Scottish Referendum (Trident)

Debate between Mike Weir and Michael Connarty

Thursday 7th March 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mr Weir]

Twenty-five of the 28 member states in NATO do not have nuclear weapons. The hon. Member for Epping Forest (Mrs Laing) asked whether NATO would let Scotland in if we wanted rid of nuclear weapons; I remind her that Canada, a member of NATO, got rid of its nuclear weapons in 1984 and Greece, another member of NATO, got rid of them in 2001. It is not unprecedented. Norway does not have nuclear weapons, for example.

Much of the rest of the report goes into detail about the options open to the UK Government in finding an alternative to Faslane. Frankly, that does not appear to me to be the concern of the Scottish people or Government. It is a matter for the UK Government, should they wish to continue with the possession of nuclear weapons. Scottish independence gives the remainder of the UK the perfect opportunity to accept that it can no longer justify the possession of such weapons and to decide that it will no longer have them, but that is a decision for it to make. It is worth noting that even some military figures have begun to question the wisdom of retaining Trident in the UK, given the huge cuts to conventional forces.

[Michael Connarty]

The hon. Gentleman said earlier that he wished to see our shores rid of such weapons. As someone who has been a supporter of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament since the days of Polaris, and who remains a member of the parliamentary CND, I am concerned about the safety of all the nations in the United Kingdom. Is he saying that neither he nor the Scottish Government care if there is a similar danger elsewhere in the UK to the lives of the people in the UK?

[Mr Weir]

I have just said that, in my opinion, the UK should get rid of Trident. However, once we have our independence and the missiles are removed from Scotland, if the UK wants to retain them, that is a matter for the remainder of the UK. Scotland will not have them. We will have nothing to do with them.

Interestingly, as the report suggests, there seem to be alternatives. Francis Tusa of Defence Analysis has been quoted as saying that the problems have been exaggerated. It appears that the UK Government do not want to site the missiles on the south coast of England for fear that the missiles would be too near centres of population, but it does not seem to worry them that Faslane is close to the main centres of the population of Scotland.

It seems curious that there is objection to the use of Kings Bay in Georgia, because it might give the impression that Trident is not a totally independent system. I think most people think that already. Given that the report says that a stockpile of weapons is stored there and that the UK already contributes £12 million per annum towards the site, it seems that there is already considerable involvement there. Francis Tusa also makes the point that previously there were shared storage facilities with the Americans at Iserlohn in Germany, but such considerations are for the remaining parts of the UK, not the Scottish Government, who wish to see the missiles removed from Scotland.

Much of the debate has been about the impact on jobs if the Trident system left Faslane, but nowhere in the report is there a mention of the jobs implication; the report is about what the UK might do with Trident when Scotland is independent and ensures that we do not have weapons of mass destruction on our soil. However, the Scottish National party understands the concerns of those who work at the base.

Scottish Ministers have made it clear that they are fully committed to the future of Her Majesty’s Naval Base Clyde in an independent Scotland, operating as a conventional naval base without nuclear weapons. We are the only party in Scotland to have made that commitment.

Human Trafficking

Debate between Mike Weir and Michael Connarty

Wednesday 8th February 2012 Westminster Hall

[Mr Bone]

Thank you, Mr Weir. Do not encourage me.

The UKHTC costs £1.6 million a year and employs 30 people. Support for victim care, which the Government have increased, costs nearly £2 million a year and services nearly 1,500 people. There seems to be a little discrepancy there. We could take a fraction of that £1.6 million— perhaps, at most, £250,000—and establish a national rapporteur. It would do all the things we want at the fraction of the cost. The Minister could then go back to the Chancellor and say, “By the way, Chancellor, here is £500,000 back that I have found.” I know his career prospects are good, but that would be an added incentive for the Prime Minister.

Three components are required for a national rapporteur to make an effective contribution to combating human trafficking, as opposed to simply writing reports that gather dust: independence from Government; unlimited and direct access to all relevant information, not just Government information; and annual reports that should be made public, with their recommendations debated in Parliament. It is important to keep in mind that, while a report by the national rapporteur on the status of human trafficking is designed to cover the scope of the problem and the changing trends as well as the appropriate responses, it should not lose sight of the ultimate goal: to end this vicious modern-day slavery.

The UK Government’s human trafficking strategy clearly states its main four objectives and how to achieve them. If established in the UK, a national rapporteur could gather and synchronise the information to assess the Government’s progress on its timely and efficient implementation, make recommendations on where more attention and action were needed, and ensure the adequacy and appropriateness of services provided to victims of trafficking.

