Rejoining the EU
Debate between Al Pinkerton and Bernard Jenkin(2 days, 7 hours ago)
Westminster HallRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Dr Al Pinkerton (Surrey Heath) (LD)
It is a pleasure, Mrs Barker, to serve under your chairship; I believe that it is for the first time, so it is a particular pleasure. I thank the hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Tony Vaughan) for so expertly opening this debate, and I thank the petitioners for bringing this issue to our collective attention today. It is wonderful to see so many of them here in the Public Gallery.
The petition asks whether Britain should seek to return to being a member of the European Union at the earliest opportunity. I am very proud to say that the Liberal Democrats have been clear about our long-term ambition. We believe that Britain’s future lies at the heart of Europe, helping to shape its institutions and decisions rather than watching from the sidelines. However, we must also be serious about how we get there.
Britain desperately needs growth to raise living standards, rebuild public services, support businesses and strengthen our defences. Can a family afford their weekly shop? Can a small business take on another employee? Can a manufacturer invest in a new production line? After years of weak growth, stagnant productivity and squeezed living standards, those questions demand serious answers and any serious answer must involve our having a better relationship with Europe.
Before entering Parliament, I spent more than 20 years researching and teaching geopolitics—studying borders, territorial disputes and international crises. If those years taught me one thing, it is that geography matters. Just 21 miles separate Britain from mainland Europe and no referendum can change that; our economies, history and security remain deeply connected. The European Union remains our largest trading partner, taking more than 40% of all British exports. Our factories depend on European supply chains, our farmers sell into European markets and our businesses compete for European customers. Yet for the past decade we have made trading with our largest market harder.
Brexit has happened and Brexit has failed. Those who campaigned to leave promised less red tape, but businesses got more; they promised new opportunities, but instead they erected barriers. Of course Brexit does not explain every weakness in our economy, and nor have our European neighbours escaped weak growth and productivity, but the question is not whether Britain has grown faster than France or Germany in any particular year; the question is how much stronger our economy could be today without the barriers that we have imposed upon ourselves.
Research published by the National Bureau of Economic Research estimates that Brexit had reduced Britain’s GDP by between 6% and 8% by the end of 2025, and business investment by as much as 13%.
Dr Pinkerton
Not for the first time today, the hon. Gentleman has intervened from a sedentary position, and he says that that figure is a projection.
Dr Pinkerton
Well, it is not, because that information is based on two methodologies: first, a doppelganger economy; and secondly, 11,000 businesses reporting their direct experiences to the Bank of England. It is not a fiction.
Sir Bernard Jenkin
That reporting was from a self-selecting group of businesses. The doppelganger model included the United States, which is not a comparable economy to the United Kingdom. It also included eastern European states like Estonia that are growing very fast, which is not a sensible comparison. But in any case, those figures were just projections.
The facts show that we have grown faster than our two main competitors in the European Union and the hon. Gentleman cannot accept that. He thinks that our economy would have been between 4% and 8% bigger by 2025 than it would have been without Brexit, so we would have been growing even faster than we have grown—that is what he is saying—and very considerably faster than we did when we were in the European Union.
Dr Pinkerton
As ever, I am incredibly grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his interventions. He speaks with passion and with some alacrity.