European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Stephen Gethins Excerpts

Monday 25th March 2019 Commons Chamber

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

This morning, I left my home, not far from the town of St Andrews in my constituency, to set off on my regular commute. Like other Members of this House from different parts of the United Kingdom, I travelled quite literally by plane, train and automobile. Like most weeks, I had no idea when I would be going home to my family and my constituents, but unlike most weeks, my family, my constituents and I had no idea whether, by the time I got home, I would still be afforded the rights and privileges that EU citizens take as their own. What a state to be in, all these years on. That is why I thank the right hon. Members for West Dorset (Sir Oliver Letwin) and for Derby South (Margaret Beckett), and their colleagues, for the work that they have put into their amendments, which the SNP will obviously back this evening.

We are here for no other reason than an attempt to offset a Tory civil war. This disaster is years in the making, and we are only in this situation because once upon a time David Cameron decided to call an EU referendum so that he could avoid a full-blown Tory civil war. There are many people in the House who will disagree with me.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union (Kwasi Kwarteng)]

Yes, yes.

[Stephen Gethins]

But I am not sure that there are many who will disagree with me when I say that it is not working very well, is it? How is that attempt to avoid a Tory civil war going? Does the Minister want to intervene now? No, I did not think so, because there is a full-blown civil war in his party. And this is a Tory party determined to take the rest of us down as well, but today’s amendments give us the chance—for the moment—to stave off that opportunity that the Tories are trying to give us.

The Prime Minister continues to appeal to the hardliners in her own party, rather than to face up to the reality of minority government, but this is a lost cause. The Brexiteers who campaigned without any sort of plan are the ones who got us into this mess. And, frankly, the message to the Prime Minister must be that they are unlikely to get us out of it. Now, it is not for me to judge Conservative party management—the voters will have their opportunity to do that in due course—but what strikes me is just how in thrall this Conservative Prime Minister is to the extremists in her own party. With that, I want to praise some Conservative Members, because there are Members who I disagree with and who disagree with me, but who have stuck their necks out, and look at the way they have been treated.

The hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford (Nick Boles), who is in his place, and I disagree over plenty, including Brexit; he wants us to leave the European Union and I do not. Some Members have tried to make positive proposals, although we do not always agree on them. But even when one of those proposals is accepted by the Government—as was the case with the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for South Leicestershire (Alberto Costa)—we are now in a situation whereby the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford finds himself deselected and the hon. Member for South Leicestershire finds himself sacked, yet all along—I disagree with them over this—they have backed the Prime Minister’s deal. What does that tell us about trying to find some kind of consensus or trying to reach across? This is a Government who are in thrall to the very extremes, and this House cannot put up with that any longer. Just look at the invitation list of those who were treated to lunch at Chequers: the very people voting against the Prime Minister. This tells us everything about a Prime Minister who has lost control of her own party and who has dragged us into this folly.

[Anna Soubry]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Stephen Gethins]

I will give way to the right hon. Lady because she has some experience in this.

[Anna Soubry]

I do indeed. Does it strike the hon. Gentleman as being quite perverse that the very people invited to Chequers were the very people who, in December, sought a motion of no confidence in the Prime Minister as leader of the Conservative party and plotted against her? Is he also aware that a lot of Conservative associations hold their annual general meetings at the end of this week, and does he share my concern that too many right hon. and hon. Conservative Members will be more concerned about the outcome of those AGMs than about the effect of a no-deal Brexit—or, indeed, any Brexit—on their constituents?

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen Gethins]

The right hon. Lady knows the Conservative party much, much better than I do, and it shows. She makes a very valid point. The small, elitist group of Conservative MPs—all men, incidentally—who were invited to Chequers have failed, and failed spectacularly, on their pet, lifelong political project. I would not let that lot anywhere the TV remote in my house, never mind the most important decision that we have had to make for generations.

