Scotland: General Election and Constitutional Future

Debate between Tommy Sheppard and Iain Stewart

Wednesday 17th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Iain Stewart)]

It is a great pleasure to wind up this important debate, which has been impassioned and, on the whole, good-natured, with one or two small skirmishes.

It is always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart). I sincerely mean that—I really enjoy his performances and admire the passion and dedication that he shows for his cause. I am afraid, however, that we have heard it all before. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mark Fletcher) said, it is another spin of the greatest hits record. It comes as no surprise that SNP Members want to use this debate—they could have chosen any subject—to rehash their tired old arguments about why the United Kingdom should be split up, but it is a missed opportunity to debate more important issues.

I must take up the hon. Gentleman’s comment that we have not debated independence—separation—enough. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell) said, SNP Members have not stopped talking about it since the day after the 2014 referendum. The idea that they have not had enough airtime is completely laughable. Let us face it: they could have chosen any subject for debate today. With elections for the Scottish Parliament less than two months away, I would have thought that they would want to use this debate to showcase their achievements after 14 years of running the Scottish Government. However, as many Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Eastleigh (Paul Holmes), have pointed out, their record on education and on public services generally has not been good. It is therefore not surprising that they do not want a light to be shone on that today. SNP Members could have used the time to focus on the covid vaccination programme and the other measures that have been put in place to see us through the pandemic.

[Tommy Sheppard]

I am grateful to the Minister for spending time discussing things that are not on the Order Paper. Would it be possible for him to address the Question that is on the Order Paper, and tell us whether he believes that the people of Scotland have the right to make a choice about their own constitutional future?

[Iain Stewart]

I am happy to tell the hon. Gentleman that I shall come on to that very subject. However, I am putting into context the question of why the SNP has chosen this debate, and why it has failed the people of Scotland by not concentrating on the many, many issues that are of primary concern to people in Scotland.

SNP Members do not want to talk about the vaccination programme and covid measures because that would show the effective partnership between the UK Government and the Scottish Government—something that undermines their perpetual grievance narrative. They could have used this debate to make their points about the security and international challenges that we all face, but that would mean conceding that together the UK is much stronger than the sum of its parts. They could have used this time to consider the economic challenges and opportunities that we all face post covid, but that would mean admitting that there is a need for all Governments in Scotland—local, Scottish and UK—to work together to face those economic challenges. That includes the work that we are doing on the city deal programme, the new trade deals that we are signing, the new export support that we are putting into Scotland, the removal of whisky tariffs that were damaging to Scottish jobs, and the connectivity review to make sure that all parts of our country are properly connected. But no, SNP Members chose to use the time to rehearse the same tired old arguments.

I am sure it will be of great comfort to people worrying about what education their child has missed during the pandemic or the security of their job that the separatists are looking for ever fresher opportunities to pit family against family and community against community in yet another divisive referendum. Glasgow will be hosting COP26 later this year, and the eyes of the world will be on us. We will be showing our global leadership on climate change. What message would it send to the world if Scotland were looking inward and debating constitutional matters that have been settled many years ago?