(6 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberI certainly share the hon. Lady’s view that these are ill-thought-out closures, and I am very happy to take the specific point forward. I am sure that colleagues who serve on the Scottish Affairs Committee will also be prepared to put that view to the chief executive of the Royal Bank, who, I am pleased to say, has finally agreed to appear before that Committee.
The big issue for many rural communities, such as those in my constituency in the borders, will be the access to cash given that RBS is shutting so many branches on the back of previous bank closures. Can the Government do more to ensure that rural communities are getting access to the cash to support the local economies?
My hon. Friend raises a very good point. I would be very happy to meet him to discuss that issue further.
(6 years, 5 months ago)
Westminster HallWestminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
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I absolutely agree, and I thank my hon. Friend for making that point. I will come on to the differences in voting ages across the UK in just a moment.
Let us look at what has already happened in this place on votes at 16. I am glad and grateful to have secured this debate. I also spoke during the debate on the Representation of the People (Young People’s Enfranchisement and Education) Bill secured by my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham West and Royton (Jim McMahon). There were many passionate contributions during the debate—I made a short contribution—but the Bill did not quite make it to the next stage. It was talked out by the Conservatives for fear of losing a vote in Parliament on whether to proceed. I use the word “fear” deliberately. Some say that the Government do not want young people to vote because they are scared that they do not agree with their policies. That move during the debate showed me that the Government seem scared of their own MPs, some of whom I am sure would vote to support votes at 16.
The hon. Lady is making a very good case as to why young people should be able to vote. My party, the Scottish Conservative and Unionist party, opposed the extension of the voting age before the 2014 referendum in Scotland, but having seen how young people in Scotland were so enthusiastically involved in our referendum and the debate about our country and Scotland’s future within the United Kingdom, on reflection we decided to change our position. We now support the extension of the voting age to include 16 and 17-year-olds. I look forward to working with her and others in a personal capacity to persuade other Members of this place that extending the voting age is something that we should try to achieve.
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that contribution. I absolutely agree that all parties can get behind the issue and work together on it. I would very much welcome that from all parties from all parts of the House. That brings me perfectly on to my next point. Former Chancellor George Osborne has said that
“not only is extending the vote the right thing to do but…the cause is also unstoppable.”
I know that the Scottish Conservatives are supporters, with their leader, Ruth Davidson saying that she is a fully paid-up member of the votes at 16 club. We can speak and we can work together, but when can we vote on the issue in the House? Or are the Government going to block us from voting as well?
(6 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberOrder. I am sorry, but we must press on; we have a lot to get through. I call Mr Lamont.
Small charities are vital to the UK’s funding for international development. Last July, the small charities challenge fund was launched to support the work of small, UK-based charities in international development. The fund will enable these organisations to increase the reach and impact of their projects.
Scottish Borders makes a significant contribution to the UK’s overseas aid effort, often in the form of fundraising or volunteering for larger national charities. Local grassroots organisations can play a crucial role in some of the world’s poorest countries, but applying for funding can be challenging, and some worthy organisations might not be aware of opportunities such as the small charities challenge fund. Will the Minister reassure me that the Department is doing all it can to promote these funds and make applying for them as easy as possible?
I thank my hon. Friend for his excellent question. I agree that we need and have tried to make the process as simple and streamlined as possible. We have publicised it through a range of different regional events and—importantly—written to every Member of Parliament, because excellent local MPs such as my hon. Friend can publicise these opportunities to the great grassroots charities.
(6 years, 8 months ago)
Commons ChamberMy sincere apologies, Mrs Laing. You are right to reprimand me, and I apologise. I am talking about the powers that the Government are taking back—the naked power grab that is taking place against the Scottish Government.
The Secretary of State and the United Kingdom Government have made it absolutely clear that, after Brexit, the Scottish Parliament will be much more powerful than it is today. Despite that the right hon. Gentleman continues to stand and spout those views. That is just not the case. Our job is to protect Scotland’s place within the United Kingdom and within the internal market of the United Kingdom. Can he tell me the value to Scotland of the rest of the UK trade compared with the value to Scotland of trade with the EU?
