Prorogation (Disclosure of Communications)

Tom Brake Excerpts

Monday 9th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Keir Starmer]

I do agree with my hon. Friend.

It is regrettable that we are compelled to use this process of a Humble Address, but the reason is obvious. Today’s measure speaks to a wide truth, which has been touched on a number of times by the right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield, and I am sad to say that it is the basic lack of trust that now exists between this House and the Executive. That has changed in recent weeks. That lack of trust arises very much from the actions of the Prime Minister over the last weeks, which have contributed hugely to it. That alone should be a profound cause of concern to all Members of this House, because in my experience—only four years plus—this House operates on the basis of trust. That trust is going, day by day, and that is why this application has had to be made. That is a concern to all of us and it should be a concern to the Secretary of State.

Let me take the two issues one by one. At this stage of the Brexit process, the House should be sitting as often as possible. Frankly, we should be sitting every day until 31 October. Instead, we have a five-week Prorogation. The Prime Minister and other Ministers say that this is to allow for a Queen’s Speech and a new legislative agenda. If anybody believes that, they will believe anything. As the Secretary of State is likely to try to make that case—I say “try” because I do not think he will succeed—I have two questions. First, why now? Why prorogue now at such a crucial time? What is wrong with proroguing in November when we know the outcome of the negotiations and have a decision? Secondly, why five weeks? There is no requirement for Parliament to be prorogued for five weeks.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

The right hon. and learned Gentleman may be interested to know that in previous years I have asked the House of Commons Library to provide me with a list of what is going to be in the Government’s Queen’s Speech in advance. This year I have again asked that question, but the Library has replied that it is unable to provide me with any information about what might be in it because it has not detected the Government announcing anything in relation to what is going to be in the Queen’s Speech.

[Keir Starmer]

That intervention speaks for itself.

I remind the House that in the past 40 years Parliament has never been prorogued for longer than three weeks, so it is extraordinary that this Prorogation should come now and for five weeks. In most cases, the House is prorogued for the purposes of the Queen’s Speech for a week or less, and often just for a few days, so to shut down Parliament for so long a period at this stage of the Brexit process is extraordinary.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

I will certainly speak within the four-minute limit, Mr Speaker.

I wish to focus on Operation Yellowhammer. The issue with Prorogation is whether the Government deliberately misled Parliament. The issue with Operation Yellowhammer is whether the Government are deliberately withholding key documents from Parliament and the public.

Members of Parliament will have seen The Sunday Times last month when it published the leak of Operation Yellowhammer and said that Britain would face shortages of fuel, food and medicine and three months of chaos at its ports in the event of a no-deal exit. The report went on to warn that lorries might face delays of two-and-a-half days at ports and that medical supplies might be vulnerable to severe extended delays. It also said that the Government had expected the return of a hard border in Ireland. We have not, of course, been able to see this document, because the Government have not been willing to provide it to us, but what we have had is a series of Ministers touring studios saying, in effect, that there is nothing to see in this document, that there is nothing to worry about and that everything is under control. I am afraid that, at the same time, we see reports that the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster has sought to sanitise it. Having apparently failed to sanitise it, he has simply decided to rely on the fact that the report will not be published at all.

I have sought assurances from the Government that if civil servants were asked to modify this document—in effect to sanitise it—that would be in breach of the ministerial code. I have also asked whether those civil servants would be subject to disciplinary action if they refuse to sanitise it and whether, if they spoke out because they noticed that the documents had been sanitised, they would be covered by whistleblower legislation. When I asked for this information, I was referred to the evidence that the Minister gave to the Select Committee, or was about to give to the Select Committee, last week. After he had given evidence, I went hotfoot, as Members would expect me to do, to see whether he had answered any of these questions, and, of course, he had not. When he replies now, perhaps, rather than sending me a letter referring me to evidence in which he has not answered the question, he would like to answer those specific questions, because we need to have that information available.

Businesses are trying to prepare for no deal. The Government are withholding information from them. At the same time, the Minister in charge of local government is writing to local authorities telling them that they have to provide information to residents and businesses about what preparations they are making in relation to no deal. It does seem that if the Government are asking local authority leaders to make that information available, there is a duty on them to make that information available. Yet what we have from the Government is the withholding of this critical information that would allow all of us to prepare for a no-deal scenario.

It may be that the Government are worried that putting this information into the public domain might lead to shortages of food. To some extent, I understand that, and, if that is the case, that would be less than perfect. Again, I did suggest to the Minister that the Government might want to release the information on Privy Council terms to Privy Counsellors and allow us to access that information. Clearly, I would prefer all Members of Parliament to be able to see that information, but if that is one way that the Government would feel more confident that the information could be shared, then they could do that.

I hope that, when we get a response from the Minister, he will be quite specific in answering these questions, which have so far been avoided by the Government. We would all like to know the answers to those questions so that we have a degree of certainty about what the impact of no deal will be, so that we can all help businesses and others to prepare for that eventuality.