Early Parliamentary General Election Bill

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Committee: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 29th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Today’s vote lays down precedents which override the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011, thus overriding one of Parliament’s checks and balances against excessive Executive power. Can you advise how to protect democracy in this place from further such government by fiat?

[Mr Speaker]

We are in unusual times; there have been many examples to evidence that over the last few months. Very specifically, what I say to the right hon. Lady is that the will of the House determines what happens in these matters, subject to the overriding principle of adherence to a clear rule. The right hon. Lady strongly objects to what has happened, but nothing that has happened today has been in any way disorderly: a Bill has been introduced; there has been a Second Reading; there has been a Committee stage; and there was a business of the House motion, in amended form, accepted by the House. The right hon. Lady has registered her discontent, which I was very happy for her to do, but beyond that the matter cannot be taken further tonight.

European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

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

[Mr Speaker]

If the right hon. and learned Gentleman will forgive me, I will come first to the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Liz Saville Roberts), whom I have kept waiting.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Can you explain to me and to people outside, now that the Government have chosen to pause legislation and, by doing that, to extend the Brexit process—[Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I accept that feelings are running high, but the right hon. Lady must be heard.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

The Government and people outside will appreciate that there is now more opportunity to release the economic impact assessments that we should all have sight of before we make such material decisions.

[Mr Speaker]

The right hon. Lady makes her own point in her own way. It requires no comment from me, but I thank her for saying what she said.

Points of Order

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Thursday 26th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. The Supreme Court told us with great clarity this week that accountability lies at the heart of parliamentary democracy. I seek to know what resorts we have when the Prime Minister respects no boundaries in his tactics, language and conduct—and does that to avoid or deflect accountability. Could you advise me, therefore, on the applicability of an impeachment motion or, alternatively, censure by the House relating to the conduct of the Prime Minister?

[Mr Speaker]

I thank the right hon. Lady for her point of order and for her characteristic courtesy in giving me advance notice of her intention to raise it. There are various ways in which right hon. and hon. Members can seek to debate the conduct of Ministers and, indeed, of others on the Floor of the House. My suggestion is that she visit the Table Office, where the Clerks will be ready to advise her in more detail on the options open to her.

Prime Minister's Update

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Wednesday 25th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I am going to try to be helpful to the hon. Gentleman, who is a most dedicated and assiduous Member of two years’ standing. We do not have points of order in the middle of exchanges. I will try to provide a tutorial to the hon. Gentleman on another occasion, but the right hon. Lady will not be prevented from asking her question. She is asking her question and it will be heard, and the hon. Gentleman will sit quietly and listen.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

I think the House will find this relevant. In 2004 the Prime Minister, who was the MP for Henley at the time, wrote a column in The Daily Telegraph in which he argued that Tony Blair should be impeached, as he

“treated Parliament and the public with contempt”

over the matter of disclosure of motives and legal advice relating to the Iraq war. The right hon. Gentleman even edited a copy of The Spectator that called for Blair to be impeached for lying. He also signed an impeachment motion—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I have rightly protected the right hon. Lady from inappropriate attempts to cut her off, but she must ask a question. I very much hope that she is approaching the end of her question. She really needs to do so.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

The Prime Minister signed a motion for the impeachment of Tony Blair, which was tabled by Adam Price, who is now leader of Plaid Cymru. The Prime Minister is surely not a man who likes to appear inconsistent. Does he still believe it to be right and proper to seek to impeach a Prime Minister who has been judged to mislead the public?

[Mr Seely]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Points of Order

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Monday 9th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

The hon. Lady has made her point with vigour and alacrity, and it is on the record. If she wants to obtain, almost in real time, an electronic copy of what she said and to deliver it to the office of the Leader of the House, she may well elicit a response. The Leader of the House of Commons, the right hon. Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg), is somebody I have known for a very long time. I have sometimes agreed with him and sometimes not, but I have found that the right hon. Gentleman, though he has delivered some extremely waspish and widely objected to comments on this occasion, has invariably been widely regarded as courteous. He is a polite man and a gracious person, and his characteristic generosity of spirit could serve him well here. He has apologised outside the House—that is my understanding from the media—and it is perfectly open to him to do so in the Chamber. It is not for the Speaker to instruct him to do so. It is incumbent upon a Member who has erred in this House to correct the record.

