Trade Bill

Kirsty Blackman Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 17th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Stewart Hosie]

That is a reasonable question, and I will answer it properly. Clearly we cannot tell precisely where the problems will arise, because we do not yet know precisely what the UK Government might do. Having said that, the Bill gives back to Ministers discretionary powers over procurement. In Scotland, because of the actions taken there, 78% of publicly procured contracts go to small and medium-sized enterprises, 60% to Scottish SMEs. The UK Government figure is 20%. If that power is taken back, and if oversight is retained by Westminster, there would be a real risk that we could lose that economic diversity and that fantastic achievement in a real-life area. That is a real concern that I hope the right hon. Gentleman will share.

I shall turn briefly to the amendments. Amendments 25 and 26 seek to address an issue in the Bill that has a direct read-across to clauses in the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 that confer powers on UK Ministers in devolved areas without any form of devolved consent. No amendments have been made to the Act to alter that approach or to require the consent of Scottish Ministers when UK Ministers make regulations in devolved areas. Amendments 25 and 26 seek to ensure that the UK Government seek consent from devolved Ministers before amending legislation in devolved areas.

Before I move on, I meant to say that I recognise that Government amendments 64 and 66, and consequential amendments 65 and 67, now require Scottish Ministers only to consult and not to seek consent in certain areas. However, the number of areas is limited, and the amendments do not address all the problems.

Amendment 27 requires the Secretary of State to consult Scottish Ministers before deciding whether, or for how long, to prolong the period during which implemented powers can be used. That is important because there is no equivalent provision in the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, and because no amendment has been made to the existing provisions in the Trade Bill that allow the UK Government unilaterally to alter the powers of Scottish Ministers in relation to grandfathering trade arrangements for further periods of up to five years at a time.

At present, it is envisaged that the powers in the Trade Bill relating to the grandfathering of existing free trade arrangements with third countries would have to be used in only a very small number of cases that could not be dealt with under the European Union (Withdrawal) Act—for example, for reasons of timing. However, with so much uncertainty around the ease with which existing agreements will be rolled over, it is possible that this restriction could have a more significant impact, not least because many of the 24 areas likely to be subject to the clause 11 regulations—that is, the power grab—are highly relevant to the world of trading and trade deals. If left unamended, or amended only along similar lines to the amendments in the withdrawal Act, this provision in the Trade Bill would in effect allow the UK Government to change the law in devolved areas to allow for the implementation of these arrangements, which might not necessarily remain exactly as they are at present. In essence, that is close enough to having an ability to implement a new trade Bill with almost no consultation or consent at all. Our amendment 28 deals with that problem.

Amendment 29 is small and seeks a direct read across from the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018. It would replace the need for consent from UK Ministers in certain circumstances with the need only to consult. As I said, I note the Government amendments in that regard.

We are not arguing for vetoes for Scotland nor for any sense of Scottish exceptionalism; we are simply looking at the facts, understanding what is going on and what needs to happen. If Scottish Ministers are required to consult or seek consent when Scottish parliamentary responsibilities intersect with UK responsibilities, we are simply arguing that UK Ministers should be under the same obligation to consult or seek consent where UK policy responsibilities intersect with those of the devolved Administrations. It was said in the last debate that that happens with the Parliaments of Belgium, and it also happens with the Canadian provinces. The world does not collapse when proper respect and statutory weight is given to the rights and responsibilities of sub-state administrations. It is common sense. We are trying to improve the situation to make it work and to ensure that our voices and our national interests are protected and that the rights of the devolved Administrations are respected.

Time is short, and we do not want many votes on this group so as to allow time for the last group, particularly new clause 18, which needs to be properly debated, but I hope to press amendment 25 to a vote.

[Kirsty Blackman (Aberdeen North) (SNP)]

I will not speak for long because our Front-Bench spokesperson, my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee East (Stewart Hosie) has covered the issues well, but I want to talk briefly about why it is important that the Scottish Parliament, Scottish Ministers and the Scottish people in general should have more of a say in deals going forward than is proposed by the UK Government.

In recent times, the UK Government have not had responsibility for signing off and negotiating trade deals. They have not been the key player. Therefore, they have not been able to undertake some of the practices that we think they could undertake, so it is understandable that the Scottish people are worried given that we have been monumentally badly served by the UK Government over decades. Just look at the roll-out of universal credit, the bedroom tax, the rape clause and the passage of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018—legislation that happened despite the Scottish Parliament refusing consent. All those things show the ways in which the UK Government are badly serving Scotland.

