Trade (Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership) Bill [Lords]

Debate between Liam Byrne and Greg Hands

Report stage
Tuesday 19th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Gareth Thomas]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. Ministers will have heard his point; whether they will act on it remains to be seen, but I certainly hope they do. If we are lucky enough to be elected at the next general election, we will certainly work with the ILO to try to drive better adherence to its conventions.

Last but not least, I share the ambition of my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow, who made a powerful speech, for a much more open dialogue on trade and the axing of more of the red tape, bureaucracy and barriers to trade with European markets thrown up by the poor negotiating skills of the last Prime Minister but two.

There remain, in particular, serious concerns about scrutiny of trade agreements and about the damage that ISDS provisions could do, so we will, with the leave of the House, press new clauses 4 and 5 to a vote.

[The Minister for Trade Policy (Greg Hands)]

I thank colleagues for their contributions to the debates on this important Bill. Let me begin with the new clauses relating to new accessions to the CPTPP: new clause 1, tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith)—who always demonstrates his passion on this important matter—new clause 4, tabled by the hon. Member for Harrow West (Gareth Thomas), and new clause 11, tabled by the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Sarah Green).

As the House may know, there is no rule within the CPTPP that requires new applicants to be dealt with on a “first come, first served” basis. Rather, it has been agreed within the group that applicant economies must meet three important criteria—called the Auckland principles—and it is on those key principles that applications will be assessed. Applicants must: first, be willing and able to meet the high standards of the agreement; secondly, have a demonstrated pattern of complying with their trade commitments; and thirdly, be able to command consensus of the CPTPP parties. Those strong criteria will be applied to each accession application. It is right that we in the United Kingdom, as a new member of the CPTPP group, work within the principles of the group to achieve a consensus decision.

I remind the House that while the UK rightly participates in discussions on this topic with CPTPP parties, we will only have a formal say over an application post-ratification and entry into force of the agreement. It is therefore crucial that we ratify the agreement and become a party, so that we can work with CPTPP members decisively on each current and future application. With that in mind, it would not be appropriate for the Government to give a running commentary on individual applicants, not least because to be drawn on individual applicants now, ahead of the UK becoming a party to the agreement, could have an impact on our ability to achieve that important goal of ensuring that the CPTPP enters into force. I should also make it clear that our own accession process has set a strong precedent. The robust experience that the UK has undergone has reinforced the high standards and proved that the bar is not easy to meet for any aspirant.

Regarding the scrutiny of any hypothetical future accession, I can assure the House that any accession of a new party to the CPTPP would require an amendment to the terms of the CPTPP. Therefore, as with the UK’s accession protocol, our firm intention is that such a future accession would be subject to the terms of the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010—the CRaG process. I assure the House that CRaG is applicable to plurilateral agreements such as the CPTPP. The Act makes no distinction between bilateral, plurilateral or multilateral treaties as outlined in section 25 of CRaG.

[Liam Byrne]

The Minister is being characteristically generous in giving way. We obviously sought a debate under CRaG for this treaty. The Secretary of State, who is now in her place, told our Committee that she supported that, but the Leader of the House then refused to make Government time available for that debate. What further assurances can the Minister give us that there would indeed be a debate if the treaty was changed in the way that he described?

[Greg Hands]

The Government’s position is unchanged. It is always the desire of the Government, as expressed by the Secretary of State in writing to the House and to the right hon. Gentleman as Chair of the Select Committee, to urge and to ask for there to be a debate, but that will always be subject to the availability of parliamentary time. In a little bit, I will discuss the opportunities that there have been to scrutinise the CPTPP, which have been manifold in recent years.

[Greg Hands]

I will give way a little later.

The Act makes no distinction between bilateral, plurilateral and multilateral treaties. In addition to Parliament being able to make its views clear through the CRaG process, let me remind the House that, as a dualist state, any legislation necessary to implement the treaty—such as alterations to tariffs legislation, to take a hypothetical example—would need to be fully scrutinised and passed by Parliament in the usual way. It is the long-standing policy of His Majesty’s Government not to ratify international agreements before all relevant domestic legislation is in place. Were Parliament to refuse to pass any necessary implementing legislation, ratification of an agreement would be delayed.

