Leaving the European Union

Ronnie Cowan Excerpts

Monday 11th March 2019 Westminster Hall

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

The public who are listening to this and similar debates cannot believe that this Parliament so lacks confidence and courage that, two years and eight months on from the great people’s vote, it is still considering forgetting the impact of that vote and ditching Brexit altogether. The public are saying two things to us: “Get on with it!” and, from the majority who voted to leave, “What part of ‘leave’ did you not understand?”

Leave voters deeply resent how too many Members of Parliament and smart commentators look down on them and pretend that they did not understand what they were doing or know what they were voting for, or that they were in some way muddled about their aims. We have heard that again today from the Petitions Committee representative, the hon. Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner): he says that we did not know what we were doing, that it was all fanciful and that we all had a mixed idea. We knew exactly what we were doing—voting to take back control. We voted to take back control of our laws, our money and our borders, and that is exactly what this Parliament has to get on and do.

[Ronnie Cowan (Inverclyde) (SNP)]

I appreciate what the right hon. Gentleman is saying, but he cannot possibly say that two and a half years ago people knew precisely what they were voting for, when a few hours away from our vote, we do not know what we are voting on.

[John Redwood]

Well, I know exactly what I am voting on. I am sorry if the hon. Gentleman has not prepared or read anything and does not understand what is going on, but I am voting to leave the European Union. The only way that we can now leave the European Union, because of the way in which the negotiations have been mishandled, is to leave on 29 March without signing the withdrawal agreement and to offer a comprehensive free trade agreement—which, if there were nothing else on the table, the EU would be well advised to accept.

[Ronnie Cowan]

rose—

[John Redwood]

If the hon. Gentleman wants to try again, he can try again.

[Ronnie Cowan]

Okay, what about haulage companies whose drivers need European Conference of Ministers of Transport permits? The UK can give out 984 permits, but there have been 11,300 applications. What does the right hon. Gentleman say to the 90% of hauliers who cannot get permits? Is that just a minor detail?

[John Redwood]

Well, the Government will make sure that haulage will work, and of course that is something that the Government can and will do. I have every confidence that roughly the same number of lorries will come through Calais and Dover on 30 March as on 28 March. I am sure it will work fine. I know of no reason why the Government would stop lorry drivers moving through Calais and Dover.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ronnie Cowan]

If there is no fear whatever, why are the Government telling people to stockpile? Why are pharmaceutical companies telling me, “There is one key ingredient in the entire process, and if we do not get it, we will run out of that product”?

[John Redwood]

The hon. Gentleman got the lorries thing wrong, and now he has got the drugs thing wrong. The Government are not asking people to stockpile drugs. People will buy their normal drugs in the normal way, or be offered them free on the NHS in the normal way. There is no need to panic, as I have just explained. The hon. Gentleman has not named a company or a drug that will be deliberately withheld from the British market; unless he can do so, I do not think that he has a case at all.

[Ronnie Cowan]

The pharmaceutical company Martindale tells me that it needs sugar to manufacture methadone, because it is a syrup. It has stockpiled three months’ worth, but then it will run out. If sugar does not come into this country, it will run out of methadone.

[John Redwood]

Why would somebody mount an economic blockade of Britain and not sell us their product? That is complete nonsense. This is a competitive world. When the scare stories were first put round that Calais would be blocked by deliberate action, I and others made inquiries and were told that Zeebrugge, Ostend, Antwerp and Rotterdam would love to have the business and were making very competitive offers against Calais, but Calais immediately said, “No, of course we don’t want to lose that business, and by the way we still have the shortest crossing, so it should still be the easiest way.”

Such malicious and unpleasant scare stories are why this Parliament is losing the trust of the public generally. The public expect us to be grown up and manage these things. If there are issues that need managing on our exit, it is our job to manage them, not to scaremonger or try to make them worse.

