European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill

Lord Mann Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons
Tuesday 22nd October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry]

The hon. Gentleman should listen to the voices from Northern Ireland—and it is not just the DUP or the hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon); it is from across the community. This is a genuine threat, and it is incredible that Members of the Conservative and Unionist party are prepared to vote through this Bill when its attendant protocols will undoubtedly mean that there will be a separate arrangement for Northern Ireland in perpetuity. There is nothing in the Bill that will allow things to change.

I would also ask: how much better is our country since we had this referendum? Are we a happier, gentler people, and are friends, families and communities more united or are we divided now in a way that we have never experienced before? This Bill will do nothing to heal divisions; it will actually increase the divides in our society. That is a concern.

I believe with a passion that not one single promise that was made by the leave campaign has been fulfilled in any way, shape or form. We were promised a deal before we left. We were promised that Northern Ireland would not be treated any differently, and we were promised that it would keep and preserve the United Kingdom. We were made a promise that we would have the same trading relationship that we currently enjoy as a member of the single market and the customs union, and none of those things has been delivered in the Bill or any of the attendant documents.

I agree with the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy). He and I disagree on so many things, but on this we are at one. If this is so good, it should go back to the people. That should not be by way of a general election, which will solve nothing just as the 2017 general election did not solve anything—

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

It’ll get rid of you!

[Anna Soubry]

This now needs to go back to the British people. And may I just say that I do not actually mind losing my job, but I do care about the jobs of my constituents? I will do the right thing by my constituents, their children and their grandchildren, and by their jobs. That is why this matter must go back for a people’s vote now that we have clarity on Brexit and see what a disaster it is across the United Kingdom.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Mann Excerpts

Wednesday 24th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

I want to pay tribute to men and women from Commonwealth countries who serve in our armed services. That service is something that this and previous Governments have valued enormously. On the particular point that my hon. Friend makes about immigration requirements, I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary will take very seriously, and look very carefully at, the representations that my hon. Friend is making.

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

Q8. When last month a football referee in Nottinghamshire had to flee a game, lock himself in the car and call the police, the Football Association responded with a six-match ban and a £50 fine. If we bear in mind what is happening to Raheem Sterling and Danny Rose, who have called for a national forum, and the growth of racism at every level in football, is it not clear that without our help and Government help the football authorities are not capable of getting on top of the problem of racism in football? Will the Government take a lead, just as the Prime Minister did on Hillsborough, and help to convene, using their auspices, such a forum as Mr Sterling and others have requested this summer? Perhaps, Mr Speaker, you might offer this location as an appropriate venue for such a forum.

[Mr Lidington]

Every Member of this House will condemn without reservation the behaviour to which the hon. Gentleman referred; it should be regarded as completely beyond the bounds of acceptability in our society. My hon. Friend the Sport Minister will want to sit down with the hon. Gentleman and any other colleagues in the House who make this issue a priority, to discuss what more might be done.

Voter ID Pilots

Lord Mann Excerpts

Wednesday 10th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Chloe Smith]

I look forward very much to being able to do that. I will do it in conjunction with my hon. Friend the Member for Torbay (Kevin Foster) in the coming months, because as Members may know, I shall be taking maternity leave shortly.

In the first instance, I direct my hon. Friend the Member for Stirling (Stephen Kerr) to our democratic engagement plan, which sets out the principles of how we intend to engage people and how we will work with partners across the electoral community to do so. Of course, we have to work with colleagues in the devolved Administrations and local councils up and down the country. We are doing that and have set out a range of plans. We will update the House regularly when we have the opportunity to do so. My hon. Friend will be pleased to know that we will come back with an evaluation of these pilots in due course, as we did last year. We expect the independent Electoral Commission to do the same thing again in the summer period, after the elections.

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

Let us get this right: the privileged class of MPs can register once in London and once in their constituency and vote twice at local elections, but should this House foolishly allow a second referendum, my constituents who do not have a car and do not have a passport could turn up to vote, having voted in the first referendum, and be sent away to walk back a mile because they do not have a driving licence or a passport, having been told, “You can’t vote.” And the Government call that democracy. Why is it that I have constituents who have to come to me to get passports? They have no ID of any kind and have been refused a passport, and the only way they can get one is if I intervene. That is the price that will be paid for this absurdity.

[Chloe Smith]

No, it is not. As I have set out, every council that participates in the pilots will make ID arrangements that are free of charge. That is as the House would expect it to be. Frankly, if the situation were as the hon. Gentleman describes it, I would agree with him, but it is not. He is simply not giving an accurate picture of the pilots. Crucially, the 10 pilots, which are being done in slightly different ways across the country, are operating a broader list of ID than only driving licences or passports, and as I have emphasised, there will be a free-of-charge alternative. What I would say to his constituents and to anybody else who is listening is that they need not have that concern. This policy has been well planned, with them at its heart.

