald]

The hon. Gentleman is a long-serving Member of Parliament and no doubt over the years has been to many a protest outside the Saudi embassy. Off the top of his head, can he give an example of a meaningful public condemnation of the Saudi regime that has been made in the years in which he has been debating the issue in the House? Can he think of one, or perhaps two?

[Jeremy Corbyn]

Ministers have often said to me that they are concerned about human rights in Saudi Arabia. Usually the narrative from the Foreign Office is that constructive dialogue is making progress. It is not obvious to me what progress has been made in the matter, but that is what is often said. The Minister, I am sure, can speak for himself.

My last point is about migrant workers. There are hundreds of thousands of migrant workers all over the Gulf states. They are doing the jobs that nobody else wants to do. They run the economy; they run the oil industry; they clean people’s houses; they fix the roads; they run the railways. They run just about everything. The whole economy relies on them completely. Generally speaking they are poorly treated everywhere, but 300,000 have been deported from Saudi Arabia, and others who have protested in any way about their conditions of work have been summarily removed from the country. We ought to be aware that that is a systemic problem across the region.

British companies are heavily involved in service industries and oil exploration and exploitation in Saudi Arabia and other places. I am not saying that British companies are particularly exploiting migrant workers, but I do say that Britain should not turn a blind eye to what is happening to many vulnerable people across the region. What is happening in Qatar has at last got some publicity, because of the number of migrant workers who have died on construction sites. Things are not that different in every other country of the region.

I hope that the Minister will be able to tell the House that tough representations will be made to the Saudi Arabian Government, and that we will suspend arms supplies to Saudi Arabia if it is shown to be using weapons illegally in the Yemen. There is also the question of past weapons use in Bahrain. I hope he will say that we will demand rights for women, an end to the death penalty, and rights and justice for the migrant workers in the region. We cannot just say that because Saudi Arabia is oil-rich and has huge amounts of money with which to buy arms from us and from other places, human rights standards should be lower. We should say that human rights standards should be the same throughout the world. The declaration of human rights is, after all, a universal declaration, not a selective one. We should make that clear in our foreign policy relationships with Saudi Arabia.