--- Later in debate ---

[John Redwood]

Not at all, because that was an entirely truthful statement at the time. Clearly, Scotland had no right to independent membership of the European Union, which was the issue. It was already clear in 2014 that my party would campaign for a referendum. I always thought that we would win both the general election and the referendum—I was about the only person who thought that we would win both, and I am very pleased that we did. It was an entirely democratic process. Scottish voters could see that might happen when they made their decision to stay in the Union. As very welcome full members of our Union, they then had every opportunity to make a decisive intervention in the debate we had together on whether we stayed in the European Union.

I want to finish on the economic issues, of which much has been made. It is a strange debate, because most leave voters voted on the issues of democracy, independence, sovereignty, making our own decisions and spending our own money. I am someone who thinks that we will be better off—not worse off—by leaving the European Union. I have consistently argued this before and after the referendum. The case is very easy to make. I would like us to have a Brexit bonus Budget as soon as we leave the European Union at the end of this month. Such a Budget should boost our economy by between 1% and 2% of GDP.

Let me take the more modest version—a 1% boost from a £20 billion stimulus, which would provide a mixture of increased money for much-loved public services. It would also include tax cuts. The kind of thing I have in mind is more money for our schools budgets and teachers. We need more money for our armed forces and security, and for our police and the work on gangs, knife crime and so forth. We need more money for our social care, where the shoe has been pinching. The Government have already found prospectively large sums for the health service, and the challenge is to ensure that—where we vote those sums through—we get good value for money and are buying something that really does provide a higher quality service, which is what the public expect.

There should also be a series of tax cuts, firstly on VAT—the tax that we are not allowed to cut or reduce in so many ways, because it is an EU tax. I would take all VAT off green products, because it is wrong that people have to pay rather large taxes on better boiler controls, insulation and various other green measures they can take in their homes to cut their fuel bills. I would like to get rid of VAT altogether on domestic fuel. The budgets of people on the lowest incomes have the highest proportion of expenditure on fuel—there is fuel poverty. Why do the Government contribute to it by adopting an EU tax on domestic fuel? It would be good to get rid of that.

I would like stamp duties to be put back to the same levels as before the big hikes. I would not put back stamp duties that have been cut, but those that have been increased—it has clearly done a lot of damage to the property market by stopping transactions and stopping mobility—so that people can afford to live in the right-size property that is appropriate for their stage in life.

I would also like quite a big reduction in business rates. There is definite unfairness for high street retailing by comparison with online retailing, and now would be a good opportunity to reduce business rates. It is eminently affordable. The Government have provided their estimate of £39 billion, which is largely to be spent in a couple of years over the period of further negotiation. I think it will be much more than that in the long term—there are no numbers in the withdrawal agreement. Quite a lot of that money falls in the first couple of years, and I would like us to spend it in the next couple of years in the way I have described, with a £20 billion increase in the first year to get things going. There is a running saving of £12 billion a year or more from the saving of the net contribution, leaving aside any special payments under the withdrawal agreement.

The Chancellor has already let it be known that there has been a big overshoot of his fiscal tightening: we are borrowing far less than he was expecting, so he has a bit of leeway. We might learn more about that later this week. Putting it all together, the package I suggest is very modest, but it would give a very welcome improvement to our public services and give quite a good economic boost through targeted tax cuts. Our GDP would go up in the first year after we left the European Union, rather than go down on what it would have been otherwise.

[Ronnie Cowan]

I am just curious how a national debt of £1.7 trillion can be serviced with all these tax cuts.

[John Redwood]

As I just explained, my measures would not increase the build-up of public debt, but would be financed out of the amounts that are already in the Budget to go to the European Union.

The public find it extremely odd that many Members of Parliament want to give any amount to the European Union without challenging or probing what bill it is sending to us and why, and yet begrudge us spending that money on our priorities at home. One of the winning themes of the vote leave campaign was that we want to control and spend our own money. There is absolutely no legal obligation to pay that money to the European Union after 29 March, when we have left. Indeed, the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 repeals the European Communities Act 1972, so I do not think the Government will have any powers to send money to the European Union after 29 March, given the admirable legislation now on the statute book that means that we will leave.