This is a matter of opinion, rather than of fact, but if he has apologised outside the House and can be cajoled, exhorted, charmed or persuaded by the hon. Member for Bristol West (Thangam Debbonaire) and me to beetle along to the Chamber to give us a sample of his contrition and humility, who knows? He may well be widely praised.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I am very saddened, on behalf of Plaid Cymru, to make this address to you today. We are eternally grateful to you for making a point of ensuring that the various and multifarious voices of this House are heard. There is such a variety, and earlier you mentioned the importance of Members of Parliament and their role. We need to remember in this place that every Member of Parliament is returned in exactly the same way by their constituents. Whichever party we stand and speak for, we are all here equally. I only hope that your successor will follow in your footsteps, because it has meant much to us. Rydan ni’n ddiolchgar i chi o waelod ein calonnau. Diolch yn fawr iawn.

[Mr Speaker]

Thank you. That was a very beautiful tribute, and I appreciate what the right hon. Lady has said.

Early Parliamentary General Election (No. 2)

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Monday 9th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

There are two actions that can be taken. One is to speak on the Floor of the House, which is what the hon. Lady has just done, and to that extent she has found her own salvation. The second course of action open to her is to deposit the petition in the Bag. I have a feeling that, with a fleetness of foot that will be admired in all parts of the House, that is the action she will now take. It may be a second best so far as she is concerned but, as I say, she has found a means by which to give expression to the concerns of her constituents.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. We now face 34 days during which all the checks, balances and gears of parliamentary democracy have been deliberately stalled while the Government teeter between avoiding and evading the law. This is neither normal nor honourable.

We desperately need a new politics of citizens’ conventions in every nation and of truth and conciliation in an informed referendum, with article 50 revoked, if necessary, to allow that to happen. In all honesty I know I cannot ask you to resolve this, but I think the time is fast approaching when you will have to do exactly that.

Points of Order

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Wednesday 26th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Diolch yn fawr iawn. On Monday, I received a letter from the Chief Whip confirming an intention to move the writ for the Brecon and Radnorshire by-election on Tuesday 25 June. Yesterday came and went, but no writ was moved. It was claimed that an issue with Powys Council, specifically the returning officer, was delaying the process. Powys Council confirmed within a matter of hours that that was not the case, and that it was waiting for the writ to be moved. ITV Wales’s political editor, Adrian Masters, has speculated that the Government have not moved the writ for the Brecon and Radnorshire by-election not because of problems in Powys but because they could not guarantee that Powys would not—as would be its right—hold the election on 25 July, that being of course the first full day of the new Prime Minister’s premiership.

Can you confirm that you have had notification that the Government intend to move the writ today, or will they continue to miss their own deadline and make highly questionable excuses for sparing the blushes of a new Prime Minister by delaying moving the writ?

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for her point of order and for giving me notice of it. I was advised yesterday that the plan to move the writ yesterday had been aborted. Instead, I was advised at that stage, approximately 24 hours ago, that the plan was to move the writ today. However, I was informed earlier that the writ would not be moved today. If the right hon. Lady is asking me, as the Chair, whether I am clear about when the writ will be moved, the honest answer is that I am not aware. It is certainly regrettable for her to have received information privately that it transpired was not borne out by events. If she was given to understand that it would be moved but it was not—and indeed has not been—that is regrettable. I suggest that her best recourse is directly to approach the Government Chief Whip on the matter.

Gulf of Oman Oil Tanker Attacks

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Monday 17th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I am sure it will.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

These attacks are to be condemned, and I commend the Minister for his cool words. There is, of course, the prospect of other drums beginning to beat, which is ominous. Surely our influence should be used to urge the US and Iran to re-engage in talks, rather than risk a crescendo of warmongering. Will he consider whether an international inquiry into these attacks and the wider question of safety of shipping in the Gulf would be more productive, given that it has an international effect?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Tuesday 4th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Well, I think we will take that as a no, then.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

I have been taking part in the Prison Service parliamentary scheme at HMP Swansea, where over only two days I witnessed one dirty protest and two incidents at height. These were handled professionally by prison staff, officers and management alike, but surely the Minister shares my concern that prison officers are now expected to respond to such physically demanding and risky challenges as everyday workplace hazards? Will he meet the POA to discuss the absolute anomaly of our expecting emergency services officers to work until they are 68?

