King’s Speech

Lord Murphy of Torfaen Excerpts

Thursday 14th May 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Murphy of Torfaen (Lab)]

My Lords, I noticed earlier that two of my predecessors as Secretary of State for Wales talked about steel. I will touch briefly on that, although it is not the thrust of what my remarks will be about.

It is almost 60 years to the day that I attended a great rally in Sophia Gardens in Cardiff, when Harold Wilson, the Prime Minister of the day, addressed us on steel nationalisation. He announced that it would be one of his first tasks—it happened in 1967—and a great roar went up from the very large Labour Party crowd in Sophia Gardens. Those were the days when we had those crowds there. That reminds me that steel was hugely important, not only for Wales but for our whole country—it was integral to it. I am not sure that I agree with everything that the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, said, but I agree with his emphasis on doing something about steel, and I very seriously agree with the Government on what they are going to do in their Bill.

I will now touch on the European Union Bill. We have had some very colourful and spirited contributions from the other side of the Chamber on this issue. Whatever side one took in the Brexit debate, the reality is that 20-odd miles away, 350 million people live and trade with us, and therefore it is the biggest trading partner we have. It simply does not make sense that we do not trade with it in the best way we could. It makes sense that we should ensure that the SPS arrangements for food and drink are in place for the industries and businesses that want those changes to come about. My successor as Member of Parliament for Torfaen, the right honourable Nick Thomas-Symonds, is doing a very good job in that regard.

The same is the case with Erasmus. Does it not make sense that we have Erasmus+ for our young people in all parts of the United Kingdom? Of course it does. Therefore, those proposals are hugely important.

My noble friend Lord Robertson made, as always, a spectacularly impressive speech about where we are with regard to defence and our global position. I hope that the Government listen to him and his wise words. He told us that the landscape in our world has changed dramatically over the last number of years, and so has the landscape with regard to the 11 million of us who live in devolved Administrations in the United Kingdom. When I was the Secretary for Wales and for Northern Ireland, there was a Labour Government in Cardiff, in London and in Edinburgh. There was no Labour Government in Northern Ireland. There was direct rule. So I negotiated with myself on those particular issues.

That was an important factor in those early days, but the world has changed. The world changed last Thursday in Wales, of course, as Plaid Cymru is now the governing party in Wales. In Scotland, after 19 years, the SNP still rules there. Northern Ireland, which I will come to in a second, is rather different. But in Scotland, which voted to remain in the European Union, the Scottish National Party is a pro-European party. Scotland, under a Labour Government and indeed under an SNP one, benefited enormously from its membership of the European Union. Wales benefited enormously. We had the Objective 1 money coming to us all those years ago, which brought billions of pounds for investment in Wales. Wales voted to leave. But the Plaid Cymru Government is a pro-European Government.

In Northern Ireland, 56% of the people voted to remain. But, as your Lordships know, there is deep division. Generally speaking—not exclusively—nationalists voted to remain and unionists wanted to leave the European Union. The problem we then had when Brexit came was: how can you reconcile the terms of the Good Friday agreement, which was firmly based on a common membership of the European Union? The Irish and British Governments were partners in the Union. It meant that we could negotiate that agreement on very different terms from what had happened many years before. Objective 1 money came to Northern Ireland—billions of pounds again. Social Fund money but particularly, of course, peace money came to Northern Ireland. That meant that the nationalist and the unionist communities had to negotiate at local level in order to acquire that money and it helped the peace process.

So, when Brexit came, what could you do? The problem then was that Ireland remains in the European Union and the United Kingdom has come out of it, so we had the protocol, which was not very good. It was a start but, in fact, had there been at that time, and there was not, the institutions in Northern Ireland, both the Executive and the Assembly, I believe they could have solved the issue of how to deal with it themselves. As it was, it was imposed and did not work. Then we had the Windsor Framework, which was better, certainly—although, in between, the institutions had collapsed, which brought the Windsor Framework about. But that has been proven to be very complex, with huge bureaucracy for business and there is a democratic deficit.

Last year the Government asked me to do a review of it, which I did, and I made 17 recommendations. The Government accepted them. It means that we are going to have a one-stop shop in Northern Ireland so that people can overcome the bureaucracy. In addition, steps have been taken to deal with the democratic deficit. When we look at this EU Bill to come and the issues surrounding the democratic deficit which people argue will occur if we adopt it, you need look only to Northern to see whether we can adopt some of the new proposals to ensure that we ameliorate those difficulties. I say to my noble friend the Minister from the Treasury—as always, the Treasury is very important—that although money has come to Northern Ireland as a result of my review, we also need more money to ensure that those recommendations are put into practice, and that all political parties in Northern Ireland are involved in it.

My other plea to the Government, on the negotiations that are to come with the European Union Bill, is the involvement of all the devolved Administrations in that issue. Even though there are an SNP Government in Edinburgh and a Plaid Cymru Government in Cardiff, it means we have to take the people along with us, and there are very different views—of course there are. All I know is that only benefits can come from this Bill. If industry wants it, if business wants it and if the academic community in our country wants it, surely it must be a good thing, and so it has my fullest support.