Another point that was brought to my attention is that the Dutch Government discovered that having a national rapporteur actually helped them. When outside bodies said that the Dutch Government were not doing enough, they could point to the rapporteur’s report and say, “Yes, we are doing the job.”

In conclusion, not only am I being a good European today, and not only am I making the Minister’s life easier—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) says that there is a first time for everything. Not only am I saving the taxpayer money, but I am arguing for a big step towards ending the evil of human trafficking.

[Michael Connarty (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Mike Weir (in the Chair)]

I cannot call the hon. Gentleman unless he has the permission of the initiator of the debate and the Minister. Does he have the permission of both?

[Michael Connarty]

A minute of their time.

[Mr Mike Weir (in the Chair)]

But has that been granted?

[Mr Mike Weir (in the Chair)]

I am sorry; I cannot call the hon. Gentleman.

[Michael Connarty]

As vice-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on human trafficking, I find that quite appalling.

Postal Services Bill

Debate between Mike Weir and Michael Connarty

Thursday 9th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Connarty]

I was talking about the amendments; the new requirement in Lords amendment 1 is that the report must include the

“objective intended to be achieved”

by the disposal of shares. That is a specific Lords amendment and I am questioning what will be put before the House as a result. Will it be a report on the progress of fragmentation and of these parts in trying to achieve the Minister’s stated aim for his sale of these shares?

The Minister has spoken repeatedly about finding some way of saving the post office network. I know that great steps have been made on the Bill through the amendments won by the diligent efforts of Labour Members and Cross Benchers in the Lords. There will be some sort of inter-business agreement and it will be extended. I know that the Minister is not trying to pull the wool over our eyes, because he is telling us about his aspirations. However, when I hear him talk, I am unsure what his benchmarks for achievement under these amendments will be if it turns out that his idea of having a full network of post offices and post office “locals” does not work, the “locals” fade away and—I believe this will happen—we begin to lose post offices at a faster rate than would have happened under the previous Government’s plans to stop the flood by taking out a number of post offices and hoping to leave enough business for those that remained.

I did not agree with that approach, but I recognised what the previous Government were trying to do. I do not understand how the Secretary of State will report on these matters as a result of these amendments. If the report were honest, it might suggest that we have to do something different. I want the Minister to tell us what he feels his duties now are as a result of these amendments or what he feels the duties will be of whoever succeeds him, should there ever be a change of Minister. I do not wish such a change upon him, because he deserves to come back to apologise for everything he is now bringing about.

Is this about return to the Exchequer? Let us look at the attempts of previous Governments to sell shares and at the way in which they sold those shares. The sale of the first tranche of British Telecom shares achieved a 90% profit in one day for those who bought them, because it was an attempt to get quick money into the Exchequer—or was it just to get British Telecom into the private sector? If it was to get money into the Exchequer, the then Government appear to have greatly short-changed themselves and the country. A better example, also in telecoms, is provided by the sale of level 3 broadband, in which we made a substantial profit for the Exchequer because of the way in which we auctioned it off, although that did not please people in the industry.

I would like the Minister to tell us how these things are going to work. Will the judgment be based on return to the Exchequer? I know that the Government will, if they get their way, want to balance that against their willingness to take on any deficit in the pension fund that comes with taking on the pension assets. These matters have to be clearly spelt out by the Secretary of State so that people can judge what he is going to do in the Bill. That is what is accepted in the amendment. People want more clarity because we have not been given a clear understanding of the benchmarks and targets that the Government hope to achieve. We have had warm words and aspirations, but given the backdrop—the person who has given those assurances has previously given assurances that they were against full privatisation of the Post Office—we would like to see something a bit more solid on the ground. Perhaps the Minister could say something about what the intentions are.

The amendment also asks for more information about the purpose and structure of the mutualisation. It has been suggested to the Government that it might be useful to set up a task force immediately, but I do not think they have taken that idea up. The idea is to give share options to the members of a work force who have seen 55,000 of their members thrown out the door already and who have heard from the chief executive in the past few days that another 40,000 are about to go behind them, so there is hardly going to be an atmosphere in which anything can be done mutually unless a lot of hard work is done.

I agree with the points made my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) about the hard work and dedication of long-term Post Office employees. We know that people go and work there in the short term and realise that it is a difficult job with unbelievably hard hours and that they often have to work in the most inclement weather to get the mail through. However, many of the people who have been there for a long time want the company to succeed and want its work force to be secured and modernised. A task force would be useful, and it would be useful if the Minister would spell out exactly what will be the benchmark for mutualisation so that the amendments have some value when they are in the Bill.