Points of Order

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Wednesday 20th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. This has been an afternoon in which colleagues have volunteered more personal information than is customary.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Can you inform me of how I might best do my duty? As leader of the Plaid Cymru parliamentary group, I have been invited to No. 10 at 6.15 pm, but I have also been invited to a meeting, at between 6 pm and 7 pm, with the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union. The meetings clash, and I seek your advice on how best to proceed.

[Mr Francois]

Follow the money.

European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Tuesday 12th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

The hon. Gentleman chairs an important Select Committee in this place, the International Trade Committee. His brow was furrowed, he had a look of great seriousness and I thought he was going to make a purely procedural point. It is partly a procedural point but, if I may say so, it is also a political point, to which the answer is that there will be an opportunity for an amendment to be tabled to any motion on the prospective extension of article 50. The opportunity is there for colleagues, and, if an amendment is tabled and garners significant support, that will be a factor in the mind of the Chair in deciding whether to select it. It is open to him to table such an amendment, and I have a feeling he will go beetling around the House in hot pursuit of colleagues who share his views on this matter.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I note that the Prime Minister listed revocation, a different deal or a people’s vote. I seek your advice on how this House will ascertain those choices.

[Mr Speaker]

Forgive me, but I think the hon. Lady has foxed me. I apologise to her, because I am sure her point was an extremely good and clear one, but it was not clear to me immediately. Would she just put that question to me again, because I am not quite sure what she is seeking?

[Liz Saville Roberts]

We have been presented with three options by the Prime Minister: revocation, a different deal, or a people’s vote. What I seek is clarity on how this House, which is being seen outside to be very good at disagreeing, will actually arrive at agreement on one of these points.

[Mr Speaker]

The answer is that there are terms of debate for tomorrow and for Thursday, but that is not necessarily the end of the debate. In fact, I think I can say with almost complete certainty that it will not be the end of the debates on these matters. I see the Chancellor chuckling, I think in agreement with that proposition. It will be the end of Thursday’s debates and no more than that. So the answer to the hon. Lady’s question is that if Members wish to test the will of the House on a variety of different options, there will be such an opportunity. This point has been flagged up by the Father of the House, the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) and others. If it is the will of colleagues that there should be such a series of votes, I think it almost certain that that opportunity will arise in the coming days or weeks.

If there are no further points of order, we can now conveniently come to the business statement by the Leader of the House.

European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Tuesday 29th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

I am proud that my name is on amendments (o), (g), (b) and (j). We also support amendments (a) and (i), but not amendment (n). That is because the Brexiteers’ modest proposal to the problem of Ireland is Swiftian in its grotesquery, its historical ignorance and its single, 360°, all-encompassing blind spot.

In June 2016, the Prime Minister, in a last-ditch attempt to win the referendum, explained how customs checks between Northern Ireland and Ireland would be inevitable if we were pulled out of the EU. What followed was a series of warnings from customs experts, culminating in Eric Pickett, an authority in WTO rules and international law, telling MPs in February 2017 that giving Ireland special treatment would be a strict violation of WTO law. When Mrs May triggered article 50 a mere month later, with the help of the Labour party, she started the clock on Brexit without having the faintest idea how she might avoid running roughshod over the Good Friday agreement. Now, two years later, we are still debating whether or not we need a backstop designed to avoid the dangerous chaos of a hard border. All the while, the clock is ticking and this place cannot find a resolution, and all the while the Prime Minister’s status is sinking before our eyes. Will she take the peoples of the UK down with her? Or will she put all four nations before unforgivable party loyalty and turn to us for answers?

There are plenty of answers the Prime Minister could choose on today’s Order Paper. Not all of them perfect—some of them attempt to have cake and eat it—but some of them are necessary and rational compromises. They are necessary to avoid the no-deal-by-default scenario towards which we accelerate with every passing day. The Labour party’s indifference makes it just as culpable. Last night’s last-minute one-line Whip against the Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill is illustrative of the Labour party’s intentional apathy towards all things Brexit. The amendment tabled by the Opposition Front-Bench team today is a masterclass in fence-sitting. Let me be clear: their self-serving ambiguity is paving the way to a no deal.

