Brexit: Withdrawal Agreement and Political Declaration

Lord Mendelsohn Excerpts

Wednesday 5th December 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Mendelsohn (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the opening speakers for setting the scene for this debate so well. I particularly thank my noble friend Lady Smith of Basildon for setting the case for her Motion extremely well; I strongly support her. I have deep concerns about the withdrawal agreement and the political declaration, and I do not think that they are as illuminating as the Government believe. I am reminded of the old adage: it is darkest at the bottom of the lighthouse.

As a pragmatic businessman, I would have been open to accepting the Government’s intended plan at the very beginning to respect the will of the referendum and to set out a broad plan and timetable. But my confidence has strongly waned since then, and I truly believe not only that are we in the position of having an inadequate agreement but that it is time for us to return to the question of whether there is a place and time for another referendum.

The main long-term questions are still unresolved. The two-year period of negotiations has created an ever-larger series of negotiations, for many more years to come. All this is because the date for withdrawal was set before any plan was made. The planning and preparations continue to be inadequate, and options have not been properly evaluated. In business, we would call this stage of the process the heads of terms: we would come to the main agreement and be able to say that we had the basis of a deal, and then all the detail could be addressed in an orderly way. But this is not even remotely near a heads of terms. As an old mentor would say to me if I came back with an unfinished job, a cake with its ingredients missing is basically a biscuit. This is not a deal. Those so exhausted by this process that they believe any deal should come forward will be most disheartened by this deal’s consequences.

This deal is the unfortunate product of a process that has not just lacked long-term objectives and strategy, but been plagued by a piecemeal approach and lacked the most basic forms of consultation. It is too internally focused. There has been a deep lack of preparation and no desire to see the Government act in a way that would make this effort a national mission. It has been the story of internal political divisions and the agreement’s contents bear this out. That is not only on one party’s side, but one party is the Government.

The accompanying documents also cite the economic impact. The many economic projections all tell pretty much the same story: the loss of economic output over 10 years of a post-Brexit Britain will be somewhere between £40 billion at best and up to £200 billion. That is less than the projected £300 billion cost of the financial crisis, but it comes after it and after failed growth following the appalling austerity plan. One also has to admit that after we come to this agreement the period towards the next election will also have a tremendous amount of political uncertainty and fear for business, which will continue to be a drag on any prospect of growth. These objections also do not deal with some of the likely industry-specific consequences, be they in aviation, the car industry or across our services, which have a very uncertain future outside the EU. This is a terrible story of potential decline—one that we must be very concerned about, given the state of our public services, economy and development.

This is a matter that we must take deeply seriously and that we have to address with the public. The evidence is overwhelming. The future is not certain, but it is a certainty that we will be worse off. I might not share their view, but noble Lords can argue that Brexit is worth the economic damage it implies, that economics is not the most important consideration or even that some of these economic warnings are overblown, but it is absurd to say that there will be no damage at all. There are strong divisions in this country that will not be addressed by the outcome of the withdrawal agreement. It provides absolutely no certainty whatever, rather the prospect of continued division, uncertainty and negotiation.

The sense of betrayal from all sides of the debate has a poisonous impact on our body politic, and brings corrosion and a sense of disaffection. We can see this happening with awful things such as the terrible takeover of UKIP by the far right, which means that the next few years will be deeply unpleasant in our country unless we address this.

The agreement really does not help any of these matters and it is not the only option. Even if there is no capacity in anyone’s ability to renegotiate the arrangements with the EU, it is not the EU’s problem: it is our inability to have the right sort of vision or plan. It is easy to renegotiate. But there is now no doubt that even Article 50 can be stopped. When we come to crystallise our view we have the chance to make sure we make the right expression that we oppose the deal. We should say that it has no long-term vision, offers prolonged and ever worse division, and does not offer Britain wider economic prosperity and opportunities, and that we have to rise above our divisions.

Ultimately, we have to take a view on a new people’s vote. I truly believe we should also have remain as an option. This country has come to a point where it now understands Brexit’s consequences. They are too terrible to bear. Our position has not been resolved over two years. It is time to take this matter seriously with a long-term view.