Government’s EU Exit Analysis

Peter Grant Excerpts

Wednesday 31st January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

I am grateful for the chance to speak in this debate and I commend the main Opposition party for securing it.

I am wondering why we are here because, yesterday, the Minister’s colleague beside him on the Front Bench, the Under-Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker), spent over an hour valiantly, loyally and completely unsuccessfully trying to persuade the House that the sky would fall down if this information were shared with anybody. Now we are being told that it can be shared at the very least with 650 people.

Incidentally, part of the reason why relatively few MPs—certainly those in the Scottish National party—went along to the “Kremlin” reading room to look at the sectoral analysis is that, having seen part of the papers, I told a lot of my colleagues not to bother. It simply was not worth their time to go through the security checks to read stuff that they could get by looking online.

Again, we are seeing a symptom of the fact that, despite all the assurances we get that Brexit will restore “sovereignty” to Parliament, this is really about trying to restore the alleged sovereignty of a minority Government over the will of Parliament. Parliament is supposed to tell Government what to do, but every time it looks as if Parliament is going to tell the Government to do something they do not want to do, it causes absolute panic on the Government Front Bench. It also causes a headache for civil servants, as one of their main responsibilities is supposed to be to prevent Ministers from doing anything that causes political embarrassment to the Government—good luck to them. If they can achieve that, they must be quite remarkable people.

[Stephen Kerr]

May I ask the hon. Gentleman a very simple question? Does he condone or condemn the leaking of Government papers? It is an important question.

[Peter Grant]

At this point, the answer is no: I neither condone nor condemn because I do not know what the circumstances were.

I walked away from a potentially successful career in NHS financial management. I wrestled for six months with my own conscience, seeing things that I knew had to be brought to public attention but knowing there was no way I could do that, and knowing that the public were being deliberately misled about what was going on in the health board that I worked in. The only way I could bring it to public attention was to resign and walk away from the job. So I will never, ever condemn anyone who believes they are acting in the public interest by doing something that they are not supposed to do.

I would be very surprised if there is a single Member in the Chamber today who is not at this very moment considering an important constituency case that has been brought to them by someone who technically was breaking the rules by raising it with a Member of Parliament. There are times when the public interest has to outweigh all other considerations, and until I have seen the full circumstances of why this information was disclosed, I am not going to condone or condemn, and I do not think anyone else should prejudice the case by commenting on it now.

[Geraint Davies]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that there is a distinction between a leak and whistleblowing? Whistleblowing is in the public interest. The provisional evaluation of the economic impacts, be it incomplete or imperfect, and given that good is not the enemy of perfect, should be in the public arena. This is a whistle blow, not a leak.

[Peter Grant]

I am grateful for that intervention. We have to be careful about language. There is whistleblowing as defined in the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998 and it is not clear whether this incident would comply with that.

As a council leader, I sometimes found myself having to respond to information that technically should not have been disclosed. I always took the view that, if the motivation was clearly public interest, we should seek to protect those who did that, even if they had not technically done it in the correct way. The question today should not be about the motivation or principles of whoever disclosed this information into the public domain. The question should be first about what the information tells us, and secondly about what the Government’s determination to hide this information from the people tells us about the Government’s handling of Brexit.

I hope that, when the Under-Secretary of State responds, he will do what the Minister did not do earlier, and tell us when the Government started to prepare this analysis. Is this the homework that the Secretary of State had to confess to a Select Committee he had not done yet when the House asked for it? It looks suspiciously like this is not only the Secretary of State’s late homework but that he copied it off his new pal Big Mike in the high school up the road in Scotland. The similarities between the Scottish Government’s analysis that the Government rubbished two weeks ago and the Government’s own analysis are so striking that it would be a remarkable coincidence if the people who prepared those analyses had not been copying from each other.

[Tom Brake]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman that it is clearly important to get this information out into the public domain or in controlled circumstances. Is he as worried as I am that, despite having information out in the public domain that tells us that Brexit, whatever version we go for, is going to cause us huge damage, not only the Government but, it seems, those on the Labour Front Bench are still going to proceed none the less?

[Peter Grant]

Again, this may not be the time for that debate. My position is perfectly clear. We have the results of four national votes and we have to seek to respect those as far as possible. We cannot respect them all because two of us want to leave and two of us want to stay, and the European Union does not allow bits of nation states to stay or go. However, on the Government Front Bench and, to a lesser extent, on the main Opposition Front Bench, there has been a failure to distinguish between leaving the European Union and leaving the single market, the customs union and various other European institutions, which is where the real damage exposed by these analyses lies. It is possible to leave the European Union, to comply with the referendum result, and not to bring down on ourselves, for example, the potential 8% reduction in Scottish GDP as a result. That can only be done if the Government admit that they got it wrong and step back from the red line on single market and customs union membership. There was no referendum about the single market or the customs union. At the moment, we only have unilateral political dogma from the Government, telling us that we have to leave.

The real reason why these analyses were never done and they were kept secret for as long as possible after they had been done is that they show that, in deciding to take us out of the customs union and the single market, the Government got it badly wrong. All we need is for the Government to admit they got it wrong and this whole debate then becomes an irrelevance.

The Government’s behaviour demonstrates again the fallacy of the argument that Parliament holds the Government to account. In effect, we do not have an electoral system that is designed to produce a proper Parliament. We have an electoral system for this place that is designed to produce one winner and one loser, and it does not like it if there is more than one party on the alleged losing side, because the system cannot cope with having more than one big Opposition party. It does not like it if it is unclear who the overall winner is. This place is always in turmoil if a coalition has to be formed and there is a minority Government. The whole procedure of Parliament—the way that Bills are produced, the way that time is allocated and so on—is based on the assumption that the Government decide and just every once in a while Parliament tries to tell the Government that they should have decided something different.

In the discussion we had about the first batch of Brexit papers before Christmas—there have been elements of it again today—we heard that it is disloyal to the country and to our constituents for any Member of Parliament to suggest that the Government have got it wrong and should be doing something different. Whether it is in relation to publishing or not publishing the papers, to handing them over in secret to a Committee or not, to the decision to take us out of the customs union in the first place or to any other decision that the Government take and announce without having the full mandate of the people, it must be open to any Member of Parliament to criticise and seek to change it.

When I keep hearing Members—not so much those on my Benches, because we have a clear mandate from our constituents—on either the Government Benches or other Opposition Benches being denounced as traitors and enemies of the people simply for standing up in this place for what they believe in, we have to ask ourselves what is going on with democracy in these four nations. In some ways, that is even more fundamental than our membership of the EU and its related institutions. We have to get a grip.

It was disappointing to hear comments yesterday from Government Back Benchers about London-based elite remoaners. No one on the Government Front Bench picked up on that and said that that kind of language is not acceptable. There should never be any need to question the integrity or motivation of anybody in the Chamber simply because we disagree, however passionately, with what they are saying.

[Vicky Ford]

I listened to what the hon. Gentleman said earlier about the sector-by-sector reports and I think I heard him say that he had told other colleagues not to bother to go and read them. My understanding is that we need a trade deal that works for all sectors of the economy and especially for areas such as food, agriculture and farming. My memory of those sector-by-sector reports is that that is an area that is enormously detailed, so perhaps he will think again about encouraging other Members to go and look at this detailed information.

[Peter Grant]

Part of the Government’s response earlier today to the disclosure of these documents was that the quotation or citation was selective and incomplete. I am afraid that is what we have just heard from the hon. Lady.

[Joanna Cherry]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Peter Grant]

May I deal with the first intervention first, please?

What I said was that the reason I had told my colleagues that it was not really worth while for them to hand over their phones, make appointments and so on to go and see the documents, was that there was nothing in there that they could not have got quite easily on the internet. Is it really a good use of a Member’s time to go through a security check more severe than at an airport, in order to read in a classified document that Airbus and Boeing make aeroplanes? To read in a classified document that gambling legislation in Northern Ireland is devolved but not elsewhere? These are all things that were in the documents that the Government said they could not disclose. To read in the sectoral report on the electricity industry that lots of people in the United Kingdom rely on electricity for domestic and commercial purposes?

Come on, Madam Deputy Speaker: there may well be information in the latest batch of documents that there is good reason for wanting to keep classified and confidential, but the Government’s attitude is that they tell the people and Parliament as little as they can possibly get away with. We all know that the reason for the change of heart from yesterday to today is nothing to do with the Government’s having decided that, because part of the documents had been published, they might as well give Parliament everything. The Government are not opposing the motion today because they know they would go down badly if they forced it to a Division. They do not have the support of their own Back Benchers; I doubt if they even have the support of their own Front Benchers. Their culture of excessive secrecy no longer has the support of their own people. They are not forcing the matter to a vote today because they know they would not only lose, but lose so badly that it would call into question the continuation of the Government in its entirety.

[Stephen Kerr]

rose—

[Peter Grant]

I did say I would give way to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry).

[Joanna Cherry]

As usual, my hon. Friend is being modest. He is not explaining to the House that he is a member of the Exiting the European Union Committee and has been part of the project to produce detailed reports of sectoral analysis, so he knows, like anyone who has bothered to read the reports—I see the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford) is still sitting beside the hon. Member for Stirling (Stephen Kerr)—that all the information in these top-secret documents is already in the public domain.

[Peter Grant]

I am grateful for that intervention. I am aware of the time, and I do not want to impinge too much on other people’s—

[Stephen Kerr]

rose—

[Peter Grant]

I will give way once more, but I hope the intervention is a bit more relevant than the earlier one.

[Stephen Kerr]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his gracious approach to my intervention. It is just that he is contradicting himself. He says that the Government are not responsive to Parliament—that Parliament is some kind of constitutional eunuch—and in the next breath he says that the reason there will not be a vote today is that the Government cannot control their own side. He cannot have it both ways. This Parliament is very successfully holding the Government to account and is being very thorough in its scrutiny. In defence of the honour of this Parliament, I needed to intervene to say that.

[Peter Grant]

The reason why Conservative Back Benchers will abstain in this debate is that the Government Whips have told them to abstain. The reason why the earlier motion on the main Brexit sectoral analysis was not opposed was that the Government told their Back Benchers not to oppose it. Since then a number of Back Benchers, sitting in this Chamber, have said that they would have been quite happy to lead a move against that Humble Address before Christmas but the Government Whips told them not to. The fact of the matter is that all too often the Government hold Parliament to account, not the other way around.

We shall not fix that today, but if we appreciate that that is the background against which this fiasco has developed, it is easier to understand how it is that, as soon as there is a Government who do not command a substantial majority in the House, there are problems. The British electoral system has a phobia against minority Governments or coalition Governments, despite the fact that in numerous other places—some of them not too far north of here—there are examples of Governments operating very successfully indeed, either in coalition or as a minority Government.

The Minister, as part of his argument to try to discredit his own Government’s analysis, points out that it is based on average free trade agreements, as opposed to the all-singing, all-dancing with bells and whistles free trade agreement that the Government keep telling us they will achieve within the next year or two. What is that assurance based on? What grounds does this Parliament have to believe that the Government have a snowball in hell’s chance of finding anyone to give the United Kingdom on its own a better trade agreement than they are willing to give to the 500 million people of the European Union single market? Have the Government done an analysis to tell them that they are going to get better trade deals? I hope not, because if they have done such an analysis, that analysis is quite clearly rubbish as well.

Given that analyses that come out of Her Majesty’s Treasury are no longer to be trusted, may we now take it as the Government’s official position that we can no longer believe what was said in the 16 analyses that were done by Government Departments in 2013-14, showing what a disaster a yes result in the Scottish referendum would be? And can we just cut to the chase, and save everybody a lot of time, by getting the Government to admit now that the bucketsful of analysis that they are going to produce next time around are also worthless and incomplete and selective, so they can just not bother producing them and save us all a lot of time?

Madam Deputy Speaker, when you get a Government who have to defend their own excessive secrecy by telling the people of these islands that they cannot rely on information that comes out from the Government, whether it was meant to come out or not—when the Government tell us we cannot rely on information that the Government themselves are producing—that is what undermines Britain’s negotiating position with the European Union. It is not the fact that information might be published that the EU could have put together itself quite easily; it is that the Government’s action in attempting to conceal that information and then seeking to discredit it demonstrates to our EU partners what they probably knew—that they are negotiating with a disorganised, disunited, shambolic and incompetent Government. That weakens Britain’s negotiating position more than any release of Brexit analysis papers could ever do.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen Kinnock (Aberavon) (Lab)]

First, may I add to the earlier comments about how good it is to see you back in your place, Mr Deputy Speaker? It is an honour to follow the hon. Member for Redditch (Rachel Maclean).

The debate has been conducted in a cordial and respectful manner. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of previous debates about the impact assessments and many of our Brexit debates, when Members on the Government Benches have repeatedly impugned the motives and questioned the patriotism of Members not only on my side of the House, but on their own Back Benches. This kind of conduct has to stop because debate in this Chamber cannot function on that basis.

