Business of the House

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Thursday 19th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

My hon. Friend continues to be an admirable champion not only for the city of Plymouth, but for its heritage. He has done more than any representative of that city in recent years to promote it as an historic centre and I commend him for that. We have Culture, Media and Sport questions next week and I am sure he will use the opportunity to raise this again. I send all my good wishes to those in Plymouth who are preparing for this important anniversary, and I wish my hon. Friend well for his continued support for the heritage of the constituency and the city he represents.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)]

I thank the Leader of the House for announcing the business for next week. I associate myself with the remarks made and the condolences offered following the events in Paris last week and the events in Cardiff. I associate the Scottish National party with the comments about the staff of the House who work so hard to ensure that we continue to be safe and who do so in such a friendly, pleasant and accommodating way. Everyone in the House should recognise those attributes of the people who keep us safe every day.

I noticed a few ripples of excitement and anticipation ahead of the Scottish National party’s debates next week. The Trident debate offers an opportunity for all parties in the House to clarify their position in advance of the critical decision that is going to be taken about Trident main gate. We know the Conservative position. The Conservatives love their nukes and they are quite happy to spend £167 billion on obscene weapons of mass destruction—a cold war weapon that cannot even start to defend us from the range of threats that we face. We know the Scottish National party position and our historic opposition to that, and we will suggest a number of ways in which £167 billion might be more usefully spent on social projects. Who knows, we might even find out what the Labour party thinks about Trident, although I am not holding out any great expectation of that. If I am right, I think Labour is both for and against, uncertain and unsure about Trident. When it comes to the vote next week, I think Labour Members might be for, against, maybe for and maybe for abstention. That roughly categorises the Labour position on Trident and we look forward to hearing from Labour Members next week.

When are we going to have the debate on Syria that is due? Yesterday, when I closed my eyes, I could swear that I heard the voice and the words of Tony Blair coming from the Prime Minister, without a care about UN resolutions—the position that the former Prime Minister took—and not caring less about public opinion. We saw how that worked out for the former Prime Minister. If we are going down the Blairite route towards further military action without UN authorisation, may we have some sort of statement and clarity from the Government?

I am pleased that we have a debate on Thursday next week on the Airports Commission. It might be an opportune time to bring up the little issue of the Prime Minister’s plans for his own personal air travel—Air Force One, brought to you in association with Bullingdon airways and etonJet. It is an incredible vanity project when, the day before, the Chancellor will be standing at the Dispatch Box with his latest round of misery for those who are the most disadvantaged and vulnerable in our communities.

I know that the Leader of the House likes his anniversaries, as does the shadow Leader of the House. Yes, we welcome the 21 years of the national lottery. It is just a pity that the Government are cutting the Big Lottery Fund by some 40%, as was announced this week. Here is another anniversary for them: it is one year since Nicola Sturgeon took over the helm of the Scottish National party, and what a year it has been. We have 56 out of the 59 MPs from Scotland. We are still north of 50% in opinion polls on the Holyrood elections next year, and we have personal satisfaction ratings in Scotland way beyond anything that has been seen by either of the main parties down here. So I am pretty certain the Leader of the House would like to pay tribute to the success of the First Minister and all that she has achieved in the past year.

[Chris Grayling]

The hon. Gentleman had more acclaim from his Back Benchers than the Leader of the Opposition had yesterday from his Back Benchers. On Trident, I do not understand either where Labour stands. It is utterly confusing. Indeed, we had the extraordinary position on yesterday’s “Daily Politics” show where the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann), when asked if he had confidence in his party leader, said, “I have confidence in Hilary Benn.” That speaks volumes. I am not surprised: I am completely confused about what Labour stands for. The shadow Defence Secretary, the hon. Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle), is saying that she supports Trident, but Labour appointed somebody who opposes Trident to co-chair its defence review with her. I therefore understand the hon. Gentleman’s confusion. Perhaps next week we will discover a little more about what Labour’s policy is.

I gently chide the hon. Gentleman about the contradictions in the debate subjects he has chosen for next week. For half the day, he will argue that we should pull a really vital national resource out of Scotland, costing thousands of jobs and leaving an important part of Scotland a wasteland, yet for the other half he will complain about our making necessary reductions in HMRC and worrying about that costing jobs in Scotland. I do not quite understand how he squares those two things. I think that our defence industry plays a really important part not only in the Scottish economy but in defending our nation. The SNP’s position is utterly contradictory.

The hon. Gentleman asked about Syria. I simply say that he is going to have to wait for the Prime Minister’s response. The Prime Minister has said that he will respond personally to the Foreign Affairs Committee. This is the first time he has made a personal response of this kind, and the House needs to wait to see that. We will address the issues once the House has had a chance to digest the report.

The hon. Gentleman made mention of the plane. The difference between us—not just between us and Labour but between us and the SNP—is that when we make a change of this kind it is designed to save money. This will reduce Government travel costs, and that is surely the right thing to do. The Scotsman reported last year that when Nicola Sturgeon was in charge of transport she never travelled by rail but always by chauffeur-driven car. I travelled to work this morning by train, and it was late, which was frustrating. I get the train each day, and perhaps the First Minister should have done the same.

The hon. Gentleman talks about Nicola Sturgeon’s first anniversary and the achievements of the SNP over the past 12 months. We all recognise the successes it has had, but I think he slightly underplays his own contribution. It is a team effort, so he should give himself a bit of a pat on the back and not just Nicola Sturgeon.