Leaving the European Union

Patrick Grady Excerpts

Monday 4th February 2019 Westminster Hall

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

It is a real pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hanson, and a rare pleasure to be back in Westminster Hall. Before I was appointed Chief Whip for the SNP, I covered a lot of Brexit debates in here; in fact, we called it the Brexit Minister hall, because we discussed the subject so frequently. It is good to see that has not changed. I do not think I will speak for two hours, but as a Whip this is a rare opportunity for me to speak. As the hon. Member for St Albans (Mrs Main) said, the Chamber is usually so busy.

The petition is quite intriguing. It jumps out at me that article 50 must not “under any circumstances” be extended, whether for technical reasons, as the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Scully) said, or for a general election, a zombie apocalypse, alien invasion or any circumstances. Brexit must go ahead on 29 March. But that date is not some sort of geological fixture or part of the fundamental laws of physics. It is a date that was put in to a piece of legislation, largely as a sop to Back Benchers. The original European Union (Withdrawal) Bill talked simply of “exit day”, which would be defined by statutory instrument. I wonder if we might be in a much calmer place if the original clause had stood. People are becoming fixated on 29 March—at least that is what the people who signed the petition seem to think must happen.

I want to dwell on the point made by the hon. Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood). We hear that the British people must be given the Brexit they voted for and that anything else is not acceptable, but what is the Brexit they voted for? All the ballot paper said was, “to leave the European Union.” That might simply mean leaving the political institutions, as the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam said and I suspect a lot of people thought. The hon. Member for St Albans said people had had 40 years of Europe and they did not like it. I have had slightly less than 40 years of European membership—only slightly less—and I have quite liked it.

Perhaps some of the people who voted to leave did not like the bogeyman that the European institutions had become. Perhaps they did not like the political institutions. Perhaps they did not like the political establishment that argued for remain, of which many of us in effect find ourselves a part. It is more difficult to make the case that they did not like their European health insurance cards, which allow them to access medical treatment wherever they go in Europe, that they did not like being able to travel visa-free across the European continent and take advantage of sunnier climates and cheaper holidays, that they did not like the medicines they get access to through the European Medicines Agency and that they did not like the safe regulation of nuclear materials.

[Mrs Murray]

May I give the hon. Gentleman the benefit of my experience? I voted to stay in the European Union when Labour held the referendum in 1975, but I voted to stay in a trading partnership, which is what it was sold as. Of course, this time I voted leave, and I know that a lot of my constituents, and probably a lot of his, feel the same way. As he said, he did not know anything other than the European Union, I thought he might like the benefit of my experience and age. Life did not end before 1972, when we were not members of the European Union.

[Patrick Grady]

I absolutely take that point. Of course, if we want to keep going back into history, the European Coal and Steel Community was founded in response to the second world war to link European economies, and peace has prevailed on this continent for longer than at any other time in the past several centuries largely as a result of closer European integration. The hon. Lady says the Common Market back then was very different from the European Union today, but rejoining the Common Market—or Common Market 2.0, which some Members are discussing—is not what the House is currently being asked to vote for. If anything, we are being asked to move further away from that.

Let us look again at what people voted for. They were told by the now former Foreign Secretary, the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson), that there would

“continue to be free trade, and access to the single market.”

The current Environment Secretary said we would be

“redefining the single market, not walking away from it.”

The current International Trade Secretary said in 2016:

“The free trade agreement that we will have to do with the European Union should be one of the easiest in human history.”

All that is collapsing in front of our eyes. Shortly, the business in the main Chamber will move on to a statement about Nissan in Sunderland and the consequences of our plunging off the cliff with a no-deal Brexit on 29 March.

[Mrs Main]

Does the hon. Gentleman not wonder why Nissan has chosen to relocate not to Spain, where it has factories, but to Japan?

[Patrick Grady]

Well, that is where its parent company is and where it currently has factories it can easily locate to. The point is that it is not choosing to stay here in the United Kingdom precisely because of all the uncertainty.

[Mrs Main]

I have to correct the hon. Gentleman. I think anyone from Nissan would say it is staying in the United Kingdom, and I am sure people in the constituencies concerned would not like to hear that he is closing it down.

[Patrick Grady]

I take that point. Nevertheless, jobs are at risk and there is massive uncertainty, and it is in large part to do with the cliff edge that we face because of Brexit.

From the SNP’s point of view, three things should happen, two of which are related. One of the effects of extending article 50 would be to rule out a no-deal Brexit. As I said, 29 March was just picked and written on a bit of paper. Frankly, that is true of all the Brexit negotiations. All this comes down to people in a room being willing to talk to one another. It is not rocket science. It is not changing the fundamental laws of physics. It is about there being political will among the negotiating parties to speak to each other and reach an agreement.

Of course, we are still in the European Union. We will continue to be members until such time as something called Brexit does or does not take effect. The easiest option—the simplest, safest and best option—is to continue on those terms. As the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) said, by definition, the best possible relationship with the European Union is membership; otherwise, nobody would want to be a member. Everybody would want the better deal. Everybody would want those terms and conditions. The point of leaving has to be that somehow we will have more benefits because of our relationships with the rest of the world, but there is absolutely no evidence of that. All the trade treaties we were told we would have simply are not in place.

[Mrs Murray]

The hon. Gentleman will correct me if I misheard him, but did he not say that we should stay in the European Union no matter what? He is sending the message to all those people in Glasgow North who voted to leave the European Union that he knows better and we should stay in.

[Patrick Grady]

Well, 22% of the people who voted in Glasgow North voted to leave the European Union. Some 78% voted to remain, and recent analysis suggests that figure will be even higher if and when we get a people’s vote.