Brexit is a thinly veiled assumption by the British Government of their right to centralise power and concentrate wealth. I am not talking about taking back control and money from the EU; I am talking about using Brexit as an excuse to take powers back from Wales and spend ever more per head in London than in Wales than they currently do. The economic disparity between Wales and London is already the worst in the European Union. It is not possible to overstate the grotesqueness of our current inequality. Inner London’s GDP is 614% of the EU average, while West Wales and the Valleys, where I live, possesses a regional GDP of 68% of the same EU average. Westminster has always seen fit to benefit most that which is closest to its heart, and its heart is in south-east England. As for the rest of us, we are as we always have been—peripheral, expendable, beyond the pale.

This place indulges itself with endless, abstract angels-on-a-pinhead debates about backstops, safe in the knowledge that most of us here will probably be all right in a no-deal scenario. I was in Holyhead yesterday, with the hon. Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies). What we were told by people in the port of Holyhead is that they probably can survive day one of no deal, but they have no idea what is happening in the weeks after that—they have no idea whatsoever. The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is going there this week to deal with pets and racehorses; the grand national is a week after we come out and most of the horses come through Holyhead. We will be all right here in a no-deal scenario; it is real people, constituents of mine and of all hon. Members—the hill farmers, the factory workers, the mums and dads; and, ultimately, the children—who will pay the real price for our time-wasting. I beg the Prime Minister: let us move on, rule out no deal and allow the House to work, at least for once, for the people and not for her party.

[Mr Speaker]

A three-minute limit now applies on each Back-Bench speech.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Speaker]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his point of order.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. When the woman holding the title of Prime Minister is driven solely by the ideal of holding the Tory party together, and the man known as the Leader of the Opposition will neither lead nor oppose, how do you advise that we get the House back to working for the communities we are supposed to represent?

[Mr Speaker]

Again, if I may very politely say so, I think the hon. Lady’s point of order, although it contains what is ostensibly an inquiry, is one in which she is making her point rather than seeking anything from me. The short answer to her is that, as I said a moment ago, there will be further debate. Members must speak and vote as they think fit. All these matters will be thoroughly aired in the days and weeks to come, and I am sure we all look forward to that—the hon. Lady from her vantage point and I from mine.

Points of Order

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Monday 14th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear; people do seem a bit confused, but I will certainly try to help the hon. Lady. First, to the best of my knowledge and recollection I have not had any meetings or, as she puts it, discussions about such matters. I see a certain amount of speculation in the press but I am not aware of, or in any way party to or involved with, any such proposals. Secondly—I would have thought that the hon. Lady would know this after nearly four years in the House but perhaps she is not aware of it—more generally I regularly see Members from across the House upon a range of matters if they ask to see me. There is nothing odd or unusual about that; there is nothing without precedent. On the first point that she raised, the fact that there might be speculation about matters that causes perplexity or befuddles some people may be a concern for them, but it is not the responsibility of the Chair. I hope that I have given her a clear and explicit answer which brooks of no misunderstanding.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. The Prime Minister responded to my question earlier by saying:

“We accepted the result of the referendum vote in Wales…We made clear at the time that we respected the result of that referendum in Wales.”

However, her actions and the actions of her party at the time and since then are on record, and they contradict these assertions. I fear that the Prime Minister has misled the House on this matter in responding to myself and other Members. How might she correct the record?

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her point of order. I am sure that if she is suggesting what she has just suggested, she would wish to insert the word “inadvertently”, because she is a person of impeccable manners and I am sure that she would not suggest for one moment that the Prime Minister had deliberately misled the House. I just seek that assurance; is the hon. Lady suggesting that it was inadvertent?

[Liz Saville Roberts]

I am content to apologise and to insert the word “inadvertently”.

