EU Referendum Leaflet

Pat Glass Excerpts

Monday 9th May 2016 Westminster Hall

[Pat Glass (North West Durham) (Lab)]

We are here to state the merits of a petition that I understand was started by Jayne Adye, who is the director of the Get Britain Out campaign. She is therefore not a disinterested person who is independent of the issue or whose only concern, as the petition claims, is about the spending of public money.

We need to be honest about what this debate is about. It is yet another example of the wider leave campaign wanting to talk about process and not the real issues. I do not have a problem with that, but let us not pretend that this is about a leaflet issued by the Government. The faux outrage is intended to drown out the arguments made in the leaflet. I very much doubt that the director of the Get Britain Out campaign would have raised a petition if the Government were spending taxpayers’ money on a leaflet arguing that we should leave.

[John Redwood]

Has the hon. Lady been listening to the debate? Colleague after colleague has stood up and pointed out that the leaflet is simply wrong and misleading, because we care passionately about getting back democratic accountability and control for the British people.

[Pat Glass]

As the right hon. Gentleman said, I have sat through almost three hours of the debate very politely and courteously and listened to all of the arguments.

If we are going to do this, we should get it right. This is a small issue, but the petition talks about the Government spending

“money on biased campaigning to keep Britain inside the European Union”

and about the “Great British Public”. If we want to get this right, we must talk about the UK, not Britain. Britain is the island; the UK is much wider than that. I am sure that it was not the intention of the campaigners to cut out an entire country and all of the people of Northern Ireland. Nevertheless, let us get it right.

[Kate Hoey]

I thank my hon. Friend for that very important point. Does she not squirm at the fact that her campaign to remain is called “Britain Stronger in Europe”?

[Pat Glass]

It is not. It is called “Labour In for Britain”. I am part of a Labour campaign. As far as I can see, the leaflet is entirely legal. It has been issued by the Government well in advance of the last 28 days of the referendum period, when section 125 of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 will apply and restrict publications about the referendum by bodies or persons that are wholly or mainly publicly funded. The leaflet represents the official view of the Government on the biggest decision that this country will make in a generation and which will impact on this country and our neighbours for decades. In my view, it would be unacceptable for the Government not to have a view on that and not to share that view with the people of this country.

[Ms Gisela Stuart]

Will my hon. Friend give way on that point?

[Pat Glass]

No. As has been pointed out, we have had a huge debate, but we have heard one side of the argument. Hon. Members should do me the courtesy of allowing me to give the other side of the argument.

It seems perfectly reasonable to me for the Government of the day to set out their position in the referendum. This is not a precedent; it is exactly what Governments have done before. This leaflet is clear, and the title is not misleading. It seems to me, and no doubt to those watching the debate today, that those challenging the leaflet are hoping to silence the arguments contained in it, rather than discussing the merits of issuing a leaflet or the cost.

We know that, on this issue, the Labour party—I expect to get one or two requests for an intervention here—is largely of one voice. A handful of my colleagues—I think it is five altogether—have long-held and deep-set views on the issue, and I absolutely respect that, but I think they are mistaken, and they would certainly have to agree that they are out of step with the vast majority of the parliamentary Labour party, constituency Labour parties and Labour voters. The Conservative party, however, is split on the issue. Let us look at the facts. We have a parliamentary Labour party pro-EU group. That group has 214 members.

[Tom Pursglove]

Where are they?

[Pat Glass]

I will come on to that in a moment. They include all of the leadership and all of the shadow Cabinet. On this one issue at least, in comparison with Government Members, we look like an old married couple.

I have sat here throughout the debate and listened to the arguments, and some good arguments have been made. I absolutely accept some of the arguments made by the hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) about fairness. However, I was hoping that, in almost three hours, I would have heard what “out” looks like in terms of jobs, consumers and the environment. What would it look like for women and young people and for our future security? I have not heard any of that. What I have heard is that it will be all right on the night. Even the leading Brexit economist now says that an EU exit would kill off our manufacturing sector.

As someone from the north-east, I was surprised at what was said by the hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mrs Trevelyan), who is not listening at the moment. We are the only region in the country that has a trade surplus. We are a manufacturing region, and hundreds of thousands of jobs depend on our being part of the European Union. Leaving the EU would be a disaster for regions such as mine. I understand what the hon. Lady says about one Emirates flight out of Newcastle airport every day, but that cannot compare to the hundreds of thousands of cars that we export from the north-east to the European Union.

In the leaflet, the Government make a clear recommendation to the people of the UK that they judge it to be in our national interest to remain a member of the European Union. For once, I agree with them. The Cabinet Office has told us that independent polling shows that 85% of voters are seeking more information on which to make an informed decision. That supports what I am finding on the doorstep. When I talk to people, they are clear that this is not their No. 1 priority at the moment. However, they know it is important and they want the facts on which to make a decision.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

Like my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady), I apologise for arriving late. I was stuck on a Eurostar train or I might have wanted to make a speech in the debate. Does the hon. Lady agree that it is a great pity that the referendum is taking place among the citizenry who are the least well informed in the whole of the European Union about what the European Union actually does? Is she concerned, as I am, that whatever the result is, it might not be the result of an informed electorate, and that cannot be good for democracy?

[Pat Glass]

Governments of both colours, over the last 41 years, have failed to make the case for the European Union; they have failed to make it real for real people’s lives. That is part of the problem: we have had 41 years of one side of the argument. It is not unreasonable that we should now start to see some of the other side of the argument.

The leaflet has cost £9.3 million, which is equivalent, we are told, to 34p per household. The official in and out campaigns will each receive £15 million and a higher spending limit of £7 million each, the use of public rooms and a public grant of up to £600,000, in order to make their case to the people of the UK, so the cost of the leaflet will presumably not now be the issue. Presumably there will now be another petition, asking us not to spend the £15 million on each side and provide the access to public rooms and so on if the issue is really the spending of public money.

My understanding from talking to people who have received the leaflet is that it has certainly caused debate and a thirst for further information. The hon. Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone) said that he had received 476 complaints about the leaflet, and I do not doubt that for a moment, but I have received two complaints from constituents about it. In the past four weeks, I have received almost 500 contacts and complaints from constituents about tax havens in UK dependencies and overseas territories. I have actually received more complaints from constituents about the degrading quality of modern bricks than about the leaflet. That shows that it is a much greater issue among different people and in different parts of the country. My reading of the situation on the doorstep is that there is a public thirst for information. The public want a debate on the facts, and they do not want a debate on a leaflet that has been sent out already in England. One thing that I hope we can all agree on is that at least the leaflet encourages everyone to be registered to vote—everyone should take part in this far-reaching referendum. No one can say that this issue does not affect them.

I want to reference this fact sheet. Full Fact contacted every Member of Parliament in advance of the debate—I have no reason to think it contacted only me. Having checked the leaflet, Full Fact says, in summary:

“The government explicitly states that the leaflet is arguing for the UK remaining in the EU. So it is not attempting to be even-handed...Given that, much of the leaflet is accurate and the government deserves some credit for ensuring that it was published with details of the sources, making it easier for”

people to “judge independently.”

Finally, I simply want to set out Labour’s case for remaining in the EU. It is a simple case. We believe that for jobs, growth, investment and security reasons, we are better off in the European Union. We believe that, for the protection of the workers of the UK and for environmental reasons, the UK is better off in Europe. We believe that we are safer in an increasingly unsafe world if we are part of a strong economic group of 520 million people. We believe that the people of Europe can tackle those big issues that do not recognise borders and that threaten our future—climate change, international terrorism and global tax avoidance—only if we do so together.