Many people who are interested in these affairs want us to get on with it and leave the European Union. Many share my optimism that we will be better out, trading and developing free trade agreements with the rest of the world and cutting tariffs where that makes sense and does not damage our home industry. Above all, we will spend the money that we will spare because we are no longer making a huge tribute to the European Union through these very large sums of money. What’s not to like? How do MPs who got elected to implement Brexit think they will get away with telling the British people that they were wrong, and that they will delay or stop Brexit?

--- Later in debate ---

[Ronnie Cowan]

To paraphrase the hon. Gentleman, the people of Scotland did not vote “Yes” in the 2014 referendum because they were cowards.

[Steve Double]

I say to the hon. Gentleman that those who promoted leaving the Union clearly did not sell their positive message enough to get people to vote for it. In the European Union referendum, however, that clearly did happen.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steve Double]

My hon. Friend makes the point very well. If we say that we can only leave the EU with an agreement, we are actually saying that we can leave only on the terms that the EU dictates. If it knows that we will not walk away without a deal, it will dictate the terms—as in any negotiation—and that has been part of the problem all along. Too many people in this House—those on the Opposition Front Bench have certainly contributed to this position—have told the EU, “We will not allow Parliament to take the UK out of the EU without a deal,” and it has believed it. The EU has not been willing to come to the negotiating table in good faith and negotiate a good deal because it has known all along that Parliament was very unlikely to allow us to walk away without a deal.

Too many Members of this House have also said publicly “We respect the referendum result”—some even stood on manifestos that said so—while working tirelessly behind the scenes every week to undermine the result and find a way to prevent it from happening. That has also been hugely damaging to trust in our politics.

We will find out only in the years ahead, when all this is over and the history books about this period have been written, exactly how damaging those who have sought to undermine the Prime Minister’s negotiating position have really been to our country. I believe they have been hugely damaging and have largely contributed to where we are today. Only when the history books have been written will we really understand all that has gone on behind the scenes to give the message to the EU that we will stop the UK leaving if we can, in any way that we can. That has been massively damaging to our chances of getting a withdrawal agreement and future deal that this House can support.

[Ronnie Cowan]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that another part of the problem is that, at the outset, the UK Government stated that nothing was agreed until everything was agreed? Had we gone to the negotiating table, had some debate and arranged something, we would have created a working relationship between us and the EU27, which we could then have built on, implemented and fine-tuned over time. We started off on the wrong foot, where we have stayed for two and a half years.

[Steve Double]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman; as I said earlier, many mistakes were made, and some of the serious ones were made right at the start of negotiations, when we started negotiating from a very weak position without really knowing what we wanted from all this. His point falls in that category. We should have been much clearer and much stronger.

Those who seek to promote a second referendum, and have done so for a very long time, have also massively undermined the Government’s negotiating position. Those people have given a message to the EU that the referendum result can be overturned. That has encouraged the EU to give us a bad deal. Everything points to the fact that if there is to be a second referendum—I will do everything I can to stop that happening—and the deal on the table is bad enough, no one will vote for it and we will stay in. Clearly, some of the unguarded comments by leading members of the EU have betrayed that. They think that if they give the UK a bad enough deal, we will reject it and eventually reverse the decision and stay in. Those calling for a second referendum have contributed to our being where we are today.

I do not know whether the Prime Minister will come back from Strasbourg with something. I genuinely wish her well, and I hope she can come back with something substantial and a genuine change to the backstop that is legally binding, which hopefully we can get behind. I hope that happens, but if it does not, it is imperative that we leave the EU on 29 March, as we voted for and time and again have said we will.

Everyone talks about uncertainty. Let us be clear: virtually every business I talk to says that uncertainty is killing them. They would rather know what will happen, even if they do not particularly like it, to have certainty rather than drag this out for months or years to come. Any extension of article 50 will do no more than prolong the uncertainty, the agony and the debate, with no clear answers for business.

I have come to the conclusion that unless the Prime Minister can get substantial changes to the backstop, the only way to deliver on the referendum result—to keep our commitment to the British people and deliver what people voted for—is to leave on 29 March with no deal. That is what I will be working to achieve.

