John Cooper
Main Page: John Cooper (Conservative - Dumfries and Galloway)Department Debates - View all John Cooper's debates with the Scotland Office
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John Cooper (Dumfries and Galloway) (Con)
Devolution is not working. Instead of two Governments working in harness, Scotland has one in Westminster with its back turned to the one in Holyrood, which daily plots to break up Britain. Labour took power convinced that they were the grown-ups who would reset relations with the SNP at Holyrood. The harsh reality is that the SNP Government have no interest in joint working, for if devolution is a success, they lose the argument that independence is a necessity. They are aided in their mission by Labour’s “devolve and forget”.
This Government trolly billions of pounds north to Edinburgh via the block grant, but what happens after it disappears into the SNP black hole, where we can see what goes in but not what comes out? Well, no one on the Government Benches seems to care overmuch. The sleekit SNP is running rings around them. The Chancellor appeared in a smart video saying that she was delivering investment in Scotland. The backdrop was Lossiemouth, a key RAF base for protecting the High North, yet the SNP actively undermines British defence. There has been ludicrous talk of deploying “Scottish forces” as peacekeepers in Ukraine. There are many Scots men and women in Britain’s forces, but there are no Scottish forces. Ironically, the SNP denies defence firms vital investment because of childish opposition to ordnance—the shells, bombs, bullets and missiles that keep us all safe in a dangerous world. That is pulling apart, not pulling together.
Under the previous Administration, the Scotland Office was the guardian of devolution. The then Secretary of State for Scotland, Alister Jack, adroitly deployed section 35 of the Scotland Act to prevent the unlamented Nicola Sturgeon’s gender recognition reform from trampling on the rights of women and girls across the entire UK. That was not some assault on Holyrood’s powers, but a judicious application of the law as it stood to prevent devolution from being abused, to prevent Scotland from becoming a different country bit by bit, and to stop devolution being used as a battering ram to smash the Union. Would that happen now?
Today’s Scotland Office is, we are told, “Scotland’s window on the world”. Rather than nurturing the Scotland Act, it looks increasingly like Dover House has been annexed by the Department for Business and Trade as a pop-up shop for salmon and whisky. Perhaps a bit less looking out the window and a bit more attention to what is going on at John Swinney’s Bute House is in order, for Scottish Ministers seem to have more foreign breaks than Galloway Travel Service in Stranraer, in my constituency of Dumfries and Galloway. They have gone to Malawi, Zambia, Canada and Washington DC. Despite having no role in international affairs, Scottish Ministers have racked up more air miles than Biggles, at taxpayers’ expense. What are they discussing, given that trade policy is reserved? Let us take China, for example: Scottish Business Minister Richard Lochhead sloped off on a low-key visit to Beijing, and I asked what occurred, but the Foreign Office did not have eyes on it, in another display of “devolve and forget”.
There are many siren voices calling for Holyrood’s abolition as Supreme Court judgments on gender are ignored; its Committee system, as we have heard, is neutered so that genuine scrutiny is near impossible; and the First Minister spends more time pronouncing on Gaza and boycotting Israel—foreign affairs are outwith his bailiwick—while Scots’ taxes rise with no improvement in public services.
Seamus Logan (Aberdeenshire North and Moray East) (SNP)
The hon. Gentleman is drawing attention to many issues that he says are the fault of the Scottish Government’s creating difference between Scotland and England. What would he say about the Brexit vote in 2016 creating such difference?
John Cooper
I just gently point out that I think more Scots voted for Brexit than for anything else in the history of Scotland.
John Cooper
Sorry, but I will not give way, because I want to make some progress.
John Swinney—not so much yesterday’s man as the day before yesterday’s man—is a pound-shop Parnell trying to suborn British institutions to undermine Britain. Devolution is not working, but it is not broken beyond repair. My noble Friend Lord Offord of Garvel, who sits in the other place, has challenged Holyrood to do better in a series of essays entitled “Wealthy Nation, Healthy Nation”. That is predicated on Holyrood parking its constitutional obsession to deliver what it was intended to do—to better the lives of those living in Scotland. Amen, but it will require the Scottish Government to respect democracy, not least the clearcut decision in the 2014 independence referendum to remain part of the UK, and it will take this House finding the courage to confront what the SNP Government are up to. It is not about putting them in their place or keeping them in their lane. No, it is merely about both Governments respecting the Scotland Act.
If Holyrood is to have another 25 years, John Swinney needs to comport himself as First Minister, not “First Agitator”. The present Secretary for State for Scotland once told Harvard University of the need
“to more closely align accountability with decision-making authority.”
Hear, hear. The chink of ice in the whisky cocktails in far-flung embassies is seductive, but while the Scottish Secretary is distracted, the SNP plots, and it is our constituents who will pay the bar bill and face the hangover.
Kirsty McNeill
Apologies, Madam Deputy Speaker—my mistake.
The hon. Member for Moray West, Nairn and Strathspey (Graham Leadbitter) said that he would like to focus some of this debate on the state of the health service in Scotland, and we would be delighted to address that. As we have heard repeatedly on the Floor of the House today, if people live south of the border, they experience more and more appointments being available and waiting lists going down; if they live up the road, one in six of them is on a waiting list. My hon. Friend the Member for Cumbernauld and Kirkintilloch (Katrina Murray), who I thank for her service in the NHS, relayed that so movingly. My hon. Friend the Member for Cowdenbeath and Kirkcaldy (Melanie Ward) did likewise and spoke movingly about the experience of patients in her area.
The hon. Member for Gordon and Buchan (Harriet Cross) talked about paused capital health spending in her constituency, and I am very sorry to hear that. I advise her to ask the SNP Government about the record settlement they had in the devolution area and where the money, which could have been put to good use for patients in her area, has gone.
The shadow Secretary of State, the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Andrew Bowie), asked this Government to be unequivocal in our support for the United Kingdom. I am pleased to confirm that we are, but we recognise that support for this family of nations is partly dependent on the delivery of this Government in Westminster. We are resolutely focused on delivering for Scots and cleaning up the mess that his party left.
The shadow Secretary of State’s party colleague, the hon. Member for Dumfries and Galloway (John Cooper), accused us of focusing too much on trade promotion— guilty as charged. We could almost taste the envy about the three trade deals secured under this Government. I am pleased to confirm that we will continue to promote Scotland’s world-class products and services to the world, and we will do so proudly and without apology.
John Cooper
The Minister will agree that the work on those trade deals was begun under the previous Administration.
Kirsty McNeill
Credit for those trade deals sits with those who got them over the line. This is a Labour Government who have delivered comprehensively for Scotland’s world-class producers and services, and we are delighted to have done so.
The hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry (Stephen Gethins) said that we should really be having a debate about accountability, and I agree with him. We have more quango chiefs than MSPs in Scotland, because it is actually very difficult to hold to account those who deliver public services and spend public money in Scotland. That is why Anas Sarwar is so intent on bringing back accountability to elected Members.