Leaving the EU: Customs

Peter Grant Excerpts

Wednesday 16th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to this debate.

I was going to say that I stand here with a sense of déjà vu, but perhaps I should say “already seen” in case I upset those who want to purge these lands of all trace of foreign influence. The SNP will be supporting the motion, but what does it say about this so-called mother of Parliaments that we have to keep going through such a ridiculous medieval charade—another French word—just to get the Government to provide Parliament with the information we need to do the job we have been elected to do?

We will debate the motion until 7 o’clock, when we now know the Government will frogmarch their obedient little minions through the Lobby to oppose it. The motion probably will not be carried, but even if it were carried, we would spend the next six months raising points of order to argue over 14th-century precedent as to whether the Government actually need to pay a blind bit of attention to anything this Parliament might say.

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Peter Grant]

The hon. Gentleman has just been advised of how little time there is for debate. If he has his name down to speak, he will get his time. If he has not put his name down to speak, I am sorry, but those who have put their name down get precedence.

Would it not be so much better if the Government were simply prepared to trust Parliament with that information in the first place? The Government’s response was not only predictable but was so predictable that I wrote what I am saying now before they responded. They say there is a long-established convention that Cabinet papers are confidential. They say routine publication would prejudice the smooth and efficient operation of Government. They say that publication would place in the public domain sensitive information that could compromise our negotiating position.

I accept there are occasions, maybe the majority of occasions, when any or all of those considerations should predominate and the balance of argument should be against disclosure, but the motion before us does not ask for the automatic release of everything the Cabinet ever does; it asks for the release of some papers in relation to Brexit that the Opposition, including the SNP, believe need to be made available to Parliament in the unique circumstances in which we now find ourselves.

The Government keep telling us we are in an unprecedented situation, and then they ask us to be dictated to by precedent in a situation that is unprecedented. Yes, the confidentiality of Cabinet papers is an ancient convention. In fact, we are reminded that the convention goes back to the days of King George III—that great, wise and all-caring monarch whose glorious reign has been immortalised in film as “The Madness of King George”. What better metaphor could we have for the Brexit process?

If the Government are so thirled to sticking to the fine detail of these honourable conventions, why on earth has the Foreign Secretary still got a job? He has earned more red and yellow cards in two years than Vinnie Jones did in his entire career, but he is still on the pitch—the Foreign Secretary is not on the subs bench just now, obviously—arguing in public with the manager over what the team tactics should be, while some of his colleagues try desperately to calm him down before he gets suspended permanently. In the interests of strict accuracy, I should say that Vinnie Jones is only ninth in the world record list for red cards—or 10th, if we include the Foreign Secretary.

We must also consider the argument that releasing these papers would not be conducive to the smooth and efficient running of Government business. We do not need to release Cabinet papers to prevent the smooth and efficient running of Government business, as the Cabinet is perfectly capable of doing that for itself. The main Opposition party tabled this motion because it is becoming terrifyingly clear that those in the Cabinet are making a bigger mess of the Brexit process every time they meet to try to fix it.

[James Cartlidge]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Peter Grant]

I will give way this once, as the hon. Gentleman has been very persistent.

[James Cartlidge]

That is very kind. Does the hon. Gentleman think the Scottish Government should disclose all of their confidential papers?

[Peter Grant]

If the hon. Gentleman had listened, he would have heard me make it clear that I am not arguing, and neither is the motion, that this should be regarded as routine, automatic or standard practice; this is a request in a specific instance. I will explain why in this instance and on this matter those in the Cabinet have shown themselves incapable of fixing it by themselves. We do not need a Humble Address to mess up the smooth and efficient running of Government business; we only need Cabinet Committees and Sub-Committees in order to do that, as they can do it perfectly well. The Government’s arguments might carry some weight if they could point to some kind of progress—there has been some but not nearly enough. Almost two years after the decision was taken to leave the EU, and five months before, as we know, we need agreement on the Government’s preferred solutions, we do not know even what their preferred solutions are, because they cannot agree on them. Those in the Cabinet are too busy fighting among themselves, jockeying for position for when the Prime Minister goes, willingly or unwillingly. Almost the only thing they can agree on is that this mess is everybody’s fault but their own.

As for the Government’s non-plans for our future customs relationship, here is what we know: we know that the Prime Minister’s plans are “crazy”; we know there are “significant question marks” over whether they can be delivered on time; we know that the Foreign Secretary is undermining the negotiations; and we know that thousands of people in the car industry could lose their jobs if the Government get it wrong. We know all that because it is what Cabinet Ministers are already telling us in public. If what they are saying in private is more damaging to our negotiating stance than what they are saying in public, heaven help us. Those quotes have come from serving Cabinet Ministers within the past 10 days—that is what they are saying in public. It is hard to believe that what they are saying in private can be so much more damaging that they cannot be allowed to say it—

[Lady Hermon (North Down) (Ind)]

rose—

[Peter Grant]

I am sorry, but I did say I was taking only one intervention.

We have a Government who claim to be taking back control but who are now seen to be running completely out of control. They claim to be restoring parliamentary sovereignty, for those parts of these islands where such a strange idea actually holds any sway, but they are at best failing to co-operate with and at worst appear to be wilfully obstructing Parliament’s attempts to hold them to account. The ducking and diving that went on with respect to a previous Humble Address, on the Brexit analysis papers, has been discussed often enough that we do not need to repeat it now. We also know that the Government are still trying to avoid complying with a recommendation from the Public Accounts Committee’s 18th report, published more than three months ago, that they publish details of what work Departments are doing to prepare for Brexit. Two weeks ago, the Chair of the Brexit Select Committee had to take the highly unusual step of publicly rebuking the Secretary of State for not giving proper priority to making him and his civil servants available to give evidence to the Committee. There are probably other instances going on right now, which are not yet in the public domain, where individual members of particular Select Committees will know that their Committees and their Chairs are losing patience with Ministers for either not being available to be questioned or for not providing information on time.