When we take our Oath of Allegiance of office, we swear to act in the national interest, in faithful service to those who elected us, and we do so on the understanding that everyone else in this place does the same. Although I may believe that other Members err in what they hold to be in the best interests of our country, I would never for one moment doubt or question the sincerity with which they hold those views, I would never question their patriotism and I would never impugn their motives.

The contest of ideas that illuminates and enlivens this Chamber is one of different solutions, predicated on a common understanding that we all place the interests of our country first, even if we differ over what best serves those interests. Without that common understanding, our democracy breaks down.

That is just one part of a worrying shift in our political culture, however: one where parliamentarians simply trying to do our job are dismissed as traitors or saboteurs; and where the civil service is told, “We’ve had enough of experts,” because they do not give Ministers the answers they want. The job of civil servants is not to tell Ministers what they want to hear. It is to tell them what they need to hear—to speak truth to power.

Parliamentarians requesting information are not betraying our country. We are simply trying to do our job and stand up for our constituents. So when we call for the release of these documents, it is not about undermining the process; it is about improving the process. Parliamentary government requires an informed legislature. That means we must have access to this information. It is not good enough to tell us to wait until October, because by then it will be too late, as we are entering a crunch-point in the negotiations right now.

Earlier this week, we saw the EU agree its transition negotiating guidelines in just two minutes and, as we have seen, once Mr Barnier gets his marching orders he does not deviate from them. In about six weeks the EU will agree the negotiating directives for the final trade deal phase of the withdrawal talks. We should let that sink in for a moment: in six weeks, we will be asked to make the most important choice in our post-war history.

We talk of the fantasy Canada plus plus plus, but these leaked reports give the game away. They do not have anything on a Canada plus plus plus scenario, because such a scenario does not exist. It cannot exist. The “plus plus plus” is presumably supposed to mean the services sector, which accounts for over 80% of the British economy, but just two weeks ago at the Brexit Committee we heard from Christophe Bondy, the lead Canadian negotiator on CETA—the comprehensive economic and trade agreement—who said there is no way for services to be part of a CETA-type deal. The fact is that a Canada-style deal would be about as much use to this country as a chocolate teapot.

It is crystal-clear that the most seamless and secure Brexit—the Brexit that is best for Britain—is an EFTA-a EEA-based Brexit. That is the only Brexit that protects jobs and opportunities, while also delivering control and influence. An EEA-EFTA Brexit ensures maximal access to the single market, being an internal market with the majority of the single market. It therefore protects jobs and investment, strengthens our hand in taking on multinationals such as Google and Amazon when they fail to pay their fair share, and protects vital workplace rights.

[Peter Grant]

Given the hon. Gentleman’s desire to retain access to the single market, can he explain why he does not want to just stay in the single market? Would not that provide the best possible access?

[Stephen Kinnock]

One of the key issues in the referendum was the free movement of labour and, as I shall go on to explain, there is an important provision in the EEA agreement that enables the application of an emergency brake on free movement. That is an important distinction between the EEA and the single market and it is one that we should look at seriously.

An EEA-EFTA-based Brexit would let us take back more control. It would end the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice and direct effect, ensuring that British courts had sovereignty. It would also allow us to shape the rules of the internal market through the EEA joint committees and veto those that did not work, with the right of reservation as enshrined in the EEA agreement. An EEA-EFTA Brexit would allow us to reform free movement by triggering articles 112 and 113, following the protocol 15 precedent, potentially allowing us to introduce a quota-based system to manage the inward flow of labour.

Above all else, an EEA-EFTA Brexit would allow us to reunite our deeply divided country. The Brexit referendum was won on a narrow margin, but the result was clear, and that was why I voted to trigger article 50. The Prime Minister then called an election, hoping to secure a mandate for a hard Brexit, but she had her majority cut substantially. The country said no to a hard Brexit. Any rational Government would accept that decision and commit to a sensible Brexit, rather than ploughing on through this fantasy hard Brexit land of rainbows and unicorns. The country said no to a hard Brexit. It said yes to a Brexit that bridges the divide. Our future relationship with our most important commercial, diplomatic and political partner is on a burning platform, and we have only until the end of March to put out those fires. I therefore urge the Prime Minister and her Cabinet to show some leadership, get off the fence and commit unequivocally to an EEA-EFTA Brexit.

Leaving the European Union

Peter Grant Excerpts

Monday 22nd January 2018 Westminster Hall

[Paul Scully]

Yes, I have had people talk to me about financial services. The financial services industry is important for Sutton and Cheam, for London and for the country—about 11% of our entire tax take comes from that industry, and it creates a lot of jobs. That is another good reason not to leave immediately without giving any thought to what happens to every single industry, including financial services, manufacturing, education and the medical sector. It all needs to be put in the pot.

On the idea that we need to panic about financial services, there are things we can do. This year the European Union is bringing in MiFID II—the second markets in financial instruments directive—and we had already been talking about a number of regulatory equivalence issues, at the behest of the UK, before the referendum. There is plenty more we can do, and we need to ensure that we develop that in our talks, to demonstrate that the financial services industry in London has the rule of the law that the EU is looking for, and the right time zone, language and support systems, so that it continues to be an attractive place in which to settle and remain for not just European financial institutions but worldwide ones.

On how we think the negotiation might pan out, we have to be really careful of the rhetoric. We knew how it was likely to pan out in the first place. A friend of mine, Syed Kamall, the MEP who is the leader of the European Conservatives and Reformists group in the European Parliament, wrote an article—I have also heard a few of his speeches on this—in which he detailed how he thought the negotiation would pan out. In it, he talked about how we need to be clearer about our priorities, but not necessarily reveal our hand, and that we need to set the right tone regarding co-operation. No one is talking about the need to break up the EU; all we have said is that we are leaving the EU. We are not leaving Europe. We want to work with Europe as one of a number of trading areas around the world.

We need to understand how the EU negotiates as it tries to grab some of our markets and close down some of our discussions. That is natural: we have talked about trade, but there is an element of competition. Trade is very much a partnership; competition can get a bit more feisty, because we are looking after our own interests. We must bear in mind, of course, that not all the negotiation will be rational. To be frank, the debates we have in this place are not always rational, so imagine multiplying that by 27, with all the competing priorities in the EU. It is no accident that many free trade agreements have not been dealt with speedily. The Australian trade agreement has primarily been delayed by Italian tomato growers, and the Canadian agreement has only just come to fruition—Romanian visas were one thing stopping it. There are many little competing priorities.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

The main thing is that on a number of occasions, the European Commission has been keen to press on with international trade deals but has been unable to because one member state or another has prevented it. Does that not destroy the argument that the European Commission has been imposing laws on the United Kingdom against the latter’s wishes? Is it not the case that in every major decision regarding approval of European Commission proposals, the United Kingdom has played an equal and often decisive part?

[Paul Scully]

The hon. Gentleman was right in the first half of his intervention: there are undoubtedly competing priorities. However, that is not necessarily the same as the laws, rules and directives that come from the European Commission. The 27 member states, individually or in small groups, often feel disempowered by the moves from the centre, from Brussels.

On asking for more than we want, I do not think that the EU understands our negotiation style sometimes. I believe that if we had asked for more when we were trying to renegotiate many things before the referendum, including the emergency brake, we would have got some movement, and we would have voted to remain in the EU. Instead, we did not ask for enough, and we did not even get that. So in this negotiation, it is absolutely right that we are ambitious, that we ask for perhaps more than we want. That is why we need time. We might do a deal on the courtroom steps, perhaps even on the very last day, but we need to be prepared to walk away as well. There is absolutely no point in saying, “You know what? We’re happy to sign up to anything you ask us for,” because if we do they will offer us a deal that we can easily refuse and we will never get anywhere. If we end up staying in the EU in all but name, that will not be good for the country, for the division and uncertainty I spoke about earlier, or for the other 27 nations when they want—and they clearly do—to seek to reform the EU.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrew Bowie]

I absolutely accept that. That was the case at the time, of course, but the people of Scotland went to the polls in 2014 in the full knowledge that a referendum on our membership of the EU was on the table. It was January 2013 when David Cameron made his speech at Bloomberg stating his intention to hold a referendum on our membership of the EU if the Conservatives secured a majority at the 2015 general election. The people of Scotland went to the polls in September 2014 in the full knowledge that that would happen if we won a majority.

[Peter Grant]

Will the hon. Gentleman remind us how David Cameron’s party got on in Scotland in 2015, when it put that referendum promise in its manifesto? How many MPs did the Tories get elected in 2015?

[Andrew Bowie]

It will come as no surprise to the hon. Gentleman that I tend to reflect more favourably on the result this year, when 13 Scottish Conservatives were returned to this Parliament and, sadly, the Scottish National party lost 21 seats to various Unionist parties. As much as I would like to continue that debate for the entire evening, I must carry on.

In June 2016, 17.5 million people voted to leave the EU and 16 million people voted to remain. That was a conclusive result, which must be respected by all who claim to be democrats. We are leaving the EU, but we are not—this is absolutely key—leaving Europe. That has been recognised on countless occasions by the Secretary of State for Exiting the EU, the Foreign Secretary and the Prime Minister. We will remain the closest of friends and allies outwith the single market, the customs union and the political bodies of the European Union. It is evident from my discussions last week and from discussions at a far higher level than mine that our friends in Europe recognise that, too.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ross Thomson]

I would like to make some more progress. I do not think we would have seen a call for another referendum to leave the European Union.

On the border with Northern Ireland, it was made clear last month that when we leave, we will leave as one United Kingdom. Now, the doom-mongers will say, “Sure, phase 1 was fine, but they’re going to punish us in phase 2.” After being wrong about the economic effects of a leave vote, the economic effects of article 50 being triggered and the outcome of phase 1, we might think they would have given up on “Project Fear” by now, but apparently not.

[Peter Grant]

How can anyone know what is right or wrong about forecasts of the economic impact of Brexit when we have not left yet and the Treasury has not done an impact analysis? What is the source of the figures that enable the hon. Gentleman to say that it will not cause an economic problem?

[Ross Thomson]

I vividly remember being told during that campaign that, according to the Treasury, not just leaving the European Union but voting to leave the European Union would lead to an emergency Budget and a mass sense of panic. The world was going to collapse around our ears because of the economic devastation caused, but that simply never came to fruition.

What should be considered is this month’s analysis by the EU committee of the regions, which demonstrates why we have leverage in the Brexit negotiations. It found that—unsurprisingly—no deal would be not ideal for major industries in the EU 27, to put it mildly. It transpires that the EU cannot afford to be blasé about no deal or intransient in the negotiations, because a good deal is in our mutual interests. That is why I am confident we will get exactly that.

I believe in Brexit. I believe we will make Britain more prosperous and more democratic. We will be able to: equip our economy better to face the challenges of the 21st century; develop agriculture, fisheries and immigration systems better tailored to this country’s needs; decouple ourselves from the fortunes of a routinely crisis-hit EU; restore our democracy; enhance devolution at home; and become a global leader in free trade. Getting a good deal with the EU is part of that last goal.

The truth is that we are not waiting but laying the groundwork for the best Brexit possible: one that maintains free trade with our European neighbours while allowing us to reap the benefits of leaving. The past few months have shown that a good Brexit deal is not just achievable but highly likely. The fears of those who want us to ignore the referendum result and remain, and of those who want us to walk away immediately, have proved to be unfounded.

I understand why some Brexit supporters are upset by the efforts of the Opposition—the Labour, SNP and Liberal Democrat politicians who undermine Brexit—but successive votes have shown that, in this elected House, we have a Conservative-led cross-party majority for democracy. We will deliver Brexit, both here in Parliament and in the negotiations. There are now just 14 months until we leave, so we are closer to exit day than to the referendum day. After 45 years of EU membership, there is not much longer to wait, and we will be better off for it.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

I am pleased to begin the summing up of the debate. Interestingly, no one wanted to speak about how a no-deal Brexit would be a good idea. That is not surprising: I suspect that all 650 Members of the House know, deep down in their hearts, that leaving the EU without a deal would be almost criminally incompetent on the negotiators’ part.

The hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Scully), who introduced the debate, did what a representative of the Petitions Committee should do: he presented both sides of the argument. I commend him for that. I would be a bit concerned if one of the benefits of Brexit was that we went back to being what he described as a “buccaneering maritime trading nation”. Buccaneers were the state-sponsored international terrorists of their day. The fact that we can hark back—even jokingly—to days when part of Britain’s power as a trading nation was founded on piracy, theft, murder and similar crimes may be an indication of how we have got into the state we are in now.