European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Lord Mann Excerpts

Monday 25th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Keir Starmer]

I am grateful for that intervention. On this question of the Government accepting the outcome, if they simply reject whatever is the outcome of this exercise, they will be doubling down on one of the big mistakes of the past two years, which is to push Parliament away and not let Parliament express its view as to where the majority is. That is one reason we are in this mess. For two and a half years the Government have pushed Parliament away at every turn and we need now to find a mechanism, albeit a constitutionally innovative one, to break through that.

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. and learned Friend not recognise that, in some areas, there is huge opposition among the electorate to having European elections, but there is the opportunity, through the withdrawal agreement Bill, should it ever be reached, for every single option being potentially proposed on Wednesday to be put as amendments, including the customs union? Has he considered that as an option?

[Keir Starmer]

I have, not least because my hon. Friend raised it with me last week. The difficulty is that the EU argues that, once the withdrawal agreement and political declaration are agreed, we cannot, through domestic legislation, change the terms of those documents. Therefore, whatever amendment is put down to the legislation, it could not alter the terms of the political declaration. So it is not accurate to say that all of this could be swept up with the implementation Bill, because the words in the document that we are seeking to implement have to be the ones that the House is happy with and thus has agreed before we get to that stage. Some things could be dealt with in the implementation Bill—I do not quarrel with that—but the EU will not countenance this House changing the terms of the EU’s agreement through amendments to the Bill. That was one of the concerns the Government rightly put in relation to the meaningful vote. When we were saying that there should be amendments to the meaningful vote, the Government’s position was that we cannot really have amendments because this House cannot amend the substance of the document.

[John Mann]

rose—

[Keir Starmer]

I will give way, but then I am going to make some progress because I realise how long I have been talking.

[John Mann]

Would my right hon. and learned Friend not also accept, on the proposal put to him this afternoon of having separate votes on the political declaration and the withdrawal agreement, that it is the political declaration that is up for steering what happens in the next phase, whereas the EU has made it clear that the withdrawal agreement itself is not for renegotiation with anyone, at any time?

[Keir Starmer]

I certainly accept the proposition that the EU has said that the withdrawal agreement is not for reopening at any stage, and it has resisted that for month after month from the Government. But I remind myself and the House that in the letter that Presidents Tusk and Juncker wrote to the Prime Minister in January they were clear that the withdrawal agreement and the political declaration are part of the “same negotiated package”. I believe those were their words. I also remind myself and the House that under section 13 the withdrawal agreement and the political declaration go together. That does not mean that there are not different views on the agreement and on the declaration, but they are part of the same negotiated package.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Mann Excerpts

Wednesday 19th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend raises an important issue, and I know that he has consistently campaigned on it. I understand that he raised it yesterday in a debate in Westminster Hall. As he said in his question, the events at HBOS Reading—at that branch—constituted criminal activity, and it is right that those responsible were brought to justice. Decisions about whether to launch financial services conduct investigations are the responsibility of the Financial Conduct Authority, as the independent regulator for the sector. I understand that it is currently conducting two investigations into the events at HBOS Reading, including into the bank’s communications with regulators following the discovery of the misconduct. Obviously, we look forward to the conclusions of those investigations. I know that my hon. Friend will continue to champion the needs and concerns of all those who found themselves recipients and victims of what was identified as criminal activity.

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

Q3. For almost 400 years, this country, almost uniquely in the world, has been a place of safety and security, and a place where Jewish communities have thrived. In 2018, many in the Jewish community are questioning whether that will be the case into the future. A disturbingly large number of young Jewish people are questioning whether they should remain in this country. Does the Prime Minister agree that 2019 has to be a year when we all stand up and be counted, to ensure that those young Jewish people believe in and stay in this country, wishing to contribute and no longer fearing for their future?

[The Prime Minister]

I absolutely agree with the hon. Gentleman. Jewish people should be able to feel safe and secure in this country. I never thought I would see the day when Jewish people living in this country questioned whether they should stay in this country. This is a terrible state of affairs that we have come to. There is no place for racial hatred in our society and it is important that we all take every step to tackle it. I was very pleased to host the reception for the recent groundbreaking Sara conference, organised by the hon. Gentleman and the all-party group on antisemitism, along with the Antisemitism Policy Trust, which looked at the twin evils of misogyny and antisemitism. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to talk about the need for us all—every one of us—to stand up as we go into the new year and say that 2019 will be the year when we stand up and say there is no place for antisemitism or racial hatred in our society.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Mann Excerpts

Wednesday 12th December 2018 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

1. If the Government will make it its policy to build a national memorial to British service personnel killed on service in Northern Ireland.

