Oral Answers to Questions
Philip Dunne Excerpts(2 years, 3 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
I support passionately the right hon. Gentleman’s indignation. Yes, I never thought, when we negotiated, that it would mean 200 businesses would stop supplying Northern Ireland, foods being blocked and Christmas cards being surcharged. Frankly, the EU is implementing the protocol in an insane and pettifogging way. We need to sort it out and I completely support what the right hon. Gentleman says.
Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Yes, my right hon. Friend is completely right, and I welcome the report by his Committee. This Government are going further and faster than any other Government hitherto to protect and improve the health of our rivers and seas.
Oral Answers to Questions
Philip Dunne Excerpts(3 years, 4 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
On the last point, that is a matter for the Scottish Government, who have the fiscal freedom to do that. I thank health and social care workers in Scotland and across the whole country, and I am proud of the increases we have been able to put in—12.8% over the past three years, and a pay rise for 1 million people in the NHS, as part of the biggest ever investment in the NHS, even before covid began. This investment will continue under this Government.
Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
I am proud that the UK led the way in instituting a target of net zero by 2050; of all the developed nations, we were the first. We are looking at our nationally determined contribution, which will be extremely ambitious and will be published around the time of the climate summit on 12 December this year.
Oral Answers to Questions
Philip Dunne Excerpts(3 years, 11 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
All Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies advice is published in due course, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows. Let me be absolutely clear with the House that SAGE, our scientists and our medical officers have been involved in every stage of preparing this strategy. I remind the House that what we are doing is entirely conditional and provisional. The UK has made a huge amount of progress.
The people of this country have worked incredibly hard to get the R down, and we cannot now go back to square one. We cannot risk a second outbreak, and we will do everything to avoid that.
Actually, when people look at what we are advocating as the way forward, the stepped process that we have set out, I think they can see exactly what we are trying to do as a country, and they can see that everybody is still required to obey the social distancing rules. The common sense of the British people got us through that first phase of this disease: I am absolutely confident that they will get us through the next as well.
Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
I thank my right hon. Friend for what he does to champion the environment and the cause of reducing CO2 emissions. Alas, we have had to postpone the COP26 summit that was to have taken place, as he knows, in Glasgow at the end of this year. But our enthusiasm and determination to get to net zero by 2050 remains undiminished.
European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill
Philip Dunne ExcerptsWednesday 8th January 2020
(4 years, 3 months ago)
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Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con)
I am grateful to be able to make a brief contribution this evening and to follow the hon. Member for Glasgow East (David Linden), who reminded me of the debates that we have been having over the past three and a half years since the referendum. There was an overwhelming sense of déjà vu in that some Members who supported the remain position at the 2016 referendum have still not properly recognised that time has moved on. I was one of those who voted remain in the referendum and I, in common with many Conservative colleagues, am reconciled to the fact that the British public voted to leave, as demonstrated forcefully in the general election. The déjà vu that I am experiencing is that many of the arguments that we have heard ad nauseam for hours, days and weeks in this Chamber are still being trotted out again in this debate today.
Several hon. Members rose—
Philip Dunne
I want to make some progress. The reason why I stood to speak this evening is that I made my maiden speech in a debate on the EU in my first month in this House 14 and a half years ago. It is therefore fitting that I should say something in this debate just before we hopefully cease debating whether we are leaving the EU this month, because that matter has now been resolved.
I want to make a specific contribution in relation to new clause 27, which was tabled by the hon. Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams). I have considerable sympathy with the spirit and principles underlying the new clause, which she spoke eloquently on earlier, but the reason why I want to refer to it is to ask the Minister, in his summing up before the Committee ends this evening, how the Government intend to take account of that spirit and intent in future legislation. I recognise that it is not appropriate to adorn this Bill with commitments that have nothing to do with the withdrawal agreement per se, but they are none the less worthy in themselves.
I draw the House’s attention to the part in the Conservative manifesto, on which I was proud to stand recently, that says:
“we will legislate to ensure high standards of workers’ rights, environmental protection and consumer rights.”
We have already heard from others this evening about the existing higher level of workers’ rights that apply in the UK over and above those that are applied across the EU, and we as a Government have an ambition to maintain environmental protections in many areas at a higher level than those that currently apply across the EU.
Debbie Abrahams
This is not meant to sound trite, but a number of different commitments were made in different manifestos. For example, the Conservatives party’s 2015 manifesto committed to halving the disability employment gap and to introducing new starter homes, neither of which was delivered. This is about backing up commitments. If the Government are seriously committed to this—I understand that the right hon. Gentleman certainly is—what is wrong with including it in the Bill?
Philip Dunne
I will give one example of what is wrong with the hon. Lady’s new clause, and that is its territorial jurisdiction. I remind her that environmental protection is primarily a devolved matter. The territorial jurisdiction of the environment Bill that was in the Queen’s Speech and that will be brought before this House will relate to England primarily and, to a small extent, Northern Ireland. I am rather surprised that hon. Members representing the Scottish National party, who are here in force this evening and who have spoken before me, did not choose to raise that point.
Alan Brown
It is great to hear that the right hon. Gentleman is such a great defender of devolution. As a defender of devolution, does he respect the fact that the Scottish Parliament today rejected the UK Government’s legislative consent motion, and does he also respect the right of Scotland’s people to choose their future?
Philip Dunne
As the Prime Minister said, far more eloquently than I could, during Prime Minister’s questions earlier today, the Scottish people did decide in 2014 and that is the vote that should be respected by this House. [Interruption.] I am going to move back to my point rather than engage—
Philip Dunne
I am not going to take the hon. Gentleman’s intervention, because I know what he is going to say.
In conclusion, will the Minister, if he has the opportunity to do so, refer in his winding up speech to the environment Bill that will shortly be brought before this House and explain the extent to which the protections sought in new clause 27 are likely to be enshrined in it?
James Duddridge
It is always a pleasure to follow my right hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Philip Dunne). I think I will be able to reassure him throughout my contribution, particularly on non-regression issues.
We have heard a number of good speeches. In the days since the general election, I have sensed a change in tone in Parliament, an acceptance of that which is happening, and a better debate across the House about what is actually going to happen. [Interruption.] There is a little bit of laughter, or chuntering, as the hon. Member for Glasgow East (David Linden) would call it. I have been an offender in that sense, but I do sense a small change in tone.
I would like to speak to 21 new clauses, but I will focus my time because I understand that the House wants to make progress on the substantive new clauses, as opposed to those that are technically flawed. Some are probing new clauses—that point has been made a number of times—and I hope they are more in number than the substantive new clauses that will be pushed to a vote.
I will first speak to new clause 2, tabled by the official Opposition, and to new clause 51 and new schedule 1, tabled by the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry), who has been omnipresent throughout the day. I am grateful to her for her contribution. The amendments relate to the protection of workers’ rights. As the Government have stated and the Prime Minister has confirmed, we are committed to ensuring that workers’ rights are protected as the UK leaves the EU. I want to reiterate that and add some detail. There is no suggestion that this Government would propose, or that this Parliament would allow, a change or regression in workers’ rights to make them lower than currently required by EU law. We have been clear, in fact, that we will protect and continue to improve workers’ rights. We do not need to be in the EU to do that; we can do it on our own.