There is a tendency—certainly in sections of the right-wing media and the right wing of the Conservative party—to build up the days of the empire, when everything was wonderful, and say, “Can’t we just go back to the days when Britannia ruled the waves and waived the rules? Everything will be fine.” No, we cannot, because 6.5 billion to 7 billion people on the other side of the water are saying, “No—this is our country. You are not getting to run India, Pakistan or Kenya in the interests of a handful of British businesses in the way you did before.”

[Andrew Bowie]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Peter Grant]

I will.

[Mrs Madeleine Moon (in the Chair)]

I call Ross Thomson—sorry, Andrew Bowie.

[Andrew Bowie]

I have been called much worse, Mrs Moon. I may be wrong—forgive me—but I did not hear anyone in this Chamber, the House of Commons or anywhere else say that we should go back to the days when we ruled India or that we should rule the waves and bring back the empire. That is simply not what we are debating.

[Peter Grant]

Perhaps I have misunderstood what a buccaneering maritime trading nation is or what period in history it refers to. If so, I am happy to apologise, but the days of the buccaneers were those of international pirates and terrorists sponsored by businesses in one country in effect to terrorise the interests of other countries.

The hon. Member for Eddisbury (Antoinette Sandbach) made a powerful, well-put-together contribution. Importantly, she did not talk just about trade. Because trade is such a vital part of the United Kingdom’s relationship with the European Union, it is easy to forget all the other benefits that come from EU membership, such as open skies. There was recently an interesting suggestion that MPs should be allowed to know which of their constituents sign petitions as well as how many of them do so. I would like to go back to the 107 of my constituents who signed the petition—that is 0.12% of the electorate—and say, “Have you heard of open skies? Did you know that it existed when you voted to leave the European Union, or when you signed the petition saying we should leave without a deal? Did you really understand that, without a deal, British-owned and operated airlines will not have automatic authority to land their aircraft or even cross over European airspace after take-off? The only way they will be allowed to do that is through getting a deal.”

[Wera Hobhouse]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the accusations about “Project Fear” are way off? We should talk about “Project Realism.”

[Peter Grant]

To be honest, some of the claims made by those who claimed to be on the remain side before the referendum were nonsensical. In the past couple of weeks I think I have heard five Members on the Conservative Benches say, “You can’t believe what the Treasury tell you during a referendum campaign.” We know that, and perhaps some in other parts of the House need to remember that.

At the time of the referendum, and I suspect even now, an awful lot of people in the United Kingdom did not understand—and they still do not fully understand—how complex our relationship with the European Union is. It is not just about being able to buy bananas with as much or little bend in them as we like or being able to prevent these so-and-so foreigners from coming over and taking our jobs or claiming our benefits—which they do not do. It is much more detailed and complicated than that, and to extricate ourselves from that relationship in a way that does not harm the interests of the people of these islands is a difficult and perhaps impossible task. Time alone will tell.

[Royston Smith]

Going back to my earlier comments, would the hon. Gentleman agree that continually saying people do not understand what they were voting for is patronising and why petitions such as the one before us today are presented to this place?

[David Hanson in the Chair]

[Peter Grant]

No, I do not agree at all. I remember when one of the hon. Gentleman’s colleagues in the main Chamber turned talking about people not being well informed into a claim that they were stupid—and, of course, the Daily Express, as is its wont, put me on the front page saying that people who voted to leave were stupid.

I would never question anyone’s sincerity or intelligence when they cast a vote in a referendum or election, but the fact is that many people, at the time they voted, did not fully understand the implications of what they voted for. People will sometimes do that in an election, too. They vote for the party they usually vote for, and do not really look into the issues in any great depth. If someone does not like the outcome of a general election, they get another chance in a few years. Calling the referendum as the Government did, so quickly, and having it deliberately in the middle of important council and parliamentary elections in almost every nation of the United Kingdom, so that the referendum campaign ran at the same time, prevented debate of the length and detail that was needed.

[Wera Hobhouse]

Is it not time that we all admitted that there were things we did not know about the European Union? When I listen to what is said in the Exiting the European Union Committee, I hear so much information about the European Union that we did not know. It is not necessarily a question of a mistake or fault, but if even we did not know all the details and all the ins and outs of the European Union that are emerging in the debate now, it is time we said so. That would make both remain and leave voters comfortable about saying that they did not know about some aspects of the EU, but that they know them now, which is why it is healthy to have a debate.

[Peter Grant]

The hon. Lady makes a valid point. However, I want to make it clear that I respect the wish of the people of England and Wales, as expressed in the referendum. I insist—I demand, as do my constituents—that the wish of 62% of people in Scotland, as well as the wish of the majority vote in Northern Ireland, should be respected too. That does not have to mean that some should be in the EU and some out, but it must mean seeking—not necessarily reaching—a solution and deal that, as far as possible, recognise the diverse views in these islands. We keep being told that we are a partnership of equals. It would not be acceptable for the express wishes of 62% of voters in England to be cast aside in contempt, as is happening to the express wishes of 62% of voters in Scotland.

I was pleased that some speakers in the debate discussed the absolute need for a deal on Northern Ireland, so that we know what the status of the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland will be. Most people in the United Kingdom did not think that that would be an issue during the referendum; it was hardly raised in any debate. It was a major issue in the debate in Northern Ireland, but in most of the rest of the United Kingdom, if it appeared anywhere, it would be at the bottom of page 22 of someone’s submission. Incidentally, I include myself in those comments: I did not appreciate how fundamentally damaging a hard border and a no-deal Brexit could be to the Northern Ireland peace process. That does not mean that people in mainland Great Britain voted stupidly; it simply means they did not have the information at their disposal. Would that knowledge have made a difference to their votes? We do not know. It is too late: that horse has gone.

It is not too late to make sure that there is a deal that protects the promises that the Government of these islands made to the international community and the Government of the Republic of Ireland at the time of the Good Friday peace agreement. There is a guarantee that there will be no border controls on the Irish border. That is what everyone whom the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee spoke to in Northern Ireland desperately wants. The Committee spoke to senior police officers who are still leading the fight against terrorism, representatives of community organisations, and politicians—any elected politician who came to see us, including a number from Sinn Fein.

It was perhaps surprising how much unanimity there was across the spectrum about the fact that we cannot afford a return to the days of armed border checkpoints across the island of Ireland. Many of the people we spoke to—and not only on the nationalist-leaning side—believe that if we leave the European Union without a deal it will be almost impossible to prevent border posts from returning, and to prevent the return of other things from the sad history of that island.

There were several contributions by Scottish Conservatives, every one of whom, completely unprovoked, tried to reopen another referendum argument, which is not on the agenda just now. The Scottish Conservatives want a public debate involving the whole population of Scotland, about its future place in the world. I am ready for that, but it is interesting that no matter the subject being discussed they always manage to talk about that.

[Luke Graham]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Ross Thomson]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Peter Grant]

My goodness—what a decision! The hon. Gentlemen are almost identical. I give way to the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Ross Thomson).

[Ross Thomson]

I am grateful. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman accepts that is not the Scottish Conservatives wedging the issue into the debate. The fact is that before anyone could even digest the European Union referendum result, the First Minister was immediately in front of the television cameras in Bute House putting a second independence referendum back on the table, against the wishes of the people. We are not crowbarring it into the debate; it is the First Minister.

[Peter Grant]

I am afraid what the hon. Gentleman says about its being against the wishes of the people is completely inaccurate. The First Minister of Scotland did that a few weeks after being re-elected, when the people of Scotland had voted for a Government who explicitly said in their election manifesto that, if we faced being dragged out of the European Union against our will, that could trigger a referendum.

The people of Scotland can choose whether to respect the wishes of the 55% who want to be in the United Kingdom or those of the 62% who want to be in the European Union. As I have said, I am happy for that process and debate to start at any time when the Scottish Conservatives can get their act together. I do not want to labour the point, because the present debate is supposed to be about the European Union. I simply want to say that the Scottish Conservatives have once again shown their obsession with independence. They cannot even talk about an important matter such as membership of the European Union without bringing the independence argument into it.

[Christine Jardine]

The hon. Gentleman mentions the choice between the 55% who want to stay in the UK and the 62% who want to stay in the EU. Things do not have to be so mutually exclusive: we can stay in the UK and, hopefully, we could stay in the EU as well.

[Peter Grant]

I think that that prospect is becoming much less likely as time goes on. We certainly can retain a lot of the benefits of EU membership. We can do that by staying in the single market. There has never been a referendum vote by the people of the United Kingdom to leave the single market, so it is perfectly legitimate for the Government to admit that they have got that wrong, and to go back on it.

I was quite interested when a Member—I think it was the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Andrew Bowie)—referred to the high turnout in the EU referendum and used that as a basis for treating it as binding, conclusive and final. It might surprise some people, but the percentage of eligible voters in the UK who voted to leave the European Union was lower than the percentage of eligible voters in Catalonia who voted to leave Spain. I suggest that if the EU vote is binding, conclusive and final, the future of Catalonia has been determined by its people. Of course, the Government do not want to fall out with Spain, so they will not recognise that.

[Andrew Bowie]

The difference between those two referendums is that the one on our membership of the European Union was legal, whereas the one on Catalonia’s membership of Spain was not legal in any way. It was an illegal referendum, as has been recognised by the European Union and the United Nations.

[Peter Grant]

It was legal according to the wish of the people of Catalonia. The referendum in Gibraltar was illegal, but the United Kingdom was quite happy to recognise it and act on its result—and I think it was right. We must be very careful about quoting the European Union as the arbiter of what is and is not acceptable as a way for any nation or people to seek to determine its own future. That does not quite sound like taking back control to me.

To go back to the matter we are supposed to be debating—the petition signed by just over 137,000 people across the United Kingdom—part of the issue I have with it is that some of the statements of fact at the start are quite simply untrue. The European Union is not, and never has been, intent on deliberately punishing the United Kingdom for a decision by its people. For all its faults, at its heart, the European Union wants to see itself as an organisation that respects democracy. That is why, despite the comments from the hon. Member for Ealing Central and Acton (Dr Huq), who has not been able to stay for the rest of the debate, it will not be easy to get back in after we leave. The United Kingdom would be disqualified from applying for membership of the European Union because we are not democratic enough, since more than half of our legislators in the UK Parliament are not elected but appointed on patronage.

The European Union sees itself as an organisation that wants to recognise the will of the people, whether in elections or referendums. What it has said, and will continue to say—I do not think the Government have quite got this yet—is that under no circumstances will the European Union allow the United Kingdom to have a better relationship with the EU by leaving than we would have had had we stayed. That is perfectly understandable and logical; it would be astonishing if it did anything different.

The petition also talks about a “settlement fee”. There is no settlement fee. There have been discussions to agree the liabilities that the United Kingdom has accrued through commitments it made as a member of the European Union, and any liabilities due to come back to the United Kingdom in the same way. Although it is on a bigger scale and more complex, it is a bit like somebody deciding to leave the house they rent before the end of the month and expecting to get a couple of weeks’ rent back because they decided not to stay until the end of the rental period.

If we scale that up several million times, that is what the European Union has been saying to the UK and what the UK has accepted in its relationship with the European Union. Talking about it as a settlement fee or a divorce payment, as many in the media have done, is misleading and steers people down the path of saying, “This is clearly unfair. Let’s just leave without even bothering to wait to fulfil our international legal obligations.”

I think the reason that the petition has attracted so many signatures has been mentioned. There is a clear malaise about politics in these islands. People are fed up with politicians and political parties. They are fed up with the notion that someone can tell blatant lies during a referendum campaign and it does not matter as long as they still win at the ballot box. People do not want that any more. They are fed up with politicians who make promises when everybody knows the promise will be broken.

I am sorry to say that we have not seen any change in that practice from the present Government; we only have to look at the backsliding on the firm commitment that there would be changes to the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill in the Commons on Report to avoid any undermining of the devolution settlement. That was a clear promise given by the Secretary of State for Scotland, which was completely ignored when the crunch came. When politicians are allowed to break promises like that and get away with it, it is no wonder that the public begin to lose faith in all of us.

[Luke Graham]

The hon. Gentleman has made a few valid points in his speech about ensuring honesty and clarity over the course of this debate. He made specific reference to clause 11, which was debated in the main Chamber just last week. In the interests of clarity and honesty, does he accept that amendments were not made because there are ongoing negotiations between the devolved Administrations and Her Majesty’s Government? An agreement has not yet been reached and when it has been we can table amendments and make them? Does he also accept that it is not over yet? The Bill goes to the House of Lords but it will come back to the Commons, when both he and I will have the chance to approve, reject or propose amendments in lieu.

--- Later in debate ---

[Peter Grant]

That prompts the question as to why the Secretary of State for Scotland made those unconditional guarantees at the Dispatch Box. There was a time when a Minister who made promises at the Dispatch Box and did not keep them could not possibly remain a Minister. Perhaps, if we were prepared to go back to those days, we could start to rebuild some of the trust that has been lost.