My goodness, that really does demonstrate that they are not getting this. Purely and simply, it is about the powers that are being taken back from the EU that will sit here in Westminster. The Scotland Act is very clear about the areas that are devolved and the areas that are reserved. It comes to this fundamental point: are Conservative Members who have been sent here from Scottish constituencies going to defend the interests of the Scottish Parliament, or are they simply going to go through the Lobby tonight and speak up for London? Are they speaking up for Scotland or for London? That is the question that the Tories face tonight.
I do not know what part of that line the hon. Gentleman does not understand:
“Ministers of the Crown shall only create UK-wide frameworks”.
It does not talk about anybody else. I will leave that there. It is unfortunate. I do not know why Labour Front Benchers could not have come to us and had a conversation about it. We could have put forward our concerns. We could have come together consensually, as we have been doing quite a lot, and worked something out, but unfortunately that was not the approach they wanted to adopt. That was up to them.
Back to my friends in the Scottish Conservative party—I feel like I have neglected them now. This evening is a test for them. The future and the principles of the devolution settlement are up for grabs this evening. They can trust these guys here—the Ministers—trustworthy though they may be, to do the right thing. Perhaps they have received assurances that the Government are going to do all these things and that everything is going to be all right.
But what is not acceptable—I know most of my Scottish Conservative colleagues and friends are new to this place—is for this to go to the unelected House of Lords to be amended. That is what increasingly this Government are doing. They do not like to accept amendments in this place, which is a democratic outrage. This House, which we are all elected to by our constituents, should be the exclusive place in which these things are resolved and fixed down. If those Tories think that we should resolve these really important issues in a place that is full of unelected donors and cronies and failed Members of Parliament—I am thinking about the guy who opposed me in the Scottish Parliament and who managed to get himself in there and a role in the legislature—then that is their view, not mine. When we have debates about such critical issues, we owe it to our constituents to ensure that it is we who decide and determine them and not those in another place, which is unelected.
I hope that the Scottish Tories are right—I am looking round now and can see that they have full confidence that this will be resolved and fixed down—but the one way that they can definitely guarantee that they will get their way is to vote. That is what we do in this House: we vote on issues that we agree on and support. For the sake of the devolution settlement and to ensure that we get some sort of solution to everything that we need to get fixed, they should back us tonight, stand up for Scotland and make sure that these amendments are passed.
I will speak to the measures that relate to Scottish devolution, particularly clause 11, which we have heard so much about during this debate. However, before I do so, I want briefly to talk about my role in this process, and indeed that of other Scottish Conservative and Unionist Members here and in the Scottish Parliament. Our job is to ensure that the Bill is in a form that will ensure that the Scottish Parliament can give its approval through the legislative consent procedure. It is fair to say that without a legislative consent motion, the Brexit process will shudder to a halt and create a constitutional crisis. It is therefore imperative that the consent of the Scottish Parliament is achieved.
No, I just want to make a little bit of progress.
Although I do not support the amendments proposed by the Scottish and Welsh Governments—I will try to outline my reasons why—I do think that the UK Government need to do more to find a way forward with the devolved Administrations. The leader of the SNP here, the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford), completely misjudged the tone of the debate. Peddling lines about “power grabs” when the complete opposite has clearly been stated to be the case really was staggering. Moreover, I was astonished that the hon. Members for Edinburgh South (Ian Murray) and for Edinburgh West (Christine Jardine) seemed to be supporting the Scottish Government’s amendments, which would do so much harm to the integrity of the UK internal market and to Scotland’s place in the United Kingdom, given that so many of their voters voted overwhelmingly for Scotland to remain part of the United Kingdom in 2014.
Does the hon. Gentleman accept that I and, I hope, the hon. Member for Edinburgh South (Ian Murray) are doing what we believe is necessary to protect the devolution settlement? By doing so, we are doing much more to protect the United Kingdom than the Conservatives, who may actually be undermining it.
