Oral Answers to Questions

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Thursday 13th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Chris Law (Dundee West) (SNP)]

11. What steps he is taking to prepare UK ports for when the UK leaves the EU.

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

17. What steps he is taking to prepare UK ports for when the UK leaves the EU.

[Tonia Antoniazzi (Gower) (Lab)]

18. What steps he is taking to prepare UK ports for when the UK leaves the EU.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ms Ghani]

I was hoping that the hon. Gentleman was going to talk up his own ports and the extra business that will become available once we have left Europe, considering how excited ports are about the further opportunities coming our way. As I mentioned earlier, it was right and proper that we prepared for no deal, and we were working with a number of Government Departments to make sure capacity was available. The question of capacity was not for this Department; it was for a number of other Departments. It is curious that the hon. Gentleman does not also reflect on what the Scottish Government wanted in place just in case they needed extra capacity as well.

[Marion Fellows]

So far the Secretary of State’s reckless actions on ferry contracts alone have cost £43.8 million in termination payouts to Brittany Ferries and DFDS, £800,000 in consultancy fees and £33 million to Eurotunnel, with P&O also expecting £33 million-plus legal fees to be added to the final bill, so the sum will be over £110 million. What is being sacrificed to pay for this, and when will the Secretary of State apologise?

[Ms Ghani]

No-deal preparation carried out by this Department for freight capacity was just 1% of the overall budget for no-deal planning—1%.