Article 50

Stephen Gethins Excerpts

Tuesday 24th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Davis]

My right hon. and learned Friend and I have been skirmishing over this issue for, I think, some 30 years, always with good humour, and I hope to respond to him in the same vein today. He repeated on television earlier today that characterisation of what the Government are proposing, so let us look at it. As I said, we have already had 10 debates and vast numbers of other arguments, but this is what is going to happen: first, we will have a Bill to authorise the triggering of article 50; then we will have a great repeal Bill whereby we go through the entire corpus of European law as it applies to the United Kingdom, which I should think will go on for a considerable amount of time; and then we will have primary legislation on major policy changes and secondary legislation, all put before both Houses. There will not be just one vote. At the end of the process, we will have the vote that eventually decides whether or not the House supports the policy we propose. Let me make it plain: that policy will be aimed solely at advancing the interest of the United Kingdom—getting the best possible negotiated outcome that we can achieve, having taken on board the informing debate of this House of Commons throughout the entire two years running up to it.

[Stephen Gethins (North East Fife) (SNP)]

First, I welcome the judgment and anything that strengthens parliamentary scrutiny of this process. There was a time, back in the dim and distant past, when the Secretary of State was a great champion of parliamentary scrutiny, so I am sure that, deep down inside, he welcomes the judgment as well.

I wonder why the Government fear parliamentary scrutiny. Is it because they might be found out? Is it because we will find out that the emperor in these circumstances has no clothes? They talk of democracy, but I gently remind the Secretary of State that in Scotland at the general election, the Conservatives got their worst result since 1865. They have one MP.

We are told today that this is a political decision, and as a political decision on the role of the devolved Administrations I hope that this Parliament and this Government will continue not to legislate on areas that are the responsibility of the Scottish Parliament without its consent. Today’s judgment said that this process should enhance devolution. If that is the case, will the Secretary of State tell us today that no powers will be returned from the Scottish Parliament to Westminster during the course of this process, and will he seek consent from the Scottish Parliament before legislating in areas over which it has responsibility?

[Mr Davis]

Again, I am surprised. I would have thought that, of all people, the Scottish National party attached great importance to the results of elections to the Scottish Parliament, in which last time the Scottish Conservative party came second under the estimable Ruth Davidson.

To the main point of the hon. Gentleman’s question, I want to make two responses. First, the process we have gone through with all the devolved Administrations—the joint ministerial process—has been going on for some months now, and at the very last monthly meeting we had a presentation from Mike Russell, the Scottish Government Minister, on the Scottish Government’s proposals. We disagreed with some and agreed with some absolutely—for example on the protection of employment law—and some we will debate in the coming weeks and months, most particularly on the point the hon. Gentleman raised: the question of devolution and devolved powers.

The hon. Gentleman knows that I am a devolutionist. I can say to him firmly that no powers existing in the devolved Administrations will come back, but there will be powers coming from the European Union and we will have to decide where they most properly land, whether that is Westminster, Holyrood or wherever. The real issue there is the practical interests of all the nations of the United Kingdom—for example, preserving the single market of the United Kingdom and the United Kingdom’s ability to do international deals. There is a series of matters that are just as important to the ordinary Scot as they are to the ordinary English, Welsh or Northern Irish citizen, and that is what we will protect.