I thank my right hon. Friends the Members for Chingford and Woodford Green and for North Somerset (Sir Liam Fox) for their opening speeches. Both are strong supporters of the UK joining the CPTPP. Indeed, my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset, who is the former Secretary of State, initiated these talks back in 2017 with me at his side, and successive Secretaries of State have given maximum priority to doing so. I am now in my fourth stint in this role, and it is fantastic to see his and my vision in 2017 now nearing fruition and being very close to UK ratification.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green and I know that Parliament is perfectly capable of expressing a view on an international agreement and whether a country might join it, and the Government of the day would be very likely to take notice. In debates in this House over some years now, he has made clear his views on trade with China, has gained support and attention, and been effective in doing so. Indeed, he has helped to achieve changes in policy in relation to supply chains in Xinjiang, and I agree with his support for Taiwan —a full member of the World Trade Organisation—as an important trade partner for the UK. We are positive about this kind of debate in the House.

The right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Liam Byrne), who chairs the Select Committee, mentioned the scrutiny that there has been in this House for the CPTPP agreement, and he doubted whether there had been four debates. I had a slightly nagging feeling that I may actually remember each of the four debates, so I went back and checked the four debates, which started with the very first one that I responded to in April 2021. There have been four debates in this House and in the other House on the CPTPP. There have also been two oral ministerial statements and 16 written ministerial statements, and five separate Select Committees have taken evidence from Ministers and senior officials on the matter. There has been a Trade and Agriculture Commission report and a section 42 report. This is not an under-scrutinised trade agreement—rather the opposite. As has always been clear, we want the CPTPP to expand to fast-growing Asia-Pacific economies. I also agree with the Auckland principles.

[Liam Byrne]

rose—

[Greg Hands]

Of course I will give way—if the right hon. Gentleman first concedes that this has been a well-scrutinised trade deal.

[Liam Byrne]

Not quite. I am grateful to the Minister for setting out the full history, but will he accept that the Secretary of State believed that we should have had a debate, under the CRaG principles, on the full treaty? This Bill covers only three of 30 treaties. It is a matter of disappointment to many of us in the House that even though the Secretary of State no doubt argued vigorously and passionately for the debate, the Leader of the House was unable to grant us time. That is not necessarily the precedent that we want to establish for further trade treaty scrutiny.

[Greg Hands]

Of course, the right hon. Gentleman was a Minister in the last Labour Government, and he will remember that there are the vagaries of time available. Making an application to say that we would like there to be a debate is not the same as those who run the parliamentary timetable agreeing to there being one.

Let me move on to the new hon. Member for Kingswood (Damien Egan), who made a very accomplished and well delivered maiden speech. He spoke fondly of predecessors whom I know and like, such as Roger Berry and Rob Hayward. He won a keenly contested by-election—I have been to a few by-elections in recent years, and I was grateful to be given a bit of time off and to not go to Kingswood. None the less, I have great admiration for those who win by-elections. I have seen at close hand that they are a different kind of contest.

The hon. Gentleman spoke of his support for free trade and for rewarding hard work, and expressed sympathy for the Government, who have faced the challenges of covid and Ukraine. I agree with him on all of those issues, and the Government do too. I look forward to his continuing the tradition of an independent-minded Member for Kingswood—but please do not tell the Labour Whips Office.

As ever, my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Anthony Mangnall) spoke passionately about trade and CPTPP. He is always probing on those issues.

Various amendments and new clauses that have been tabled ask for additional impact assessments. Before addressing some of those amendments directly, I would like to reassure the House that the Government will publish a biennial monitoring report and a comprehensive evaluation report of the agreement within five years of our accession.

Amendment 1 and new clause 12 would introduce commitments to publish impact assessments on the performers’ rights provisions in this Bill, and I will set out why we consider them to be unnecessary. The impacts of the rules depend in large part on how they are applied in particular cases through secondary legislation made under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. That secondary legislation may restrict or extend particular rights to particular countries. Wherever the Government intend to make significant changes to the secondary legislation, we will engage with affected industries and carry out an impact assessment. The Intellectual Property Office has done that recently with its consultation and its assessment of the impact of potential secondary legislation on the broadcasting and public playing of recorded music. A commitment to assess the impacts of the measures in this Bill is therefore unnecessary, and risks overlooking the effects of the secondary legislation.

I will now turn to new clauses 2 and 6, which broadly focus on environmental and other standards. I can provide assurance that the UK will continue to uphold our high environmental standards in respect of all our trade agreements, including CPTPP. As I have previously mentioned, the Government intend to publish a comprehensive ex post evaluation of the agreement within five years of the UK’s accession, and I can confirm that this evaluation will include an assessment of the environmental impacts of our accession. In addition, the independent Trade and Agriculture Commission was asked to scrutinise the UK’s accession protocol and produce a report. The TAC concluded in its advice, published on 7 December 2023, that

“CPTPP does not require the UK to change its levels of statutory protection”

in relation to the aforementioned areas.