[Mr Speaker]

I was not requesting an apology, although it is very gracious of her to proffer it. I just wanted to hear the insertion of the word “inadvertently”. The answer is that, in a sense, the hon. Lady has partially found salvation in the matter by raising the point of order and putting the factual position as she sees it on the record. In terms of further redress, my response is that every Member of this House, including the Prime Minister, is responsible for the veracity of what she or he says. In the event that a Member believes that he or she has made an error, it is incumbent upon that Member to put the record straight. Knowing the commitment to this Chamber of the hon. Lady and her regular presence at statements and other opportunities to interrogate Ministers, I am sure that she can seek a correction in direct exchange with the Prime Minister at the material time.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Wednesday 5th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I am sure that the hon. Lady will seek to render her inquiry more relevant and apposite to the context of the question on the Order Paper. I feel sure that that is not beyond her creative genius.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

The debate in my country is how to deal with crime post Brexit and the challenges that we face, with drug crime in their midst. None the less, I feel that I must explain the answer. Yesterday the Welsh Assembly voted in favour of a Plaid Cymru motion to reject the withdrawal agreement of the Minister’s Government. In addition, the Government’s own chief Brexit adviser admitted on Monday that the Joint Committee outlined in the withdrawal agreement and the political declaration will not include representatives from the devolved nations. What will he and the Secretary of State do personally to rectify that deficit of representation with the Prime Minister?

Withdrawal Agreement: Legal Position

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Monday 3rd December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. No one enjoys the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s eloquence more than I, but let us share it with the whole House.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

The British Government insist that they have the right to take privileged legal advice that remains private between lawyer and client. I recall the Labour Government using the exact same excuse during the Iraq war. In the light of the confessed damage that any Brexit deal will cause, I beg, who is the client? Should not the Attorney General learn from the mistakes of the past, discharge his solemn and constitutional duty as a humble servant of Parliament and of the public, and publish? If not now, when?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Wednesday 24th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts]

It is no secret that the Secretary of State does not speak as Wales’s voice in Westminster on Brexit. He has, in fact, poured scorn on the efforts of others who seek to make representations for Wales in Brussels. He may be aware that, together with other sensible Opposition leaders in this place, I am meeting Michel Barnier tomorrow, and I will do my duty to represent my country. Does he have any Wales-specific priorities that he would like me to raise with the EU Brexit negotiator-in-chief, or would that be against England’s interest?

[Mr Speaker]

In relation to private sector care homes?

Northern Ireland (Executive Formation and Exercise of Functions) Bill

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Wednesday 24th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

Is cearta daonna iad cearta teanga agus tá cothrom na féinne tuilte ag lucht labhartha na Gaeilge.

Under the St Andrews agreement of 2006, the British Government pledged to introduce an Irish language Act based on the experiences of Wales and the Republic of Ireland. Will the Secretary of State uphold that commitment by introducing an Irish language Act if power-sharing institutions are not restored within six months?

[Mr Speaker]

I assume that that intervention contained a translation. That is my working premise—

[Liz Saville Roberts]

I would be delighted to offer a translation if that would be sufficient.

[Mr Speaker]

I thought it had been offered, but if it has not been, I hope that the hon. Lady will indulge not just me, but the House.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

Language rights are human rights and the Irish speakers of Ireland deserve fair play.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Wednesday 18th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Let us hear more about the horizontal port situation.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

I will say more about the situation of the rural economy, given that the former Wales Office Minister, the hon. Member for Aberconwy (Guto Bebb), stood down this week to oppose the Brexiteers’ wrecking amendments. At next week’s Royal Welsh show, will the Secretary of State announce his resignation in protest at the Government’s policy of wrecking Welsh livestock farming?

[Alun Cairns]

First, I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Aberconwy (Guto Bebb) for his excellent work at the Ministry of Defence in supporting the defence services across the whole UK, as well as his role in looking after agriculture as a Wales Office Minister. The hon. Lady will be well aware that the Chequers agreement provides a frictionless trading opportunity for Welsh farmers that will allow them to continue to sell Welsh beef and lamb, and other Welsh produce, to the European Union as they do at the moment.