One of the great ironies is that, while a lot of the emotion linked to petitions such as this is the result of a lack of trust in politicians, both the hard Brexiteers and the not-so-hard Brexiteers on the Government side are asking us to trust the entire future of our nations to a small and not particularly accountable group of Government Ministers and advisers in the negotiations. To me, that seems completely illogical. If the process has been driven by people’s loss of trust in their politicians, the one thing we should not be doing is passing legislation that allows a few Ministers to go off and do what they like, with little or no effective scrutiny or holding them to account.

I will not say “blame” because I do not like using the word, but I think certainly the Conservatives, and the Labour party for a number of years, deserve to be strongly criticised for not standing up to dismiss the EU myths. I know that Labour have begun to do it more recently, but by that time it was too late. Instead of David Cameron saying that as part of his EU negotiation he would put an end to benefits tourism, why could he not have just told the truth and said, “We don’t need to put an end to it because it doesn’t really exist to any noticeable extent in the first place”? Why did he not say, “We’re going to use the rights we already have to prevent benefits tourism in its entirety”? Why, when there was so much talk about the damage being done to our economy by immigration, did no one in the Government stand up and say, “Immigration is good for our economy”?

[Antoinette Sandbach]

It is all very well to explain that, but when we look at the signatures on the petition, they come from areas that have had very large impacts from inward migration from the European Union. That was largely caused during the period when former Prime Ministers Blair and Brown could have put restrictions on the number of EU migrants coming in, and did not. That is what has caused the issues, because the volumes coming in meant that it was difficult for local councils to adjust to the demands on their services. I do not accept the hon. Gentleman’s point on that matter.

[Peter Grant]

The hon. Lady makes a valid point, and I have a lot of sympathy with her. However, the fact is that under the existing freedom of movement rules within the European Union, if the UK Government determined that there were particular geographical areas of high unemployment, for example, they would have the authority to take steps to restrict freedom of movement in those areas. That is just one example.

The hon. Lady is absolutely right to talk about the difficulties that local authorities, health authorities and so on have had in dealing with a significant number of people, whether they have come from the UK or elsewhere. A significant increase in the population of an area in a short time does cause difficulties, which were made much worse by the complete inadequacy of the system of Government funding for local services, certainly in England; I.do not know whether it applies in Northern Ireland or Wales. Local authorities simply were not given the powers they needed to take decisions to cope with increased demand for their services, because it was easier for some people to blame it on immigrants than on a failure of Government policy.

We have seen the EU myths that were never properly challenged; we had the myth again today about the all-powerful European Commission, able to impose laws on the United Kingdom. It is not. The Parliament of Wallonia was able to hold up the comprehensive economic and trade agreement deal. The Parliament of the United Kingdom tried to prevent the relevant UK Minister from signing it, but they went off and signed it anyway, against an explicit instruction from the European Scrutiny Committee acting with the full authority of the House of Commons. The Scrutiny Committee said to the Minister, “No, you don’t sign it.” The Minister went and signed it anyway.

The lack of parliamentary control and scrutiny over what has been happening in Europe for the last 20 years is not down to problems with the European Union. It is down to this Government and previous Governments being prepared to ride roughshod over the will of the House when it suited them.

If we were to accept just walking away from the European Union right now, none of these great international trade deals, which we are told will suddenly come out of the pipeline a few days after we leave, will be possible. Who will go into a major trade deal with anybody who says, “Oh yes, we had the biggest trade deal in the economic history of planet Earth, and we walked away from it and didn’t even stay to comply with the obligations we’d adopted and agreed to under that. We welched on the last trade deal we had; can we have a trade deal with you, please?” That is not going to happen. Even as a matter of self-interest and to present ourselves as an honest trading partner to future trade deals, we must ensure that we fulfil the obligations of our existing EU membership.

I do not have to hand figures for the rest of the United Kingdom, but in Scotland, we currently have £15.9 billion-worth of exports that go either to the EU or to countries to which we have access because of our EU membership. That is 56% of all Scotland’s international exports, and the figure is likely to rise to between 80% and 90% by the time we actually leave the European Union, because of the number of new trade deals that are coming on stream. We are looking at a potential drop in Scotland’s GDP of £12.7 billion if we leave without a deal. Actually, there is no scenario of leaving the EU that does not cause a reduction in Scotland’s GDP, but leaving with no deal is by far the worst. People would on average be £2,300 worse off. Who was it who said that nobody voted to make themselves poorer when they voted to leave the European Union? Perhaps they did not vote for that, but if we leave without a deal, it is what is going to happen.

I respect the views of the people who have signed this petition. I take offence at those who say that I am accusing people of being stupid. I would never use words such as “traitor” or “disloyal” to anybody simply because they voted or spoke in a way that I disagreed with. It is mainly Conservatives who have had those terms thrown at them, and worse, simply for following what they think are the interests of their constituents. That is despicable and should be called out and condemned unreservedly by us all whenever it happens. I have spoken out previously when people who claim to be on the same side as me have used similar inflammatory language about people they disagree with. There is simply no place for that in any democratic and free society.

That said, I genuinely do not understand what people who signed the petition think would happen if we were to leave the EU tomorrow without a deal. Let us say that we did leave tomorrow without a deal. There is no agreement on the future of the 3 million EU nationals living in the UK or the 1.5 million Brits living in the European Union. There is no deal about no border in Ireland, and that quite possibly means there is no longer a peace process in Ireland. There is no deal that allows our planes to continue to fly to the EU’s airports and its planes to bring us back from our holidays afterwards.

I think that the Prime Minister was highly irresponsible in coming up with the cheap line that no deal is better than a bad deal. The final sentence of the last report from the Exiting the European Union Committee was that it could not envisage, or it would be difficult to envisage, any scenario that the negotiating team would bring back that could possibly be as damaging as leaving the European Union without a deal, so let us get rid of that terminology, the sloganising, and the sound bites. They might sound good and get a few cheers on the front page of the Daily Mail, but they are contributing to a negative part of the whole debate. No deal is not better than a bad deal. No deal is the worst of all possible deals. This Parliament should have the courage of its convictions and send that message out, and each of us should be prepared, if need be, to say face to face to those of our constituents who signed the petition, “I know that you have done this sincerely and this is what you believe, but I cannot support it, because I am convinced that it is a recipe for complete and utter disaster.”

--- Later in debate ---

[Suella Fernandes]

No. The Government’s policy is to leave Euratom, because although it provides some benefits, it also subscribes us to a jurisdiction and legal framework that are not aligned with our objectives in leaving the European Union. Our Nuclear Safeguards Bill provides us with an opportunity to combine exactly the objectives that my hon. Friend set out with honouring the legislative requirements of leaving the European Union.

[Peter Grant]

Does the Minister not accept that the Government might have got things the wrong way around? They decided that they wanted to get away from any influence from the European Court of Justice, and despite the damage that that is now doing to our future nuclear safety regimes, for example, that red line has become almost an obsession. Regardless of what disadvantages it brings with it, the Government seem to be hell-bent on not moving any of those red lines by as much as an inch. Is that not just silly?

[Suella Fernandes]

A vote to leave the European Union entails an end to the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice. That is what this Government are committed to and that is what will be delivered. It is essential if we are to regain the benefits of leaving the European Union.

Although the Government do not want or expect a no-deal scenario, we have a duty to plan for all eventualities, so we continue to develop those plans to ensure that we are prepared when we leave the EU at in March 2019. Alongside the necessary legislation, we are procuring new systems and recruiting new staff where necessary to ensure a smooth exit regardless of the outcomes. However, to walk away from the negotiating table now and leave immediately would be counterproductive and unnecessary, especially in light of the progress made in December on the first stage of the negotiations.

First, consider the financial settlement. Far from the punishment deal anticipated by the petition, we have achieved a good deal for UK taxpayers. Britain is a nation that honours its obligations, and we will honour our share of the commitments made during our membership while ending the vast sums of money going to the EU every year. Crucially, we have ensured that our rebate will continue to apply, and that the EU will reduce the settlement accordingly. The settlement may be paid over the course of several years, but the Government estimate that it will be between £35 billion and £39 billion, equivalent to roughly four years of our current budget contribution, around two of which we expect will be covered by the implementation period.

As the hon. Member for Glenrothes (Peter Grant) pointed out in his speech, the money is not a divorce bill. We have agreed a fair financial settlement with the EU, enabling us to move to the next stage of negotiations. We will soon see significant savings from our payments to the EU, compared with what we would have paid had we stayed in. We will continue to benefit from EU programmes under the budget plan. No UK region will lose out on EU budget funding, and anyone who gets European funding—local councils, regional bodies, UK businesses, scientific researchers, Erasmus students or charities—can continue to bid for and receive funding until the end of their projects.

From the beginning, the Prime Minister has been clear that safeguarding the rights of EU citizens is her priority. In her open letter in October, she made it clear that we

“hugely value the contributions that EU nationals make to the economic, social and cultural fabric of the UK”,

and that we want them to stay. We are pleased that that commitment is reflected in the joint report of December. The agreement reached in principle will provide citizens with certainty about their rights going forward, enabling families who have built lives together in the EU and UK to stay together. The agreement gives people more certainty not only about residence but about healthcare, pensions and other benefits. The agreement will cover only those people defined in the withdrawal agreement. Anyone arriving in the UK after the specified date who does not fall in that category will be subject to future arrangements.

Those who signed the petition may well have had concerns about the European Court of Justice. At present, the UK is bound by all ECJ decisions; hundreds of decisions every year have effect in the UK, whether or not the case originated in the UK. That will end. The UK will take back control of its laws, and UK courts will have the final say on UK cases. EU citizens’ rights in the UK will be upheld by implementing the agreement into UK law.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Peter Grant Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: Second Day: House of Commons
Wednesday 17th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Pennycook]

I absolutely agree; and the unpicking of, or wheeling back from, some of the progress we felt had been made in the Florence speech is one of our concerns.

The Bill before us was drafted before the Florence speech, but rather than amend the Bill to reflect the evolution of Government policy outlined by the Prime Minister in that speech, the Government chose instead to fashion a legislative straitjacket for themselves in the form of enshrining “exit day” for all purposes in the Bill as 11 pm on 29 March 2019. Let us be clear: bringing forward amendments to stipulate that exit day for all purposes of the Bill had nothing to do with leaving the EU. The article 50 notification made our departure from the EU on 29 March 2019 a legal certainty, so, for the purposes of the Bill, exit day could be left in the hands of Parliament.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

The hon. Gentleman just used the phrase “legal certainty” in referring to our departure from the EU on 29 March 2019. Does that mean that he has seen legal advice that article 50 cannot be revoked? Is the Labour Front-Bench position that it is impossible, as opposed to politically inexpedient, to consider revoking article 50?

[Matthew Pennycook]

The hon. Gentleman tempts me down an avenue that has nothing to do with the point I am making, which is that it remains unclear why the Government tabled three exit day amendments to their own Bill which have sown further confusion. We do not know why they did that—whether it was driven by Tory party management considerations or some other reason. The effect of those Government amendments would have been to end the jurisdiction of the ECJ on 29 March 2019, thereby preventing agreement on a transitional period on current terms.

The Government clearly soon realised their mistake and to save face enlisted the right hon. Member for West Dorset (Sir Oliver Letwin), who is not in his place, to table amendments to loosen the legislative straitjacket they themselves had created. But his amendments, which the Government have accepted, only provide a limited form of flexibility. Ministers may now amend the definition of exit day in clause 14 for the purposes of the Bill if the date when the treaties cease to apply to the UK is different from 29 March 2019. However, there is good reason to argue that that power might not be sufficient to facilitate transitional arrangements after 29 March 2019 on the same basic terms as now. If it is not—this might end up being the most bizarre aspect of the Bill’s curious parliamentary process—the Government will find themselves in the ludicrous position of having to amend this Bill when they bring forward the withdrawal agreement and implementation Bill later this year.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Kenneth Clarke (Rushcliffe) (Con)]

I am glad to see my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne) in his place behind me, where I always welcome him. When I arrived, I inquired whether he had had a cup of coffee before today’s long proceedings, and I undertake to try to have no soporific effects on those Members who have survived to the eighth day of this Committee and Report stage.

I do not intend to follow entirely the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook), although I listened to many of the points he made with considerable sympathy; I am quite sure that clause 7 will require more work when it gets to another place, and I also have considerable sympathy with what he said about the confusion now surrounding exit day and the ability to proceed to what I am sure is the obvious transition arrangement we are going to have to have for quite a long time, which will be on precisely the same terms that we have at the moment, so far as access to the market is concerned.