UK Accession to CPTPP

Debate between Liam Byrne and Greg Hands

Thursday 22nd February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Liam Byrne]

The way that we approached our analysis was to look at food standards and whether they would be diminished by our joining the treaty. The Trade and Agriculture Commission looked at three questions, which are talked about in paragraphs 40 to 42 of the report. We reported the Trade and Agriculture Commission’s advice, which was that there would not be a diminution in the statutory protection of food standards in this country, and that we would, in fact, be allowed to reinforce some of those protections.

However, as the hon. Gentleman importantly flags, we are now finding that sometimes the devil is in the detail. Despite having joined CPTPP with Canada, we now appear to be struggling to get in place a free trade agreement with Canada. The Canadian Government are very clear that technical discussions have stopped. I understand that the Secretary of State, or a spokesman for her, told the Financial Times yesterday that discussions were ongoing, but discussions are not trade talks. If discussions were trade talks, we would be having trade talks with the entire world right now, because our diplomats around the world are in constant engagement with their counterparts in different parts of the planet. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to flag that issue. The reassurance that I can give him is that we do not see this treaty lead to a softening of the trade standards that we so treasure in this country.

[The Minister for Trade Policy (Greg Hands)]

I welcome the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Liam Byrne) and his report. I think that this is the first time that I have had an interaction with him since my return to the Department and since he became the Chair of the Select Committee. Of course, as two former Chief Secretaries to the Treasury, we are well used to a bit of sparring over the years. His report is good, strong and constructive, and he makes some strong points about FTAs being, of course, choices. I welcome his statement that CPTPP has been well scrutinised in this House.

I do not intend to give an answer to any general questions raised, because it is not me who is being asked. However, I point out to the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Richard Foord) that the National Farmers Union does welcome the UK joining CPTPP. I say to the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill that a new FTA implementation unit in the Department for Business and Trade is looking at the important point he raised about how, post-signature, we ensure that the agreements work for British businesses and British consumers. On investor-state dispute settlement, nothing prevents a right to regulate in this country and it can be of benefit to British businesses overseas, guaranteeing jobs at home.

My only question for the right hon. Gentleman is really just a clarification. He says that CPTPP represents 15% of the Indo-Pacific area, which I think is true in the sense that China and India are not in CPTPP, and that therefore it is quite a small economic bloc. But if I can just take issue with him, CPTPP is currently about 12% of global GDP and the UK joining would make that 15%. So he is not wrong in what he says, but if he could just acknowledge that the part of global GDP in CPTPP is also 15%, not just a portion of the Indo-Pacific trade.

[Liam Byrne]

I am grateful to the Minister for that question and for welcoming the report. We look forward to welcoming him before the Committee at some point in the near future to talk about some of our forthcoming reports on export-led growth. The point he makes is right and I am glad that, for once, he and I agree on the numbers—that has not always been the case. The reason we wanted to flag it is that the Government’s impact assessment states:

“CPTPP membership acts as a gateway to the wider Indo-Pacific region which is expected to account for the majority…of global growth between 2021 and 2050.”

We appreciate that all Governments need to hard-sell their policy achievements—that is the nature of the game we are in—but it is important that we do not oversell the treaty. The reality is that it accounts for only quite a small fraction of the Indo-Pacific market, which is trumpeted in the impact assessment and in the integrated review as one of the treaty’s virtues. We must be clear-eyed and hard-headed about precisely what gain comes from this treaty specifically, and it would help us all, frankly, if the Government set out their road map for growing the treaty in future.

National Policy Statement: Airports

Debate between Liam Byrne and Greg Hands

Monday 25th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Greg Hands]

My right hon. Friend makes a very important point about the introduction of the first point-to-point flight from Australia to London. It returns to my point about what is in not just my constituency’s interests but London’s interests as a whole and the national interest. Creating the super-hub at Heathrow clearly suits the interests of British Airways and of Heathrow. I have nothing against that. I am a Conservative and have nothing against companies doing well, but we should not equate that with the national interest.

I promised to say a few words about night flights.

