Priorities for Government

Pat McFadden Excerpts

Thursday 25th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on the campaign he has waged for many years to support our armed services. I share with him a strong desire to increase spending, particularly on shipbuilding, which not only drives high-quality jobs in this country, but is a fantastic export for the UK around the world. The ships we are building now are being sold for billions of pounds to friends and partners around the world. We should be very proud of what we are achieving.

[Mr Pat McFadden (Wolverhampton South East) (Lab)]

Do the Government stand by the commitment they made in the joint UK-EU statement of December 2017:

“In the absence of agreed solutions, the United Kingdom will maintain full alignment with those rules of the Internal Market and the Customs Union which, now or in the future, support North-South cooperation, the all-island economy and the protection of the 1998 Agreement.”?

[The Prime Minister]

Of course, that is the very trap from which it is now absolutely vital that we escape. As the right hon. Gentleman says, that 8 December document effectively commits the UK to remaining in regulatory alignment in the customs union. We believe—and it is common ground in Dublin, Brussels and elsewhere—that there are facilitations available to enable frictionless trade not just at the Northern Irish border but at other borders too, in order for the UK to come out of the EU customs union while doing a free trade deal. That is what we are going to achieve.