I will turn my attention, however, to the Bill’s impact on the economy, following from new clause 17, which is in this selection and strikes me as excellent, and several more of the same kind. In our eight days, the House has not had anything like adequate opportunities to consider this absolutely vital policy implication of what we are embarked upon as we seek to leave the EU. I do not share the view that the Bill needs to be treated in this House or the other place as a mere technical or necessary Bill of legal transition; we have the opportunity to put into the Bill some of the essential aspects of our future economic relationship and to allow the House to express a view and put into statute things that we wish, and instruct in line with our constitution, the Government of the day to follow.

There is undoubtedly going to be some economic cost to this country, regardless of the means by which we eventually leave the European Union. If we have a complete break with no deal, the implications could be very serious indeed. I am one of those who think it rather foolish to try to put precise figures on this. The Scottish National party earlier tried to make precise estimates of what would happen because a think-tank had put out a range of consequences, depending on which options were followed. It was rather reminiscent of the arguments put forward by the then Chancellor of the Exchequer when he tried to help the remain side during the referendum campaign. They were really rather fanciful figures.

[Peter Grant]

rose—

[Mr Clarke]

As I have mentioned the SNP, I will give way to the hon. Gentleman.

[Peter Grant]

Clearly, any forecast or projection is going to be approximate, and I do not think that anyone is claiming that the Scottish Government’s figures are precise. But would the right hon. and learned Gentleman prefer to defend a position that was backed up by approximations and forecasts that may or may not be accurate, or would he prefer to be in the Government’s position of defending a position backed up by no impact analysis whatever?

[Mr Clarke]

I shall turn to that in a moment, but I agree with the hon. Gentleman entirely. I was not making a criticism of the think-tank, which has done its best, but we all know from experience that all economic forecasting should be taken with a slight grain of salt. It is utterly beyond the capacity of either the Treasury or the most expert outside groups to predict with absolute confidence what the precise consequences will be.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Speaker]

Order. A considerable number of Members are seeking to catch my eye, and colleagues will be conscious that these proceedings must conclude at 4.30 and that it is reasonable to allow the Minister some considerable time to respond to the points made. Therefore, a certain self-denying ordinance is required if I am to enable everybody to contribute. The hon. Member for Glenrothes (Peter Grant) speaks for his party from the Front Bench and, of course, must be afforded a decent opportunity, but I know that he will want to tailor his contribution to take account of the interests of others.

[Peter Grant]

With the consent of the House, I rise to speak to amendment 59 in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford) and other right hon. and hon. Members, and to amendments 9 and 56 and new schedule 1.

Before I speak in more detail about amendment 59, may I commend the hon. Member for Nottingham East (Mr Leslie) for the amendments that he submitted? What he has done is to remind us of what a complete sham this entire process has been. Almost 90% to 95% of the way through these eight hours of debate, the Government who had promised, day after day after day, to listen to the debate and to take appropriate effective action still have not corrected some of the glaring deficiencies in their own Bill, the most serious of which, perhaps, is the fact that we still do not have any statutory guarantee that the Northern Ireland peace process, the Belfast agreement and all that that implies, will be protected in law. If the Government cannot be trusted to bring forward amendments to correct such a desperate deficiency in their own legislation, how can they expect this House to trust them with the draconian and unprecedented powers to use ministerial directive to correct deficiencies in domestic legislation after we have left?

Amendment 59 seeks to ensure that the withdrawal agreement can only be implemented when we also have an agreement to remain in the EU single market and customs union. Let us be honest: everybody knows that, on a free vote of this House, there would be a substantial majority in favour of remaining in the single market and the customs union. My plea this evening will be for all of those who know that that is in the best interests of their constituents to set aside the demands of the party Whips and to go through the Lobby in support of this amendment. We can win this vote this evening if all those who know that it deserves to win are able to set aside the demands of the Whips and vote for it. We can take a decision tonight that will keep us away from the cliff edge, not just for two years but for very much longer.

I am very grateful to colleagues from the Liberal Democrats, Plaid Cymru and the Green party who have signed this amendment. Although there have been no signatures from Labour Members, either from the Front Bench or the Back Benches, I appeal to all of them to support this amendment today.

Let me first deal with the question of the constitutional or democratic legitimacy of the amendment. One of the very disturbing aspects of the referendum debate, which has continued all the way through the process since then, has been the degree of hostility and open hatred that has been created against anyone who speaks, or even thinks, against the wisdom of the Government, the newspaper editor, the blogger or whoever. I have a good bad example: just a day or two ago, a group of MPs who had the temerity to go over to Europe to meet Michel Barnier were denounced as traitors—treachery with a smiling face—by one well known bloggist. Apart from the fact that such inflammatory and violent language has no place in any supposedly respectful debate, I want to remind the House of some facts of our membership of the single market—facts that I appreciate will be very uncomfortable to some Members, but that are still utterly incontrovertible.

It is a matter of fact that the people of the United Kingdom have never voted in a referendum about membership of the single market or the customs union. This House had the opportunity when the European Union Referendum Bill was on its way through Parliament. We could have decided to ask questions about the customs union and the single market, but the House and the Government chose not to. Having chosen not to ask the question, none of us—including me—has any right to decide that we know what the answer would have been.

It is a matter of fact that it is possible to be in the single market and the customs union without being a member of the European Union. Hon. Members will have different views as to whether it would be wise, appropriate or in our best interests to do so, and they have every right to debate the benefits of membership of the single market and the customs union. But anyone who insists that it cannot happen is not engaging in debate; they are engaging in fiction. We have had far too much fiction in this debate already—from both sides, it has to be said—as the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke) mentioned earlier. The decision to leave the single market was a unilateral political decision taken by the Prime Minister without any prior consultation with the people or with Parliament. It cannot, under any circumstances, be described as an inevitable consequence of the vote to leave the European Union.

Finally, it is a matter of fact that when the Conservative party fought on a manifesto that said it wanted to stay in the single market, it won an overall majority of seats in this place—the only time in the last 25 years that it has managed such an achievement. It is also a fact that the Conservatives lost that overall majority two years later, when they stood on a manifesto saying that they wanted to take us out of the single market. Nobody can claim that that is clear evidence of a popular democratic mandate to stay in the single market, but it certainly blows to smithereens any nonsense that there is any mandate for us to leave.

I am conscious of the need for brevity from me as well as from others, so I will not go into the full and detailed argument for staying in the single market, as that would take us from now to Brexit day, if not beyond. However, the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe referred to the latest analysis produced by the Scottish Government, entitled “Scotland’s Place in Europe: People, Jobs and Investment”. I certainly accept his caveats that we cannot be sure that the forecasts and projections in it are accurate. They are certainly not intended to be precise or definitive.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil]

I have found some media chat saying that the Scottish Government’s analysis of staying in the single market was alarmist, giving the figure of a 2.5% loss in growth. That is actually less than the figure put out by the UK Treasury for the loss of growth of just being in the single market, with no deal and the Canadian-style option far worse still.

[Peter Grant]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention, but I should put it on the record that I do not use Her Majesty’s Treasury figures as the touchstone for reliability or honesty; that is just a personal gripe of mine.

“Scotland’s Place in Europe: People, Jobs and Investment” is available in summary form and in all its 58-page glory. As a bonus, the back page contains the full text of the United Kingdom’s impact assessment of leaving the European Union. The one that I have is actually the Chinese version for those who understand Chinese.

Among the likely—perhaps very likely—consequences, the Fraser of Allander Institute has forecast that GDP in Scotland could fall by £8 billion over a 10-year period; that the real value of wages in the pockets of the people of Scotland could fall by 7%, including those who cannot afford to live on the wages they have just now, never mind on 7% less; and that 80,000 jobs in Scotland could be at risk. The updated document published this week indicates that the cost of leaving without a deal would be of the order of £2,300 for every citizen in Scotland. Our economic output could fall by 8.5%. That has to be the recession to end all recessions.

Exports from Scotland to the European Union currently run at £12.3 billion a year. If we add other exports that we can only carry out because we have free trade agreements as part of our EU membership, that figure increases to a fraction under £16 billion. Some 56% of Scotland’s current international exports are either to the European Union or to countries with which we already have a free trade agreement, and that could increase to somewhere close to 90% by the time we actually leave the single market and the customs union. How much of that is absolutely, unconditionally guaranteed still to be available after we leave? Right now, the answer is nil or very close to nil. That is the economic cost that we could well be subjected to if we leave the single market and the customs union.

I have not even mentioned the horrific social cost. We saw another heart-rending story today of a lady from Spain who has given 15 years’ service to the NHS, but who has given up and gone back to Spain. Somebody actually queried, “Why is that newsworthy?” Well, given the current recruitment crisis in the NHS, if even just one more well-trained professional leaves, I think it is a bit more newsworthy than somebody leaving a jungle because 250,000 people phoned Channel 4 and asked for them to be thrown out.

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[Peter Grant]

For the avoidance of doubt, I will repeat what I have said in this place before: I think we have to accept the views of the people of England and Wales who have expressed a wish to leave the European Union. Unless the people of those nations give a contrary view at some future point, that view has to be respected.

Some 62% of my people voted to stay in the EU. I want to hear just a single word from this Government that indicates they are prepared to change anything in their chaotic Brexit plan to recognise the sovereign will of the people of Scotland and, indeed, the majority of people in Northern Ireland who also voted to remain. Half the member states of this Union voted to remain in the EU, and there has been no recognition whatever of that fact from the UK Government so far. They have even shown their contempt: having promised to table amendments to correct yet another deficiency in the Bill on the impact on the devolved nations, they then changed their minds and are going to leave it to the other place, where nobody is elected or has any democratic mandate to do anything.

The Government’s woeful handling of Brexit from day one demonstrates that they are so incompetent that they do not even trust themselves to know what is a state secret and what is very common knowledge. It would be wrong for this House to hand over to a competent, cohesive Government the draconian powers contained in the Bill. It would be criminally negligent to hand them over to a Government so disorganised that they could not even appoint their own party chairman without announcing the appointment of the wrong person.

While the SNP’s main purpose has been to scrutinise and seek to improve the proposal from the Government, it has to be said—it hurts me greatly to do so—that the performance of Her Majesty’s official Opposition to date has left a great deal to be desired. We are seeing signs of improvement, which I warmly welcome, on membership of the single market and the customs union. The right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) has very helpfully tweeted recently reminders of the six red lines that his party had set out last year. The hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook) referred to them earlier.

The second of those red lines is whether the deal delivers the “exact same benefits” as we currently have as members of the single market and customs union. The only way that that red line can be satisfied is if we remain in the single market and the customs union. I hope that in the intervening period since he sent that tweet, the right hon. and learned Gentleman and his colleagues have managed to persuade the Leader of the Opposition that it is time to get down off the fence and to stop doing the Tories’ work for them and time for every Labour MP in this House to go through the Lobby to vote for this amendment to keep our place in the single market.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil]

My hon. Friend talks about the principal Opposition party—by number, that is. Is he aware that in the past year, for five months they supported the single market, for five months they were against the single market, for two months they were uncertain, and sadly there were only two months—July and August—where they had a consistent policy without alternating every other month?

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[Peter Grant]

As I said, I have been disappointed in the performance of the official Opposition up until now. I think we are seeing some signs of cohesion, and quite a number of speakers have been very firm in favouring the single market, as indeed we have heard across the House.

I do not want to point out mistakes that have been made in the past or score political points. There is a time and a place for that. The situation that we will face within the next couple of hours is so important and could have such devastating consequences for all our constituents that how about, just for a couple of hours, we forget the mistakes that each other has made and look at the catastrophic mistake that we may be about to make if we allow the Bill to go through without amendment 59 or something similar being passed? This may be the last chance we have to keep ourselves away from the cliff edge. I say to all those in this House, regardless of their party allegiance, who know that the single market and the customs union is where we have to be, please come through the Lobby with us tonight to vote to make sure that that happens.

[Sir William Cash]

The European Scrutiny Committee, of which I have the honour to be Chairman, has been holding inquiries into the fundamental constitutional implications of the Bill, including clause 5. As is now shown on its website, I have had correspondence with the Prime Minister on its behalf since December. The provisions I refer to would empower the courts, for the first time in our Westminster-based legislative history, to disapply Acts of Parliament. This is no theoretical matter. Indeed, we are advised that such disapplication is likely to apply to a whole range of enactments, including those relating to equality, terrorism, data protection and many other matters.

I raised this massive constitutional issue, as I regard it, in Committee on 14 and 21 November, including by reference to the authoritative statements made by the late Lord Chief Justice Bingham in chapter 12 of his book on the rule of law and the sovereignty of Parliament. Let us bear in mind that he is one of the most authoritative judges in recent generations. He says:

“We live in a society dedicated to the rule of law; in which Parliament has power, subject to limited, self-imposed restraints, to legislate as it wishes; in which Parliament may therefore legislate in a way which infringes the rule of law;”—

I repeat, “infringes the rule of law”—

“and in which the judges, consistently with their constitutional duty to administer justice according to the laws and usages of the realm, cannot fail”—

I repeat, “cannot fail”—

“to give effect to such legislation if it is clearly and unambiguously expressed.”