[Mr Weir]

The proposal is for the mutualisation not of Royal Mail but of Post Office Ltd, so the average postie does not come into this. They are the ones who will be subject to whoever takes over. Mutualisation will apply only to Post Office Ltd after it is demerged from Royal Mail some time in the future.

[Michael Connarty]

That is even more frightening. People at that end of the business are facing the same problems from the same management. If the management model has changed, I would like to think that the Minister would put that forward.

Those are my concerns about the amendments, which have been hard won and which came with a promise from the Government that there would be real changes that would make a difference to the Bill. I wonder therefore whether the Minister, if he speaks on this again, will give some idea of what is going on to give us an infrastructure for these matters.

My final point is about the sale of shares to employees. The record is exactly as the hon. Member for Angus (Mr Weir) said. Shares are slowly but surely bought up by large organisations. The famous case is the one with Sid and the idea that Sid had some power, but Sid’s shares are probably now owned by several multinational hedge funds or equity funds or perhaps by insurance companies or a pension fund or two. There is this idea that members of the work force will get shares that will give them some sense of ownership, and I remember the first debates in which this was talked about by Ministers. This is one of the myths that the Liberals like to push—that if someone is given a few shares, that will make them a part of the ownership of the business. It does not do that unless those shares come with some powers. As we have seen from many of the banks’ recent annual general meetings, even having large amounts of shares does not give one any power over bonuses, performance or the behaviour of the people who run the companies. What will come with the deal apart from a few stocks and shares that will be stuck in the bank until they are sold to fund a holiday?

Scotland Bill

Debate between Mike Weir and Michael Connarty

Tuesday 15th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Connarty]

I would not want to accuse the hon. Gentleman of trying to distort my words; I just think he might not be swift enough to understand them. I said that people resent it. They know that they did not choose the Member who lost under first past the post, and they are not happy that that person then turns up as a list Member. They believe it is important that when they make a choice under first past the post, they choose between candidate A and candidate B. I take the point made earlier that every party does it, but it is wrong because it distorts the will of the electorate.

[Mr Weir]

The hon. Gentleman is making the point that several of his colleagues have made about people who lose under first past the post and come back on the list. However, does he not accept that it is a different electorate? Regional seats have seven or eight first-past-the-post seats in it, so they are not being elected by the same electorate. I do not understand his objection.

Postal Services Bill

Debate between Mike Weir and Michael Connarty

Wednesday 12th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Connarty]

I have no problem doing that. I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman has been in the House when I have spoken about the Post Office in the past. I am the organiser and secretary of the communications workers liaison group in this place. I have opposed every attempt by any Government to bring in schemes to downsize the post office network—every single one of them.

My Government was criticised by me and by the Communication Workers Union. That Government put in a director, Crozier, who walked off with millions of pounds in bonuses for sacking people—for downsizing the number of people at the sharp end and failing entirely to do the one thing that he was tasked to do, which was to bring in the technology to modernise the process of distribution and introduce letter-bundling by street, as is done in any sensible country. He failed and was paid millions of pounds. That sounds like what happened with the banks so it seems as though we did a lot of that under the previous Government.

I am happy to say that the Labour Government got it wrong, because they did get it wrong. I say to the hon. Member for Colchester (Bob Russell) that his party will be judged on how it acts in government, not on how he is acting from the liberal wing of the Liberal Democrats. The orange book Liberals have joined the Tories and will become Tories if they want to stand at the next election. They are sitting opposite me at this moment. They are the people who are destroying the post office network, just as the delusional people in my party cost us millions of votes by doing what is about to be carried to its final conclusion—that is, attacking the structure of our communities.

When a Crown office goes and a sub-post office is put into a sweet shop at the end of the high street, we see the change. We see people queuing outside in the rain because the shop is too small to handle the business. When a sub-post office is put into the back of a small supermarket, as one has in Bathgate, or into a sweet shop, as one has in Linlithgow in my constituency, people in wheelchairs cannot get into the post office when staff create a barrier as they stock the shelves with quick-sale goods. All that happened under our Government, and the measures proposed in the Bill will be worse than any of that.

[Mr Weir]

The hon. Gentleman is making a good point. He speaks of a post office being put into a sweet shop. Does that not underline the need for the agreement? There is much talk about post offices delivering government business. After the closure programme and the relocation to paper shops and sweet shops, how many post offices in his constituency will realistically be able to do such business immediately?

[Michael Connarty]

As I said, the new clause is intended to ameliorate the impact, not to negate it. I would prefer a permanent agreement that the Royal Mail and the Post Office would not be sundered by the Bill. It is an illusion that the market will allow things to become more efficient. I do not believe that.