English Votes for English Laws

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Tuesday 13th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

As the majority of taxation is set on a United Kingdom basis and the Barnett formula ensures that the level of spending provided for services is proportionate to decisions taken by the Union Parliament, I do not think that is as unreasonable as the right hon. Gentleman suggests. Sometimes the West Lothian question’s significance gets exaggerated.

Last week, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster told the House that the Government believe that the procedure has added complexity and delay to the legislative process. Slightly over 10% of all our Standing Orders are taken up with enabling EVEL-doing and its additional parliamentary stages, notably the Legislative Grand Committee, which is held on the Floor of the House between Report and Third Reading. In theory, that allows English MPs to veto provisions, but not to propose them. In practice, it has resulted only in short-lived and poorly attended debates that have always concluded with English MPs, or English and Welsh MPs, giving their consent to England only, or England and Wales only, provisions.

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

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I know that the hon. Gentleman has been waiting with bated breath. His breath is now unbated.

[Pete Wishart]

Does the Leader of the House recall who has made the most contributions to the Legislative Grand Committee? Perhaps he could tell the House how many contributions that Member made.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I have a sneaking suspicion that we may get the accurate statistics from a careful consultation of Hansard that took place earlier this afternoon by the hon. Gentleman himself. May I point out that I made a speech on the matter in 2011, when I outlined all the difficulties that the system would have? I therefore predate the hon. Gentleman in that I opposed EVEL before it had even been proposed. As a good Catholic, I would be expected always to oppose evil.

--- Later in debate ---

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

I am thrilled to be called to speak now, Madam Deputy Speaker.

May I start by setting something straight? There is an answer to the West Lothian question. Tam Dalyell and I actually came up with two answers some 17 years ago. One, Madam Deputy Speaker, as you know, is the Harthill services, and the second is salt and sauce. I will leave it to the House to determine which one is the correct answer.

What an utter humiliation this is for the Government. A flagship policy of the 2015 manifesto will soon be nothing more than a footnote in future constitutional history books, and, remember, it is just another Tory policy disaster. God knows what they were thinking about when they introduced this some six years ago. They were consumed with the notion that we, the unkempt Caledonian hordes, were somehow stopping them securing the democratic outcomes that they desired—us, the 59 Scots MPs out of 650 MPs, needed to be constrained and curtailed. EVEL was just about the worst solution to a problem that did not even exist.

Never before has a procedure come to this House that has divided the membership of this House into two different and distinct classes. Not only did it do that, it did it by nationality and by geography. It is a procedure that barely anyone understands, that is a burden to the management and administration of the business of this House, that is entirely unnecessary, and that produces almost unprecedented resentment. Something that it will be remembered for more than anything else is what it has done for the cause of English devolved governance. This was the first serious attempt to create some sort of forum for English democracy. We actually agree with them. They do deserve their English Parliament. They should always get the outcomes that they want and deserve. We have even got a neat, practical and elegant solution to that, but, of course, they will not even start to look at that. There are myriad solutions to resolving this within the precious Union. The thing is that they could not be bothered doing the work. They could not be bothered rolling up their sleeves and designing a Parliament of their own. They decided instead to come here and to use the national UK Parliament of Great Britain and Northern Ireland for this doomed experiment. Imagine a quasi-English Parliament squatting here in the national Parliament. What an absolute and utter disgrace.

[Mr Carmichael]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Pete Wishart]

I do not have time to give way to the right hon. Gentleman.

It satisfied absolutely no one. All it did was infuriate Scotland. Instead of securing the near federalism that was promised, Scotland instead saw its MPs become second-class Members in the Parliament that they had just been invited to lead. There were signs in the Division Lobby saying, “England only.” They would have been better saying, “Scots out.” That is what the Government did with this procedure.

The Government knew it would never work. From the first moment when they suggested this nonsense, we have told them again and again that it was madness and that, at some point, they would be here—as they are this evening—to withdraw it. Now under pressure from the SNP, EVEL is to be abandoned. This is a spectacular victory for the Scottish National party, and I congratulate all my hon. Friends on bringing down this nonsense. This is one victory that we have secured this week in the United Kingdom and, by God, we are going to celebrate like it is 1966. Believe me, we will be banging on about this for the next 55 years and we will enjoy every minute of it.

There is a part of me that will miss the entertainment of it all and the laughs that it gave us. It was designed to quell this tartan menace, but I ended up making the most contributions in the Legislative Grand Committee. With 57 contributions, not only was I the most committed and dedicated Member of the English Parliament but I beat all the English Members combined two times over.

[Harriett Baldwin]

Given the hon. Member’s digression on to football, which team did he support on Sunday night?

[Pete Wishart]

I supported the best team on Sunday night. I enjoy my football, and I can say quite clearly Forza Italia.

English votes for English laws started its sorry and doomed journey just hours after the Scottish independence referendum result was announced. Instead of the statesmanship and consensus required at a sensitive and raw moment in Scottish constitutional history, David Cameron announced that the English question should now be addressed. With that, as well as bringing us to this point, he ensured that the campaign for Scottish independence started once again almost immediately. That campaign will soon be concluded with a victory for the Scottish National party and a victory for Scotland.

We believe it is legitimate for English representatives to secure the outcomes they want, and SNP MPs do not vote on English-only legislation or business that does not affect Scotland. If it is not in the Scottish interest, we take no interest in it. If there are financial consequences or an inadvertent impact, we will represent our constituents—but it is us who will decide that, not the diktat of a Tory Government. We commit not to participate in legislation that does not impact on our nation, but, please, let us never, ever do anything like this again.

Instead of going on about KwaZulu-Natal, the Leader of the House should be apologising to the House for wasting hours of the House’s time on a stupid experiment that went absolutely nowhere. Let us now work together to resolve this and ensure that our nations get what they want. We are on different trajectories and we want something different. Let us now give our nations what they want.