It is my colleagues on the Government Benches who have made the Scottish Parliament as powerful as it is today. The Scottish Secretary has given a guarantee that, after Brexit, the Scottish Parliament will have even more powers. The problem with the amendment that the hon. Lady intends to support is that it goes too far. It would harm the internal market of the United Kingdom and undermine Scotland’s place in the United Kingdom. I do not believe that that was what the voters of Edinburgh West or of Edinburgh South voted for when they voted for their MPs, with their Unionist credentials, back in June.
I just find this debate absolutely ironic. We talk about the power of the devolved Assemblies at a time when one individual, in a quick phone call with the Prime Minister, can scupper the whole policy and the whole plans for devolution. Nobody from the Democratic Unionist party is in the Chamber to argue their case. DUP Members will go into the Lobby to vote, but they will not come here to argue their case. That is the shame of this debate. There is no parallel between what is happening in Northern Ireland, and what is happening in Scotland and Wales.
The hon. Lady should perhaps look at last week’s discussions between the Secretary of State for Scotland and the Deputy First Minister for Scotland about how powers should be divided between this place and the Scottish Parliament. I believe that genuine progress is being made, but we should not rush it.
I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for allowing me to correct his inaccurate record. He talked about my constituents in Edinburgh South. I should know them better than he does, and they voted 68% to 32% to keep Scotland in the United Kingdom. There is no greater defender of that United Kingdom than me, but perhaps he would like to reflect on the fact that the danger to the United Kingdom is Brexit and English votes for English laws. He stood on a manifesto saying that he would not only maintain the single market and the customs union, but enhance them.
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that point. I will leave it to him to explain to his constituents why, by pressing his amendment, he will be putting at risk Scotland’s place in the United Kingdom. The amendment would damage the internal market of the United Kingdom and Scotland’s place in the United Kingdom. We are not supporting it because it goes too far. As my hon. Friend the Member for East Renfrewshire (Paul Masterton) explained, we want to amend the Bill, but we will not do so if it puts Scotland’s place within the United Kingdom at risk. The amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Edinburgh South would do that, and that is something that we will be reminding his voters of.
I come to this debate as someone who was disappointed with the result of the referendum in 2016, but I am also a democrat. We need to accept the result and move on to ensure that we get the best outcome possible for Scotland and the United Kingdom. SNP Members would do well to show a degree of acceptance of that, too. They have been on the losing side of two referendums in recent years, but they seem to be unable to accept the result of either.
Our job now is to deliver Brexit smoothly and in a legally coherent way. That is why the Bill is so important. It is horrifically complicated—I expect that most people in our country do not really understand what it is all about—and it could affect many aspects of our everyday lives, particularly in constituencies in parts of our country that are also governed by devolved Parliaments and Assemblies. Rather than focusing on the detailed wording of each clause, my approach has been to focus on outcomes. What do Scottish residents living in the border communities that I represent want to achieve from this process? What do Scottish farmers believe to be important? What do Scottish businesses and traders want from leaving the EU? What do our fishermen want to see on the other side of Brexit day? Ultimately, they all want as little disruption as possible. They want to be able to trade, move, and work within Scotland’s most important trading partner—the rest of the United Kingdom.
Given the concerns that the hon. Gentleman is raising about many issues and the complexity that he is describing, is he not surprised to hear that, in recent moments, the statement that the Prime Minister was due to give to the House tomorrow about the negotiations and these matters of devolved Administrations has apparently been cancelled? The Prime Minister will not be coming here. Does he not agree that she should come to this House to explain just what is going on with these negotiations?
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I will not get involved in a running commentary on what he has been reading on Twitter. I look forward to hearing what the Prime Minister has to say when she is ready to speak to us.
My priority from Brexit is twofold. My first priority is to protect the integrity of the UK internal market, which is worth four times more to Scottish businesses than that of the European Union. The other priority is to get the best possible access to the EU market. That, I believe, is also the priority of SNP colleagues, although there are differences over how we define the word “possible”.