In that book, he publicly criticised the attitude of Baroness Hale, who is now President of the Supreme Court, and Lord Hope of Craighead for suggesting that the courts have constitutional authority as against an Act of Parliament.

Lord Bingham also specifically approved the analysis of what he described as the “magisterial” authority of Professor Goldsworthy, whom he quoted as follows:

“the principle of parliamentary sovereignty has been recognised as fundamental in this country not because the judges invented it but because it has for centuries been accepted as such by judges and others officially concerned in the operation of our constitutional system. The judges did not by themselves establish the principle and they cannot, by themselves, change it… What is at stake is the location of ultimate decision-making authority… If the judges were to repudiate the doctrine of parliamentary sovereignty, by refusing to allow Parliament to infringe on unwritten rights, they would be claiming that ultimate authority for themselves.”

He went on to state that they—the judges—would then be transferring the rights of Parliament to themselves as judges. He says:

“It would be a transfer of power initiated by the judges, to protect rights chosen by them, rather than one brought about democratically by parliamentary enactment or popular referendum.”

That is the basic principle.

Members of this House and the House of Lords, including former Law Lords and members of the Supreme Court, are themselves deeply concerned about—

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Peter Grant Excerpts

Committee: 8th sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 20th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Richard Graham]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon), who has spoken so well today, and indeed throughout these debates. This is the first time that I have risen to speak on the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill, and I do so because I wish to add a little to what has already been said about amendment 348. I do not intend to revisit the arguments put forward in the previous Humble Address, or the decisions taken by our Select Committee. That issue has been dealt with, but since the shadow Minister hinted that the Opposition would come back to it, I want to focus on the substance of the amendment and on why I disagree with it so strongly.

It is my belief that what amendment 348 seeks to achieve is without precedent in the history of negotiations by our country. It would require the Government to publish their economic impact assessments of the policy options for withdrawal from the EU. However, the missing words at the end are “during our negotiations on withdrawal from the EU”. Those missing words matter, because this is a particularly important negotiation for our nation—nobody is any doubt about that—and because this is a particularly delicate time. The Government start negotiations on the implementation period and on our future relationship with the EU soon after the new year. On the other side of the negotiating table, the EU has made it absolutely clear that it will not be publishing all its research. We will therefore certainly not see any published analysis, let alone any impact assessments relating to, for example, what no deal would mean for specific ports in northern Europe, or to any potential drop in GDP for the town of Calais.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Richard Graham]

Let me just develop my argument first, if I may.

It is therefore a curious affair that we should expect our own negotiating side to lay out in great detail what our own negotiating position should be. I tried to find precedents in our negotiating history, and I did some analysis of negotiations in which I was involved in the later stages. Those were the negotiations leading to the joint declaration on the future of Hong Kong in the early 1980s. Some Members will remember that there was considerable concern at the time about the economic future of Hong Kong under the sovereignty of communist China, and therefore about confidence—above all, economic confidence—in the territory. Were any economic analyses of the different scenarios published? No; not least because, had they been published, all of them would surely, at that time, have made the assumption that any change in the existing arrangements would have been negative to the economy of Hong Kong, and therefore probably to the UK as well.

In fact, today—20 years after the handover—whatever our concerns might be about the commitment to some of the freedoms guaranteed under the joint declaration, Hong Kong has surely made significant economic progress. My point is that any analysis at that time would have been done on the consensus assumptions of the early 1980s, which would have been substantially wrong and, if published, would almost certainly have been an impediment to the sensible, pragmatic, diplomatic negotiating compromise that was then achieved to everybody’s benefit. In the same way today, the range of assumptions behind trying to calculate which future road in the negotiations will be most economically beneficial makes that almost impossible to calculate, so let me give a few examples of the sort of questions that would have to be considered.

The latest statistics show that our current trade is 43% with the EU and 57% with the rest of the world. If our relationship with the EU did not change—if we were not leaving the EU—what would those figures be in five or 10 years’ time? The figure for EU trade has declined, but would that continue or reverse? Would the strong predictions for growth in Asia prove optimistic and accurate or would they underestimate what will happen? Right now, we are exporting more goods than services, which was unimaginable five years ago, but will that continue? How would different trends in goods and services affect our future trade across the world? Which countries would we benefit more from trading with if our goods were doing better than our services or vice versa? When we leave the EU, with whom will we reach free trade agreements? FTAs are just one of the tools available to us, so what other trading arrangements will we set up? How long will each of those agreements take, and what will their economic impact be?

Looking at south-east Asia—the area where I work for the Prime Minister—if we want to, will we be able to move on individual free trade agreements faster than the current progress of the EU? What about the US—the biggest of them all? We know that the US executes 25% of its trade with the European Union with the UK alone and that 50% of its financial services trade is with the UK. Its interest in having a separate FTA with us will largely depend on the degree to which we offer something different or the degree to which we converge, have equivalence or have mutual recognition of the regulations and laws in the EU. Given what I have just outlined, how can we possibly know the economic impacts of various aspects of future potential scenarios with the EU?

[Peter Grant]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. He seems to be arguing not for or against the publication of information, but against the whole idea of any kind of economic impact assessment at all, which makes me wonder what the Chancellor’s last Budget statement was about. If he is being consistent, does he also think that none of the 16 economic impact analyses published by the Government in the run-up to the Scottish independence referendum were worth the paper they were written on? They were also based on surmise and speculation.

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[Peter Grant]

I have no doubt that the people and Government of Gibraltar will be grateful for the Minister’s assurances, but the wording of this amendment intends to make sure with 100% certainty that, even inadvertently, nothing in the Bill can damage the interests of the people of Gibraltar. Can the Minister tell us with absolute certainty that if this amendment is not added to the Bill, there is nothing in the Bill that will cause that damage? Assurances, objectives and promises are good, but can he say with absolute certainty that nothing in the Bill will ever damage or prejudice the interests of the people of Gibraltar?

[Mr Baker]

What I can say to the hon. Gentleman is that this Bill extends to Gibraltar only in the way I have set out: the Government’s policy is as I have indicated to him, and we remain steadfastly committed to the interests of Gibraltar.

I turn now to the REACH regulation, new clause 61. We will use the powers in this Bill to convert current EU chemicals law, including REACH, into domestic law. That will mean that the standards established by REACH will continue to apply in the UK. I believe that that renders new clause 61 unnecessary.

On custodial sentences and amendment 349, the scope to create criminal offences in the Bill is restricted so the powers cannot be used to create an offence punishable by a sentence of imprisonment for more than two years. It might, however, be necessary to create criminal offences in certain circumstances, for example offences related to functions that are to be transferred from EU bodies to UK bodies which would be lost without the ability to recreate offences relating to functions then held at a UK level. To lose the offence, and therefore the threat of a sanction, would remove what could be seen as important protections in our law, and for that reason we are not able to support the amendment.

I turn now to amendment 362 on the issue of ambulatory references. I hope the Committee will bear with me on the final, technical section of this speech. The amendment concerns paragraph 1 of schedule 8, which deals with the ambulatory references in our domestic law, as well as EU instruments and other documents in EU legislation that will be retained under clause 3. At present, the ambulatory cross-references update automatically when the EU instrument referred to is amended. After exit day, the Bill provides that such references will instead be read as references to the retained EU law version of the instrument, which, unless the contrary intention appears, will update when the retained instrument is modified by domestic law. This is necessary in order to prevent post-exit changes to EU law from flowing automatically into UK law. It would not be appropriate for the reference to continue to point to the EU version of the instrument after we have left the EU.

The approach set out in the Bill will be applied in relation to ambulatory references within any enactment, retained direct EU legislation, and any document relating to them. I understand that this last provision—the reference to documents and whether or not that includes contracts—has concerned my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst. The Government are alive to concerns that we should not unduly disturb the operation of private contracts, or prevent parties to a contract from being able to give effect to their intentions. We are happy to explore this issue further with my hon. Friend and interested parties, to ensure that we achieve the appropriate balance between clarity and flexibility.

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[Huw Merriman]

I will not give way because of the lack of time.

This also misses the point that we trade as part of the EU under WTO rules with a number of countries, such as the US, China, Hong Kong, Australia, Russia, and Saudi Arabia. To say that we cannot continue to trade with those countries under WTO rules when we already do so as part of the European Union misses the point.

I now come to the real point that I wish to make. During the referendum campaign, unlike many Members in this place I did not take a view. I chaired debates but I did not take any view. Instead, I listened to the arguments going on from both sides. I dare say that right hon. and hon. Members who took a view were not listening to both sides because they were so passionate about their own. I cannot remember any individual who wanted to leave the European Union arguing, “I fancy a bit of what Norway has got. I would like to leave the European Union and remain within the single market.” The customs union has also been mentioned in that context, but of course Norway is not part of the customs union. It is quite clear to most members of the public—it was certainly made clear by those on both sides of the argument—that the EU is effectively a brand. The substance of the EU is the single market and the customs union. If more people voted to leave the European Union than to remain, which was indeed the case, there is a very fair chance that those people knew what they were voting for, and certainly did not want to leave and then return through the back door, as many hon. Members have suggested.

This is the key part for me. I really believe—I put this respectfully—that many in this Chamber are seeking to re-engineer the arguments to get them on their side because they do not want to leave. Even though most of them voted to trigger article 50, so they have chosen to leave, they now want to redesign the terms. They are seeking to have the public on their side by asking, as the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) mentioned, that the public are asked what they think—as if we have a spreadsheet big enough for that. The reality is that the majority of the public have voted to leave. They now look to the Executive to lead the negotiations, and they look to Parliament to support the negotiations and provide scrutiny, as it is doing. Ultimately, they want us to get on with the job and to be optimistic and ambitious about the future of this country, rather than sitting on our hands.

[Peter Grant]

I am grateful for the chance to contribute to tonight’s debate. First, I will deal with new clause 56, which is in my name and those of many other hon. and right hon. Members from across the House. I am grateful to everybody who supported the new clause, which is designed to give legislative certainty to the people and businesses of Gibraltar. Having heard the Minister’s comments—a long, long time ago now—my understanding is that the Government of Gibraltar are happy that the assurances they have been given provide the certainty they are looking for. On that basis, I do not intend to press the new clause to a vote, but I want to reserve the ability to bring it back at a later stage should the position of the Government of Gibraltar change.

We have heard a lot this afternoon and tonight about the wonderful opportunities for trade that await the United Kingdom if we leave the customs union and the single market. I welcome the fact that although the Minister repeatedly said that we would be leaving the customs union and the single market, he did not say—I listened very carefully—that we had to do so. He did not say that it was impossible to remain in either or both when we leave the European Union, even though a lot of people on the Brexit side have said that. That is simply not true; it is perfectly possible to leave the European Union without leaving those two trading agreements. The Government’s decision to leave them is purely political and it was not part of the referendum, despite what some people say. It is not yet too late for the Government to accept that that is a catastrophically bad political decision and that it should be reversed, even if doing so would come at a high political cost for some.

Earlier, we heard the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith) justifying the need to leave the single market because the losing side in the referendum said that we had to. I am quite happy to go through some of the things that were in the losing Conservative manifesto in Scotland about what would happen if people voted SNP. If we are going to be bound by the promises that the losing side made, the SNP is in for a bit of a field day.

I still find it astonishing that there are Labour Members looking for a complete exit from the European Union. Only today, the Court of Justice of the European Union delivered a massive victory to Uber drivers and workers by ruling that Uber is a taxi business—surprise, surprise; that is what it is. The ruling has given Uber drivers massively better employment protection than they would have had without it. I cannot believe that any Labour Member would argue to remove those drivers from the protection of the European Court and leave their employment rights at the mercy of a Conservative Government, but that is what at least one Labour Member, the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Kate Hoey), argued for just now. I know that she is very much in the minority in her party, but I am astonished that a Labour Member can express such views.

The same hon. Member commented on how much of the UK’s trade is done outside the European Union. She forgot to mention that if we include the trade that relies on trade deals that the European Union has already made with big trading nations, more than 60% of the UK’s trade effectively depends on the European Union. When we build in the trade deals that the European Union is in the process of finalising, the figure increases to 88%. In other words, in a couple of years’ time, 12% of the United Kingdom’s overseas trade will not depend on our membership of the European Union. Twelve per cent. of our trade will probably be guaranteed, but the other 88% is up for grabs. Believe me, a lot of other trading nations will be very keen to nibble away at that 88%.