[The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (John Penrose)]

May I start by paying tribute to my predecessor in this role, my hon. Friend the Member for North West Cambridgeshire (Mr Vara), who has been typically generous and helpful with his time and efforts during the handover?

I am sure that everyone on both sides of the House will agree that we all owe a vast debt of gratitude to the heroism and bravery of British servicemen and women who were killed upholding the rule of law in Northern Ireland. Their sacrifice will never be forgotten. Within the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire sits the armed forces memorial. Rightly, it includes the names of every member of the armed forces killed while serving in Northern Ireland, as a permanent reminder of their bravery and sacrifice.

[John Mann]

Anthony Dykes, who came from Harworth, a mining village in my constituency, was murdered on 5 April 1979. His parents, Fred and Kathleen Dykes, are two of the finest people I have ever met and represent everything that is good about my community and this country. Other grieving parents have specific memorials. For Fred and Kathleen’s son and others who were killed or murdered on duty in Northern Ireland, there is no such memorial. Is it not now time that, as with other conflicts, there is a specific memorial for those who served our country and lost their lives in the conflict in Northern Ireland?

[John Penrose]

I understand and empathise with the hon. Gentleman and his constituents. In fact, as I visited the former Massereene Army barracks in Northern Ireland last week, I paused to pay my respects at a local memorial to two former Army engineers who were killed in 2009. There are many such memorials to individual acts of heroism or tragedy scattered not just across Northern Ireland, but around the rest of this country. Those commemorate individual actions and tragedies. The national memorial is the one in Staffordshire, and we should not underestimate its importance or value—it having been opened by Her Majesty the Queen and recording the names of everybody who has been killed on service in Northern Ireland and other conflicts.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Mann Excerpts

Wednesday 31st January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

My hon. Friend raises an important point. I know about the important role that Culdrose plays in the life of Cornwall, but he has highlighted the fact that its work deserves to be in the national spotlight as well. We want and need to build the science, technology, engineering and mathematics skills that we will need in a growing and rapidly changing economy, as we highlighted in the Government’s industrial strategy, and the initiative at Culdrose will contribute to the success of those objectives.

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

Q11. It is an extraordinary fact that this year, last year and every year for more than a decade, one London borough, the London Borough of Islington, has received more Arts Council funding than all the midlands and northern ex-coalfield communities combined. Who is going to be brave enough to reverse that inequity so that my constituents, especially my young constituents, can have fair and equitable access to arts funding?

[Mr Lidington]

I am not sure whether that was meant as an attack on the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) or the right hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry), but I can say to the hon. Gentleman that if there is a particular bid that he feels has been unfairly treated, he is welcome to take that up with the new arts Minister, who I know will want to examine the case carefully. In general terms, however, more than half the arts funding in England is awarded to arts activities outside Greater London.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Mann Excerpts

Wednesday 29th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

My right hon. and learned Friend has been around long enough to know not necessarily to believe everything he reads in the newspapers, and it would clearly be wrong for me to go into figures now, but he is absolutely right that what we are about, and what my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union is about, is making sure we get the best possible deal at this stage of the process, so we can move on to the trade talks. Britain, as a country that meets its international obligations, of course will, as it exits the EU, meet the obligations and have all the rights that we have in that process, so that we can maintain a deep and special partnership with the other 27 members of the EU, as we move forward in friendship and co-operation after we have left the EU.

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

Q3. Being believed, reliving trauma, fear of publicity, and a culture of denial are some of the reasons why very many women are reluctant to report rape, assault and sexual harassment. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that Government and Parliament need to lead by example? Will he, on behalf of the Government, apologise to the victims that Parliament and the Government have been letting down?

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Mann Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

I am delighted to. We are developing a system called Contracts Finder—a free, online source for current and future public sector contracts above £10,000 in central Government and above £25,000 in the wider public sector. We are improving the visibility of supply chain opportunities available to SMEs via that site.

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

T4. When was the ministerial code last equality-proofed, and by whom?

[The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Sir Patrick McLoughlin)]

The Prime Minister has committed to reviewing the ministerial code to ensure that it remains fit for purpose, and she will update the House in due course.

UK Elections: Abuse and Intimidation

Lord Mann Excerpts

Wednesday 12th July 2017 Westminster Hall

[Simon Hart]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for that contribution, which touches on the reason we are here: the degree of collateral impact from which we may fairly visibly suffer, and the knock-on effect on people who want to do good things for their community, charity or cause, but who are beginning to ask themselves whether it is worth the effort. What plans do the Government have to assess the extent of the issue, because I do not think that any of us here know what it is?