[David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)]

It is a great pleasure, as ever, to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McDonagh. I thank those who initiated the petition, which has secured over 130,000 signatures, including many from my constituency. I must also thank the hon. Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner) for eloquently opening the debate.

I have the privilege, pleasure and displeasure of summing up the debate on behalf of the Scottish National party. Having listened to the previous speeches, I feel a bit like I am in a European Research Group support group meeting. The hon. Member for Cambridge made an excellent contribution; he spoke passionately in favour of the European Union and reflected on his experience of representing a university town. There is no doubt that our universities will be worse off as a result of our pulling up the drawbridge and adopting the isolationist approach that the Brexiteers seem to advance.

We had an incredibly consistent speech from the right hon. Member for Wokingham (John Redwood). He outlined his fantasy Budget if he was in the Treasury. Unfortunately for him, his party has moved away from that. He rightly spoke about investing more in social care, but he omitted to mention that we have an ageing population and we will need people to look after them when we limit free movement of people. I am not sure that was factored into his economic analysis.

The hon. Member for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double), who is a friend, spoke about our turning into a national embarrassment. I fear that point may have come already. Legal action is being taken against us for contracts with a ferry company with no ferries. We may have already arrived at the point of national embarrassment —a view shared even by Brexiteers.

The clock is ticking towards leaving the European Union in just 18 days. I cannot believe that this close to Brexit we still do not know what will happen. When I speak to my constituents I find that incredibly embarrassing. Even as a remainer, I find it embarrassing to go round my constituency and explain to folk that we still do not know what will happen. People look to me as a Member of Parliament and say, “You must know what is happening because you are in the House of Commons.” The reality is that the vast majority of us are still getting our information on Twitter about when the Prime Minister is flying to Strasbourg, when we might get updated legal advice from the Attorney General, and when or if at all we might have meaningful votes this week. That is a national embarrassment that brings this place into disrepute.

[Ronnie Cowan]

The latest Twitter update is that there will be a statement to the House at 9 pm. The right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith) has said, “We may have reached a point where there might be an agreement, and we will keep an open mind.”

[David Linden]

I am grateful for that update at 5.34 pm. A statement is expected at 9 o’clock but it may change a couple more times, so I will take that with a pinch of salt.

The Prime Minister has spent the last two years trying to placate her own party while its members peddle their almost impossible visions of a post-Brexit future to the public. After the referendum, the SNP attempted to extend an olive branch and said we would back a deal that offered to keep Scotland in the customs union and the single market. As the right hon. Member for Wokingham said, that fell on deaf ears. Instead, the Prime Minister opted to lead the country towards the hardest of Brexits, simply to pursue her personal vendetta against immigration. She has done so without a plan or a roadmap of what this Brexit will look like; instead she goes around with meaningful words such as “Brexit means Brexit” and “I’m going to make a success of this.” Ms McDonagh, if you know what that means, I would be delighted to know. For the last two and a half years we have been told that Brexit means Brexit, but what does that mean?

With days to go, we still do not know what Brexit will look like. The Lords EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee heard last week that the Government still have no idea whether the UK can remain in EU food safety systems after Brexit. Yesterday, Simon Fraser, the former Foreign and Commonwealth Office official, described the state of affairs as

“a shocking failure of our government and our parliament, and a national humiliation”.

I could not agree more. The Conservative Government in Westminster have shown they are institutionally incapable of acting in the best interests of the Scottish people.

I have described this chaos without even touching on the effects that Brexit will have for Scotland, its people and our business community. As I said in my earlier intervention, people in Scotland voted 62% in favour of remaining in the EU—higher than anywhere else on these islands. It is estimated that more than 100,000 Scottish jobs are under threat from a no-deal Brexit. The right hon. Member for Wokingham often talks about economic analysis. That analysis is not from the SNP but from the independent Fraser of Allander Institute, which has outlined that 100,000 jobs would be at risk as a result of a hard Brexit.