I want to comment on the confusion of the hon. Member for Edinburgh South (Ian Murray). His stamina also seems to have deserted him, although I cannot say that I blame him. He said tonight, as he has said on several occasions, that he cannot understand the contradiction between the Government’s statement that we can have free, open and easy trade across international borders, and their insistence in the run-up to the independence referendum in Scotland—where, by his own admission, he shared a platform with some people who are now on the Conservative Benches—that that would not be possible.

I can put the hon. Gentleman out of his misery. There is no inconsistency. What the Government are saying now is correct, and what they and he said in 2014 was complete and utter rubbish. There is absolutely no need, in today’s modern world, for an international border to be anything more than a line that demarcates the jurisdictions of different Parliaments, Governments and courts. That is how international borders are seen all over western Europe, and that is the kind of international border we should be seeking. It will be difficult if not impossible to maintain open borders, even the open border we want to maintain across the island of Ireland. It will be difficult to deliver what the people of Northern Ireland so desperately want to maintain if we leave the customs union and the single market.

Oral Answers to Questions

Peter Grant Excerpts

Thursday 14th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Two very brief inquiries. I call Peter Grant.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

Yesterday, in response to a question from the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms) querying the Government’s failure to conduct these impact assessments, the Prime Minister said:

“No, it is not the case that no work has been done in looking at that”.—[Official Report, 13 December 2017; Vol. 633, c. 397.]

How does the Minister reconcile that statement with others previously made by the Secretary of State, as it directly contradicts them?

[Mr Walker]

I do not think it does that in any way at all. We have always been very clear that there is a wide mix of quantitative and qualitative analysis, and we draw on a range of work across government. We have released the sectoral analysis that has been done by our Department to the Select Committee, but of course what we will not do is release information that is market sensitive or that would be prejudicial to our negotiating position.

[Peter Grant]

May I gently remind the Minister, Mr Speaker, that your ruling is that the Department must provide to the Select Committee any impact assessments that have been done? The question from the right hon. Member for East Ham was not about sectoral analysis; he explicitly used the phrase:

“Assessing the impact of leaving the European Union”.—[Official Report, 13 December 2017; Vol. 633, c. 397.]

Are the Government now telling us that “assessing the impact” is different from “an impact assessment”? If so, will the Minister explain the difference?

[Mr Walker]

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State made this very clear in his evidence to the Select Committee. The information that has been shared with the Select Committee and is available to all Members of this House in the reading room includes assessments of the impact on the regulatory matters and of the importance of EU trade to different sectors.

Brexit Deal: Referendum

Peter Grant Excerpts

Monday 11th December 2017 Westminster Hall

[Susan Elan Jones]

As ever, my hon. Friend makes his point well.

Let me return to that recent risk study by the Bank of England. In its stress test for British banks, the Bank modelled a 4.7% fall in output, a 27% devaluation of the pound against the dollar, and a devaluation of a third in house prices. Indeed, what if—to quote the Brexit Secretary—some of our key decision makers have just “slightly misspoke”? One minute the first part of a deal seems to have been done, and the next we are told that nothing is agreed until everything is agreed. Then, in the midst of it all, it seems that the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has had a moment of epiphany—we all like those moments. Recognising that there may be trouble ahead, he reassures us:

“If the British people dislike the arrangement we have negotiated with the EU, the agreement will allow a future government to diverge.”

But would it not be much cleaner, quicker and simpler just to put the final deal to the British public?

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

The hon. Lady is making a passionate and carefully thought out argument. Is it not also the case that after we have left the EU the Environment Secretary, or anyone else, will be unable to offer the United Kingdom the chance to come back in, because as soon as the United Kingdom is out we would fail the fundamental test of democracy? We would not be allowed back in because too many of the legislators in Parliament are not elected.

[Susan Elan Jones]

The hon. Gentleman makes a very interesting point.

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[Martin Vickers]

The right hon. Gentleman might think that it is not in doubt but other opinions I have read and heard differ. Whatever the situation, Parliament would undermine the clear will of the British people if it attempted in any way to reverse that position.

Suppose the Prime Minister had stood up this afternoon and, instead of saying that there will be no second referendum, as she did at 4.21 pm, said, “Well yes, okay, let’s think about it. Maybe we’ll have a second referendum.” That would have undermined the British Government’s negotiating position. Clearly, the EU could then have said, “We’ll give them the worst possible deal and they will of course accept it.” Why would we want continued membership on worse terms than we have now? As I said, the Prime Minister has made that absolutely clear.

Another reason for not having a second referendum is that it would cause further political paralysis in this country and yet more time would be devoted to this matter. People have said to me repeatedly, “We’ve made our decision—just get on with it and let’s get over it.” The hon. Member for Clwyd South (Susan Elan Jones) spoke of multiple options. What could be worse than multiple options? Suppose 20% of people agreed with option A, 20% agreed with option B and 19% agreed with option C. That would be a recipe for complete and utter chaos.

[Peter Grant]

I certainly accept that, if the voting system is wrong, multi-option referendums can be worse than useless, but does the hon. Gentleman not accept that, with hindsight, it might have been handy for the question on the ballot paper to refer to membership of the single market and the customs union? As things stand, we have no idea how many of the 17 million people who voted to leave wanted to remain in the single market and the customs union.

[Martin Vickers]

It was made very clear by speakers on both sides of the argument—there was a little package illustrating this on “The Andrew Marr Show” yesterday—that a decision to leave would mean us leaving the single market and the customs union.

I was in Brussels last month to take advantage of the opportunity to speak to MEPs, officials and so on to test the water. There is no doubt that there is some sadness among our European neighbours that we are leaving. There is sadness for different reasons. Those who, like us, are net contributors to the system—Germany, for example—are sad because either they will have to pay more or the EU budget will be drastically reduced. If the budget is drastically reduced, countries that are net gainers—those that joined fairly recently, such as Romania and Bulgaria, which are very happy at the moment and benefit from the largesse of the EU—would quite rightly say, “Hang on, folks. We joined this little club knowing that we were going to get these benefits. Now you’re actually taking them away.” There is clear unhappiness over there.

There is no significant support in my constituency for another referendum. Indeed, I suggest that in Cleethorpes, as in most northern towns and perhaps even in Southend, Sir David, where it has to be said there are many Labour voters—I am talking in some cases about constituencies with significant Labour majorities—the Labour party does not represent the people it purports to represent. There is obviously a state of confusion. I recall that only a few months ago, the leader of the Labour party sacked Front Benchers for voting in favour of our remaining in the single market. Now we are told that that is on the table and we ought to be leaving. There is clear confusion.

As I said, the reality is that this issue has been a running sore through the body politic for half a century or more. All parties have been split on it, which is perhaps a true representation of the British people. That said, we have taken the decision and it is now the Government’s duty to deliver on it. I am confident that that will be to the benefit of the whole country.

--- Later in debate ---

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

Thank you for calling me, Sir David. I am grateful for the chance to begin the summing up. I am not yet persuaded, but I am certainly open to persuasion. I do not agree that we can look for a second referendum just because we do not like the result of the first, any more than I like the idea that every defendant should be allowed to appeal over and over just because they did not like the verdict; it must be demonstrated that there was something wrong with the process.

In this case, there was something badly wrong with the process. Some of the flaws in the referendum legislation and process have already been highlighted, although it must be said that if some of the people raising those concerns had voted against the referendum Bill on Second or Third Reading, or voted against triggering article 50 instead of following their Whips through the Lobby, it might have been a different story, although I know that some Members who were here earlier did in fact rebel on some of those votes.

[Geraint Davies]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Peter Grant]

I am just about to refer to the hon. Gentleman, so I might be about to cover his point. He commented on the clash of dates in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, which had vital national elections just a few weeks before the EU referendum. It was not realistic to expect all in those elections not to campaign on issues for which the individual Parliaments were responsible and concentrate on the EU referendum.

The franchise has been mentioned; 16 and 17-year-olds, who statistically had more to gain or lose from the referendum result, were the one group excluded. EU nationals were not allowed to vote. Who anywhere in the UK has been more affected than EU nationals? The rules that usually control funding in elections in Great Britain did not properly apply, so a £500,000 donation was able to be channelled into the leave campaign—from who knows where—via the accounts of a political party in Northern Ireland, where, for understandable reasons, there have been more moves to retain the confidentiality of those who fund political parties.

As has been said on numerous occasions, there was no process whatsoever to hold anybody to account for telling the biggest pack of lies ever told during the referendum campaign. The £350 million on the side of a bus was certainly the biggest in terms of the size of the letters, but it was not the only or the biggest lie that was told.

[Martin Vickers]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Peter Grant]

I will give way first to the hon. Member for Swansea West (Geraint Davies) and then come back to the hon. Gentleman.

[Geraint Davies]

The hon. Gentleman likened the situation to a court making a decision, and mentioned the process. Surely the other issue is fresh evidence, and an abundance of evidence is emerging every day that people will pay more and more jobs will be lost. Now that people are realising what the evidence is, they are changing their minds.

[Peter Grant]

I will come back in due course to the wider question of whether the circumstances have changed significantly or whether people simply understand the circumstances better now.

[Martin Vickers]

Since the referendum, we have heard repeatedly about the myth of the £350 million. “Where is the money?” is the question repeatedly asked. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that the £350 million will become available only after we leave?

[Peter Grant]

Well, it might become available after we leave, but I have not seen any hint of it in the Chancellor’s forward spending projections, or any indication that the NHS will suddenly become adequately funded, after not having been for a long time. The simple fact is that that was a good example of taking one isolated piece of information about the European Union and interpreting it to say whatever was wanted. In a previous Westminster Hall debate, I remember a number of hon. Members on the leave side claiming that nobody paid any attention to that big red bus anyway, which makes me wonder why they spent so much money driving it the length and breadth of these islands.

On the change of circumstances, I would always say that if it cannot be demonstrated that there has been some change of circumstances, it is difficult to argue for a rerun of any kind of process, whether an election, a referendum or anything else. In this case, it is difficult to be sure whether the facts have changed or whether people are more in possession of the facts than before. Certainly, some people have switched from vote leave to vote remain because they simply did not understand how complicated and fundamental a change this could be—the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) gave some exceptional examples of that.

With permission, Sir David, I will quote at greater length than I would normally from a document that was published shortly before the referendum, to give an indication of how people’s interpretation of the facts can sometimes change. It says:

“Voting to leave the EU would create years of uncertainty and potential economic disruption. This would reduce investment and cost jobs…it could result in 10 years or more of uncertainty as the UK unpicks our relationship with the EU and renegotiates new arrangements with the EU and over 50 other countries… Some argue that we could strike a good deal quickly with the EU because they want to keep access to our market. But…it would be much harder than that… No other country has managed to secure significant access to the Single Market, without having to: follow EU rules over which they have no real say; pay into the EU; accept EU citizens living and working in their country”.

A number of hon. Members will be familiar with that information, which comes from the document about the referendum published by the UK Government in April 2016. The hon. Member for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley) spoke glowingly about what a good-quality publication it was.

We might look back to those Government announcements from April 2016 and say that they got it right, but unfortunately they are now telling us that they got it wrong. They are telling us that the negotiations will be very quick and there will be no loss of investment, no loss of jobs and all the rest of it. The Government have changed their mind; they have obviously decided that there has been a significant change of circumstances. The Prime Minister has gone from a remainer to a leaver; the Foreign Secretary had written an article for a newspaper saying why we should remain, and changed his mind; and of course, the Environment Secretary went from the best friend and strongest supporter of the Foreign Secretary’s leadership campaign to somebody who chose to stand against him. Even at the highest levels of government in these islands, Cabinet Ministers can change their minds very quickly. I understand the argument that if the people change their mind at some point in the future, they should be given the opportunity to express that at the ballot box.

Generally speaking, however, I take the view that the way for a party to change a referendum result is to get elected at the ballot box with an explicit manifesto commitment to a referendum. The Liberal Democrats had that manifesto commitment at the last election, but they did not come close to winning. I do not think we can say that everybody who voted Liberal Democrat wanted another referendum. We certainly cannot say that everybody who voted for another party did not want another referendum. If somebody wants to put the public through a process such as a referendum, they have to have some kind of clear public mandate for that. Only in exceptional circumstances could Parliament decide on a referendum that was not in the manifesto of the Government or the Opposition. I am not saying that it could never happen, but I think it would be very unusual indeed.

Having said that, we have to accept the simple fact that we have never had a referendum on leaving the single market or the customs union. Some people might claim that we did because somebody on the vote leave side and somebody on the vote remain side said that we would have to leave the single market and the customs union if the result was to leave. I caution hon. Members to be careful before they start asking the House to accept that the losers’ views are the ones that have to be put into place after the votes have been counted. I could give examples of where that logic would lead to conclusions that Conservative and Labour Members would be unhappy about.

The Government’s response to the question of the single market and the customs union has been to conflate what is necessary with what they have unilaterally decided. We now have Conservative Back Benchers who believe in good faith that it is not possible to leave the European Union without leaving the single market and the customs union. Quite clearly, that is possible. It is not what the Government have decided, but they have decided that because they decided it; it was nothing to do with the referendum.