Nuclear Sector Deal

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Thursday 28th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

I welcome the launch of the nuclear sector deal, which is being held this morning in Trawsfynydd power station in my constituency. I congratulate local people and trade unions, and especially Prospect rep Rory Trappe of Blaenau Ffestiniog, for working to safeguard the tradition of innovative and safe energy production in the heart of Welsh-speaking Meirionnydd. The people of Wales seek to be equipped with the means to overcome poverty. Today’s announcement is a step in the right direction that will strengthen our capacity to generate and to profit from exporting energy, offering once again the prospect of well-paid technology jobs in a region that presently suffers some of the lowest wages in the UK. I call on the Minister to do all he can to work with the Welsh Government, Cyngor Gwynedd, Grŵp Llandrillo Menai and higher education to develop Trawsfynydd to its full economic potential, and I specifically call for final site clearance of the two decommissioned reactors to enable that.

[Mr Speaker]

I will assume the insertion of a question mark.

Points of Order

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Tuesday 12th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I am most grateful to the right hon. Gentleman, and I will respond, but I think that the hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Liz Saville Roberts) wants to raise a not altogether dissimilar point.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. What avenues are open to me to seek further clarification on the operation of the Sewel convention, about which we heard so much, when the precedent set today is so corrosive to public trust in Wales?

[Several hon. Members rose—]

Points of Order

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Wednesday 25th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. For the first time since the birth of devolution, the Westminster Government—[Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. There is too much noise as people are leaving the Chamber, so we will pause for a moment. I would not want the gravamen of the hon. Lady’s inquiry to go unheard or inadequately heard. If people toddling out of the Chamber could do so quickly and quietly, that would be much appreciated by the hon. Lady and doubtless by others. With a bit of projection, I think we will hear her.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

I greatly thank you, Mr Speaker, for your support for my point of order.

For the first time since the birth of devolution, the Westminster Government have succeeded in clawing back powers that should be held by our National Assembly. That will have major consequences for the UK’s constitution, and it is all thanks to the Labour party in Wales. Despite the profound significance of that backroom deal, it has been raised by the UK Government through written statement only. Can you advise me how best to request an oral statement in the Chamber and to whom I should direct such a request?

[Mr Speaker]

My interpretation of what the hon. Lady just said is, “I don’t like just having to content myself with a written statement; I want an oral. Mr Speaker, can I register my point?” The truth of the matter is, as she is very well aware, that that is precisely what she has just done to considerable effect, in the sense that it has been heard. Whether there will now be an oral statement, I do not know, but events take place and matters evolve. If in subsequent days she is not satisfied, she can always seek, if she thinks the matter warrants the urgent attention of the House, to persuade me that it does, and I will have to judge on a case-by-case basis. For today, she has done her best.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Wednesday 31st January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

Hoffwn gymryd y cyfle i groesawu’r Gweinidog i’w barchus, arswydus swydd. The Minister will recall the Scottish Secretary claiming there to be a Scotland-specific economic impact assessment, only to contradict himself a week later. [Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The hon. Lady should not be disquieted in any way. I think the robin is keenly attending to her words.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

It appears now that regional assessments do exist. Which road will the Minister take? Will he confirm that a Welsh assessment has been produced, or will he concede that the Government are so heedless of Wales’s future that there is no such assessment?

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: Second Day: House of Commons
Wednesday 17th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I seek your advice on how to inform the House of some breaking news coming out of the Welsh national Parliament. Assembly Members have unanimously supported the introduction of a Welsh continuity Bill to put a halt to the Westminster power grab. So great is the constitutional encroachment of the Westminster Government that this Bill to support Welsh democracy is supported by not only Plaid Cymru, but the Welsh Conservative party and the UK Independence party. This is of great constitutional significance, with implications for the passage of the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill, which has just received its Third Reading.

[Mr Speaker]

Whether it is a matter of great constitutional significance is not for me to say. It is, however, not a matter for the Chair. The hon. Lady inquires how she can achieve her objective, and the answer is that she has done so—it is on the record.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Wednesday 1st November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. There are very many private conversations taking place, but I think it is fair to the Secretary of State if we are able to enjoy the product of his lucubrations. He spent a lot of time preparing for this session; it seems a very great sadness if his observations cannot be properly heard. Liz Saville Roberts.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

Diolch yn fawr. A report earlier this year found that foreign direct investment to Wales declined by 44% during the EU referendum year, with what are described as “geographically peripheral” regions lagging even further behind. What will it take for the Secretary of State to admit that the only way to protect jobs and wages is to maintain economic links with the EU by staying in the single market and customs union permanently?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Wednesday 6th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

One hundred years ago, y Gadair Ddu—the Black Chair—was posthumously awarded at the Birkenhead Eisteddfod for Hedd Wyn’s awdl “Yr Arwr”. I would like to congratulate the poet’s nephew Gerald Williams and Parc Cenedlaethol Eryri on safeguarding for Wales the family farm, Yr Ysgwrn, which will be opened officially today.