[Liam Byrne (Birmingham, Hodge Hill) (Lab)]

I respect the position in which the right hon. Gentleman finds himself. Birmingham airport could take 17 million extra flights now on the existing infrastructure, and that capacity could be unlocked if we built the high-speed loop that was originally proposed. The cost of that loop would be about half that proposed for the new runway at Heathrow. Should we not look again at using high-speed rail to unlock capacity we already have rather than bring forward a proposal that will drain 43,000 flights from our airport?

[Greg Hands]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that intervention. I support high-speed rail. With regard to the sort of solutions that one could come up with with the money being spent here, I certainly think that that is probably an example of the sort of thing that could increase the UK’s connectivity as a whole.

On night flights, the situation is untenable. There are allowed to be up to 16 flights each night, starting from 4.30 am. I hear these planes at 4.30. I frequently receive letters about them from my constituents. One can almost time the first flight coming over at 4.30. This is done in the interests of a few thousand people. These are important people travelling from the far east to this country to do business; nevertheless, we are talking about a few thousand people measured against the convenience of many hundreds of thousands of people living directly under those flight paths, many of whom are some of the most economically productive people in this country, paying a lot of taxation. We should not ignore their interests. We need to ban night flights—6 am is early enough. Even if this proposal is to be adopted, the minimum quid pro quo should be the abolition of all arrivals before 6 am. We definitely do not want this stealthy smoothing.

I have just outlined a few of the arguments against this policy statement. The proposal is fundamentally flawed, but this vote is also about integrity and about the pledges that we make to our electors. It is to be regretted that we will not now have a free vote, but I urge colleagues to vote against the proposal tonight.

UK Economy

Debate between Liam Byrne and Greg Hands

Wednesday 29th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Greg Hands]

No, I will carry on.

The result may not have been what some of us wanted, hoped for or even expected, but that does not mean that the Government were unprepared for it. In the past six years, we have been working hard to bring our economy back from the brink and get our public finances back under control. We said we needed to fix the roof for any economic storms ahead, and that is what we have done. We have brought down the deficit, and we have steady growth, record employment and a resilient financial system, which we spent the past six years strengthening.

We have done the analysis on what leaving the EU might mean, and considered the potential impacts on our economy in both the short and the long term. There was general consensus in the House a fortnight ago on the risks we might face, so hon. Members recognise that it will not be plain sailing and that there are challenges ahead, but thanks to the measures we have taken over the past six years our economy is as well prepared as it could be to face whatever comes our way.

We anticipated that there would be an immediate impact on the value of our currency and the stability of the financial markets. The Treasury, the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority have extensive contingency plans in place and we are watching the markets closely. Although we have seen volatility, the markets nevertheless continue to function effectively.

The Prudential Regulation Authority has worked closely with major financial institutions to prepare extensively for the consequences of a vote to leave. The Bank of England stress tests show that UK banks have enough capital and liquidity reserves to withstand a scenario more severe than the country currently faces. Thanks to our work to strengthen our financial stability, banks in the UK have raised more than £130 billion of additional capital in the past six years, and have more than £600 billion in liquid assets to ensure that they can keep lending to UK businesses and households during challenging times. The Bank of England can provide more than £250 billion of additional funds to support the banks and the smooth functioning of the markets. It can also provide liquidity in foreign currency if required. The authorities have all the necessary tools in place to protect financial stability. They are monitoring developments closely and will not hesitate to take further measures as required.

As we embark upon the renegotiation of our relationship with the EU, I reiterate the reassurances of the Prime Minister that the result does not mean that everything changes overnight. For British subjects living in the EU and EU citizens living in this country, there will be no immediate changes. People can still travel across the EU, businesses can trade as they did and our services can be sold as before.

The Prime Minister has been clear that there will be no immediate triggering of article 50, the procedure by which a member state can leave the EU. That gives us time to plan the new arrangements we are seeking with our European friends and neighbours. It also gives the Prime Minister’s successor the opportunity to make any adjustments to economic policy and our public spending, informed by an assessment of our economic situation from the independent Office for Budget Responsibility this autumn. In the meantime, we will continue to work hard to maintain the fiscal stability we have always worked so hard to deliver. A new unit will be set up in Whitehall bringing together experts from across the civil service, and in answer to the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill I can say that it will extend right across Whitehall, including all Departments likely to be affected, and that it will be given the resources it needs.

[Liam Byrne]

The Home Office?

[Greg Hands]

Yes, it will include the Home Office, and it will advise on the many options we face as we determine our future relationship with the EU. As Chief Secretary to the Treasury, I expect to play my own part in that task over the coming months.