It almost seems that the age of reasoned argument in elections is under threat. All of us, in our own particular way, have experienced situations in which we mention immigration and are instantly labelled a racist, or we mention welfare and are instantly labelled as having some extraordinary dislike of the disabled, or we want to talk about complicated and sensitive issues around the economy, which is interpreted as simply wanting to starve the poor. Absurd, extreme, ridiculous, lazy and trite comments are assigned to Members who simply want to tackle a complicated social problem in the way we were sent here to do. The fact that there is no room for reasoned argument any more is a cause of this debate. It seems that it is not really about winning votes or arguments anymore.

The manner in which some of those campaigns are conducted—I am obviously trying to steer a careful, non-partisan line here—is about driving people out of politics altogether. It is not about votes and arguments; it is about the single-minded determination to do away with anybody who happens to hold a contrary view. That is a big difference between 2015 and 2017, and it is an unattractive development that will simply reduce the gene pool from which we recruit our politicians and volunteers. I cannot believe that any member of the public, however vociferous they might be online, actually thinks that reducing the number of people from which we choose our representatives is a good thing.

What is all this doing to society? How is it impacting on candidate recruitment? What is it doing to the retention of good people in the House? Have we reviewed the recommendations that the Law Commission made 18 months ago? I am hopeful that the Minister has views on that. Are we doing enough to bring the existing provisions to the knowledge of the enforcement agencies and, indeed, to candidates? I hope that when the Minister gets to his feet in a few minutes he will be able to give us some indication of the Government’s view on an independent assessment of the extent of the problem—what is going on out there, what is the cause and what is the remedy.

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

Four years ago the all-party parliamentary group against anti-Semitism produced a detailed set of recommendations on an all-party basis about conduct in elections and asked every political leader to endorse it. To date, none has. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that if the political leaders themselves drew up a code of conduct and a way of addressing behaviour during elections, that would go a considerable way towards dealing with the most difficult period? If there is a transgression by a candidate or their supporters, they face the issue of votes at that time, and therefore there is a tendency to try to dampen it down or ignore it during elections. That is precisely why we produced that report.

[Simon Hart]

I could not have put it better myself. In fact, I would expand it to outside election times, too. As we have heard today, this problem is not limited to that four or five-week period every three or four years.

My second question to the Minister is about reviewing existing laws and seeing which work and which should work but are not being enforced. Where there are gaps, we should recommend how to fill them. Then, as the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) said, we should ensure that there is cross-party support for legislation to achieve that aim.

We need to look at the responsibilities of the social media platforms, which, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller) and I discovered not long ago, all too often wring their hands and say, “It’s all too difficult.” Actually, it is not all too difficult. It is all too important that they now adopt the same responsible attitude to what they publish in their name— although they deny they are publishers—which is, on occasion, the sort of material that is completely unacceptable. Earlier I raised the example of Byron Davies and the Gower, who asked a social media platform—I think it was Twitter—to remove an outright lie that was possibly going to affect the outcome of the election. It refused and said that what was going on was within the guidelines. It cannot be with the guidelines simply to sit back and allow people to publish utter nonsense with the aim of artificially disrupting the outcome of an election. I suspect that everybody in this Chamber is of that view.

When the then Minister responded to a debate on online bullying last year, he said:

“There needs to be partnership, and I do not rule out regulation…We need to work with the companies, and we need clear guidelines on, and definitions of, online abuse. Even more importantly, we need very quick reactions, so that all of us as constituency MPs do not have to sit in surgeries with people who are clearly utterly distressed because of online material”.—[Official Report, 7 July 2016; Vol. 612, c. 1107.]

That applies just as much to electoral behaviour as to behaviour outside that time.

Finally—thank you for your patience, Mr Hanson—we need a political lead, as other colleagues have said. That means that the leaders of all parties and groups need to stand up and not just send out warmly worded tweets about bad behaviour or transmit mealy-mouthed messages of condemnation, but take a “not in my name” approach. All of the groups we have talked about overtly and by insinuation need to say, “Not in my name. Nobody who is a member of this party or this group should engage in online or offline abuse, either during an election or at any other time.” The leadership of those organisations have the opportunity today to stand up and say that they will deal with this robustly. If they do not, they are complicit in the problem. That is why there have been rumours and this whole thing has gathered momentum—with a small “m”—over the past few months and years.

Thirteen months ago our colleague Jo Cox paid the ultimate price for this kind of stuff. It shook the nation and sent a message that I hoped people would listen to, whether they are in a position of political leadership or just able to vote at elections. One year on, the problem seems every bit as bad as it was back then. Unless we have joined-up, co-operative leadership from the Government—I hope we will hear about that now—and from all the Opposition parties and the groups that support them, all of the extraordinary work that has been done in Jo Cox’s memory will have been wasted.