This month also celebrates the referendum 20 years ago that brought devolution to Wales. The European Union (Withdrawal) Bill is a bare-faced Westminster bid to take back control against the will of the people of Wales. Will the Minister tell the House what his Government will do when Wales denies consent to the Bill later this year? Would it not be political folly to press ahead in such circumstances?

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am most grateful to the hon. Lady. If colleagues could show some sensitivity to time, that would be appreciated.

Changes in US Immigration Policy

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Monday 30th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

“We should seek to engage with our American friends,” the Foreign Secretary repeated over and over in his statement. He justified that, with no sense of irony, on the grounds that engaging with such powers is the most effective way to influence them—this from the man who led, with great gusto, a campaign to persuade us to turn our backs on our closest and largest economic relationship.

Our actions in this place are inherently passive. As we heard earlier, this is an echo chamber. Passivity is easy. Passivity is amoral. Passivity means risking nothing. However, our passivity will weigh heavily on many others. It will weigh heavily on the people who are trapped, the people who cannot see their families, the people who are stranded, and the people who are fleeing with nowhere to go. This is not even just about the immediate physical ramifications of the policy. The atmosphere of hate, fear and anger that it feeds also stokes the flames of radicalism. It is not a policy that builds peace and security. We are told that this is a relationship that is worth holding on to, but a relationship in which one party stands by and watches with automaton-like levels of dispassion as another wreaks calamitous harm is not a healthy—never mind special—relationship by any stretch of the imagination.

The Government’s approach to the Trump Administration’s draconian policy is, perhaps, a product of their own making. “The only way you're going to make a deal you want is if you are coming from a position of strength”. Those are not my words, but the words of the new leader of the so-called free world. Boxed into a corner by the Government’s self-imposed Brexit boundaries, we are forced to creep, cap in hand, to people whose values now run directly counter to those professed by the House. I will therefore not be compelled by duty to kowtow to Mr Trump and his prejudiced Administration if he is invited to address us. I hope that the Minister will listen to the 1,469,828 signatories of the petition that is lengthening with extraordinary speed even as we speak, and will decide that perhaps this visit should be treated in a different way.

It strikes me that at present the Chamber is, for once, dominated by women, which would be an interesting observation with which to end my speech, but let me end with a question: how many of their great British values can the Government sacrifice in their quest for a new special relationship?

[Mr Speaker]

That was a splendid example, to be followed. It is not for me to comment on the content of the hon. Lady’s speech, but the length was admirable.

Pubs Code Adjudicator

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Thursday 10th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call Liz Saville Roberts—[Laughter.] That is inexplicable to me, but I am sure that nobody is laughing at the hon. Lady, whom I take extremely seriously. I want to hear what she has to say.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. In the Dwyfor region of my constituency, one brewery effectively has a monopoly, with 30 tied houses. This blocks local producers such as Cwrw Llyn from selling to pubs on their doorstep. More than 100 small breweries are in a similar position across Wales. Could the economic context of Wales be considered by the newly appointed pubs adjudicator?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between John Bercow and Liz Saville Roberts

Wednesday 18th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Liz Saville Roberts]

I take this opportunity to extend our sympathies to every nation that has suffered at the hands of IS in recent days, and to express concern at the news of the explosion in south Wales.

I understand that the Ministry of Justice has closed its consultation on the court and tribunal estate in England and Wales, which proposes the closure of 11 courts in Wales, including Dolgellau in my constituency, and that is without undertaking a Welsh language impact assessment, as required by law and under the Welsh language scheme. Will the Secretary of State ensure that a Wales-wide assessment is undertaken and that its recommendations are implemented before any decisions are reached on court closures?

[Mr Speaker]

I thank the hon. Lady, but we are very constrained for time and must move on.