[Damien Moore]

The hon. Gentleman said 78% of people in his constituency voted to remain. Was it a soft remain or a hard remain?

[Patrick Grady]

That is highly amusing. They voted to remain under the conditions we currently have. I will come back to what the relationship between Scotland and the European Union should be.

I believe we should remain—I believe that is the best option—but the point is that people should now be given a choice, because we now know what leave looks like. The Prime Minister set red lines—incidentally, I think she did so without the agreement even of her Cabinet; she announced them at the Mansion House or somewhere equally grand up the street. She did not set them after consulting on a cross-party basis, as she is now trying to do, or after putting forward a proposal or a Bill for the whole House to agree. They were set arbitrarily. Having set those arbitrary red lines, the deal now is probably, more or less, the only deal that could have been got. The Prime Minister wants to leave the ECJ, to stop free movement of people, to be able to negotiate our own independent trade deals, and whatever the fourth one is. Those red lines are very restrictive, and they inevitably lead us to a much more damaging relationship than the one we have or one we could have. Nevertheless, if we set those red lines, that is the deal we get.

That deal should be put to the people. Why should they not have the opportunity to have their say? What are the Brexiteers afraid of? If the Prime Minister’s deal is so glorious—if it is going to launch mother Britannia into a new position of ruling the waves, global leadership and all the rest of it—why are they so afraid to put it back to the people? Why would people not vote for it? The Environment Secretary said to me in the main Chamber a couple of weeks ago that other countries would be looking enviously at the United Kingdom’s deal. If that is the case, why would the people of the United Kingdom not back it in a people’s vote?

[Damien Moore]

Can the hon. Gentleman say that, in such a campaign, the remain side would be honest about some of the things the European Union has in store, such as further integration and a European army? Some of those things would be terribly unpalatable to people—even those who want to stay.

[Patrick Grady]

The United Kingdom has consistently negotiated derogations, alternative arrangements, opt-outs and so on throughout its history. The point of membership of the European Union is that, within the Union, a country can help to shape its direction and its future. Brexit will take us out completely.

[Wera Hobhouse]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that, “We want to become a sovereign country again,” is a completely misleading phrase? All of us in the European Union are sovereign members; we are sharing and pooling sovereignty. That is the whole point about the European Union.

[Patrick Grady]

I was going to make that exact point in my peroration. Members can probably guess what that will be.

The problem is that this deal is not good enough. It has already been rejected by Parliament, and the Prime Minister has had to accept that it needs to be renegotiated so that we have these magical alternative arrangements. That in itself demonstrates that if the House—if parliamentarians, whether we are delegates or representatives—cannot agree on the shape and form of Brexit, then it has to be put back to the people, either in a people’s vote or in a general election. I assure the House that the Scottish National Party fears neither of those.

[Mrs Main]

I was encouraged to hear the hon. Gentleman talk about the deal. If there were amendments to the deal, could he support it?

[Patrick Grady]

No, because we support remaining in the European Union. That brings me to my final point, which is about the treatment of Scotland in all of the debate. As I said to the hon. Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray), 78% of my constituents voted to remain, which was one of the highest proportions in the United Kingdom. I want to listen to and understand the people who voted to leave, but I am not afraid or ashamed to stand up for the vast majority of my constituents. Some 35 residents of Glasgow North signed this petition—it is interesting to look at its geographical spread.

The day after the 2016 referendum, the First Minister of Scotland said that we had to respect the results of both the 2014 independence referendum and the 2016 UK-wide referendum on the European Union. The Scottish Government have consistently put forward alternatives, compromises and ways forward that could respect the result of the Brexit referendum across the United Kingdom. I meant to say at the start that the SNP voted against having the Brexit referendum, as we did not think it was necessary. We are not in the position of the Liberal Democrats, who now want to revisit an answer that they did not like.

The Scottish Government have not been listened to at all. For example, we proposed ways of retaining single market or customs union membership for Scotland—and potentially for Northern Ireland and parts of the United Kingdom that had voted to remain—and none of that was paid attention to. The promises made to people in Scotland, both in 2014 and 2016, have been broken. The major promise in 2014 was that voting no to independence guaranteed that Scotland remained a member of the European Union, which has proven to be false.

In these circumstances, the people of Scotland will come to the conclusion that it is not the European Union that is failing, but the Union of the United Kingdom; they will choose their own course, whether through a referendum or at a general election, and choose to take back control for themselves. As alluded to by the hon. Member for Bath, independent countries nowadays are defined by their interdependence; a country is known to be independent precisely because it is a member of the United Nations, because it has chosen to pool sovereignty through the European Union or because it has chosen to join any number of international organisations. That is the positive trend that the world should be aiming for, but instead Brexit represents a retrograde step.

[Mrs Main]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Patrick Grady]

I was coming to a conclusion, but if the hon. Lady is very keen I will give way.

[Mrs Main]

The hon. Gentleman talks about having a second referendum and potentially asking Scotland to go into the European Union again, stay in or whatever, so would he want a wall?

[Patrick Grady]

No. I am sorry, a wall?

[Mrs Main]

Would he want a wall for the hard border, or does he think other mechanisms could be brought about where a wall does not need to be built?

[Patrick Grady]

I think that would be completely unnecessary. Clearly, there are going to have to be arrangements made for the border with Northern Ireland. If it is possible to do that in Northern Ireland, then it ought to be possible to do when Scottish independence comes. The best solution would be to revisit the whole issue through a people’s vote and ultimately give the people of the United Kingdom the option to remain in the European Union.