[Wera Hobhouse]

Would the hon. Gentleman extend that to listening to a mob of people who will apparently rebel if we ever do not deliver on this vote of the people? Nobody listens to the peaceful 1 million people and 5 million people who want to revoke article 50. They are not giving us death threats or mobbing us; they are just peaceful people. Yet we are worried about the keyboard warriors who threaten us from the security of their homes. Is that not also wrong?

[Stephen Gethins]

The hon. Lady makes a very powerful point about the way that millions protested peacefully on Saturday. I am delighted that our First Minister joined them, as did the leader of the Liberal Democrats, colleagues in the Labour party and even some Conservative colleagues. They were right to have done so.

The Prime Minister is effectively out of power, and we need to move on. Her deal has been rejected twice, overwhelmingly, which means that it becomes more and more pointless to debate it with every passing hour. The Opposition spokesperson was right to point that out. The House of Commons must seize control of this process tonight so that we can hold those indicative votes and start—start—to find a way out of this mess. We know from the UK Government’s own warnings that her deal is not in the best interests of anybody in the UK, and we know that no deal is not in anybody’s best interests either. This Parliament has come together and comprehensively rejected both her deal and no deal. Having wasted almost three years, the Government have run out of options and run out of ideas, and we need to step up.

Where we are today is not a farce: it is a tragedy, and a tragedy that is taking us all down with it. I assure colleagues that, as somebody who fundamentally wants Scotland to be an independent state, it really gives me no pleasure when I speak to colleagues overseas and find that the UK’s international reputation is broken. That hurts us all. When I was working in the European institutions, I saw that overall in the EU, the UK could be a real force for good. Although I did not always agree with everything that it did, I acknowledge many of the positive contributions made by UK citizens to the EU project. It is right that we all acknowledge that.

What was more striking, however, was the way in which the UK and Ireland worked as the closest possible allies and partners in the European Union. For the first time in that troubled history, there was truly a working as a partnership of equals alongside other European states. Now—again, this gives me no pleasure, nor, I suspect, the Irish either—the boot that has historically been on the foot of the UK is now on the other foot. As Robert Cooper wrote in the Financial Times:

“The smallest insiders (Dublin in the case of Brexit) matter more than the biggest outsider (us).”

That tells us everything about solidarity in the workings of the European Union. Yet even on this, the Irish do not crow but have been honest brokers. The best friends any of us can have are our most critical friends—the ones who tell us the truth when we want to see it the least. I have heard, when these matters of truth have come out, Brexiteers getting enraged and annoyed at the truth that people dare speak from Dublin.

Let me remind all Members that Ireland is independent and is not coming back—and it is not difficult to see why. Independent states thrive in the European Union. That is a means of strengthening democracy and sovereignty. The EU is a partnership of equals in a way that the UK simply is not. I want to see Scotland as a full and independent member state of the EU. That would be healthier in our relationship as a modern outward-looking nation in the same way that it has been healthy for the Anglo-Irish relationship.

Here in the UK, people are seeing through this mess. At the weekend, as we have heard, hundreds of thousands of people from the length and breadth of the UK marched for our collective future. Since then, at the last look, the revocation of article 50 petition has been signed by 5.5 million people, including 17% of the electorate in my own constituency—and that is not even the highest figure in Scotland. Millions of people can see what this Government cannot. What this Government clearly cannot see, but these people can, is that when you are careering towards the cliffs you slam on the brakes—that is what they are there for. Let us not forget that Parliament has that power, as was recognised by the courts, because the UK Parliament throughout this has retained, and always will retain in these circumstances, sovereignty in a way that the Scottish Parliament does not. Spot the difference, everybody: the UK Parliament, as a member of the EU, retains sovereignty; the Scottish Parliament, as this process has shown us, does not. This may provide a mechanism to stop doing untold damage to those we all represent.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

My hon. Friend is making a very powerful speech. I want to ask him about something that the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster said earlier—that revoking article 50 could only ever be done once, and it would be permanent and could never be reversed. Has he, like me, read the decision of the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Justice? Does he agree that the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster has got that wrong and that if this House chose to revoke article 50, it would be possible at some point in the future to resubmit the article 50 notice, provided that it was done in good faith?