This morning, a hard-hitting report was published by the Work and Pensions Committee and the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee on the collapse of Carillion. In normal circumstances, it would have attracted huge attention. A lot of people have not noticed it yet because there are so many other Government failures, Government U-turns and Government fall-outs going on that it is difficult to keep on top of all of them. In publishing that report, the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee Chair, the hon. Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves), said:

“The company’s delusional directors drove Carillion off a cliff and then tried to blame everyone but themselves”.

I hope that she has registered that remark for royalties because I think it will be used an awful lot in future to describe the Cabinet’s handling of Brexit.

The Cabinet has miserably failed in its responsibility to introduce credible proposals to avoid what the Prime Minister described as a cliff edge. I suggest that we do for the Cabinet what the Cabinet would do for a failing council or health authority: it is time for this Parliament to take back control and put the Cabinet into special measures.

I do not just want the Cabinet to give us the information. The Cabinet is clearly incapable of taking a decision anywhere near on time, so as well as giving us the information, why not give Parliament the decision? Why not respect the sovereignty, as they call it, of Parliament? Why not agree to a free vote in this place on the customs union? I will tell you why, Madam Deputy Speaker: the Government know what the result would be. It would not be consistent with their red lines or anything that appears in existing Government papers.

Let us have that free vote on the customs union. The European Research Group can quietly go away and spontaneously combust when they see the result and the rest of us can concentrate on turning the bus round before it disappears over the Prime Minister’s cliff edge.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ross Thomson]

I wholeheartedly agree. If Labour Members think it is good enough for the Government to do this, it is certainly good enough for the shadow Cabinet.

Labour still refuses to commit to ending free movement. The hon. Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) raised the issue of the border with Ireland in relation to “max fac”. Let us be clear that this approach relies on electronic customs clearing, which is standard practice across the EU, following World Customs Organisation principles.

I draw Members’ attention to the EU’s own customs expert, Lars Karlsson, who in evidence to the Brexit Committee said that using new technology is not in itself new. GPS technology, which most motorists already carry in their cars, has been available for years. Such technology is already in use for the mass tracking of vehicles, and it is used by the likes of Network Rail, and by Uber for taxis. Furthermore, we could extend the authorised economic operator or trusted trader schemes for reputable companies, such as Guinness, which already, despite the different excise duties, has many lorries crossing the Irish border that do not need ever to be stopped. Beyond the scaremongering, an Irish border without any infrastructure is absolutely possible, using both new and existing technology.

[Peter Grant]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Ross Thomson]

No, thank you.

To return to the Brexit prize of being able to set our own trade policy, it was on 9 March 1776 that a great Scot, Adam Smith, published “The Wealth of Nations”, in which he outlined a vision of how trade produced prosperity and opportunity. Post Brexit, we can revitalise that vision. After we leave the EU, we can become a global leader in free trade, using trade to spread prosperity and political stability. I was pleased to welcome the Secretary of State for International Trade to my constituency last week, where he heard about the opportunities for fish processing and for oil and gas in trade across the world to increase exports and promote prosperity not just at home, but abroad.

--- Later in debate ---

[Emma Reynolds]

Turkey’s arrangement with the EU was agreed when Turkey was on the path to membership; that is not the arrangement the Labour party is seeking with the EU, and to suggest otherwise is, frankly, ludicrous. We are proposing that we remain in the customs union and have a say over trade agreements done with the rest of the world. That is a more responsible policy than the hard Brexit that Conservative Members are preaching.

The other crucial issue in this debate is the border on the island of Ireland. The Prime Minister has made two contradictory promises: she has promised that there will continue to be an invisible border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, but she has also promised that we will leave the customs union. Anybody who has rationally considered this in the round will come to the same conclusion as I have: it is clearly not possible to do both of those things. That is why both the models being considered by the Government have been rejected by the EU. The Prime Minister can have as many meetings of the Cabinet and the Cabinet Sub-Committee and with Tory Back Benchers as she likes, but that does not change the fact that the EU opposes both of these models and neither of them is tried and tested. If she spent a little less time negotiating with her party and a little more time negotiating with our EU partners, she might have made more progress in the negotiations to date.

[Peter Grant]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Emma Reynolds]

I will not.

Let us briefly consider the two models. Even some Conservative Members seem to be suggesting that the Prime Minister’s preferred option of the customs partnership is illegal, “crazy” and “cretinous”, so she does not even seem to have the backing of her own Members of Parliament. The EU has called it “magical thinking”, and from looking at the detail of the proposal it would appear that we would have to track every import into the UK—the EU tariffs would be different from those with the rest of the world—and collect the relevant tariffs, trusting those who say that the final destination is the EU. If it was not for the EU but stayed in the UK, we would not need to track it. That does not sound like a workable proposal to me. It would be a bureaucratic nightmare.

Then we come to the “max fac” option. The hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Ross Thomson)—it would be nice if he were listening—spoke enthusiastically about Dr Lars Karlsson’s proposals. When the Exiting the European Union Committee took evidence from Dr Karlsson, he admitted that some form of infra- structure—whether CCTV or automatic number plate recognition—would be required on the border. It has already been said that that would go against what has been agreed if we are to retain an invisible border on the island of Ireland.

My last point is that geography matters in trade, and I will leave the House with this point:

“We export more to Ireland than we do to China, almost twice as much to Belgium as we do to India, and nearly three times as much to Sweden as we do to Brazil. It is not realistic to think we could just replace European trade with these new markets.”

Those were the words of the then Home Secretary, now the Prime Minister, in April 2016.