The amendments proposed by the Scottish and Welsh Governments would, I believe, put the United Kingdom internal market at risk, which is why I cannot support them. By automatically devolving powers, they would place unnecessary barriers to trade between Scotland and the rest of the UK, our largest market. While accepting the need for common frameworks, the Scottish Government’s approach seems to be that everything should be devolved on day one and there should then be a process of trying to re-reserve powers to Westminster at a later date once we know what trade agreements require a UK-wide approach. That approach would bring an extra layer of uncertainty at an already uncertain time.
Does not the hon. Gentleman agree that these powers have already been devolved? We are talking about powers coming back that have already been devolved, rather than something fresh and new.
These powers are with the European Union just now. We all accept that there will be a need for UK-wide framework agreements, and we need to get the process right. Why rush into devolving everything to the Scottish Parliament when the framework agreements might require powers to be retained at a UK level to protect the UK internal market, and to allow us to enter into trade agreements with other countries around the world? It is critical that we get things done in a logical and thoughtful way, rather than rushing into a situation that we might be unable to unpick further down the line.
Does my hon. Friend agree that there are many moving parts in the current process? Our debate is taking place at a time when many things are on the move. For example, there was a very positive meeting last week between representatives of Scotland’s two Governments. Does my hon. Friend welcome that, and does he believe, as I do, that we should be optimistic that we can come up with an agreement based on some of the things that the Scottish Affairs Committee mentioned in its report?
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. Significant progress is being made between the two Governments, which was why I was so disappointed with the opening remarks of the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber. There is not a million miles between the two Governments.
But does the hon. Gentleman accept that this is not just about how well Scotland’s two Governments are talking to each other? It is also about Wales and Northern Ireland—it is about each devolution settlement. We should not expect the situations in Wales and Northern Ireland to be dependent on the outcome of talks between Scotland’s two Governments.
I accept that the UK Government are holding discussions with the other parts of the United Kingdom, but I am here to represent a Scottish constituency and my Scottish constituents. I would not be doing my job properly if I did not focus on Scotland and the challenges that Brexit will present there.
I want to make a little bit more progress.
I completely reject the Scottish Government’s unhelpful narrative in the early stages of this process—we have heard it from some who have spoken today—that there is a power grab. No powers that are currently exercised by the Scottish Parliament will be reserved to the Westminster Parliament. Every decision that the Scottish Parliament could have taken before Brexit will still be possible after March 2019. The Scottish Parliament will, in fact, be given greater powers as we leave the European Union. This Bill maintains the current powers of the Scottish Parliament. It merely replaces the restriction on legislating contrary to EU law with the restriction on legislating contrary to EU retained law.
I am beyond confused by the hon. Gentleman’s assumption that we would reserve the powers that come back from the EU here on the basis of trade deals. The hon. Member for Stirling (Stephen Kerr) is shaking his head, but the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) did say that the powers would be reserved based on trade negotiations. As a Welsh MP, I want to know whether the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk is saying that this British Parliament is to forfeit Welsh lamb in favour of Trump’s chicken. Will he clarify what he means by the powers being reserved based on trade?
My comments relate to the UK-wide framework agreements, on which I thought there was cross-party agreement. We need the framework agreements to protect the integrity of the UK internal market’s operations. As we progress out of Brexit, we will enter into trade deals with other countries, and it is important that the United Kingdom as an entity can offer one approach—common standards—in those negotiations. That will be good for Scottish business and for our constituents, and it is one reason why the framework agreements are so important.
I just want to make a little more progress.
The UK Government have made it crystal clear that clause 11 is temporary until powers can be devolved. It is simply wrong to suggest that the Bill is some sort of power grab by Westminster. I suggest that this is just another chapter in the SNP’s book of grievance politics.