The Government have refused point blank to tell us whether they have taken legal advice on whether article 50 can be withdrawn or revoked at any time for any reason. They are simply saying that their decision is that they will not revoke it—end of story. I wonder why they are being so coy about what legal advice they have had. Not that long ago, in the lead-up to other referendums, the Government were quite happy to publish legal advice when it seemed to support the political position they wanted to adopt. There is a degree of inconsistency there: sometimes the Government will publish legal advice and sometimes they will not. As long as the Government will not publish the advice they have had on whether article 50 can be revoked, people will wonder why.

[Tom Brake]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the most likely reason that the Government want to withhold that advice is because they do not want to give people the certainty that article 50 is revocable? I think that is what the advice says.

[Peter Grant]

The right hon. Gentleman may well say that; I could not possibly comment. I remind him, however, that like his colleague the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse), I am a member of the Exiting the European Union Committee and we have had a lot of interesting discussions about why the Government might or might not want to disclose stuff, to decline to say whether it has been done, and then eventually to say that they cannot disclose it because it does not exist.

I understand why the result of the June 2016 referendum came as a massive shock for a lot of people—people who voted to leave, as well as some who voted to remain. It is correct that most people, however they voted, had no idea what a massive decision they were taking. I have been accused—in the Daily Express, no less—of saying that people were stupid. I do not think that they were stupid on 23 June; I think that they were badly informed—sometimes they were ill-informed and certainly they were misinformed a lot of the time.

The social implications of leaving the European Union have still not been properly discussed. I travel to other parts of Europe on parliamentary business, and I went to Northern Ireland with the Exiting the European Union Committee just a few days ago. The social impact of a possible change in the relationship between Northern Ireland and its neighbour to the south is really frightening people. I do not use that word lightly; people are frightened about what will happen to their communities and to their social and family links.

In Donegal, if someone needs radiotherapy, they go to a foreign country—they cross the border into Northern Ireland and the Government of Ireland help to pay for that hospital. On both sides of the border, people are used to the fact that they go to hospital or to school or to visit their granny in a different country. It is not just about whether people will be allowed to stay there and continue to make those journeys every day of their lives, but about the fact that a decision has been taken—not by the people of Northern Ireland, incidentally; as in Scotland, they voted to remain in the European Union—by somebody else that will fundamentally change the psychology of the relationship between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. The psychological and social impact of Brexit in Northern Ireland has not been touched on in most of our debates over here.

Comments have been made today about the size of the majority in the referendum. I am not convinced that that is a strong argument because we could wait a long time before we got any more than a 10% majority either way on the question of leaving the European Union. People have sincerely held views in opposite directions, so if we set a limit that there has to be a majority of more than so-and-so per cent., we could be going over it again and again. I do not think that would help.

If the Government want to continue to insist that Parliament simply has to vote for whatever deal they come back with at the end of this process—remembering that the only choice we have just now as far as they are concerned is to accept their deal or have no deal at all—it is important that they are a lot more inclusive about who contributes to those negotiations. They have to be prepared to listen much sooner in the process, not only to the Opposition, but to their own Back Benchers. If they had had the humility to do that during the first round of negotiations, we would have got to the stage we reached on Friday a lot sooner and with much less pain and grief.

The time may yet come when I will be prepared to say that there has to be a second referendum on EU membership. I do not rule that out; indeed, I suspect that I am coming closer to that view as each day passes. However, although I fully understand the grief that people are suffering as a result of the vote, I think that when we give people the right to take a decision, we must give them the responsibility to live by its results. I suspect that if we had a second referendum, either during this Parliament or at some other time, we would have a much more constructive and better informed debate than we did last time. I certainly know the result I would hope for if that happened, but—as always— I will accept any result that shows the will of the people.

EU Exit Negotiations

Peter Grant Excerpts

Tuesday 5th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

My hon. Friend, who has a long history of wisdom in this subject—[Interruption.] Wisdom—he saw it before most Opposition Members did. He has a long history with this subject, and he explains better than I could why we said that no divergence is a bad option.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

On reflection, I think I prefer the phrase “the rubber has hit the road” to the one that I was going to use to describe yesterday’s fiasco.

It is no surprise that leadership contenders are now circling the Prime Minister. I can reveal that there is a vacancy coming up, because the Prime Minister is today being interviewed for the job of Scotland football manager, where her fantastic ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory could be put to very good use.

A Government who said they would bring sovereignty back to Parliament are now being controlled by someone who is not even a Member of this Parliament. A Government who refuse to give Parliament any say in the development of our negotiating position are now allowing that negotiating position to be dictated by the leader of a minority Parliament in the smallest of the four nations of this Union. I could not put it better than the shadow Minister: what a shambles; what a complete mess.

Will the Secretary of State now go back to “Scotland’s Place in Europe”, the document published by the Scottish Government that his Government rejected out of hand a year ago, and use that as a basis to produce a solution to an otherwise intractable problem? The fact is that the Government’s red lines are not compatible with each other, as the Brexit Committee concluded only last week. We were therefore unable to see how it is possible to reconcile leaving the customs union with avoiding a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic. Will the Secretary of State go back to that paper and use it as a basis for reopening negotiations?

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I think the hon. Gentleman has concluded his remarks. [Interruption.] The problem is that he has taken one and half minutes plus, and there is huge pressure on time, so I think we must now proceed.

Leaving the EU: Sectoral Impact Assessments

Peter Grant Excerpts

Tuesday 28th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Walker]

I share my right hon. and learned Friend’s commitment to ensuring that the House can scrutinise valuable information in this respect, but the problem with the motion that was passed is that it referred to sectoral impact analyses. We were clear from the start that the documents it referred to did not exist in the form that was required. We have therefore pulled together sectoral analysis for the scrutiny of the Select Committee. I think that that will prove valuable to the Committee.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

On a day in June 2016, the people of the United Kingdom were asked one question on one day. As a result of the answer they gave to that one question, there is no going back on Brexit. On 1 November, Parliament was asked one question, but for the intervening 27 days the Government have done everything possible to deny and defy the instruction—it was not a request—that they were given by this Parliament, to which, we are told, sovereignty is being restored by the Brexit process.

I remind the Minister that the question of what the Government will provide to the Select Committee is not for the Government or, indeed, for the Select Committee to decide. This Parliament has decided, and there is no discussion, debate or negotiation as to the extent to which that decision will be complied with. It must be complied with in full; otherwise, as the letter published recently by the Chair of the Select Committee on Exiting the European Union makes clear, the Select Committee will have to consider whether to table a motion on contempt. How is that going to look to our European partners? What will it do to the credibility of the Government, and particularly of the Brexit team, if they end up being held in contempt by the Parliament to which they claim to be returning sovereignty?

Will the Minister confirm that the resolution of the House was about not what was made public but what was provided to the Select Committee? In those circumstances, does he not accept that what must be made available to the Select Committee is everything—absolutely everything? If the Government are not prepared to comply with that instruction, they should not be in government. Will he tell us categorically whether he accepts that a decision on what to publish, within the bounds of parliamentary privilege, is for the Select Committee alone, and will he confirm that he and his Government are prepared to trust the judgment of that Committee to exercise on behalf of the House responsible judgment about what the public are entitled to know?

[Mr Walker]

The hon. Gentleman asks a number of important questions. I would hope to hear some welcome from him for the fact that we have shared the information in these reports with the devolved Administrations. When I gave evidence to Select Committees recently in Scotland, we were pressed on whether we would do that. We do respect the fact that the Select Committee has the complete choice and discretion over what gets published of the information that is shared with it. That is why the Government have published the information to the Select Committee in the way that they have.

EU Exit Negotiations

Peter Grant Excerpts

Monday 13th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

I thank my right hon. and learned Friend for that question. First, yes, we will have a meaningful vote, as has been said from this Dispatch Box any number of times. What I have been saying today is that we are going to add to that, over and above the meaningful vote on the outcome—on the deal—legislation which puts it into effect. In other words, the House will be able to go through it line by line and agree it line by line.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

I am grateful to the Secretary of State for advance sight of his statement. First, does he not appreciate that it is becoming increasingly clear that the only sensible solution in Northern Ireland is for Northern Ireland to remain in the customs union, and if that means the rest of us remain in the customs union as well, that must be what we do? He has already said that there cannot be a border between the two parts of Ireland, between Northern Ireland and the mainland UK, and between the Republic of Ireland and the European Union, so there cannot be a customs border anywhere between the UK and the European mainland without breaching important international treaties.

On citizens’ rights, I welcome the Secretary of State’s update on progress, but does he not accept that we are now well past the time when our constituents are entitled to absolute legal guarantees and that progress reports are not enough? People are still leaving our businesses, our health service and our social care services because they do not have confidence that there will be a deal in time for them to make their future here.

On the update on the financial settlement, would it be cynical to suggest that things will become a lot simpler when the Chancellor has got his Budget out of the way? Will the Secretary of State tell us what discussions he has had with the Chancellor about what measures might need to be in next week’s Budget to pave the way for a financial settlement in the weeks to come? Or is it the case that there will be no financial settlement in the Budget because the Government know that they could not get a Budget past their own Back Benchers if there was an admission that it included any contribution to the European Union?

Finally, on the announcement of new legislation, the withdrawal agreement Bill, I give credit where it is due: the Secretary of State has done the right thing by announcing this to the House. Some of his Cabinet colleagues could well learn from his example. Will he give us more clarity as to what the Bill will be about? I know that he cannot give us the detail, but when can we expect it to be published? Will it still simply be a question of take it or leave it—their deal or no deal? Will the House be given the opportunity to amend the Bill, as it must have the opportunity to amend any Bill, and thereby have the opportunity to attempt to amend the agreement?

Given that the Prime Minister is now only eight disgruntled Conservative MPs away from facing a vote of no confidence, why should anyone else have confidence in this Government to extricate us from the mess they have created when they are rapidly losing the confidence of their own Back Benchers?

[Mr Davis]

On the question about Northern Ireland, what I have said in terms, which is what I have said here in the House, is that there will be no internal border within the United Kingdom. That is an absolute fundamental because, apart from anything else, the Good Friday agreement—the Belfast agreement—requires the Government of Northern Ireland to operate on behalf of all communities, and at least one community in Northern Ireland would not accept a border in the Irish sea.

As for the border between Northern Ireland and Ireland, everybody has accepted that there must be no return to a hard border. Some of that is dealt with by the continuation of the common travel area, which has been around since 1923—in that respect, it is not new. In terms of the customs border, there is of course already a difference between levy and tax rates and excise rates north and south of the border, and we manage without a hard border. That is what we will continue to do.

With respect to the Budget, the hon. Gentleman is optimistic if thinks the Chancellor gives any of us more than a week of advance warning of his Budget. Of course, I have discussed with him the financial aspects of our relationship with the European Union at many meetings.

As for the new legislation, I do not think it is in the gift of the Government to put before the House primary legislation that is incapable of amendment. The nature of primary legislation is that it is always capable of amendment. Of course, we will have the practical limitations of having signed a deal and there may be implications because of that, but the whole thing will be put in front of the House.

Oral Answers to Questions

Peter Grant Excerpts

Thursday 2nd November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

My hon. Friend is of course exactly right. I remember that the last time he asked a question on this subject he reminded the House that it was the Conservative party that introduced the first employment protection legislation, way before the Labour party was created, and it will still be doing that way after the Labour party is gone.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

I am sure we all take great comfort from the Secretary of State’s assurances about the Prime Minister’s change of mind. What he now attributes to the Prime Minister is very different from what she said about workers’ rights as Home Secretary. Given that there is no intention whatsoever to reduce workers’ rights as a result of our leaving the European Union, will the Secretary of State undertake to table a Government amendment to the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill, so that the unprecedented powers given to Ministers in that Bill cannot by statute be used to reduce workers’ rights?

[Mr Davis]

The point I have made time and again about the powers in that Bill is that they are not intended to remove or reduce any law; they are intended to make all the laws practical, and that is what they will do. If we have not got it quite right, we will talk to everybody involved, in Committee and on Report, and ensure that we do get it right.

[Peter Grant]

As well as the potential threat to workers’ rights, there is a much wider threat in the Bill with the removal of the EU charter of fundamental rights from domestic legislation. Last week, the junior Minister was unable to give the Select Committee an example of anyone whose interests would be damaged by retaining that charter in domestic legislation. Will the Secretary of State tell us whose interests will be damaged if we just leave that charter in place?

[Mr Davis]

I have made this point over and over again. The charter of fundamental rights is essentially a list of existing rights and does not, as far as we can see, generate any new ones. I have said that if the shadow Secretary of State can identify a right that will be lost, we will put it back.