Until I was an MP, I genuinely thought that the UK Government were, at times, probably trying their best. When I got elected to this place, I discovered that when the UK Government propose legislation and we say to them, “Have you thought about how this will affect Scotland?” the answer is not that they are trying to do anything bad, it is just that they forget we exist. They just do not even consider the views of Scotland or the differences in Scotland. Look at how the common fisheries policy has been negotiated by the UK Government, for example. The way that the Government negotiated swaps removed quota rights from Scottish fishermen to the benefit of fishermen in the south of England. Such choices made by the UK Government have a direct negative impact on Scottish people. On that basis, it is understandable that we are worried that the UK Government will not take decisions in Scotland’s best interests because they may simply forget that we exist.

[John Redwood]

Does the hon. Lady understand that the common fisheries policy and international trade deals have been entirely in the power of the European Union? To the extent that they do not suit Scotland, it is the EU’s fault. Can she not see that power is coming back to the benefit of Scotland and the United Kingdom?

--- Later in debate ---

[Kirsty Blackman]

Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman did not hear what I said. The issue is that the UK Government have chosen to negotiate swaps that directly disadvantage Scottish fishermen. The concern is that the weight of the population in the south of England will mean that the UK Government continue to take decisions that improve life for people in the south of England without taking account of the fact that those decisions are detrimental to people in Scotland.

The amendments we have tabled would therefore ensure that, in decisions that are taken in this place—decisions on which the UK Parliament will have more power than it has had in recent decades—the voice of Scotland is heard, because we need decisions that do not disadvantage the people of Scotland.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil]

You catch me finishing off a Trebor extra-strong mint, Madam Deputy Speaker, and very nice it was, too.

At a time when the House is investigating bilateral trade agreements, my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen North (Kirsty Blackman) made the fantastic point that for 40 years the UK Government stipulated in their bilateral trade agreements, “London airports only.” It was only when they demanded that Iceland should fly to London airports and Iceland said, “There is no way we’re flying to a London airport to get the sleeper back to Glasgow,” that some change was brought about—that was relayed to me by the Icelanders themselves.

Trade agreements, by their very nature, require trade-offs, and there should be aggregate gains to the two parties involved. Within those aggregate gains, there will be people in certain sectors who lose. My International Trade Committee heard about that from Kevin Roberts of Meat Promotion Wales. He told us that some 80% of Wales is either upland hills or pasture and is suitable only for livestock farming, which is a fragile sector. About 80% of the net farm incomes of Wales come from EU subsidies, which is another matter.

Let us consider a situation in which the UK Government find themselves in a trade negotiation with somebody who says, “Do you know what? See if you could let us have some access to your market for our lamb and we’ll give you something else.” Wales would lose out. The aggregate gain to UK GDP would be increased—the right hon. Member for Wokingham (John Redwood) spoke on this point—but there would be a loss to Wales and there would be resentment in the UK to fiscal transfers back to Wales, which had sacrificed and given up things for the aggregate gain of the UK as a unit. That is one reason why many countries do not have the control freakery of the Labour and Conservative parties and allow territories, states and subnational Governments to have a voice at the table.

We should remember that Wales is not a member of the UK in the same way as Ireland is a member of the European Union. Ireland, as we have seen week in and week out, day in and day out, month in and month out, and hour in and hour out, has a real voice in Europe. In fact, some Brexiteers complain that Ireland is now the tail that wags the EU dog. If only that were a possibility for Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland within the UK, there might not then be the concerns that my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee East (Stewart Hosie) raised. That is why there should be some responsibility and some form of acknowledgement from the big beast of the UK—England, or the south-east of England—that it might gain from a free trade agreement at the expense of other places. We need some counterbalancing measures.

In a way, the Brexiteers are constitutional gold dust, because I want to see Scotland catching up with Ireland at the top of the EU growth league, rather than being at the bottom with the UK. This is putting a strain on the United Kingdom. As Laura Dunlop, QC, told the Exiting the European Union Committee:

“At the moment, there is a sense of a double-whammy: that the international arrangements, whatever they are going to be, will be negotiated by the UK Government, and then the UK Government will be telling the devolveds what they have to do to comply with them. The participation is minimal.”

That is an unsustainable way forward. It does not respect the words we heard in 2014, “Scotland, stay in and lead. Do not just be a part; lead the UK.” When push comes to shove, as we have seen all the way through the European Union withdrawal process, Scotland is shoved to one side. It is all rhetoric. If the Government had the grace to put some of their rhetoric into action, they would be accepting some of the amendments here today. This is not big stuff in any other country, so why is it a big deal in the centralised UK, both to the Tory Government and, sadly, to the Labour Opposition, who feel that they must also adopt the centralising approach? It is really disappointing from both of them.