The hon. Gentleman makes a point about the power grab, but he needs to understand that this phrase is not just used by the SNP. As I said earlier, it was first used by the former British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown. Government Members have been surprised that I am quoting Gordon Brown, but the Conservative and Unionist party needs to understand that all the Scottish parties—apart from the Conservatives—are united in their desire to protect the devolution settlement. The hon. Gentleman is describing what he hopes will happen, but clause 11 will not enable that to happen, because it involves top-down imposition, rather than organic upwards agreement.
The hon. and learned Lady is misrepresenting the Scottish Conservative and Unionist party’s position. We are completely committed to devolution. We have delivered more powers to the Scottish Parliament than any other party in this Chamber and we will continue to do so after Brexit. It is completely disingenuous to suggest anything else.
On a point of order, Mr Crausby. The hon. Gentleman has used the word “disingenuous”. We have already heard from the Chair once today that that word ought not to be used about another hon. Member. I very much hope that the hon. Gentleman is not suggesting that I am being disingenuous. We might disagree, but I am not being disingenuous. I invite him to withdraw the comment.
The hon. Gentleman should not have used the word “disingenuous”. I am sure that he will learn from it.
I will learn, Mr Crausby, and I am happy to withdraw the remark.
The hon. and learned Lady said that the Scottish Conservative and Unionist party was in some way not supportive of devolution, which is just not the case. She has given me the opportunity to repeat my point: this party has delivered more powers to the Scottish Parliament than any other party in this Chamber, and it will continue to do so after Brexit.
No; I think I have heard quite enough from the hon. and learned Lady this evening. Despite the rhetoric of the Scottish National party, the opposite is in fact true, as the UK Government and the Scottish Government are relatively close to reaching an agreement.
Does my hon. Friend agree that it would be of better service to all our constituents if we dialled down the rhetoric and looked closely at the positions that we all hold? We all agree that we need some common frameworks, and we all agree that the JMC and bilateral negotiations are the right way to make progress. Does he agree that we need to let the negotiations progress so that they can inform future changes to the Bill?
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Both sides agree on the need for common frameworks. As I listened to the Scottish Government’s Michael Russell and the Secretary of State for Scotland speaking yesterday, it was clear that significant progress has been made in the discussions between the two Governments, which is to be welcomed.
I also welcome the clear statement from the Secretary of State for Scotland that the UK Government’s default position will be devolution in policy areas that are already devolved, and that common frameworks must be agreed, not imposed on the devolved Administrations. The problem with the SNP’s demands is that they would rush a complicated process. I do not support an arbitrary timetable for listing what will be devolved and what needs to be dealt with on a UK basis until that has been agreed between the two Governments. I hope that we can proceed in a constructive way to achieve that. Although the Government are right to take their time, we do need further clarity from them on such matters during the progress of the Bill. In particular, we need more information about the areas in which common UK-wide frameworks are likely to be required.
Finally, it is absolutely not constructive—internally and within the EU—to have the threat of a second independence referendum hanging over the Brexit negotiations. We have seen the front pages of the Scottish press this morning, with the First Minister again talking about the case for independence. I see some SNP Members nodding enthusiastically. This is creating an extra layer of uncertainty for businesses in Scotland and making the task of negotiating with the EU even more difficult.
It seems as if the hon. Gentleman is coming towards the end of his speech. Before he does, will he clarify a matter for the Committee? Is he saying that if something is part of a UK-wide trade deal, it will remain reserved to this place even though it is devolved under schedule 5 to the Scotland Act 1998?
If the two Governments agree that a power is required for the framework, that is the type of power that will have to be retained. That will protect the integrity of the UK market and allow our country to do trade deals with other countries of the world, but it will be an agreed position. That is why the discussions between the Scottish Government and the UK Government are so important. That is why I have said throughout my speech that I believe significant progress has been made to get to this point, which I certainly welcome.
I urge the SNP to put the national interest first and to work more constructively with the UK Government to achieve what we all want, which is the best outcome for Scotland and the United Kingdom from leaving the EU. I look forward to working with my colleagues in the UK Government to ensure that this Bill works for Scotland and for my constituents in the Scottish borders.