[Stephen Gethins]

As usual, my hon. and learned Friend makes a very powerful point. I know that she tried to intervene on the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, but those on the Treasury Bench will have been listening to and taking note as well.

We are told that the biggest problem with this is the European elections. Let me tell the Government something: the biggest problem is not the European elections—not people taking part in a democratic election to elect parliamentarians—but the jobs that the Government’s plans are going to cost, the public services that will be hit by Brexit and the opportunities that we have all had being denied to future generations. Each and every Member of the European Parliament is elected. That Parliament sits at the heart of the European project. We sit in a Parliament where not even half the parliamentarians who serve here are elected. It is a disgrace—it really is. We will be caused a huge amount of damage just because the Government want to avoid the democracy and scrutiny that comes with a European Parliament election. However, I am not that surprised when we have a Prime Minister who, as we have heard today, not only opposes a referendum and giving people a say in this momentous decision but is even opposed to respecting the will of Parliament.

If the Brexit debate has done anything, it has shown that the UK and the way in which it operates is no longer fit for purpose, as the example of the House of Lords amply illustrates. The EU is not perfect—no union involving 28 sovereign and independent member states ever can be—but, critically, it has the checks and balances to protect the smallest members from the largest. Within the UK, we have a constitutional set-up that is somewhat outdated and has not caught up with the momentous decisions that we are having to make now, but in the EU there is a modern and up-to-date relationship between member states—a true partnership of equals. I say this to a Government who have failed to respect devolution throughout this process: the EU would not be allowed to do that; indeed, it cannot be allowed to do that. To the people of Scotland, our message is this: there is a better way to do this that our friends and neighbours—our nearest neighbours in places like Ireland and Denmark—are pursuing successfully. This is not as good as it gets. In the meantime, and until we reach that point, it is up to each and every one of us to continue to work as constructively as we can.

I do not want to see our friends and neighbours south of the border dragged over a cliff edge by an out of touch and irresponsible group of Tory anti-EU ultras—no country deserves that. The easiest thing for us in Scotland would be to say, “We voted against this. It’s not our problem,” but actually it is our problem. We cannot just say, “The Tories made this mess. It’s for them to clear it up,” because it is clear that they are incapable of clearing up the mess they have made. The damage these plans would do to everyone across these islands would be devastating and felt for decades to come.

I again thank Members who have worked constructively. Today’s motion provides a start, but it is only that—a start on undoing this devastating Brexit, which has been brought to us by a Tory party that is out of control.

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[The Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union (Stephen Barclay)]

The central question before the House this evening, as reflected in amendment (a) in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Sir Oliver Letwin), is: who controls the Order Paper? Should control be passed to Back-Bench Members in a process that is still to be fully defined and that would have constitutional implications, or do Members across this House accept the assurances given by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster when opening this debate that the Government will make time available this week for Members to express their preference on the way forward? That would follow consultation, through the usual channels, to enable the House to come to that view.

[Stephen Gethins]

Before the Secretary of State proceeds, it might be helpful for the House if he could outline whether he will vote in favour of his argument, or vote differently?

[Stephen Barclay]

If the hon. Gentleman had kept up with my speech last time, he would realise that I spoke to the three amendments, all of which were defeated last time. I hope that the same will happen tonight and that all the amendments will be defeated. That is the purpose of my speech once again. This is not the first time that SNP Members have not been awake during speeches.

The House has also been asked to consider amendment (f) in the name of the right hon. Member for Derby South (Margaret Beckett) regarding the recalling of the House in the event of a no-deal exit being imminent. The House has been further asked to vote on amendment (d) in the name of the Leader of the Opposition, which calls on the Government to provide sufficient time this week for a series of votes, including on the Opposition’s plan. The Government have committed to providing that time, but that does not change the fact that the plan from Her Majesty’s Opposition has already been rejected by this House and the EU has suggested that key aspects are not negotiable.